Showing posts with label Ron DeSantis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ron DeSantis. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 15, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- Republican Non-Endorsements

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

It is early yet in the Republican presidential nomination process. There are, after all, only two major contenders -- Donald Trump and Nikki Haley -- who have entered the race and who have held elective office (at a level that has conventionally seen success in presidential contests). Each already has a handful of endorsements as well. And that is another of those invisible primary metrics -- endorsement primary -- to eye as one assesses the degree to which Trump's institutional support has declined relative to his standing four years ago (or how much better it is than it was eight years ago). FHQ has already discussed this in terms of where the former president's organizational efforts stand, but it matters for endorsements too. 

And one sees this not only in endorsements, particularly in endorsement defections from Trump, but also in non-endorsements, as in elites and elected officials refusing to endorse Trump or anyone else at this early stage of the race. Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE) is new to the job, having been appointed to the post following the departure of Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE), so maybe the question is a natural inquiry for the Nebraska press. But the senator's response is noteworthy in that he passed on the opportunity to endorse. Then-Governor Ricketts, like many elected officials, was on Team Trump in 2020 as a campaign surrogate. But the two were at odds during the 2022 midterms both in and out of Nebraska. The president called Ricketts a RINO for supporting Governor Brian Kemp (R-GA) in his reelection bid in the Peach state, and Ricketts asked Trump not to intervene (and endorse) in the open Republican gubernatorial primary in Nebraska (advice the president refused to heed). 

And it matters for now that Ricketts also did not line up behind Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL), someone to whom members of his family have donated. Now, that may or may not hold as this race progresses (and DeSantis formally enters the contest). But the extent to which elected officials stay on the sidelines is important. Not endorsing Trump says something: that elite-level support has ebbed since 2020. But not endorsing anyone else might also suggest that those same elites cannot (or do not want to) coordinate against Trump in 2024. And that again says something about where Trump is on the 2015 or 2019 spectrum of strength in this evolving battle. These signals are important to assessing where the race stands.

This is also something that bears watching at the state party level as well. Ed Cox, the newly sworn in chair of the New York Republican Party reassumed his position atop the party and was quick to note that the NYGOP, like the national party, would remain neutral in the 2024 presidential nomination race. That is likely to be the case for state Republican parties across the country, but it is not a sure thing. That, too, tells one about the state of the Republican race and Trump's support in it. 


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No, DeSantis is not in the race yet, but he continues to do the things that (prospective) presidential candidates do. This time it is a trip to New Hampshire for a big state party fundraising event.


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Governor Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) continues to do things outside of the commonwealth. And every time he does, it draws presidential chatter. So it was with the latest news that Youngkin will head to Texas in April to meet with big money Republican donors. Youngkin, like all the other candidates or potential candidates not named Trump or DeSantis, is in the difficult position of having to assess his chances in a field where there is seemingly little oxygen. Youngkin can lay claim to being a Republican governor in a blue state, which is unique among the other possible aspirants. But like everyone else he has to hope for a DeSantis flop, a Trump implosion or for the Trump and DeSantis to pummel each other into oblivion such that the door is opened for someone else. And maybe one or some combination of those things happen. But the more immediate concern for Youngkin may be that he has to show those donors in Texas that he has that "fire in the belly," a marker he did not necessarily surpass with potential donors in New York recently.


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Vice President Kamala Harris going to Iowa causes a raise of the eyebrow until one remembers that the Hawkeye state will not be the first state in the Democratic presidential nomination process in 2024.


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On this date...
...in 1980, Senator Bob Dole withdrew, winless, from the Republican presidential nomination race.

...in 1988, Vice President Bush (R) and Senator Paul Simon (D) won the Illinois presidential primary. Simon kept all three of the big winners from Super Tuesday the week before at bay in his home state. 

...in 2004, Rev. Al Sharpton dropped out of the Democratic presidential nomination race.

...in 2016, Senator Marco Rubio (R) suspended his campaign after a lackluster showing in primaries, including his home state of Florida, at the opening of the winner-take-all window on the Republican nomination calendar.


Friday, March 10, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- Presidential Primary Runoffs?

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

My former UGA colleagues, Charles Bullock and Loch Johnson, have an interesting take on the presidential nomination process up over at The Bulwark. Runoffs in Georgia are out of vogue these days after two consecutive electoral cycles with high profile Senate overtime elections, but that has not stopped Bullock and Johnson from suggesting that adding runoff elections to the presidential nomination process might help to provide some guardrails against novice and/or extremist candidates. Maybe. 

But the whole concept is premised on the idea that the Republican presidential nomination process is winner-take-all; that a candidate can win a mere plurality by just one vote and still win all of the delegates from a state. It is not. There were 19 truly winner-take-all contests in the 2020 Republican presidential nomination process, meaning that 37 other primaries, caucuses and conventions had some other form of delegate allocation rules. And sure, Bullock and Johnson discussed all of this in the context of Trump's 2016 victory, not 2020. But there were ten fewer truly winner-take-all contests then

Look, there may be something to requiring a candidate to win a majority in a primary or caucus in order to win delegates (not to mention broaden a candidate's appeal). But a separate runoff is not necessary in order to accomplish that. In fact, there are already rules on the Republican National Committee (RNC) books that do that and have been in place since the 2012 cycle. Under the rules, states can circumvent the ban on truly winner-take-all rules before March 15 by using a baseline proportional allocation method with a winner-take-all trigger. Candidates have to hit 50 percent of the vote statewide in order to activate that trigger. There were 17 such proportional states in 2020 before and after March 15.

What's more Bullock and Johnson suggest ranked choice voting (RCV) as a means of avoiding the administrative and financial strain a subsequent presidential primary runoff election may place on states. The irony, of course, is that the RCV alternative they propose is the same one that Republican state legislators across the country are considering banning during this current state legislative season. [FHQ really needs to update the 2023 RCV legislation post. But it is the ban legislation that is actually moving through legislatures rather than the bills to institute RCV.]


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Republican county chairs prefer DeSantis over Trump. This piece was built on survey work that Seth Masket has been doing this cycle. Masket undertook a similar endeavor four years ago in the midst of the Democratic process. His work continues to be invaluable. 


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Governor Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) doing a CNN town hall will do little to quell the presidential chatter that has quietly operated on the fringes of the Republican invisible primary for some time. That said, some donors have not viewed him as an "all-in candidate" in recent days. That is not to say that the governor cannot rev things up in the money primary at some point, but he would likely have to make that transition to "all-in" first. ...at the very least in the eyes of the donors.


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On this date...
...in 1992, it was Super Tuesday, but a less super Super Tuesday than the Southern Super Tuesday of the 1988 cycle. Much of the southern states held together again in 1992, but Georgia moved earlier (as allowed under DNC rules that cycle) and states like Alabama, Arkansas and North Carolina moved back to consolidated dates later in the process.

...in 2000, a western subregional primary of sorts was held. Rare Friday primaries in Colorado and Utah and Republican caucuses in Wyoming occurred on March 10. 


Thursday, March 9, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- Doing the things that prospective candidates do

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

One of FHQ's typical bits of invisible primary advice is to look at actions not words when trying to divine what it is that candidates or prospective candidates are up to in the early going. Only, in 2023 on the Democratic side, there is something of an exception to that rule. President Biden is doing all of the things that a prospective candidate for reelection does. While he has drawn a challenger, all of the arguably most viable alternatives are not readying for long and divisive bids. In fact, many of them have already signed on to advise the president in his quest for reelection. Those around the president are suggesting he is running and the president has hinted at it himself. The only thing he has not done is say, "I'm running."

But that has not stopped a steady stream of stories in recent days from reporting on planning going on in the event that he does not throw his hat in the ring or speculation about the field of candidates that could line up to seek the nomination in his stead. All of this, of course, belies the reality presented above.  And races involving the incumbent are usually boring. The same things happened four years ago on the Republican side. But then it was stories about Weld, Sanford and Walsh, how Trump was going to play the delegate game and Republican state parties opting out of contests. It is the same thus far in 2023. But replace those Republican stories from four years ago with stories about Biden's (similarly weak) challengers and the primary calendar shake up (which is also being spun as an incumbent defense). 

There may be some there there in the Democratic presidential nomination process in 2024, but it is a relatively small there. Actions, not words.


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In the travel primary, T-minus one day until DeSantis descends on Iowa for the first time. And there is a Las Vegas stop in early primary (caucus?) state, Nevada, on Saturday as well.


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The contests in four states conflict with Passover next year. [Yep.] One of those states, Maryland is on top of it: 
The Maryland House speaker and Senate president both came out in favor of changing the date for next year’s primary. A spokesperson for Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, told JI on Tuesday that he “supports moving next year’s primary Election Day so it does not fall on Passover.”
[Yep.]

But the Jewish Insider goes on...
In Pennsylvania, no such effort is yet underway. 
[Uh, well...]

Actually, there is an effort to move the Pennsylvania presidential primary. Two of them, in fact. Passover may not be the impetus for that change, but there is a change in the works. Oh, but JI goes on...
There is currently another push in Pennsylvania to change the Democratic presidential primary date for 2024. Democratic legislators introduced a bill to move the Democratic presidential primary next year a month earlier, to March 19, to give Pennsylvania a bigger say in the party’s nominating contest. If it were implemented, that bill would not affect the Republican primary — still set for April 23 — or other statewide primaries set to take place on that date.
That is not how this works. States may move a consolidated primary up. [And that is what is happening in the two bills proposed in Pennsylvania.] They may split a presidential primary off from the rest in order to schedule it earlier. But rarely does a state split up a consolidated primary and then schedule two separate presidential primary elections. That is just too expensive for most states. South Carolina stands out as the only state with two separate, state-run presidential primaries; one for each party. But the Palmetto state is the exception to the rule.

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On this date...

...in 1976, Jimmy Carter bested George Wallace in the Florida presidential primary, seen as a southern elimination contest after Carter's victories earlier on the calendar. Wallace had won the primary in the Sunshine state in 1972.

...in 1980, John Connally (R-TX) pulled out of the Republican nomination race, raising and spending a lot of money along the way to win one delegate.

...in 1992, Tom Harkin (D-IA) withdrew from the Democratic nomination race following wins in the Iowa, Idaho and Minnesota caucuses.

...in 2000, it was the day of the South Carolina Democratic firehouse primary. It was the last cycle that South Carolina Democrats held a contest after Super Tuesday. It was also the day that both Senator Bill Bradley (D-NJ) and Senator John McCain (R-AZ) gave up bids for their respective nominations after big Super Tuesday losses. 

...in 2004, it was (again) the day of the Florida presidential primary. The contest in the Sunshine state had not moved from that second Tuesday in March position on which it had been conducted since the beginning of the post-reform era. Florida, infamously, was not in that same position in 2008.

Tuesday, March 7, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- New Hampshire's Primary Asterisks

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

There is not exactly a who's who lining up to try their hand at challenging President Joe Biden for the Democratic presidential nomination. Yes, Marianne Williamson is in (as noted a day ago in Invisible Primary: Visible). And Robert F. Kennedy Jr. revealed on the Politics and Eggs circuit in New Hampshire that he, too, is considering a run. These are not names that are going to capture the imaginations of Democratic primary voters in 2024, but it is no mistake that both have stopped in the Granite state early on in their considerations. They may not capture imaginations, but they may draw some protest votes their way in a rogue New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary next January

New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Raymond Buckley earlier this year before the DNC finalized the calendar rules for 2024 told Politico that Biden losing to a "mechanic from Arkansas or Oklahoma" (or whoever files to gain access to the New Hampshire primary ballot) would be a potential early embarrassment for the president. Maybe. But if New Hampshire goes rogue, then the president will not be on the ballot there. Candidates stand to lose delegates if they campaign in states that break the rules. And no president is going to break the rules of the party that he or she leads. 

That means that either Biden cannot lose (a contest that will not mean much during primary season) or that a write-in effort (not organized by the reelection campaign) might fall short of protest votes against a president who attempted take first-in-the-nation status away from New Hampshire. But if Williamson or Kennedy stand to gain in that scenario, it may not be Biden who loses. It may be New Hampshire that loses even more clout with the national party for 2028.


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Speaking of New Hampshire, the AP went looking for Biden resistance among Democrats and found some in of all places, New Hampshire. 


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Ron DeSantis (R-FL) is back home in Tallahassee today to deliver the State of the State address as the legislature in the Sunshine state revs up for a quick 2023 session.


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Harry Enten had a nice look at Trump's position in the 2024 Republican presidential nomination race relative to history. He called Trump a frontrunner (which he is) but also added:
It would be easy to dismiss Trump’s numbers as merely the product of high name recognition, but history suggests something different. The eventual nominees from this group include, among others, President Gerald Ford for 1976, Vice President George H.W. Bush for 1988 and Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole for 1996.
Likening Trump to Bush and Dole in particular gave off real next-in-line vibes; a flashback to a whole different era Republican nomination races. Trump is not so much next in line as he reluctant to give up his spot in line. But it remains unusual in the post-reform era for former presidents to seek their party's nomination after they have lost a general election. 


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On this date...

... in 2000, it was Super Tuesday. And it was a crowded Super Tuesday at that. Nearly 50 percent of the total number of delegates were on the line in the Democratic process that day. Only the Titanic Tuesday of 2008 has eclipsed that 2000 Super Tuesday in the percentage of delegates allocated on one date.