In Florida, Some Chatter Behind the Idea of a Thursday Presidential Primary

This is technically old news, but it is something that quietly came out of some comments that RNC Chair, Reince Priebus, made earlier in June. That was on the cusp of FHQ's mid-June break and thus slipped through the cracks. Yet, it is still something that warrants some discussion.

According to Adam Smith, political director at The St. Petersburg Times on the paper's political blog, The Buzz, one idea that has been talked about to some degree in Florida to help the Sunshine state potentially avoid sanction from the RNC is to hold a Thursday, March 1 presidential primary.

Republican leaders (Democrats have no say) are determined to be the fifth contest (after Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina) and not bunched up with a bunch of other states. One idea we've heard lately is March 1 - a Thursday - which might enable Florida to comply with the RNC, avoid penalties, and perhaps also avoid sharing the stage with other states.

We wouldn't bet any money on that though. The study committee appeared aimed mainly at taking the pressure off the RNC and buying some time before causing the nominating calendar to implode. A February primary in Florida still seems like a [sic] strong possibility.

FHQ agrees with Smith that a February primary is still the most likely outcome at this point, but the Thursday idea is intriguing (an idea that came out of earlier discussions in Georgia as well). In fact, we have speculated here that Georgia might try and piggyback on Florida's date, forcing a subregional primary just outside of the window in which the parties allow non-exempt states to hold primaries and caucuses.

One thing that should be made crystal clear here is that a March 1 primary will not help Florida avoid penalties from the RNC unless the RNC opts to bend its rules slightly (something Priebus said would not happen in his comments in early June). All contests other than Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina must fall on a day on or after the first Tuesday in March (March 6). A Thursday primary would help Florida to avoid infringing on the early states' turf, but it would not bring the state into compliance with the national party rules.

Florida's Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee's decision will be determined to a great extent by what happens with the primaries in Arizona and Michigan. Arizona is seemingly locked on at least February 28 and Michigan Republicans will decide in August on when and how to allocate their delegates. If Michigan jumps into January, that will likely keep Florida there as well.

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Ohio Secretary of State Supports May Presidential Primary

Last month FHQ looked at the efforts by the Ohio General Assembly to position the Buckeye state's presidential primary in 2012. Omnibus elections legislation passed the House to shift the contest back from the first Tuesday after the first Monday in March to the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May, but the Senate version conflicted with the House-passed version. One of those differences was the date of the presidential primary. The Senate bill -- now in the House -- would keep the primary in March.

Indeed, the move to May is something that has been on the radar since the the beginning of the legislative session in January when Secretary of State John Husted (R) raised the possibility that the redistricting process could hamper the 2012 presidential primary in the state. Husted, at that time however, did not come down on one side or the other of the primary timing discussion. As the legislature's focus begins to shift from the budget to the redistricting process, though, his position has hardened in support of moving the contest to May. The primary impetus behind the shift is to allow elections administrators the opportunity to prepare for elections given the changing congressional and state legislative districts.

But lost in the discussion is the fact that Ohio Republicans have typically used some form of winner-take-all delegate allocation and with a March primary date the party would be susceptible to sanctions from the RNC should they not shift to proportional allocation as called for by the Republican delegate selection rules. A May date would help the state party avoid that issue. A change in the allocation of the at-large delegates based on the statewide results would also accomplish that, however.

Regardless, it appears as if there is support for the May primary date in the one place it had not been earlier, the Senate. The House bill with the May primary date provision is on the Senate Government Oversight and Reform Committee agenda both today and tomorrow and could be reported to the full Senate as a result. According to Secretary Husted, there is support in the Senate for the change.

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Rhode Island House Committee Amends House and Senate Elections Bills to Move Presidential Primary to April

On Tuesday, June 21, the Rhode Island House Judiciary Committee recommended the passage of H 5633 and S 399, two bills meant to bring the BayOcean state's presidential primary process into compliance with the federal MOVE act. However, the committee amended the bills, changing the date of the presidential nominating contest from the first Tuesday in March to the fourth Tuesday in April. This is the first action in Rhode Island toward the goal of an April 24, 2012 regional primary based on the chatter from Connecticut. The legislation would bring the state's contest in line with those in Pennsylvania, Connecticut (if legislation is signed), New York (if legislation is signed) and Delaware (if legislation is passed and signed).

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Both Rhode Island bills are on the WednesdayThursday House calendar for consideration and potentially votes by the full lower chamber.

This legislation will be added to the Presidential Primary Bills Before State Legislatures section in the left sidebar.

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And then there was New York: Last February State Rapidly Moves Bill Through Legislature

The New York presidential primary has been in the news lately in regard to some chatterabout a possible regional primary with Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Delaware and Rhode Island coordinated on April 24. However, there had been little movement on that front until last week, the last week of the session before the Empire state legislature adjourned for the year on June 20. On June 14, both A8363 and S5753 were introduced and by the end of the week both had passed both the Assembly and the Senate. This clears the way for New York -- assuming Governor Cuomo signs the legislation -- to join the other mid-Atlantic/northeastern states on April 24.

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There are a couple of interesting notes attendant to this legislation. First of all, nothing in the bill does anything about what will be a non-compliant fall primary in September 2012. If held, the fall primary will be a violation of the federal MOVE act. Technically, there would be time to make that change next year, but it seems like an undue burden for the legislature in an election year. Secondly, the bills above specifically cite April 24, 2012 as the date of the primary. That means that New York will have a set primary date for the 2012 cycle, but beyond that the primary date will be in limbo. The date won't, for instance, reset to the first Tuesday in February or March in 2016 as has been seen in the past from other states (see Massachusetts and Michigan from the 208 cycle). Instead the primary will be shifted for the current cycle without provision for future cycles. In other words, the issue will have to be readdressed in a subsequent legislative session.

New York becomes the final non-compliant state -- February date or earlier -- to make some effort to bring its delegate selection event within the bounds of the national parties' delegate selection rules for 2012. Every state has now acted with the exception of Arizona, and to this point, Michigan has shown no signs of moving back. Legislation in the Wolverine state proposes moving the primary up to the last Tuesday in January.

This legislation will be added to the Presidential Primary Bills Before State Legislatures section in the left sidebar.

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Alabama Presidential Primary to March 13

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Lost in the shuffle of all the other bills Governor Bob Bentley signed on June 9 was HB 425, the bill to move the Alabama presidential primary to the second Tuesday in March from the first Tuesday in February. The legislation also shifts the primaries for state and local offices up from the first Tuesday in June to coincide with the presidential primary; a move that will save the state nearly $4 million. Alabama will join western neighbor, Mississippi, with a presidential primary on the second Tuesday in March.

Alabama now becomes the seventh state to move its presidential primary back to a later date in order to comply with national party rules, but the first to consolidate its presidential primary with those for state and local offices as a means of saving money.

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Louisiana Senate Passes March Presidential Primary Bill, House Concurs

On Monday, June 20, the Louisiana state Senate passed HB 509 by a 27-9 vote. The Senate-amended version of the bill would shift the Pelican state's presidential primary from the second or third Saturday in February to the third Saturday after the first Tuesday in March. The House had earlier passed the legislation, but that version would have called for the primary to have been held two weeks earlier, a date that conflicted with the Passover holiday. The state House unanimously concurred (91-0) with the Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee changes on Tuesday, June 21, and sent the bill to Governor Bobby Jindal (R) for his consideration.

The bill would move Louisiana back into compliance with the informally coordinated national party rules governing delegate selection for the 2012 presidential election cycle.

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Delayed Louisiana Primary Bill Narrowly Passes Senate Committee Stage

The Louisiana Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee once again took up HB 509, two days after the panel deferred on the legislation to move the Pelican state's presidential primary back into compliance with the national party rules. FHQ tuned into the hearing just in time to catch the vote and following another effort by Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-5th, New Orleans) to defer the bill again was defeated by a 5-4 margin, committee chair, Senator Bob Kostelka (R-35th, Monroe), broke a tie with and thus reported the bill favorably to the floor of the Louisiana Senate.

The bill would move the Louisiana presidential primary from second or third Saturday in February to the third Saturday after the first Tuesday in March. Should the bill pass the Senate it would have to return to the House to be reconsidered there. The original bill that passed the House would have moved the primary to the first Saturday after the first Tuesday in March; a date that would conflict with Passover.

NOTE: Once I've had a chance to review the committee hearing I'll update the post with any pertinent discussions from the committee.

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Delaware Senate Votes to Pass April Presidential Primary Legislation

The Delaware state Senate on Thursday, June 16, passed SB 89 by a 19-1 vote. The bill would move the First state's presidential primary from the first Tuesday in February to the fourth Tuesday in April; coinciding with primaries in neighboring Pennsylvania and when Governor Malloy signs the legislation in the Nutmeg state, Connecticut.

The bill will now move to the Delaware state House for consideration and will have to be moved through the lower chamber prior to the legislative session adjourning at the end of the month.

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Louisiana Senate Panel Defers Presidential Primary Bill

With more or less a week to go in the legislative session, the Louisiana Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee dealt a seemingly serious blow to the bill to shift the Pelican state presidential primary back into compliance with national party delegate selection rules. By a vote of 6-1, the panel deferred on HB 509. The bill proposes moving the Louisiana presidential primary from the second or third Saturday in February to the third Saturday after the first Tuesday in March.¹ Discussion around the bill was very limited before Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-5th, New Orleans) made a motion to defer the bill. Senator Mike Walsworth (R-33rd, West Monroe) was the only member of the committee to question the Representative Alan Seabaugh, the House member speaking on behalf of the bill. Walsworth focused mainly on the costs of the move to taxpayers² and on a repeated line of questioning as to why Louisiana was not trying to hold its primary on Super Tuesday.³

This was a strange move by the committee, but in FHQ's opinion -- having watched the hearing -- the deferral was more a matter of fatigue on the part of the committee than of playing politics with the date of the presidential primary. The committee had several nominations on their agenda and the chair, Senator Bob Kostelka (R-35th, Monroe) mentioned from the outset of the hearing that the committee wanted to move quickly through the consideration of bills and onto the nominations before them. Following lengthy discussions of a resolution to call on Congress to deal with the national debt and of a proposed Ten Commandments monument on the Louisiana state capitol grounds, the members of the committee, already two hours into the meeting, seemed eager to move on to those nominations.

In fact, reports of the death of this bill seem to have been premature, as it is slated to be reconsidered by the Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee during its next meeting Friday morning. Should the bill be killed in that meeting, the implications are not that severe,⁴ despite warnings of delegate penalties. FHQ would expect both parties to abandon the non-compliant primary in favor of caucuses. The Republican Party in Louisiana has already indicated that it would do so, and Democrats, with an uncompetitive nomination race before them, would likely follow suit.

Thanks to Richard Winger at Ballot Access News for sending along the link the New Orleans Times-Picayune story.

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¹ The House-passed version of the bill would move the primary to the first Saturday after the first Tuesday in March, but the Louisiana secretary of state's office raised concerns over the conflict that date would have with Passover. Louisiana law -- like those in other states -- prohibits elections on religious holidays, and thus mandated an amendment to the original bill.

² There would be no extra costs. The third Saturday after the first Tuesday in March is a date on which elections to 158 municipal elections in addition to both major parties' state central committees are held. That the presidential primary would coincide with those elections would actually save Louisiana taxpayers money.

³ Louisiana has not held a presidential primary on Super Tuesday since 1992. The calendar was more jumbled that year without a clear Super Tuesday after the collection of southern states that had held the most concerted regional primary to date in 1988. Regardless, Louisiana stuck with the second Tuesday in March date for its primary until the 2008 cycle; a date that had seen a large number of states pass by moving to earlier dates over that twenty year period.

⁴ That "severity" could certainly be a point of contention. Obviously a switch to caucuses would translate into much lower participation in the contest and that has its own implications. The point here, however, is that Louisiana, despite the warnings, will not lose delegates to either the Democratic or Republican conventions. The state parties will switch to compliant caucuses before allocating delegates via a non-compliant primary.

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California Senate Committee Unanimously Passes June Primary Bill

During a Wednesday, June 8 hearing, the California state Senate Elections and Constitutional Amendments Committee voted unanimously to recommend AB 80 for passage before the full chamber. The legislation would shift the date of the California presidential primary from the first Tuesday in February to the first Tuesday in June; eliminating the separate presidential primary election and consolidating it with primaries for state and local offices.

To this point AB 80 has received full bipartisan support on both the committee and floor levels in the Assembly and now in committee in the Senate. However, it is unclear as to whether the bipartisanship will continue as the bill approaches its likely final legislative hurdle. Senate Minority Leader Robert Dutton (R-31st, Rancho Cucamonga), earlier in the session, was quite vocal about the late primary within the context of the budget discussions. But that talk has dissipated of late. Any opposition will emerge soon enough, but will only be token at best -- especially if only from Republicans -- in the Democratic-controlled upper chamber.

A doff of the cap to Richard Winger at Ballot Access News for passing the news along.

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