The Iowa Caucuses Are So Important Because Of Young Progressive Activists

Every four years, Residents of the United States submit themselves to one of the most grueling job application processes around and run for president. They campaign hard — by shaking hands, taking selfies, releasing policies, hosting town halls, and standing on tables — although only one candidate can resemble each party on the United States’ general election ballot November. Group in attempt to be that candidate, presidential hopefuls have to garner enough public support from voters in primary elections and caucuses.


the opening of these caucuses is coming up on Monday (February 3). Some call it the Iowa Caucus; others point to it because the unfortunate time of the year any time grown adults vying for that sweet, sweet Oval Office gig stuff their faces with midwestern-style meats.


This year, all eyes are set on the Democratic caucus, given that there isn’t a mobile primary season for Republicans in this election. (Both former Representative Joe Walsh and former Governor Bill Weld are technically running, though!) So we’re going concentrate on the Democratic caucus and answer some key questions. Why Iowa? What is a caucus? How come we have them? Why are they so essential? And how does a state with three million people get so much attention in a nation with 300 million?


Why Have A Caucus?


the full point of caucus and also a primary election is to help pick a party nominee. Nominees are chosen by delegates who cast their vote on behalf of an audience of voters at the National Convention. Whatever candidate has most of them of delegates at their party’s convention wins the party’s nomination. The collection of delegates, and determining how those delegates vote, varies depending on the state: Some states use a winner-take-all system, in which the candidate with the most votes in the state takes all the delegates’ votes; some use proportional representation, and then some use a mixture of the two.


Iowa, routinely the overachiever, fits into that last category. As Organization Insider lays out, 27 of the 41 Iowa Democratic delegates are allocated by the state’s four congressional districts; the other 14 are “at large” delegates, which are allocated to each candidate in proportion with their statewide support. Five of the 14 “at large” delegates are called “PLEO” delegates, which are saved for “party leaders and elected officials.” Iowa has an extra eight “superdelegates.” Superdelegates are cool because if the party hasn’t determined a winner by the time the convention rolls around, they get to vote for whomever they want; if the party has determined a winner, the superdelegates don’t vote.


It’s worth pointing out that Republicans and Democrats caucus very differently. Nevertheless the reason Iowa still uses a caucus system is simple: It’s just what they’ve routinely done.


What’s The distinction Between Caucus Along with a Primary Election?


In a primary election, people vote for the candidate they would like to define them in the general election on a secret ballot and go residence. In some states, they can just mail in their primary ballot.


Caucuses, on the other hand, are way more intense. As the Washington Post points out, in the event you desire to cast your vote in a caucus, you should go to a specific place at a specific time and participate for a couple of hours. In the event you are busy, cannot participate. In case you don’t have a way of getting to the caucus place, you cannot participate. You cannot be late. You will have to listen to speeches. At Democratic caucuses, you must vote with your physical body. Truly chaotic energy.


How Does The Iowa Caucus Actually Work?


On Monday, registered Democrats in Iowa will go to one of any 1,678 assigned precincts, like a school cafeteria or church, at 7 p.M., the Wall Street Journal reports. They listen to some speeches and pick a preference candidate. Then, the real games begin.


First, party officials count each person in attendance. Then each person gets with each other in one big room and makes small talk with other caucus-goers in a try to convince each person else to caucus for their favored candidate. Then comes “alignment,” which, yes, does sound very Hunger Games.


Alignment requires that all caucus-goers write their first choice down on a presidential favorite card. They then squad up with like-minded supporters. For instance, Sen. Bernie Sanders’s supporters might meet up under the basketball hoop while Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s supporters meet on the bleachers, and former Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s supporters gather in the corner of the court. Caucus-goers can also pick “uncommitted” and not pledge immediate allegiance to any one candidate.


Party officials count the collection of people in every gaggle, and start the method of “realignment.” If caucus-goers chose a “viable” candidate — one whom 15 percent or more of the room has determined to support — they are not allowed to move from their cluster. Each person who caucused for a candidate who was deemed “not viable” is then forced to realign. They have several options:

1. Write a new candidate’s name on their presidential favorite card, and go stand with that new team




2. Try to woo some of the other eliminated voters to support their candidate in a try to bring them over the 15 percent threshold




3. Stay with their original candidate and go home




4. Decide to caucus as “uncommitted”

While the eliminated caucus-goers determine their next move, those who chose viable candidates are allowed converse with each person else in the room. (It ends up looking a lot like that scene from Disney’s 1997 classic Air Bud where the mean clown and Bud’s real owner, Josh, are attempting to get Bud to go to them: The clown waggles a newspaper, Josh pats his knees. “Come to us, Bud! Pick our president!”) Once each person has chosen their allegiance in that round, party officials count again — and the process continues up until only the viable candidates are left. At that point, officials translate those results into delegates. They aren’t routinely picked out that creatively — in 2016, a dozen sites decided delegates by coin flips.


Who’s Left Out Of This Process?


It’s true that every person who caucuses gets just one “vote,” which is ultimately translated into a delegate, although caucuses are also especially exclusionary. The Iowa caucuses are notoriously white and notoriously middle-class. They’re inaccessible for an assortment of reasons: They take a huge time commitment on a weeknight and are usually hosted in locations deemed inaccessible under the Residents of the United States with Disabilities Act, as Gen reports.


“If you desire to motivate people to have a voice in your party process, the last system you wish to design is caucuses,” Carleton College political science professor Steven Schier told ThinkProgress. “It downsides working people, parents with children, and the disabled.”


How Has The Caucus Changed?


As Gen points out, the Iowa caucuses began in the 1850s and were organized by party leaders as a way to pick out delegates: Caucuses made it easier to exclude an enormous portion of a population and were simpler to carry out than popular votes at the time.


Fast-forward to 1968, as soon as the Vietnam War was raging on. Young Democrats wanted radical, structural change. They headed to the National Convention and protested the war and the Democratic establishment. Police brutally kicked them out of the Convention, which selected then-Vice President Hubert Humphrey because the Democratic nominee. Richard Nixon ultimately beat Humphrey in the 1968 election, and progressive activists had even more reason desire to change the system. So, according to Time, new rules were traditional to root out corruption, which ended up moving the Iowa caucus because of a logistical error involving hotel room availability in Des Moines.


At the time, it wasn’t that exhilarating of a change for anyone except Iowans and maybe people in New Hampshire, which became the opening state to hold a primary election. Enter: Jimmy Carter, who ran for office in 1976. The underdog peanut farmer didn’t have much cash or political clout, and no one was really taking him seriously. Nevertheless his campaign saw a possibility to change that in Iowa, given that none of the front-runners were paying much attention to the initial caucus. Carter campaigned hard — he kissed babies and shook hands and came second in the Iowa caucus. (The winner? “Uncommitted.”) Since Carter technically beat out all of the other human candidates, he took the win, which coalesced into winning the Democratic nomination, and later, the presidential election. According to The Atlantic, he revolutionized the way candidates approach the Iowa caucus.


Why Is Iowa Important? 


Because it’s first! That’s basically the full thing! Bye!


Kidding, kidding! Nevertheless it has habitually been critical for candidates to win the opening few primaries or caucuses because winning those makes you look electable as hell, and anyone following along this election cycle understands the importance of electability. Winning Iowa a pretty good guarantee that candidates will get a burst of momentum and media attention, and Democrats who win the opening caucus nearly routinely go on to win the party’s nomination.


Other campaigns took note of Carter’s historic campaign and started making Iowa a big segment of their ground game. A recent example? In 2008, then-Sen. Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses immediately after trailing in back of his biggest competition, Hillary Clinton, in nearly every poll. There really are, needless to say, exceptions: In 1992, then-Sen. Tom Harkin won the Iowa caucus although ultimately lost the Democratic nomination to Bill Clinton.


But Is That Scope Of Influence Changing?


The caucus’s predictive power has become much less impressive per year, due to its exclusionary policies plus a parallel upswing of diverse voters turning out in other states.


This is a glaring allocate inside of the Republican party: In 2016, Sen. Ted Cruz won the Iowa caucus and lost the Republican nomination to Trump; in 2012, then-Sen. Rick Santorum won the Iowa caucus although lost the party nomination to Mitt Romney. In 2008, then-Gov. Mike Huckabee won Iowa, and Romney came in second — and Sen. John McCain ultimately won the Republican nomination. In 1988, neither then-Sen. Bob Dole nor then-Rep. Dick Gephardt won their parties’ nominations right after winning Iowa — those nods went to then-Vice President George H. W. Bush and then-Governor Michael Dukakis.


Right now, with the expansion of early voting, some voters in California can send in their primary votes around the same time as folks in Iowa meet in the sweaty health and fitness center to caucus. It seems as though a year, the Iowa Caucus would be getting even far less predictive and, as a result, even much less impactful.