Associated Press
10-29-07
Dems OK proposal for Jan. 3 caucuses
BY ELIZABETH AHLIN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
When New Year's Eve rolls around, presidential campaigning likely will be as
ubiquitous as noisemakers and champagne in Iowa.
Iowa Democrats voted Sunday to hold their leadoff precinct caucuses Jan. 3,
joining Republicans who made that same choice earlier this month.
The new caucus date, which replaces the previous date of Jan. 14, will move up
the last-minute campaign frenzy as more than 15 candidates seek to nail down
support among caucus-goers and get their supporters out to vote.
The candidates will "probably spend Christmas with their families, and live here
(in Iowa) until the caucuses," Dennis Goldford, Drake University political science
professor, said today.
The new date so close to the holidays has raised some concern among the
caucus faithful that attendance could suffer.
Rich Price of Avoca, a veteran Democratic caucus-goer, said the new date won't
keep him away. But he noted that the caucuses will be competing with the
Orange Bowl, which is also scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 3, as well as family
vacations.
"I hope it doesn't hurt attendance in general," Price said.
But Iowa's political junkies have known that the caucus date could be close to the
holidays for months, said Price, and he hopes most have planned accordingly.
Kate Cutler, a Democrat from Council Bluffs, said she planned her family
Christmas trip to Arizona with the earlier caucus date in mind. Normally, she
would have stayed past New Year's Day. This year, her family will return to Iowa
on Dec. 26.
"I think the informed caucus-goer was aware that this was a date that was
moving closer and closer to the beginning of the year," Cutler said.
The early date will come while college students are still on break and probably
will make it harder to get younger voters to turn out, said Dianne Bystrom,
director of the Catt Center for Women and Politics at Iowa State University.
"Caucus-goers do tend to be older," Bystrom said. "It makes it really challenging
for those of us trying to turn out young voters."
Gordon Fischer, former chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party, downplayed the
early date's impact on candidates, saying all the campaigns had developed
strategies for the earlier date. They've just been waiting to implement them, he
said.
With Iowa's new date now set, the scheduling focus now turns to the New
Hampshire primary, originally Jan. 22. New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill
Gardner has said only that he would schedule that primary no later than Jan. 8.
If that happens, Goldford said, presidential candidates could be forced to shuttle
back and forth between Iowa and New Hampshire beginning Dec. 26.
Iowa Gov. Chet Culver and Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, both had pushed for the
Jan. 3 date. Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Scott Brennan last week made that
recommendation to the party's state central committee, which approved it.
"As a practical matter, I think it will maintain Iowa's first-in-the-nation status,"
Brennan said.
The decision was the latest development in what's become a historically early
White House competition that has defied precedent in terms of volume of
campaign debates, candidate appearances, campaign spending and broadcast
advertisements.
For decades, Iowa's precinct caucuses marked the first major test of strength in
the presidential nominating season, followed by New Hampshire, which holds the
nation's first primary election.
That early position has brought both states enormous attention from presidential
candidates and given them a big role in the selection of the nominees.
In this cycle, however, other states have sought to get a piece of that action —
even to the point of running afoul of their party establishments.
Florida set its primary for Jan. 29, and Michigan is planning a Jan. 15 primary.
Those decisions forced South Carolina to move up its date as well.
This report contains material from the Associated Press.