Since early 2016, a trend has evolved in how the 2020 presidential nomination process will operate. In that time, several formerly caucus states have abandoned the format in favor of a state-funded primary. That has happened in states like Idaho and Nebraska where there was already a primary option included in state law, but also in states like Colorado and Minnesota, where citizen-driven initiative or the legislature, respectively, created the primary option.

The latter group used to include the caucus-to-primary shift in Maine.

Used to.

The 2016 effort to re-establish a presidential primary in the Pine Tree state passed and became law, but most of the provisions in the bill (then law) expired on December 1, 2018. The sole surviving component -- the only part that did not expire -- was the study the Maine secretary of state was to have conducted with respect to the funding of the election. And while that report was issued on December 1, 2017, as called for in the statute, questions lingered about how state reimbursement to the counties conducting the elections would function among other issues.

The impetus for the sunset provision, then, was to allow for some fact finding on the funding issue, but also in order to force legislators to consider those implications before solidifying the primary for 2020. That consideration continues now.

However, there is legislation -- LD 245 -- newly before the Maine legislature to make permanent the provisions that re-established the presidential primary, but which expired toward the end of 2018. As FHQ described in 2016, those provisions include the following:

• The secretary will then by November 1 of the year prior to a presidential election year set the date of the contest for some Tuesday in March. This date selection process will be done in consultation with the state parties. 
• That last part is key. The state parties obviously have the final say in all of this. Despite there being presidential primary, the state parties are not required to opt into it. Those parties could continue to use caucuses as a means of both allocating and selecting delegates. But by providing some (early calendar) flexibility and by consulting with the parties, the new law maximizes the likelihood that the two state parties opt into the primary and allocate delegates through the vote in the contest. 
• This legislation does a couple of interesting things. First, as mentioned above, the secretary of state has some carefully calibrated discretion on setting the date of the primary. The law does not set the primary for a specific date, but rather calls for it to happen on a Tuesday in March. More importantly, though, the decision on the date of the primary for 2020 and in the future rests with the secretary of state -- like in New Hampshire and Georgia -- instead of having to filter any date change through the legislative process. The discretion that the Maine secretary of state will have on this is far more restricted than in either New Hampshire or Georgia, but there is some flexibility there. That makes Maine a bit more adaptable than states with primaries scheduled for specific dates.

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The Maine bill has been added to the FHQ 2020 presidential primary calendar.

Nebraska Democrats voted on December 8 during their quarterly State Central Committee meeting to conduct the state party's 2020 national delegate allocation process through a presidential primary.

This is a reversion to the mode of delegate selection Cornhusker state Democrats used prior to 2008. For that cycle and the succeeding two cycles, the party held caucuses. And the primary motivation for the switch from primary to caucus ahead of 2008 was to move to an earlier date on the presidential primary calendar. That allowed for (Saturday after Super Tuesday) February caucuses as opposed to the traditional May primary.

But that move never got rid of the primary. By Nebraska law, caucus or not, a party's candidates appear on the presidential primary ballot. And in both of the competitive Democratic presidential cycles of 2008 and 2016 the later primary added two turnout data points for comparison to the caucuses. Despite the later date of the non-binding primary contests, the turnout was higher than in the caucuses.

That has remained a sticking point in discussions in and out of the state party in Nebraska and has been a primary incentive to move back to a primary election currently scheduled for May.

Nebraska now becomes the sixth state to make a switch from a 2016 caucus to a 2020 presidential primary; joining Colorado, Idaho, Maine, Minnesota, and Utah.

The Nebraska change has been added to the FHQ 2020 presidential primary calendar.

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Related Posts: 
Caucus or Primary? Nebraska Democrats Have the Decision Before Them

Nebraska Democratic Party Platform Committee Passes Caucus-to-Primary Resolution

Nebraska Democrats Signal Caucus-to-Primary Switch for 2020

Nebraska Democrats will convene this weekend to conduct their quarterly State Central Committee meeting. And on the agenda is the caucus or primary question as the group continues to consider the state party's draft delegate selection plan for 2020.

Yet, the party is not newly coming into this discussion. In fact, at its 2018 state convention this past June, Democratic delegates considered the matter as well. The state convention platform committee at the time ultimately passed a resolution calling for a switch to a primary from the caucus system the party has used to select and allocate national convention delegates from the Cornhusker state for each of the last three cycles (since 2008).

But news of the inner workings within the party on the caucus-to-primary question went quiet after that point. The convention resolution on the matter did not (and does not now) appear among the listed resolutions that were passed on the floor of the convention at the time.

However, it was listed among the passed resolutions in late June. Here's the language:

Why it disappeared from the passed resolutions was a mystery; one that was not settled later when I tried to reach out to the Nebraska Democratic Party (NDP) about it in July once I returned from vacation. Nor were they answered to any greater degree by the resolution's sponsor, Angela Thomas when FHQ reached out to her once news of the December State Central Committee meeting was reported toward the end of November.

Ultimately, this really is neither here nor there, but it was odd.

Regardless, the resolution would have been non-binding on the party. Additionally, the progression of the idea -- switching from a caucus to a primary -- has followed if not taken an expedited path as laid out by NDP Chair Jane Kleeb at the time of the state convention:

The party’s State Central Committee most likely won’t make a final decision until March, after the national Democratic Party issues guidance to the states, said Chairwoman Jane Kleeb.

The party has seemingly moved the consideration of caucus-to-primary up a quarter from March 2019 to December 2018 in order to incorporate the decision on mode of delegate selection into the party's draft delegate selection plan to be submitted to the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee by early May.

Heading into the decisive State Central Committee meeting December 7-8, it should be noted that the resolution to eliminate the caucuses drew cheers back at the state convention when it was introduced in the platform committee and as of late November the idea of a caucus-to-primary shift was said by party Chair Kleeb to have held a three to one advantage among the party's grassroots.

Take that as internal momentum to change the state Democrats' mode of delegate selection for 2020. And that parallels the external momentum to move from caucuses to primaries in Colorado, Idaho, Maine, Minnesota, and Utah that has already produced change in 2016-18.

Following a brief (by rules meetings standards) conference call on Tuesday, July 17, Unity Reform Commission Chair Jennifer O'Malley-Dillon and Vice Chair Larry Cohen released the following statement (via the DNC):

“We are proud to fully support the Rules and Bylaws Committee’s proposals for substantially adopting the Unity Reform Commission’s recommendations. Following the 2016 Democratic National Convention, the URC was established by party members with a mandate to review our party’s presidential nominating process and make meaningful reforms to strengthen our party and expand its reach. After several meetings, we proposed our recommendations for making our party more accessible, transparent, and inclusive. Since delivering our recommendations to the DNC last December, DNC Chair Tom Perez and the members of the Rules and Bylaws Committee have worked diligently to develop the new processes through which we will select our presidential nominees in future election cycles. 

“These new reforms will increase participation, empower our candidates to be more competitive across the country, bring new and unaffiliated voters into the party, broaden our base at the grassroots level, expand the use of primaries, and make caucuses more accessible to people like shift workers and overseas military personnel. Notably,​ in a reform that we fully support, the new rules will reduce the influence, whether real or perceived, of unpledged delegates. 

“These proposed reforms carry support from this commission made up of individuals that represent the vibrant, diverse quilt that makes up the Democratic Party. As such, we are confident that we’re going to head into 2018 and 2020 a stronger, more unified, competitive, and energized party that is welcome to every voter who shares our values.”

[Bolded links added by FHQ]

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FHQ will not call the aforementioned conference call a formality, but the pace with which the URC reviewed the work of the Rules and Bylaws Committee -- reconciling it with the URC recommendations from December -- made it appear as if it was just that.

And it was not just the pace. There were few times during the conference call in which objections were made. URC member, Jim Zogby, raised some concerns about a couple of subsections to the party reform section of the URC report. And vice chair, Larry Cohen, made a passing reference to the fact that the Rules and Bylaws Committee scaled back the language on how forcefully the national party would push states/state parties to change registration rules, for example. But that was the extent of the dissension. Zogby's issues will see a review by the Rules and Bylaws Committee either at its pre-DNC meeting gathering or during the winter meeting in early 2019. On the other hand, Cohen's point was more a comment on preference, but one that implied how limited the national parties are in exercising enforcement when change requires movement by state governments; state governments in some cases of which are controlled by the Republican Party.

With little dissension, then, the URC signed off on the rules reform package the Rules and Bylaws Committee has devised, clearing its path for consideration before the full DNC in August. That there has now been near unanimity on these changes at the URC stage in 2017, the RBC stage in 2018, and the URC review stage sends a clear signal to the members of the DNC ahead of the party's vote next month to adopt the changes to the delegate selection rules and convention call for 2020.

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Real time thread on URC conference call meeting:

2020 Delegate Selection Rules and Convention Call Pass Democratic Rules and Bylaws Committee Hurdlehttps://t.co/N4CwF8kgIY

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 17, 2018

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Related:
2020 Delegate Selection Rules and Convention Call Pass Democratic Rules and Bylaws Committee Hurdle

Third Way? Third Way Plus? The Democrats' Rules and Bylaws Committee Again Revisits Superdelegates

DNC Unity Reform Commission Report

Last week the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) once again reconvened in Washington, DC to finalize its proposed package of recommended changes to the delegate selection rules, call for the convention, and bylaws for the 2020 cycle. Despite some of the headlines trumpeting what a momentous occasion it was, the meeting was, in reality, another incremental step in the process of finalizing the amendment proposals. It was a meeting intended to polish one final time the changes the panel would send to the full DNC for consideration in August.

Now, that is not to minimize the work of the RBC over the last six months. Indeed, from a macro perspective the changes the members of the Democratic National Committee will vote on at its Chicago meeting next month represent some fairly significant potential changes to the Democratic presidential nomination process. But the RBC arrived at those decisions in fits and starts over a series of meetings during the first half of 2018. In other words, the heavy lifting had already been done.

Take, for example, the oft-discussed Third Way Plus proposal to reduce the role of superdelegates in the nomination process. Yes, the RBC voted on the exact language of those changes at this final July 11 meeting (27 votes for , 2 abstentions), but the group had previously passed off on the framework by a similar vote (27 for, 1 against, and 1 abstention) during a June 27 conference call meeting.

And that is the way it most often goes: changes both monumental and incremental can get lost among all of the rules tinkering that occurs at periodic but regular meetings of the Rules and Bylaws Committee.

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While that superdelegate/automatic delegate change and the remainder of the amendments package will go before the full DNC in August, the convention-created committee where many of the proposed changes found their inspiration -- the Unity Reform Commission (URC) -- has the ability to review the package and reconcile it with their own work from 2017.

A thumbs up from the URC means the DNC will likely have an up or down vote -- pending any amendments from DNC members -- on the package of changes.

Any dissension in the URC review process likely signals amendments to come from the URC itself. Their threshold is whether the RBC in the URC's judgment has "substantially adopted" the URC recommendations. If, in the committee's judgment, the RBC has failed to meet that subjective threshold in the areas of primaries, caucuses, unpledged delegates, and party reform, then the URC can put before the full DNC next month proposals that will.

Two additional notes should be added here:
First, recall the membership of the URC. Although there was wide consensus across nearly all of the planks in each of the four areas (There were only two instances in which unanimity was not reached.), the panel tilted toward the more establishment faction (Clinton-chosen plus Perez-chosen members). Should, for example then, the Sanders faction of the URC come to the conclusion that some recommendation was not substantially adopted, they would need help from the other faction to get an alternative before the full DNC. [It could work in the opposite direction as well, but the establishment faction would have the votes without needing any Sanders-aligned support. That said, this scenario seems unlikely.]

It should also be noted that the DNC parliamentarian urged the RBC during its final July 11 meeting to adopt well ahead of the DNC meeting a clear protocol for amendments to be introduced at that meeting. Objection to a proposed change, as is the case with the platform amendment process at the national convention, would not be sufficient to derail a change. Rather, an objection plus an already devised and drafted alternative must be provided. The URC, then, can object, but it will have to work out an alternative proposal for the DNC to consider. And that proposal would have to include the exact language of the change. [This was an issue with the URC recommendations. The RBC spent the first few meetings this year trying to transition the proposals to language that could be inserted in the rules, convention call, and bylaws.] That would add to the items on the URC plate in its review meeting; items that could potentially take up time as the clock ticks down toward the DNC meeting.

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Procedure aside, at what is the URC looking from the RBC and can it be reconciled with the recommendations the group settled on throughout 2017?

On superdelegates/automatic delegates, the RBC, it could be argued, went beyond the recommendations of the URC. Rather than fashioning a plan to leave a third of the superdelegates in place and bind the remaining two-thirds of the would-be automatic delegates based on statewide primary or caucus results, the RBC remedy for curbing the influence of superdelegates was to remove them from the equation on the first ballot roll call vote at the national convention.

The third way plus proposal was introduced during the June 27 RBC conference call meeting by member Elaine Kamarck. Her motion was the following:

All current unpledged delegates will become automatic delegates. On the first ballot of the presidential roll call, only pledged delegates will be permitted to vote unless a presidential candidate has secured enough pledged delegates to receive the nomination under any circumstances. At that point, automatic delegates should be permitted to vote. This determination shall be made by the DNC secretary upon certification of pledged delegates at the conclusion of the primary and caucus process. The threshold for a presidential candidate to secure the nomination is a majority (50% + 1) of all eligible delegate votes. In the event that the nominating contest moves beyond the first ballot, all automatic delegates would be able to cast a vote for the candidate of their choice on the second ballot and all subsequent ballots until a nominee is chosen. Automatic delegates would retain their ability to vote according to their own preferences on all other convention matters including the credentials, convention rules, platform, and the vice presidential nomination. 

This framework was adopted as described in the first section above. The intent and the eventual language set up the conditions under which the now-automatic delegates can or cannot participate in the first round of voting.

1. If a candidate wins 50 percent of the pledged delegates plus one during or by the end of primary season, then the superdelegates are barred from the first ballot.
2. If a candidate wins 50 percent of all of the delegates (including superdelegates) plus one, then the superdelegate opt-in is triggered and that faction of delegates can participate in the first (and only) round of voting.
3. If no candidate wins a majority of either pledged or all delegates during or by the end of primary season, then superdelegates are barred from the first round and allowed in to vote in the second round to break the stalemate.

The route differs from the URC proposal for reducing the role of superdelegates in the presidential nomination process, but the RBC plan -- third way plus -- arrives at a similar end.

There were additional tangential recommendations made around the edges concerning automatic delegates. Under current rules, unpledged delegates are barred from seeking pledged delegate slots. However, the third way plus proposal gave the RBC reason to revisit that; to lift that prohibition, allowing automatic delegates a way to participate in the first ballot vote. To do that, an amendment adopted during the July 11 RBC meeting, would force any automatic delegate taking a pledged slot to give up their automatic status.

While that may seem like a backdoor to superdelegate participation -- and it technically is -- this is a point that came up during the URC meetings in 2017. The conclusion then among some members was if automatic delegates are willing to forego their automatic status, then they can run for pledged slots.

FHQ elaborated on this in a series of tweets during the July 11 RBC meeting:

DNC Secretary Rae puts on the table for discussion the part of Article I.J of the convention call restricting automatic delegates -- formerly superdelegates -- from running for delegate slots. #DNCRBC

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 11, 2018

Rae mentions that some DNC members have approached him about the idea of lifting that automatic delegate restriction so they could run for pledged slots (and give up automatic status). #DNCRBC

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 11, 2018

This was one of the upsides of having superdelegates: It freed up quite a number of pledged delegate slots for grassroots activists that might otherwise be won in district and state conventions by party insider-types.#DNCRBC

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 11, 2018

Just to follow up on the automatics running for pledged slots discussion: DNC members and elected folks in the pre-superdelegate era were often hesitant to challenge their constituents for pledged delegate slots. #DNCRBC

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 11, 2018

And that was *part* of the impetus for creating the superdelegates in the first place: To get elected involved in the process *at the convention* (as per Hunt Commission Report). #DNCRBC

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) July 11, 2018

Collectively, the URC is likely to green light these changes given that they exceed the two more complicated, less workable recommendations on unpledged delegates.

In the areas of caucuses and primaries, most of those recommendations were consolidated into some changes to the requirements and encouragements from the national party to state parties in Rule 2. Those recommended changes drafted by member Frank Leone were adopted during the May 8 RBC meeting.

That proposal -- those proposed amendments to Rule 2 -- are making the rounds at the #dncrbc meeting this morning. pic.twitter.com/Nvp9Zs8ioM

— Josh Putnam (@FHQ) May 8, 2018

These too are likely to pass muster with the URC in whole or in part. This series of requirements more functionally embeds the recommendations in the delegate selection rules.

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The URC meets via conference call starting at 2pm on Tuesday, July 17.

Betsy Z. Russell writing for the Idaho Press:

Idaho Democrats will switch to a presidential primary, rather than a caucus, for the next presidential election in 2020.  

The party announced the change during its state party convention Saturday at the College of Idaho in Caldwell.  

“We’re looking to move to a system that we have a primary, so that everybody can vote,” said Van Beechler, the party’s first vice chair.  

Party Chairman Bert Marley said, “It’s been obvious the last couple presidential elections that the caucus system for us, in most parts of the state, is pretty unwieldy.”

And it is exactly that "pretty unwieldy" part that has been a common bond among those states that have either moved to primaries or have signaled that such a move was on the way for the 2020 cycle. Colorado, Maine, and Minnesota all made the change in 2016, the legislature in Utah added funding for a presidential primary to the budget, and Democrats in Nebraska and Washington have both voted on or voiced support for a transition from caucuses to a primary.

In each case, the administrative and financial burdens to the state parties were raised in the argument for a switch to a primary. Participation was up enough in caucus states across the board to nudge up administrative snafus and with it, the attendant disgruntlement with the process from those who were able to withstand long lines and longer meetings.

Idaho was no exception to this trend. But then, even with a state-funded option available to the state Democratic Party, the organization stuck with the caucuses for 2016. Much of that decision has to do with the on-again off-again nature of the presidential primary in the state. The state Republican Party opted for early March caucuses for the 2012 cycle in 2011, and Republicans in control of the Gem state legislature followed that by eliminating the presidential primary option in 2012.

Idaho Republicans reversed course for 2016. The party passed a resolution to trade in the once-utilized caucus system for a primary in February 2015, and then the Republican-controlled legislature passed legislation to re-establish the primary in spring 2015. This left Idaho Democrats little time to adapt while devising a delegate selection plan due to the Democratic National Committee by the early parts of May 2015.

But even with that excuse, Idaho Democrats have never had a post-reform relationship with the presidential primary that has been on the books in the state. The historical reasons have been twofold. First, the primary was always scheduled late, often after many presidential nomination races had been resolved. But second, the primary was always open, which the parties at state and national levels have tended to resist.

Those historical reasons for opting into the caucus system despite a state-funded primary option are now gone in Idaho. When state Republicans re-established the primary in 2015, it was scheduled for March (earlier in the process than had traditionally been the case) and gave the state parties the option of allowing unaffiliated voters to participate in the primary.

As Idaho Democratic Party Chair Bert Marley recently said at the state convention:

“This is the system that’s in place — we’re [Idaho taxpayers] paying for it, we’re going to use it.”

And with that, add Idaho to list of states moving toward primaries for 2020.

From the Omaha World-Herald:

Nebraska Democrats are weighing whether to scrap their decade-old practice of holding presidential caucuses.  

The Nebraska Democratic Party’s platform committee voted with no dissent Friday at Southeast Community College to advance a resolution calling for the elimination of presidential caucuses before the 2020 election.  

When the resolution was introduced, there were cheers from the group, and several people exclaimed that they dislike the caucuses.

The unanimously passed resolution to abandon the caucuses for a primary to allocate national convention delegates will now go before the state convention. Win or lose there, the decision will likely not be finalized by the state central committee until 2019 after the Democratic National Committee has set its rules for delegate selection for the 2020 cycle.

Related:
Nebraska Democrats Signal Caucus-to-Primary Switch for 2020
March Presidential Primary Bill Dies as Nebraska Legislature Adjourns

Citing party resources stretched too thin and depressed primary turnout, the Nebraska Democratic Party is considering abandoning its caucuses for a primary to allocate national convention delegates in 2020.

Prompted by the promise of an earlier voice in the presidential nomination process and no clear hope of a legislative move to shift up the primary in the Cornhusker state, Nebraska Democrats in 2007 first established a (then-compliant) February caucus/convention system for allocating national convention delegates in 2008. And while the move has driven grassroots enthusiasm and drawn candidate attention over the last three cycles in a way that a May primary may not have, the caucus/convention process has diverted party resources (around $150,000) that could otherwise have been spent winning elected offices further down the ballot.

The process of creating that separate caucus has also had implications for the May primary. First, the switch to a caucus rendered the presidential contest on the May primary ballot a beauty contest, meaningless to the allocation of delegates to the national convention. With the allocation decided, there was far less interest in the primary and has yielded lower turnout in primary elections for state and local offices.

And that is not all that uncommon for states with later and consolidated primaries combining presidential preference and a vote for nominations to down ballot positions. States that opt to create a new and separate presidential primary earlier in the calendar leave behind later primaries for other offices. Those primaries, asking voters to return to the polls again in a relatively short window of time, tend to see far lower participation.

Nebraska Democrats have apparently felt those pressures and are open to a return to the primary in 2020. The preference seems to be for an earlier primary, but state party chair (and Unity Reform Commission member), Jane Kleeb has also indicated that even a May primary may work given the outlook for 2020 (a big field of candidates).

Democrats have not exactly balked at a primary date change in the non-partisan Nebraska Unicam, but efforts to shift the contest into April (in 2014) or March (in 2016 and 2018) have all fallen flat in recent years. It is unclear whether Republican aligned legislators will be receptive to a date change in a cycle in which Republicans may not see a contested presidential nomination race.

One thing is clear: In the wake of 2016, caucuses are under scrutiny at almost all levels of the Democratic Party. Yes, the Unity Reform Commission made some recommendations regarding caucuses, but independent of that push, a handful of states have already made the caucus-to-primary switch. Colorado, Maine, and Minnesota all made the change in 2016 and Utah laid the groundwork for a primary option (by funding the election) in 2017. The number of caucus states looks to contract substantially with or without a Nebraska shift.

It is strange what does and does not pick up steam on social media sometimes.

When late last week I flagged the Astead Herndon article in the New York Times updating the Democratic efforts to finalize rules for the 2020 presidential nomination process, I was doing so more for personal reasons. As I explained in the remainder of the thread, I was more interested in bookmarking the article because there were several notes in it that deserved some attention if not pushback.

The window of attention was much more immediate for FHQ, then, than it was seemingly taken by most. Again, whereas I meant to relatively soon get back to what I see as the flaws of the NYT piece, most took it as FHQ flagging the proposed rule change -- specifically the scaling back of superdelegates -- for a time, far down the road, when the unintended consequences of the change will potentially be felt.

But the thing is, that overall story has not changed -- the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee continues to consider what it will do with respect to the 2020 rules in general and specifically regarding superdelegates -- and the NYT story does not really add much to that. That is not to suggest that the story adds nothing -- it does, which I'll note below -- but it is mainly superfluous to items reported before or in the immediate aftermath of the Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting on May 8-9.

Look, if one thing is a constant around here at FHQ it is that changing the rules changes the game. FHQ's mission has almost always been to not only detail how and in what ways the parties are altering their presidential nomination processes, but the impact those changes do and do not have on how those processes arrive at a conclusion; a presidential nominee.

We remain far removed from the ultimate opportunity to assess whether specific rules changes for 2020 will lay the groundwork for unintended consequences in 2020. After all, we do not yet know what the final rules will look like (and will not until probably August). What remains somewhat clear this far out, however, is that the combination of a backward looking, 2016-tinged fight over superdelegates ahead of a 2020 cycle that looks like it will produce a large field of candidates is potentially mismatched. Reducing the role of superdelegates in the evolving primary season delegate count runs the risk of straining the math of that proportional allocation process. If enough candidates survive a long enough period into primary season, and if those candidates are qualifying for delegates -- hitting 15 percent of the vote statewide and/or at the congressional district level -- then the likelihood of some candidate receiving 50 percent of the delegates plus one to clinch the nomination shrinks. But those are big ifs as of now (and worth a separate post from FHQ at some point). Big because we do not yet know what the final contours of the rules will be and big because it remains early, early enough that there is still a ton of uncertainty involved in how the process will progress for Democrats over the next couple of years.

Now, about that NYT story...

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I have a few thoughts that are best dealt with through some annotations alongside the passages in the piece.

#1: The compromise?

Following a lede that reestablishes the lingering divisions in the party after 2016 and a brief description of its symbolic cornerstone -- the superdelegates' role in the Democratic nomination process -- Herndon lays the groundwork of a compromise for 2020. This is not wrong, but it is a timeline truncated enough to be misleading.

The true compromise on superdelegates between the Sanders and Clinton camps, it could be argued, happened back in December when the Unity Reform Commission (URC) finalized its recommendations to the Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC). Those suggestions included a couple of options for scaling back the influence of superdelegates, and in the time since, a third option to more comprehensively reduce the role of superdelegates has been entertained by the RBC.

But what is lacking in the description above is that the compromise is without context. The membership of the URC was divided among Sanders and Clinton appointees. That was clear from the start. The RBC, however, is not. In fact when the new RBC membership was revealed in October 2017 there were complaints about how it was stacked against Sanders, his supporters, and their collective interests:

But Zogby alleges that the rules and bylaws committee chosen by Perez is stacked against the Sanders-aligned reformers.

“Not a single person from the Bernie camp is in the new bylaws groups, but five people from the Clinton side are,” Zogby said. “That’s not a way to get unity.”

There is, then, an inside-outside dynamic involved. It is not that the Sanders faction cannot continue to lobby the RBC to make changes consistent with the URC recommendations (or even more aligned with their various stances), but they are doing so from outside the Rules and Bylaws Committee. The RBC has its own divisions/differences that do not so easily fit in that Clinton-Sanders compromise narrative. The committee is balancing a number of overlapping interests.


#2: An aside on superdelegates

Herndon then jumps into some specifics on the superdelegates proposals. Look, I have been guilty of using this description, too. It is easy on social media in particular. However, it should be said that there is no plan to eliminate (or later in the section on Donna Brazile, "eradicate") superdelegates. This is a semantics issue, but well worth a mention.

There are two things that make superdelegates super. First, they are granted automatic delegate status.  Elected officials, in other words, do not have to run against rank-and-file members of the party -- often their constituents -- for national convention delegate positions. That is no small thing. Having those automatic delegates means there are more delegate slots for the grassroots member of the party.

The second feature that gives superdelegates something super is their unpledged voting status on the presidential nomination vote. Throughout the superdelegates era (1984-present) in the Democratic presidential nomination process, superdelegates have not been tethered to specific candidates based on the voting in primaries and caucuses. Rather, they have been free to choose to align with a particular candidate (or to choose not to) for any reason or combination of reasons of their choosing.

None of the three options that are on the plates of the members of the RBC seek to alter the first superdelegate feature. They will continue to exist -- to have their positions automatically carved out -- in roughly the same numbers in 2020 as 2016. And importantly, the roughly same number of superdelegates would retain the ability to vote on all matters before the national convention in 2020. That would include votes on the platform, votes on the rules, and, say, hypothetical votes by the full convention to unbind any bound delegates on (or allow superdelegates back into) the first ballot vote.¹

The only area in which the potential reforms seek to affect superdelegates is on their unpledged voting status on the presidential nomination vote. And even then, the effects extend to just the first ballot and to (in two of the three cases) a fraction of the total number of superdelegates. FHQ tries to use the same "revise the role and reduce the perceived influence of superdelegates" description from the March RBC interim report adopted by the DNC. It can be a mouthful and not particularly well-suited to social media, but does accurately describe what is on the table.


#3: Forcing states

Let's quickly dispense with this one. There is no forcing here. Yes, the URC discussed at length different ways to encourage increased participation in the nomination process. And while some of those meetings included talk of requiring states to make such changes to registration rules or whether unaffiliated voters should participate, the reality is much easier said than done. Much of the language coming out of the current RBC meetings and likely to make it into the ultimate delegate selection rules in 2020 is more about encouraging states to move in these directions where feasible. And this is made clear in the primaries section of the RBC interim report.


#4: Summer meetings

This is a minor point, but Herndon lays out the path ahead for rules changes toward the end of the piece. But in so doing, he makes it sound as if the RBC has a number of public meetings ahead, peppering the summer months. The committee will meeting in conjunction with the June DNC Executive Committee meeting where the group will dig into the 2020 Call for the Convention (which includes some specifics on delegate apportionment and allocation) and seek to finalize the superdelegates and party reform sections of the URC recommendations. That is a long list, and even though the timing may extend beyond the URC/convention-mandated window for RBC consideration of the URC recommendations (end of June), an additional meeting in July may be required to deal with it all.

If past is prelude, then the DNC will adopt the 2020 rules as it has tended to in August.


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Now, as FHQ mentioned above, the Herndon's story is not completely devoid of news. Part of that comes from Larry Cohen's comments and the impression they left:

Rather than indicating a sense of continued division, the former head of Our Revolution painted a picture of a leadership team at the DNC that is pushing forward and advocating for the reforms called for by the Unity Reform Commission. FHQ would add that the Rules and Bylaws Committee has had a measured and open consideration of the URC recommendations that has stretched beyond and not simply rehashed the Clinton-Sanders divide. Maintaining a balance on that front has been a thread throughout, to be sure, but there has been a thorough consideration of the practical implications of rules, rules changes, implementation, and unintended consequences.

As always, the proof is in the pudding on these things. Keeping folks "at bay" during rules discussions is one thing. Doing so after the rules are set in stone may be another altogether.


Another part is in Donna Brazile's comments:

There is no official whip count on these things. If there was it would be fluid and very much unofficial. The RBC is going to aim for a set of recommendations that is as close to unanimous as possible. This is the same principle FHQ discussed here with respect to how the RBC would deal with the URC recommendations. Unanimity means consensus, and consensus adds pressure to the next group considering recommendations. Any division is more likely to lead to a maintenance of the status quo.

In other words, tweaks will be made to ensure that the RBC is as close to on the same page as possible.

One could glean a sense of that tweaking process in Brazile's comments laying down a marker on the proposal to completely remove superdelegate voting rights on the first ballot of the presidential nomination at the national convention. Parsimonious though that proposal may be, there is certainly going to be resistance to the idea within the DNC. That is not any breaking news alert. And Brazile is not alone in that resistance among the members of the RBC.

But that idea is out there.

We further know that there are pockets of support and opposition to the other two options; those from the URC. RBC member, Elaine Kamarck, has voiced some opposition to the pooled vote plan. The Congressional Black Caucus has as well. That points the process in the direction of the alternate vote option. That is the messiest, most complicated proposal of the bunch, and those complications are often enough to drive RBC members in the direction of the more elegant option Brazile opposes above.

The bottom line is that the RBC is in the midst of a balancing act on superdelegates that will ultimately produce some recommendations -- on superdelegates and other rules changes -- for full DNC to consider in August. The only thing on superdelegates that is clear at this point is that leaving them untouched is not on the table at this stage.


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¹ These latter options are not all that likely to happen. There are a number of political reasons neither would. However, such hypothetical votes are absolutely something on which the full convention could vote.

This post is part of a series examining efforts -- both attempted and successful -- to move presidential primary election dates for 2020 during the now-adjourning 2017-2018 state legislative sessions in capitols across the country. While shifts tend to be rare in sessions immediately following a presidential election, introduced legislation is more common albeit unsuccessful more often than not.

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For much of the post-2016 period, FHQ, in looking ahead to the 2020 cycle, has often raised the caucus-to-primary shifts in Colorado, Maine, and Minnesota. All three formerly caucus states in various ways laid the groundwork in 2016 for 2020 presidential primaries. But that trio of states is not alone in the switch.

In its 2017 session, the Utah state legislature passed legislation -- which was ultimately signed into law -- to provide for a state-funded and run presidential primary option in the Beehive state for the 2020 cycle. And the motivation for HB 204 was borne out of the chaotic Utah caucuses of 2016 the turnout of which overwhelmed both parties in the state. Both the primary sponsor of the bill -- Representative Patrice Arent (D-36th, Millcreek) -- and others providing testimony in committee hearings for the legislation recounted stories of long lines, lack of parking, and understaffed caucus locations in both parties' processes. That prompted Rep. Arent to introduce the bill to "leave running elections to the experts -- our state elections office and the county clerks. Because political parties should be in the business of winning elections, not run[ning] them."

While that sentiment was not exactly shared by the two political parties in the state, both the chairs of the Utah Republican Party, James Evans, and the Utah Democratic Party, Peter Carroon, voiced support for the move. Evans, in particular, supported the state providing for a presidential primary election, but leaving it up to the state parties to opt into using the election as a means of allocating national convention delegates.

The state did not fund a presidential primary in either of the 2012 or 2016 cycles. It did for 2012 give parties the option of using the June state primary for expressing presidential preference to allocate delegates. The Utah Republican Party opted into in that June primary in 2012, but its late June date was non-compliant (too late) with both parties timing rules in 2016. A failed effort to move (from February to March) and fund a separate presidential primary in 2016 occurred in the same winter/spring 2015 time period that the Utah Republican Party was signaling an inclination to conduct the delegate allocation/selection process through a caucus/convention system.

For 2020, Utah Republicans, with it uncertain to unlikely that President Trump will face any competition for the Republican presidential nomination, will retain the ability to hold caucuses. However, both state parties will have the ability to avoid the caucus chaos of 2016 with an option of a state-run 2020 presidential primary. The state will put up some funds for the primary, but local/county  governments will seemingly bear the brunt of most of the costs.

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What is and was left unclear in 2017 effort to fund a 2020 presidential primary is when that primary will be held. Currently, state parties have two options on that front. The Western States Presidential Primary is scheduled for the first Tuesday in February. If and only if that option is not funded by the state -- and it was not in either 2012 or 2016 -- then the state parties can opt into the late June state primary. But neither date fits into the window -- first Tuesday in March to mid-June (different June cutoffs for both parties) -- allowed by the national parties for states to conduct their delegate selection events.

That means that with the funding now there, the Utah legislature will have to revise the date of the 2020 presidential primary during its 2019 session.

It should be noted that the legislation -- HB 204 -- signed into law funds/requires a "presidential primary", but not the Western States Presidential Primary specifically. Now, that requirement does appear in the Western State Presidential Primary section of the Utah Code, but is not exactly a requirement for that February contest. FHQ raises this uncertainty with respect to its treatment of the Utah presidential primary on the 2020 presidential primary calendar. The Utah legislature will set the date in 2019, and for now, FHQ is categorizing the primary in the Beehive state as having no date (due to the lack of clarity in the code). It is a fine distinction, but FHQ categorizes Utah as in need of setting a date and not in need of changing a non-compliant date.


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The Utah law has been added to the FHQ 2020 presidential primary calendar.

Contest type -- whether primary or caucus -- has been a topic of discussion in and out of national party rules-making circles in the time since 2016. That Sanders saw successes in that format and Clinton problems essentially forced mode of allocation into rules discussions on the Democratic side. And even Republicans have ventured into talks about potentially providing incentives to states with primaries rather than caucuses for 2020.

But most of the action thus far on this front has been on the state level. Maine and Minnesota have both adopted through the legislative process presidential primaries to replace the caucus format for 2020. And Colorado arrived at the same endpoint but via ballot initiative in 2016. In a mark of the type of energy exists behind efforts to shift from caucuses to primaries in the presidential nomination process, two bills have been even been introduced in Hawaii.

Now, the Aloha state has traditionally held caucuses rather than a presidential primary. For much of the post-reform era, the two state parties settled into a regular pattern every four years on the presidential primary calendar: Hawaii Republicans started their process with precinct meetings in late January and their Democratic counterparts on the islands followed suit in late February or early March. The regularity with which that pattern occurred developed despite a [state] constitutional provision -- Article II, section 9 -- allowing the addition of a presidential preference primary election.

And over the last two decades at least, no legislation has been proposed to add such an election. That changed during the 2018 legislative session. Bills were introduced to establish a presidential preference primary on the second Saturday in May (SB 2584) and one to create a study committee to examine the switch from caucuses to a primary (SB 2249).

No, neither bill has gone anywhere, nor are they likely to. Both are bottled up in committee, basically dead after missing legislative deadlines to move the legislation along before the 2018 session adjourns in early May. To some extent that is not exactly evidence of "energy" behind a caucus-to-primary change in Hawaii. However, most of the changes of this sort tend to occur not during midterm election years, but in the year before a presidential election year. Additionally, that anything was proposed at all is worth noting in the case of Hawaii. Again, a regular pattern had developed around caucuses and caucus scheduling, and breaking long-standing traditions is not a goal that is easily attained in the presidential nomination process.

Whether that changes in Hawaii in particular is a question for 2019. But this is a phenomenon -- caucus-to-primary shifts -- that is happening at the state level even without a national party prompt at this point in the cycle.

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More: 2020 Presidential Primary Calendar

Below is the interim report that the Rules and Bylaws Committee will submit to the Democratic National Committee at its Winter 2018 meeting. The report serves as a progress update on the RBC consideration of the Unity Reform Commission report from December 2017.

Rules and Bylaws Committee Interim Report to the DNC Winter Meeting 2018 by frontloading_hq on Scribd

Part One: Setting Expectations for the Next Round
Part Two: Early Proposals
Part Three: A Reflection on Delegate Incentives
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What lessons do past encouragement structures hold for the potential Republican caucus-to-primary incentives?

There are a few main principles arising from the previous exploration of past national party experimentation in motivating state decisions on contest scheduling that may have implications for an incentive program to entice current caucus states, in whole or in part, to adopt primaries.

    1) Conditions matter
In sum, the deep dive on past incentives hammers home a point that is often echoed in the context of electoral politics: timing is everything. Republicans in 2000 and Democrats in 2008 had ineffective incentives programs to curb frontloading mainly because of poor timing. Those regimes were instituted ahead of cycles where the motivation for states/state parties to frontload primaries and caucuses was at its peak: when there were competitive nomination races in both parties.

But those were also cycles that saw the parties act alone on incentives, sending a mix of signals to the decision makers on the state level. That did not change for Democrats in either 2012 or 2016 -- they acted without Republicans on incentives -- but what did was the level of perceived competition for the nomination at the time primary and caucus scheduling decisions were being made. In both cases, the perception was that the level of competition was low and the need to be early was as well. There were no challengers to an internally popular incumbent Democrat (Obama) in 2011, and the most viable alternatives to Clinton sat on the sideline throughout 2015.

Couple that with the fact the DNC benefited from the united front both national parties offered on penalties for would-be violating states and there existed a perfect storm for some measure of success. The penalties forced would-be violators stuck in February after 2008 to move for 2012 when the window was contracted to prohibit February contests. Penalties laid the groundwork, then, and some combination of incentives, state-level partisan control, and nomination competition helped determine the stakes and where states ended up on the calendars of the two most recent cycles. And it is FHQ's hypothesis that it is more the partisan control and competition effects driving the movement than the incentives. 2020 may provide a real or at least better test of that hypothesis.

    2) Primary or caucus decisions are not necessarily the same as frontloading decisions
Importantly, the motivation that compels state actors to schedule primaries and caucuses earlier in the calendar is different than that which animates the decision on whether to conduct a primary or caucus.

Often those two decisions -- frontloading or primary/caucus -- hinge on willingness and ability. It is one thing to ask if a state is willing to, for example, move forward on the calendar, but quite another to ask if that state is able. Compared to ability, there is more often than not a wellspring of willingness. In other words, there is often in at least some quarters of a state some desire to move the state-funded primary to an earlier date on the calendar. Bills frequently get proposed in state legislatures in the year before a presidential election to shift a presidential primary around on the calendar. But not all of those bills ultimately lead to date changes.

And the variation across states stems from a number of factors that can be broadly filed under ability. There can be partisan complications should a state be dominated one party while the other has a competitive presidential nomination. There can be structural obstructions as well. The biggest of these obstacles -- the one that has most often separated states that moved to earlier dates and those that did not during the era of frontloading -- was whether presidential primaries were consolidated with those for nominations to other offices. States with separate presidential and other primaries have been much likely to move around the calendar than those with consolidated primaries.

Moreover, this points toward another difference between states that do frontload and those that do not: budgetary impact. The financial hit to state budgets can be quite large, preventative even. States, in other words, that have incurred the costs of separating those sets of primaries are willing and much more able to shift primary dates than those with consolidated primaries.

This same willingness/ability concept can be extended to the primary/caucus decision as well, but with some subtle and not so subtle differences. In some cases, the ability may be there, but not the willingness. A state-funded primary option may be in place, but a state party may opt for caucuses instead. After 2016, this has been a point of contention on the Democratic side in the national party considerations of 2020 rules. Idaho, Nebraska, and Washington all had primaries at their disposal, but the state Democratic parties in all three states stuck with the caucus/convention system.

That group of caucus states differs from the majority of caucus states where state parties may have the willingness to hold a primary, but lack the ability. In the latter group, there is no state-funded option and little to no state party funding exists for what is a less effective party-run primary. A national party stands a better chance of nudging the caucus states with a state-funded primary toward adopting the primary. That is, a stick and/or carrot to the state party may be effective at triggering such a transition. But with that other group of caucus states -- those where state funding is not forthcoming -- national parties often have their hands tied. While they may be able to compel a state party to make a change, forcing state legislatures to appropriate the resources necessary for a primary is a different matter.

And that appropriation serves as an important aspect to flag in all of this. That is what separates attempts to curb frontloading from similar efforts to scale back the reach of the caucus/convention system. The national parties face less resistance from state governments -- whether motivated by penalties or incentives (and/or directly or indirectly through state parties) -- on reversing frontloading than on compelling a caucus to primary transition.

Why?

Much of the answer lies in the financing. The ask is not costless in the case of states with contests too early in the calendar from the perspective of the national parties, but it costs considerably less in terms of the budget hit to those state governments. Those states have already incurred the opportunity costs of creating separate presidential primaries or moving a consolidated primary up in the calendar. Instead, the price to be paid is one measured in influence over the presidential nomination process. As  a primary or caucus slips further into the calendar, the less likely it will be to have a marked influence over the shape of the nomination race.

But for the majority of caucus states, the contours of the caucus/primary or caucus to primary decision remains different. In that case, the national party is attempting to motivate a change in mode of nomination from the state party, and the acceptance of a financial cost -- funding a primary -- by a state legislature. State governments that balk at that push shift the costs to the state parties, and state parties have tended to opt for cheaper caucuses over costly party-run primaries.


    3) A united front
The national party push to curb frontloading succeeded when both national parties informally agreed a uniform shift in the start of the calendar after the 2008 cycle. Penalties in place on both sides thereafter were sufficient enough to draw most states into compliance for 2012, and the increased severity of Republican penalties for 2016 completed the task. It is under those conditions -- a united front -- that a similar effort to move states from caucuses to primaries would be stand a better chance of success.

Republican incentives may work on some states, but would likely see more widespread effects if the DNC was pushing in a similar direction. And that does not have to be in the same way. Again, Republicans have fought back frontloading with a series of penalties while the Democrats have used a combination of penalties and incentives over the last two cycles. In other words, Republicans could utilize an incentives system to draw caucus states toward primaries while the Democrats rely on some other method. There have been discussions on the periphery of the 2020 Democratic rules-making process of penalties for states with caucuses where a state-funded  primary is available. But that process, at this point in time, looks to produce a more passive national party declaration of preference (for primaries over caucuses) than a more forceful penalties regime.

Still, across both parties those signals may be enough to affect some change at the state level. Even without that national party prompt, the number of caucus states has already waned since 2016. Colorado, Maine, and Minnesota will all have presidential primary options in 2020. And Nebraska, Washington, and Wyoming have all explored either establishing primaries or strengthening the ones they have. Much of the impetus for that change or that exploration emerged not from the national parties but organically based on the strain placed on state parties to effectively accommodate those who wanted to participate in 2016.

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Given those lessons from other incentives programs, is this Republican proposal likely to work?
The answer to this question is not as clear because the actual parameters of the the proposed incentives remain unknown. It is, after all, still a proposal.

    Are the conditions right?
FHQ remains skeptical that they are. Parties in the White House tend to stick with the rules they have; the rules that helped get the president where he is. In looking at renomination, the Trump campaign and the RNC may be eyeing the curbing of a structure that did not benefit the president in the 2016 process. But if the president runs unopposed or faces only a token challenge, then the state response has often been to cancel primaries and select delegates through a caucus/convention process or even via state committee selection. Rather than reducing the number of caucuses, then, there tends to be an expansion of caucuses on the incumbent party side.

    Details, details, details
Obviously, the success of such an incentive regime would depend on the size of the carrot and to which states it applies. On some level, the bigger the incentive is, the more likely it is that states would be to opt for them. But that can open the door to a logistical problem for the national parties based on which states qualify. A broad application to current primary states and those caucus states that opt in could dramatically increase the total number of delegates to the convention. This does not come without a cost to the national party in planning the convention. However, a more narrow application, targeted at current caucus states, would allow a potentially larger incentive that would have a more minimal impact on the total number of convention delegates. This is an issue the DNC has had with its bonuses and other rules tweaks over the decades. Adding more delegates reduces the number of sites that can actually accommodate a national convention. Regardless, this is a consideration the RNC will have to wrestle with if it is serious about an incentive program like the bare bones of the one proposed.

    Conclusion
FHQ remains skeptical of just how effective this potential caucus-to-primary incentive the RNC Temporary Committee on the Presidential Nominating Process (TCPNP) is discussing. As the above discussion should indicate, there are a number of moving parts. Ultimately, however, this is something that is most likely narrowly directed at those caucus states that opted out of preference votes in caucuses in 2016. Call that the unfinished business path. Those states -- mostly North Dakota, but in part Colorado and Wyoming -- had delegate selection plans that, while compliant, were not in keeping with the delegate binding changes made after 2012. An incentive may be just enough to get them to reconsider. Time, however, will tell that tale.

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Part One: Setting Expectations for the Next Round
Part Two: Early Proposals
Part Three: A Reflection on Delegate Incentives

Part One: Setting Expectations for the Next Round
Part Two: Early Proposals
Part Four: A Caucus-to-Primary Incentive?
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The history of incentives programs
Whether the intention of a caucus-to-primary incentive is applied to a narrow list of targets or anything broader, they all belie the fact that such bonus delegate incentive programs have not historically been effective (or effective in the absence of certain conditions).

    Early experimentation
The RNC first used a bonus delegate system to entice states to later dates on the primary calendar for the 2000 cycle. To curb frontloading, the goal was to provide a bonus of five percent to states in the March 15-April 14 window, a 7.5 percent addition for contests in April 15-May 14 window, and a ten precent bonus for states with primaries or caucuses scheduled from May 15 through the third Tuesday in June. However, the experiment was met by a collective cold shoulder from the states. Only three states moved back beyond the March 15 point on the calendar from 1996-2000.

• South Dakota shifted from a late February primary in 1996 to its traditional early June position for 2000 after three consecutive cycles in February. 
• Oregon, too, moved back for 2000, from a mid-March 1996 primary back to its traditional position back in mid-May 2000. 
• Finally, Wisconsin pushed back from a mid-March position alongside neighbors Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio -- a Great Lakes subregional primary -- in 1996 to its traditional spot at the beginning of April in 2000. 

All three moved to "old" positions where the contests in those states have been more often than not in the post-reform era. And Oregon and Wisconsin reverted to those positions after a one cycle break in 1996 from those traditional scheduling patterns.

But by far the biggest beneficiaries of the 2000 cycle bonus delegates program were states that were already scheduled on or after March 15 in both cycles. In other words, states that did nothing from 1996-2000 got the most out of the rules change. Given the overall response -- or lack thereof -- the RNC scrapped the program for 2004 and has increasingly focused on penalizing non-compliance in the time since. Sticks rather than carrots, then.

Despite the failed Republican experimentation in 2000, Democrats devised their own bonus delegates regime to counter the frontloading impulse among the states beginning with the 2008 cycle. The differences across the two plans were twofold. First, the Democratic system created two groups of beneficiaries: 1) states that held their later positions on the calendar and 2) states that moved back from their earlier 2004 positions to later 2008 positions. Additionally, the 2008 system the Democrats utilized amplified the delegates added. Depending on how late the contests were scheduled, states in the first category -- holding steady -- got five or ten percent bonuses tacked on to their base delegations (not including superdelegates). That was pretty consistent with the Republican system from 2000. But it was the second category that saw the true increase in incentives. Early states from 2004 that moved their primaries or caucuses back for 2008 saw either a 15 or 30 percent addition to their base delegations, again, depending on how far back the contest was shifted in 2008.

However, even with a more aggressive bonus system, the results remained about the same for Democrats in 2008 as they had been for Republicans in 2000. Ten states gained Democratic bonuses in 2008, but only two of those ten -- Guam and North Carolina -- moved back. The remaining 80 percent of states that received a delegate bump were awarded the smaller bonuses for not moving at all, but remaining late.

The scorecard for early experimentation in bonus delegate incentives, then, just did not show much success. Although, much of that can be attributed to timing rather than any specific failure of the two programs. The primary calendars in 2000 and 2008 were arguably the two most frontloaded of the post-reform era. On one hand that makes the incentive systems look even more ineffective. The system was intended to combat the frontloading of presidential primaries and caucuses, but saw the trend accelerate instead.

But on the other hand, additional factors may have been driving actors on the state level to ignore the potential bonuses. For starters, California's 1996 shift from June to late March and subsequent 2000 move to the front end of March changed the decision-making calculus in state houses across the country. With Florida, New York, and Texas among others already in early March, California's moves pushed the total number of delegates available early in the calendar to a level not seen in the post-reform era.

Such severe frontloading had the potential to resolve nomination races earlier. And that was the fear in some states: that the race(s) would be over by the time the process got too deep into the calendar. Influence over the nomination process is not possible if the the race is resolved, whether by the viable candidates other than the presumptive nominee withdrawing and/or one candidate winning a majority of the total delegates. It was on that latter route that delegate-rich California joining a growing number of states in early March had the greatest impact.

Moreover, the relatively quick pace with which both the Democratic and Republican nominations were settled in 2000 confirmed that state-level anxiety -- fear of missing out -- for subsequent cycles. It increased the likelihood that states would consider a jump to the early part of the calendar. And in fact, the DNC widened its window in which states could hold primaries and caucuses to include February for the 2004 cycle in the hopes of deciding on a nominee faster. In other words, the DNC traded for 2004 the desire to combat frontloading for the potential to resolve more quickly the party's nomination and set their sights on defeating a Republican incumbent.

While some states shifted into February for 2004, it was not until the 2008 cycle that a mass of states sought to move even closer to the beginning of the calendar year. Why? As was the case in 2000, the 2008 cycle had competitive nomination races in both parties. That can and did open up the floodgates to increase frontloading decisions on the state level.

Very simply, then, the motivation for going early in most cases far outweighed the incentives offered by the parties in either 2000 or 2008 to not do so. And bear in mind also that the parties did not offer a united front on incentives to go later in the calendar. At the national level the Republicans walked that road alone in 2000 and the Democrats did likewise in 2008.


    Successes in and after 2012?
Elements of these relationships began to change following the 2008 cycle, giving at least the impression that the tide had turned on incentives to beat back the frontloading trend. In both 2012 and 2016, there was an expansion of incentives-based success stories. However, the overarching picture is more complex. There were more states that took advantage of the revised incentives the Democratic Party offered in 2012. But again, conditions unique to the cycle may have contributed more to state-level decisions than the incentives themselves.

First, the DNC altered its incentive structure for 2012, dropping the distinction between states that were merely holding a pre-existing position late in the calendar and those that actually moved back to later dates. In lieu of that system, the Democrats created two separate bonuses. The first of these was a 10 or 20 percent boost granted to states that held primaries after late March. Those in May or later received the largest bump.

Additionally, however, the DNC attempted to further encourage the adoption of later calendar positions by offering a bonus for three or more contiguous states clustering their contests at points on the latter half of the primary calendar. And this latter bonus could be combined with the timing bonus. In other words, a state like Montana in early June could get as much as a 35 percent increase to its base delegation for 1) holding a June primary and 2) doing so alongside neighboring North and South Dakota.

On the surface, this new structure appears to have worked in 2012. 33 states and territories took advantage of some combination of the two incentives, and only one-third of them -- 11 states and territories -- benefited by doing nothing more than retaining their positions later on the calendar from previous cycles. That left 22 additional states and territories that made decisions to shift back their primaries or caucuses from 2008 to 2012.

But while that looks like a win for the incentives Democrats employed for 2012, those bonuses were only part of a broader array of factors driving state-level decision making that cycle. At the national party level, the early February collection of contests coupled with the even earlier start to primary season that those February contests had at least partially triggered, brought on some further reflection on the factors motivating frontloading. Obviously, the DNC saw enough success in or some cause to maintain some form of incentive system after 2008. Yet, both parties were forced to enforce their respective penalties for calendar timing violations in 2008.¹ And when the national parties informally, yet collectively, closed February off to states other than the four carve-out states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina), the parallel rules changes across parties left a significant number of states in need of a change to state law to comply with the new national party rules.

That unified front from the national parties -- on 2008 enforcement and a contracting of the window for non-carve-out state primaries and caucuses for 2012 -- created a negative inducement on the states with February or earlier primaries on the books as the transition into the 2012 cycle continued. Those 18 primary states had to make changes or otherwise risked sanction from the party/parties. Despite a handful of states again flaunting those rules in 2012, most states complied with the calendar rules changes.²

And there was a pattern to the movement or non-movement. States that were non-compliant with January and February contests or those that shifted into March tended to be Republican-controlled while states that moved to April and later spots on the 2012 calendar were more likely to be Democratic-controlled. That outcome was driven in large measure due to the differing stakes across parties. The competition and stakes were higher for Republicans. They had an active nomination race. Democrats, on the other hand, with an internally popular and ultimately unchallenged incumbent in the White House had less at stake during the nomination phase of the process. While Republican states had an incentive to have an earlier voice in the Republican nomination process, Democratic-controlled states could afford to slip deeper into the calendar, enticed by delegate incentives, an ulterior motive of affecting the Republican nomination process, or some combination of the two.³ The need to be early, as established during the frontloading era, was not there for Democrats in the way that it was for Republicans in 2012.

There were breaks in that partisan/competition pattern for 2012. Often that deviation was driven by budgetary constraints that forced a number of states to reconsolidate their formerly early presidential primaries with later state and local primaries (see Arkansas, California, and New Jersey) or moving an already-consolidated primary back to a traditional spot on the calendar (see Illinois). Other states had lingering state-level disputes over redistricting that forced a reconsideration of positions (Ohio) or an outright delay to when the primary could be held (Texas).

In general, though, that partisan pattern held in 2012. States that moved back the most tended to be Democratic states. Delegate incentives may have played a role in motivating how far states shifted from 2008 to 2012, but that operated alongside the unified threat of penalties in both parties and the competition-based stakes across them. And there is a strong argument to be made that the penalties motivated the move while the combination of delegate incentives, state-level partisan control, and competitive stakes influenced how large the shift was.

And the tale was similar in 2016.

Most of the motivation to move to earlier spots was on the Republican side of the equation for 2016. The RNC mostly eliminated the caucus loophole (see footnote #2) and increased its penalties for timing violations. That made the price for holding a primary or caucus before March much higher in 2016, pushing the holdout states in violation of the (intention of the) rules in 2012 to resettle into compliant March slots for the 2016 cycle. And that was a group of mostly Republican-controlled states -- Florida, Michigan, and Missouri -- in which decision-makers were not factoring in the DNC delegate incentive structure. Other late 2012 states also pushed forward for 2016 as well. They too were newly Republican-controlled (Arkansas and North Carolina) or Republican-controlled and reverting to traditional positions following the resolution of redistricting disputes (Texas).

That Republican-driven calendar movement had implications for the lure if not use of incentives to states in the Democratic process. In total, eight states lost Democratic delegate bonuses from 2012 to 2016. Of those eight, five -- Arkansas, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, and Texas -- were Republican-controlled states with primaries. The remaining three -- Democrats Abroad, Kansas, and Nebraska -- were caucus states where state parties were making strategic scheduling decisions. In addition to those eight states losing incentives-based bonuses, Hawaii and Utah -- both caucus states as well -- moved to calendar positions and into clusters, gaining them Democratic bonuses.

But that net of six states losing bonuses from 2012 to 2016 indicates more a maintenance of the status quo for the incentive structure Democrats carried over virtually unchanged into an open nomination cycle.⁴ If the lack of competition mattered to Democratic adoptions of bonus-producing strategies on the state level for 2012, then the increased competition of 2016 should have raised the number of states forgoing incentives in 2016. It did, but only marginally. But again, most of the change was Republican-driven. Democrats were not in a position of power in state capitols across the country, and thus, not in a position to make changes into incentives or into earlier calendar positions. Moreover, the competition that developed between Clinton and Sanders during primary season 2016, was not fully formed (or recognized) in 2015 when decisions were being made on primary and caucus scheduling. Sanders was emerging but had not yet emerged as the not-Clinton in the Democratic nomination race by mid-2015.

Democrats, then, may tout the overall pictures of incentives adoption in 2012 and 2016 as successes, but the above is an overly lengthy way of saying that the supposed effectiveness of the incentives structure can potentially be explained away by other factors. It should also not be lost that the incentives have not faced a test under truly competitive circumstances. 2020 may offer such a test. And under heightened stakes, the trade-off between incentives for later calendar positions may be outweighed by the state-level desire to weigh in before it is too late.

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But what that means for Republicans and any effort to encourage caucus states to shift to primaries presents a different set of questions. The final installment in this series will tease out the lessons from the above and apply them to a potential Republican incentive for 2020.


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Part One: Setting Expectations for the Next Round
Part Two: Early Proposals
Part Four: A Caucus-to-Primary Incentive?

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¹ The DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee penalties on violating states like Florida and Michigan in the immediate lead up to and during primary season in 2008 was a roller coaster. The RBC first stripped both states of their full delegations in fall 2007 when neither state/state parties could either force a move of their respective primaries or accept remedial caucuses. That the Democratic race between Obama and Clinton was as close as it was kept the results of the two under the microscope throughout primary season. Just before the end the 2008 calendar, the Rules and Bylaws Committee returned to the original 50 percent delegate penalty called for in the delegate selection rules, before opting to seat the full delegations from both states at the convention. That move has often been cast as the party ultimately bowing to the states, but the DNC ex post facto reasoning on that progression and how penalties could be assessed in the future is the the penalty was in place when it counted, during primary season. The RNC took a different path, penalizing violating states during primary season and through to the convention. The true intent of the party's 50 percent penalty has always been kept, but the implementation has occasionally meant the seating of a full delegation from a violating state, but reducing those delegate votes to/by half.

² States like Arizona, Florida and Michigan demonstrated a willingness to take the 50 percent reduction in exchange for the potential for early influence over the contested 2012 Republican nomination race. But a number of caucus states also stuck with February dates but skirted penalty because the first step in their processes elected delegates to the next tier but without a concurrent presidential preference vote.

³ This ulterior motive could be described in a number of ways: helping a more conservative candidate emerge by backloading contests in bluer states and/or hurting frontrunner Mitt Romney by depriving him of wins in perceived hospitable territory, but also as lengthening the Republican process and/or stoking internal divisions in the Republican Party. The simplest explanation is that the Democrats, with no active nomination of their own, were informally playing on the periphery of the Republican process.

⁴ The 2016 bonus delegate regime remained the same as in 2012 with one exception. An adjustment was made to when the bonus window opened to account for there being five Tuesdays in March 2016 as opposed to the four in March 2012. The correction meant the window opened at approximately the same point on the calendar; March 20, 2012 and March 22, 2016.