NVGOP moves to dump caucuses

[Mr. Morden]

At least one version of this bill would schedule the primary for the last Tuesday of February, which would be *after* South Carolina, whereas if they stuck with a caucus, it would probably be before South Carolina.

Also, even if the Republicans want to participate in the primary, there's nothing to stop the Nevada Dems from holding a caucus (potentially on a different date).  Though if Clinton is winning every state by 50 points, then I guess the Dem. contest doesn't really matter much.

In other news, North Carolina is moving closer to scrapping its early primary, and putting it in compliance with DNC and RNC rules:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/north-carolina-presidential-primary.html

RIP Paultards hijacking the state party and almost appointing a bunch of ninja delegates to the RNC.

To be clear, the new RNC rules say that even caucus results have to be binding on who delegates get pledged to.  So this wouldn't have worked anyway, unless there's no one nominated on the first ballot.

[Mr. Morden]

If the Feb. 23rd version of this bill passes, and both parties in Nevada opt to go with the primary over caucuses, *and* if the remaining out-of-compliance states shift their primaries to March 1 or later, then the national parties would actually pull off what I previously thought was unrealistic: Getting the primary season to start in February.  The calendar in this scenario would be:

Mon, Feb. 1: Iowa caucuses
Tue, Feb. 9: New Hampshire primary
Sat, Feb. 20: South Carolina primary
Tue, Feb. 23: Nevada primary
Tue, Mar. 1: Super Tuesday

[Mr. Morden]

GOP campaigns are seriously considering skipping NV if it remains a caucus because they see it as a Paul setup. 

That is silly.  Ron Paul didn't even come in second in the Nevada caucus in 2012.  What makes them think Rand is going to do that much better?

[Mr. Morden]

GOP campaigns are seriously considering skipping NV if it remains a caucus because they see it as a Paul setup. 

That is silly.  Ron Paul didn't even come in second in the Nevada caucus in 2012.  What makes them think Rand is going to do that much better?

Paul people took over the convention, so he ended up with the most delegates from Nevada. 17 of the 28 Nevada GOP delegates voted for Paul at the national convention (5 abstained, 1 wasn't counted, and 5 voted for Romney).

That is impossible to do in 2016 with the new RNC rules though.  The delegate allocation is deteremined by how you do on caucus day now.  Do the rival campaigns not realize this?

[Mr. Morden]

In any case, the DNC rules as currently written give Nevada an early state status on the condition that it be a caucus.  If they don't change that, then I presume the Nevada Dems will keep their caucus, and won't participate in a state-run primary.  So you could have a Republican primary and a Democratic caucus, presumably held on different days.

[Mr. Morden]

As per FHQ, it looks like we might be headed for separate dates for the two parties in both Nevada and South Carolina.  Assuming that New York and North Carolina both move their primaries later, as expected, the calendar we get might look like this:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/south-carolina-republicans-eyeing.html

Monday, Feb. 1: Iowa caucuses (both parties)
Tuesday, Feb. 9: New Hampshire primary (both parties)
Saturday, Feb. 20: Nevada caucuses (Democrats only)
Saturday, Feb. 20: South Carolina primary (Republicans only)
Tuesday, Feb. 23: Nevada primary (Republicans only)
Saturday, Feb. 27: South Carolina primary (Democrats only)
Tuesday, Mar. 1: Super Tuesday

[Mr. Morden]

Yes, the fact that they're sticking with the caucuses helps Paul.  Though again, in the 2012 caucuses, Paul's father underperformed in Nevada relative to what you might expect.  He got 19%, which was only good enough for 3rd place.

The timing of this is now unclear.  Will it go before or after South Carolina?  And how badly does the RNC want to keep the four early states within February vs. being cool with Iowa spilling over into January?  I'm now wondering if the RNC will try to pressure Nevada into going after South Carolina (which'll probably be on Feb. 20th), which might leave them on Saturday, Feb. 27th, just three days before Super Tuesday.