amended early March primary bill advances in California legislature

[Mr. Morden]

Looks like the state Assembly and Senate in California have settled on a bill to put forth (not actually voted on yet) that would move California's primary date to the first Tuesday in March, which is March 3rd in 2020, or "Super Tuesday".  This would put it on the same date as a slew of other (mostly Southern) states, like Texas, Virginia, and Tennessee.

http://frontloading.blogspot.com/2017/09/bells-and-whistles-removed-amended.html

[Pessimistic Antineutrino]

Cali and Texas on the same day might suck the oxygen out of the other states... not sure what to think of this.

[NewYorkExpress]

All we need is for New York and Florida to move to Super Tuesday, and then we have a really Super Primary (even if everyone else moves away).

[Beet]

Cali and Texas on the same day might suck the oxygen out of the other states... not sure what to think of this.

That CaliFORNIA and TX are finally getting what they deserve.

There's not going to be a real contest in California if it's just going to be in the bag for one candidate from the start.

[tosk]

aiaiai. I don't mind but I'd rather we have our own day, later in the contest too. more pivotal that way for either party.

[Mr. Morden]

I do wonder if the Dems are inadvertently setting themselves up for a possible contested convention.  It's not super likely, but it's not impossible with the Democratic delegate rules.  I mean, if the 2016 Republican primaries had been run with the Democratic delegate allocation rules, then a contested convention would have been an inevitability.

What you need for a contested convention is:

1) More than two candidates win a non-negligible %age of the vote fairly deep into the primary season.

2) The delegate allocation is proportional, or close enough to proportional that the leading candidate struggles to get a majority of the delegates.

3) The second and third and/or fourth place candidates refuse to formally drop out of the race and release their delegates.

The Dems have much more proportional delegate allocation rules than the GOP does, and that doesn't look like it's going to change.  They've recently had primary contests that quickly coalesce into a 2-person race early on, but that's not guaranteed to happen again next time.  And if California is going to move to March 3rd, which will be only about a month after Iowa, then I can see 3rd and 4th place candidates talking themselves into staying in the race through Super Tuesday, just in case something happens.  You can talk yourself into waging a zombie campaign where you already know you're dead if it's only for a couple of weeks.  A bit harder to do that for months and months.

The Dem. rules do offer the possibility that the superdelegates will unite behind the pledged delegate leader, in order to prevent a contested convention, but it looks like the number of superdelegates will be reduced in 2020 (or rather, some of them will be pledged on the basis of the primary result in their state, which means that they won't really be superdelegates anymore), so it might not be enough.  I don't know the exact math, but if the leading candidate only has 43 or 44% of the pledged delegates, there might not be enough superdelegates to give that candidate a majority.

So the final escape clause is if the trailing candidates gracefully bow out and release their delegates, which would then allow the leading candidate to pick off enough of them to win a majority.  This works as long as the 2nd and 3rd place candidates find the 1st place candidate an acceptable nominee.  But is this a given, considering the splits within the party, which may be exacerbated if there's another contentious primary contest in 2020?  And even if the candidates themselves concede defeat, do the divisions in the party make it less likely that their delegates will be willing to vote for another candidate than would have been the case in primary campaigns past?

[Webnicz]

It would be awesome if Dems worked with states to hold primaries over the weekend. Would be great for turnout and a good talking point. Oh how I wish...

[catographer]

#allprimariesatthesametime

[NewYorkExpress]

Cali and Texas on the same day might suck the oxygen out of the other states... not sure what to think of this.

That CaliFORNIA and TX are finally getting what they deserve.

There's not going to be a real contest in California if it's just going to be in the bag for one candidate from the start.

We can't prove Harris is running yet, Newsom/Chiang won't run due to being Governor for just two years, and Garcetti can't carry the whole state.

[Mr. Morden]

Cali and Texas on the same day might suck the oxygen out of the other states... not sure what to think of this.

That CaliFORNIA and TX are finally getting what they deserve.

There's not going to be a real contest in California if it's just going to be in the bag for one candidate from the start.

We can't prove Harris is running yet, Newsom/Chiang won't run due to being Governor for just two years, and Garcetti can't carry the whole state.

Besides, the Dem. delegate allocation is proportional, so even if there's a favorite son or daughter candidate running and they're heavily favored, the margin by which they win is important.

[MAINEiac4434]

I'm an advocate of a national primary, but anything that makes the early primary process better (I.e., more diverse) and the entire process quicker I support.

[TheSaint250]

Politico article about this:

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/09/10/california-could-jolt-2020-presidential-elections-242530?lo=ap_b1

[Mr. Morden]

The other wrinkle here is that California actually loses delegates by moving earlier.  As described here:

https://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/D-Alloc.phtml

going late in the process in 2016 actually gave California a 20% boost in its delegate allocation, because there are bonuses for going later, and those would now be lost.  So the move earlier is premised on momentum being important (that is, on earlier wins being more decisive).  If momentum doesn't matter, and each voter acts independently of the results of previous primaries, then California would be giving up power in doing this.

[henster]

As stated in the article Cali is not a good retail state at all it is so big and expensive will be really difficult for someone with lower name ID like Bullock to break thru. At least in April give every candidate a chance to work the smaller states then move on to the bigger ones NY, CA.

[GlobeSoc]

are there any other date switch bills in any other states, or just this one?

This may give the Republican 'centrists' a large boost in the 2020 primary, and a smaller but still notable boost to the democratic 'establishment'

[Mr. Morden]

are there any other date switch bills in any other states, or just this one?

At least as of a few months ago, North Carolina was considering a bill to move their primary up to Super Tuesday as well:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com/2017/06/north-carolina-inches-toward-joining.html

But I'm not sure where that stands.  Also, Arkansas's Super Tuesday primary date has expired, so as current law stands, their 2020 primary would revert back to May.  But there's still plenty of time for them to change it back, if they wish.

[Beet]

Cali and Texas on the same day might suck the oxygen out of the other states... not sure what to think of this.

That CaliFORNIA and TX are finally getting what they deserve.

There's not going to be a real contest in California if it's just going to be in the bag for one candidate from the start.

We can't prove Harris is running yet, Newsom/Chiang won't run due to being Governor for just two years, and Garcetti can't carry the whole state.

Besides, the Dem. delegate allocation is proportional, so even if there's a favorite son or daughter candidate running and they're heavily favored, the margin by which they win is important.

It forces all the other candidates into a catch-22 where if they campaign hard in California and lose, they only make the loss look more significant, whereas if they don't, they lose massive delegates. Either way they're at an unfair disadvantage. And let's be real here, Harris will be the California candidate. She'll use California to build up an unsurmountable delegate lead before the rest of the country even has a chance to weigh in.

[Mr. Morden]

As stated in the article Cali is not a good retail state at all it is so big and expensive will be really difficult for someone with lower name ID like Bullock to break thru.

I actually don't agree.  I mean, I agree that it's tough for someone with low name ID to do well on Super Tuesday, but there remains a straightforward way to boost name ID: Win one of the first four early states.  Or heck, even just start polling well in one of them, and you start getting a bunch of national media attention.

Consider, for example, Mike Huckabee 2008.  No one knew who he was in 2005 and 2006, and once he launched his presidential campaign, he couldn't raise any money.  But he campaigned in Iowa and slowly boosted his poll #s there, to the point where he gained a huge amount of national media attention, and used that to actually become competitive in national polls (ultimately winning Iowa and a bunch of Super Tuesday states, despite still having virtually no money).  Sure, he didn't actually win the nomination, but that was because he was always limited in his appeal.  He was the Evangelical identity politics candidate.  There's no reason why some currently little known candidate with broader appeal couldn't use an Iowa win to slingshot them to the nomination.

I actually think stacking up such a huge portion of the primary contests into the first week of March likely makes the first four states even more important.  It means that any bounce a candidate gets out of winning those contests might not have faded yet by the time all those Super Tuesday states are voting.  If you delayed those contests until several months after IA/NH/NV/SC, then those early wins would have had time to fade from people's memories.

[Mr. Morden]

It forces all the other candidates into a catch-22 where if they campaign hard in California and lose, they only make the loss look more significant, whereas if they don't, they lose massive delegates. Either way they're at an unfair disadvantage.

Well OK, I agree that an early California primary is an advantage for Harris (or, less likely, some other California candidate).  And yes, obviously winning California offers a big advantage for winning the nomination.  But winning the state doesn't guarantee that you'll win the nomination, as we saw in 2008.  And so my point was simply that the margin there could be important, even if there's a favorite son or daughter running.

This is especially possible if there's still a large field of candidates in the race, and Harris wins California, but with less than 50% of the vote.  Potentially, that could even lead to a contested convention (not likely, but not out of the question).

As for the catch-22 you talk about with regard to how hard do the candidates campaign in California....I'm assuming that none of them will have time to campaign that hard there at all.  If they only have a week or less after Nevada or South Carolina to campaign in 10+ different states, including California and Texas, then there isn't much time to do anything.  They would only be able to coast off of free media at that point.  Even the candidates with money would struggle to be able to put enough ads on the air to make an impact.

[Beet]

It forces all the other candidates into a catch-22 where if they campaign hard in California and lose, they only make the loss look more significant, whereas if they don't, they lose massive delegates. Either way they're at an unfair disadvantage.

Well OK, I agree that an early California primary is an advantage for Harris (or, less likely, some other California candidate).  And yes, obviously winning California offers a big advantage for winning the nomination.  But winning the state doesn't guarantee that you'll win the nomination, as we saw in 2008.  And so my point was simply that the margin there could be important, even if there's a favorite son or daughter running.

This is especially possible if there's still a large field of candidates in the race, and Harris wins California, but with less than 50% of the vote.  Potentially, that could even lead to a contested convention (not likely, but not out of the question).

As for the catch-22 you talk about with regard to how hard do the candidates campaign in California....I'm assuming that none of them will have time to campaign that hard there at all.  If they only have a week or less after Nevada or South Carolina to campaign in 10+ different states, including California and Texas, then there isn't much time to do anything.  They would only be able to coast off of free media at that point.  Even the candidates with money would struggle to be able to put enough ads on the air to make an impact.

The difference is that in 2008, there was no favored daughter California candidate. So candidates only win California by small margins (~10 points), as opposed to say a massive 20-30 point margin local candidate often get. In 2008, they really had a super tuesday with New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, etc. etc. a ton of states all going on the same day. Unless New York and Illinois moves up to the same day California will dominate the day.

As we saw in both 2008 and 2016, once one candidate gets even a medium-sized delegate lead, it's impossible for anyone to overtake them later.

[Holmes]

But who knows? What if Harris places >3rd place in IA, NH, SC and NV? A win in CA wouldn't save her.

[Mr. Morden]

It forces all the other candidates into a catch-22 where if they campaign hard in California and lose, they only make the loss look more significant, whereas if they don't, they lose massive delegates. Either way they're at an unfair disadvantage.

Well OK, I agree that an early California primary is an advantage for Harris (or, less likely, some other California candidate).  And yes, obviously winning California offers a big advantage for winning the nomination.  But winning the state doesn't guarantee that you'll win the nomination, as we saw in 2008.  And so my point was simply that the margin there could be important, even if there's a favorite son or daughter running.

This is especially possible if there's still a large field of candidates in the race, and Harris wins California, but with less than 50% of the vote.  Potentially, that could even lead to a contested convention (not likely, but not out of the question).

As for the catch-22 you talk about with regard to how hard do the candidates campaign in California....I'm assuming that none of them will have time to campaign that hard there at all.  If they only have a week or less after Nevada or South Carolina to campaign in 10+ different states, including California and Texas, then there isn't much time to do anything.  They would only be able to coast off of free media at that point.  Even the candidates with money would struggle to be able to put enough ads on the air to make an impact.

The difference is that in 2008, there was no favored daughter California candidate. So candidates only win California by small margins (~10 points), as opposed to say a massive 20-30 point margin local candidate often get. In 2008, they really had a super tuesday with New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, etc. etc. a ton of states all going on the same day. Unless New York and Illinois moves up to the same day California will dominate the day.

I don't know that Harris will win the California primary by as much as 20 points.  There are plenty of examples of candidates not winning their home states in presidential primaries by margins that big.  The prototypical case where a favorite son wins his home state primary by an overwhelming margin is where the candidate in question has been entrenched in the state for a long time, and it's a small state whose primary electorate isn't splintered into many factions.  E.g., Mike Huckabee in Arkansas in 2008.  Or heck, Howard Dean winning Vermont in 2004 even after he'd dropped out of the race.  California's big, and Harris has only held statewide office since 2010 (as attorney general and then junior senator, not positions that allow you to dominate the state's politics as a governor would), so I don't know that a blowout victory is a given.

And even if it is, having California as a home state is an advantage that exists for her even if the primary is held later.  How advantageous it is for her if it's held early is something that we don't know yet, because it depends on how big a factor momentum will be.  2004, for example, was a primary contest where early momentum played a big factor, but then you've got cases like 2008, where, after the first few contests, you could predict how most of the rest of the primaries would go just on the basis of demographics.  By moving to an earlier primary, California sacrifices the delegate bonuses that it would get for going later, on the bet that determining early momentum will be more important than having some extra delegates.  But I'm not yet sure to what extent that bet will pay off.

[NewYorkExpress]

We can't prove Harris is running yet, Newsom/Chiang won't run due to being Governor for just two years, and Garcetti can't carry the whole state.

I still think Villaraigosa will win.

Villiaraigosa won't run for President in 2020 if he wins in 2018, for the same reasons as Newsom and Chiang (he'll only be Governor for two years).

[TheSaint250]

Lulz.... what more proof is needed that Sanders is going to run in 2020:

Bernie Sanders coming back to California

It's Sanders. He travels all the time now that he's a more widely recognized figure.

[TheSaint250]

This is great news! Kamala Harris or Tim Kaine will be our nominee in 2020 and not Bernie Sanders

I wholeheartedly concur. We need a true libertarian technocratic nominee!