The Fight for 2028
Before you think I’m skipping past the important midterm election this year, it’s because plans are being made now by the national parties regarding the 2028 nomination process.
For a half-century, Iowa held first-in-the-nation status with both parties. Not only did the state benefit from the attention, I would suggest the overall process benefited by starting in a place where retail politics matters, that is not dominated by a couple of large multi-million population cities, and is truly in the heartland of the country.
But to punish Iowa for not anointing him any of the times he ran, Joe Biden pushed the Democratic National Committee to dump Iowa in 2024. DNC leadership was all too happy to oblige, having undertaken their own efforts to undermine Iowa since they hated caucuses. The promise was that everything would be up for conversation for 2028.
Reports late last year surfaced that there was a split among Iowa Democrats on whether they wanted to fight for their prior role or not. We now hear that Iowa has indeed put in a pitch to be among the first states to weigh in on the nomination process next time out.
And for heaven’s sake, why wouldn’t you? At the very least, it’s something a state party can use to mobilize forces, register voters, and get people fired up. Why would Iowa Democrats not want that?
As we’ve talked about, the number of registered Democrats in Iowa now is pretty low; there are more Republicans than Democrats in each of Iowa’s four congressional districts. From a party mobilization standpoint, having the presidential caucuses back in their first-in-the-nation position is a great thing.
And as I’ve also said, by this time next year, despite the poor voter registration numbers, it’s more than likely that Iowa will have a Democrat governor and a Democrat U.S. Senator…so why wouldn’t the state and national parties want to build on that momentum going into a year with an open presidential race?
So the first hurdle has been passed—getting together and filing the official request for an early caucus. Now if the party can only work together on a super presentation to make their case and win back what should be theirs. I’m not sure the current crew has that in them; bet if they called Dave Nagle, who saved the caucuses more than once in the face of jealous opposition from other, he’d have a few ideas they could try. Bet they’d work too.
