USA TODAY International Edition
Winner to electability: 5 questions tonight’s caucuses will answer
DES MOINES – For more than a year, the 2020 Democratic presidential campaign has played out like a long, complicated novel with characters developing, conflicts arising and questions building about how the climax will finally play out.
Although Iowa’s caucuses are likely to raise as many questions as they answer, there will finally be a sense of resolution as the last chapter of the 2020 Iowa caucus cycle comes to a close Monday night.
Here’s a look at what we’ll learn once the results are tallied.
1. Who will win the Iowa caucuses?
The 2020 caucus campaign has been defined by the historically large and diverse field of candidates seeking the Democratic presidential nomination – a field that, at its peak, boasted 24 candidates.
Iowans have been inundated with their overtures. According to Des Moines Register data, campaigns have held roughly 2,500 campaign events since the start of the 2020 cycle when they first began visiting the state.
Four of those candidates have consistently led in polling: former Vice President Joe Biden; former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg; U. S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont; and U. S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
Still, the polling numbers have been volatile. Each of those candidates has, at one point, led the Des Moines Register/ CNN/ Mediacom Iowa Poll. And with only days to go, no clear frontrunner has emerged. Local Democratic activists and strategists say they feel the race could still go any way.
“For a long time I felt like I had a sense ( of who would win),” said Nora Walsh- DeVries, who was U. S. Sen. Kamala Harris’ political director and is now unaligned. “But just seeing the fluctuation in polling and just anecdotally having been a staffer, knowing other staffers, knowing the different organizations the various campaigns have — I think it’s really, really hard to tell still.”
2. What will ‘ winning’ the Iowa caucuses look like?
New rules introduced for the first time this year will complicate the idea of “winning.”
For decades, the winner of Iowa’s caucuses has been decided by a complicated system of state delegate equivalents, which operates kind of like the Electoral College. But unlike the November presidential vote, Iowa’s tally of popular support was never released.
On Monday, the Iowa Democratic Party will publish the raw vote totals from each precinct showing how many people supported each candidate on the first and final alignments.
The Associated Press will declare the winner based on the delegate equivalents. But the new metrics will allow the campaigns to spin the results in a multitude of new ways, potentially hijacking the media narrative and claiming momentum out of Iowa.
3. How many ‘ tickets’ will there be out of Iowa?
Iowa doesn’t always crown winners, but it always narrows the field of contenders. No matter how many candidates come in, the rule has almost always proven true that there are “three tickets” out of Iowa. With the exception of John McCain in 2008, no candidate who finished worse than third in a competitive caucus has ever gone on to win their party’s nomination.
But with a historically large field of Democratic contenders, will that rule still hold true?
The field of Democratic presidential candidates has already winnowed dramatically since it began more than a year ago from two dozen candidates to 11 – two of whom have abandoned campaigning in Iowa ( U. S. Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado and U. S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii) and two more who never focused on Iowa to begin with ( former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick).
That leaves seven candidates who have staked their hopes on a successful showing: Biden, Buttigieg, U. S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Sanders, businessman Tom Steyer, Warren and entrepreneur Andrew Yang.
If there are five tickets out of the state, it potentially leaves Steyer and Yang to assess whether they can continue funding a campaign operation ahead of the New Hampshire primary. Steyer has his own personal wealth to fall back on, and Yang has converted a devoted following into a sizeable fundraising operation.
Some of those candidates’ fates will be determined after Iowa. Buttigieg, who has struggled more than his competitors to gain the support of black voters, is among them. He will be tested more fully in South Carolina, where there is a larger base of black voters, Democratic activist Sue Dvorsky said.
And Bloomberg, who has funneled hundreds of millions of dollars into the race already, will be waiting to jump into the race on Super Tuesday.
4. Is ‘ Klomentum’ real?
With four candidates seemingly locked in a tight race, Iowa Democrats are looking to Klobuchar as the possible dark horse candidate to emerge from caucus night. If she breaks into the top four or gives a strong enough fifth- place finish, it could be enough to vault her into New Hampshire.
“I think she’ll do well in the 4th District. But how well?” said J. D. Scholten, a Sioux City Democrat who is running for Congress in Iowa’s conservative 4th Congressional District. “I think that’s a huge thing.”
Klobuchar gave a string of well- received debate performances, is one of only two candidates to pull off a 99county tour of the state and she’s had a small but steady increase in her polling numbers here.
In past years, candidates like Klobuchar might register no support at the end of the night if they failed to hit the 15% viability threshold. But Iowa’s new reporting rules could come to her benefit.
That rule also stands to benefit Yang and Steyer, who register some support in polling but so far not enough to break through the viability mark.
5. What does ‘ electability’ look like?
Biden has stressed his own electability from the earliest days of the campaign, arguing he is best suited to take on Republican President Donald Trump in a general election because he can win over independents and disaffected Republicans.
In Iowa, he’s earned endorsements from nearly every major elected leader. But although Biden entered the race a looming figure, he’s consistently slipped in the Register’s polling. If other candidates who also are making the electability argument were to surpass him by a meaningful margin on caucus night, it could change the way other primary voters think about the concept of electability.
“I think it’s really, really hard to tell still.”
Nora Walsh- DeVries
on who will win the Iowa caucuses