tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/new-hampshire-primary-14645/articlesNew Hampshire primary – The Conversation2024-01-24T04:47:33Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2214062024-01-24T04:47:33Z2024-01-24T04:47:33ZTrump wins New Hampshire primary and closes in on Republican nomination; Labor gains in Australian polls<p>Former President Donald Trump has defeated former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley in the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary with a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/01/23/us/elections/results-new-hampshire-republican-primary.html?action=click&pgtype=Article&state=default&module=election-results&context=election_recirc&region=NavBar">projected 11-point margin</a>.</p>
<p>This was Trump’s second big win in a week after he triumphed in the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/01/15/us/elections/results-iowa-caucus.html?action=click&pgtype=Article&state=default&module=election-results&context=election_recirc&region=PrimaryResultsLinksFooter">January 15 Iowa caucuses</a>) with 51% of the vote, far ahead of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis at 21.2% and Haley at 19.1%.</p>
<p>After the caucuses, DeSantis <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/21/us/politics/desantis-drops-out.html?smtyp=cur">quit the presidential race</a> and endorsed Trump, leaving Haley as Trump’s sole challenger for the Republican nomination. DeSantis had been seen as Trump’s main opponent, but he slumped from 34% in the <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-r/2024/national/?ex_cid=abcpromo">FiveThirtyEight aggregate</a> of national Republican polls in January 2023 to 11% when he withdrew a year later. Trump rose from 45% to 66% during the same time.</p>
<p>Haley now <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-r/2024/national/">trails</a> Trump by 68–12% nationally. It’s likely New Hampshire was her best opportunity to win a state. In Haley’s home state of <a href="https://www.thegreenpapers.com/P24/ccad.phtml">South Carolina</a>, which votes on February 24, Trump leads by a massive 62–25% in <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-r/2024/south-carolina/">FiveThirtyEight’s polling aggregate</a>.</p>
<p>President Joe Biden will easily win the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/01/23/us/elections/results-new-hampshire-democratic-primary.html?action=click&pgtype=Article&state=default&module=election-results&context=election_recirc&region=NavBar">Democratic New Hampshire primary</a> despite not being on the ballot owing to the state’s decision to hold its primary earlier than Democrats wanted.</p>
<p>In the US, voters can often write in someone’s name on the ballot paper. Once the “unprocessed write-ins” are counted, Biden will win around 65%, with Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips a distant second on 20%.</p>
<p>In national <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-d/2024/national/">Democratic primary polls</a>, Biden has 71%, Marianne Williamson 5% and Phillips 3%. </p>
<p>Both Biden and Trump should effectively seal their parties’ nominations by <a href="https://www.thegreenpapers.com/P24/ccad.phtml">Super Tuesday</a> on March 5, when many states hold their primary contests. By this date, 41.6% of Democratic delegates and 47.4% of Republican delegates will be determined.</p>
<p>I covered New Hampshire and the upcoming February 14 Indonesian election for <a href="https://www.pollbludger.net/2024/01/24/us-new-hampshire-primary-live/">The Poll Bludger</a> today. I covered Trump’s big win at the Iowa caucuses and other recent international electoral developments <a href="https://www.pollbludger.net/2024/01/16/us-iowa-republican-presidential-caucus-live/">last week</a>.</p>
<p>The US general election will be held on November 5. <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/national/">Recent national polls</a> have Trump leading Biden in a potential match-up by mid-single-digit margins. I also wrote in December that Trump has a slight advantage over the national margin owing to the Electoral College voting system that is used for presidential elections.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/us-elections-2024-a-biden-vs-trump-rematch-is-very-likely-with-trump-leading-biden-219093">US elections 2024: a Biden vs Trump rematch is very likely, with Trump leading Biden</a>
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<p>Biden’s ratings are currently 55.7% disapprove, 38.9% approve in the <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/">FiveThirtyEight aggregate</a> (net -16.7). His ratings have improved slightly since my December article, when he was at net -17.3. </p>
<p><a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/favorability/donald-trump/">Trump’s ratings</a> are 51.8% unfavourable, 43.1% favourable (net -8.7). His ratings have also improved since December, when he was at net -9.9.</p>
<h2>Australian YouGov poll: 52–48% to Labor</h2>
<p>A federal Australian <a href="https://au.yougov.com/politics/articles/48430-labor-support-rises-to-52-two-party-preferred-vote">YouGov poll</a> conducted January 12–17 from a sample of 1,532 people, gave Labor a 52–48% lead over the Coalition, a one-point gain for Labor since the previous YouGov poll in <a href="https://au.yougov.com/politics/articles/48095-latest-yougov-poll-labors-primary-vote-is-the-lowest-since-1901">early December</a>. </p>
<p>Primary votes were 37% Coalition (steady), 32% Labor (up three), 13% Greens (down two), 7% One Nation (steady) and 11% for all Others (down one).</p>
<p>Applying 2022 election preference flows to the primary votes gives a two-party estimate of 51.2–48.8% to Labor, suggesting that rounding was in Labor’s favour.</p>
<p>Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s net approval improved three points to -13, while Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s was down two points to -11. Albanese led Dutton by 45–35% as better prime minister, with the 10-point margin unchanged since December.</p>
<p>On Dutton’s call to <a href="https://au.yougov.com/politics/articles/48416-only-1-in-5-australians-back-duttons-call-to-boycott-woolworths">boycott Woolworths</a> over not stocking Australia Day merchandise, 20% supported Dutton, 14% supported Woolworths and 66% said their main concern with supermarkets is excessive price rises.</p>
<p>On Australia Day, 49% said it should remain on January 26 only, 30% thought it should become a two-day public holiday that celebrates First Australians and new Australians, and 21% wanted it changed to a different day.</p>
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<h2>Morgan polls and the republic debate</h2>
<p>I <a href="https://theconversation.com/freshwater-national-poll-holds-steady-at-a-50-50-tie-between-labor-and-the-coalition-as-trump-set-for-big-win-in-iowa-caucus-220286">previously covered</a> the federal Morgan poll conducted January 2–7 that gave the Coalition a 51–49% lead over Labor. In the <a href="https://www.roymorgan.com/findings/9429-federal-voting-intention-january-15-2024">Morgan poll</a> conducted January 8–14, Labor led the Coalition by 51.5–48.5%.</p>
<p>In the <a href="https://www.roymorgan.com/findings/9439-federal-voting-intention-january-22-2024">Morgan poll</a> conducted January 15–21 from a sample of 1,675 people, Labor led by 52.5–47.5%. Primary votes were 36% Coalition (down one since the previous week), 32.5% Labor (up one), 12.5% Greens (up 0.5), 5% One Nation (up 0.5) and 14% for all Others (down one).</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.roymorgan.com/findings/9422-roy-morgan-australia-day-survey-january-22-2024">separate Morgan SMS poll</a> conducted January 17–19 from a sample of 1,111 people, 68.5% said January 26 should be known as “Australia Day” while 31.5% thought it should be known as “Invasion Day” (compared to 64–36% in January 2023). By 58.5–41.5%, respondents wanted Australia Day to be kept on January 26.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.pollbludger.net/2024/01/19/friday-miscellany-culture-war-edition/">Poll Bludger</a> reported last Friday that a DemosAU poll showed 47–39% support for a republic referendum in the next five years, but suggested that a specific republic model would struggle. The most popular model was “direct election with open nomination”, which trailed the status quo by 41–38%.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-we-should-celebrate-australia-day-on-march-3-the-day-we-became-a-fully-independent-country-221015">Why we should celebrate Australia Day on March 3 – the day we became a fully independent country</a>
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<h2>Upcoming byelections</h2>
<p>The federal byelection in the Victorian <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/dunkley-by-election-2024">Labor-held seat of Dunkley</a> to replace the deceased Peta Murphy will be held on March 2. Labor won Dunkley by 56.3–43.7% against the Liberals at the 2022 election. Nominations close on February 8.</p>
<p>The Queensland state <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/inala-by-election-2024">byelection in Inala</a> to replace former Labor premier Annastacia Palaszczuk will be held on March 16, in conjunction with Brisbane City Council elections. Palaszczuk won Inala by 78.2–21.8% over the Liberal Nationals at the 2020 election.</p>
<p>Former Liberal Prime Minister Scott Morrison <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-01-23/scott-morrison-to-resign-from-politics/101277260">announced on Tuesday</a> that he would resign from parliament at the end of February. A byelection will be needed in <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/cook-by-election-2024">Morrison’s seat of Cook</a>, which he won by a 62-4–37.6% margin over Labor at the 2022 election.</p>
<p>Former South Australian Liberal Premier Steven Marshall said on Wednesday he would also resign this year. Marshall only won his seat of <a href="https://antonygreen.com.au/sa-state-seat-of-dunstan-set-for-a-by-election/">Dunstan</a> by a 50.5–49.5% margin against Labor at the 2022 state election.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221406/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adrian Beaumont does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The former president leads his only remaining Republican rival, Nikki Haley, by 68% to 12% in an aggregate of national polls.Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2217442024-01-23T20:41:07Z2024-01-23T20:41:07ZFake Biden robocall to New Hampshire voters highlights how easy it is to make deepfakes − and how hard it is to defend against AI-generated disinformation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570887/original/file-20240123-23-3sxfsm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5343%2C3559&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The fake robocall urged Democratic voters in New Hampshire not to vote in the Jan. 23, 2024, primary election.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/campaign-signs-asking-voters-to-write-in-president-joe-news-photo/1945939451">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>An updated version of this article was published on Feb. 8, 2024. <a href="https://theconversation.com/fcc-bans-robocalls-using-deepfake-voice-clones-but-ai-generated-disinformation-still-looms-over-elections-223160">Read it here</a>.</em></p>
<p>An unknown number of New Hampshire voters received a phone call on Jan. 21, 2024, from what sounded like President Joe Biden. A <a href="https://soundcloud.com/user-429524614/fake-joe-biden-robocall-nh">recording contains Biden’s voice</a> urging voters inclined to support Biden and the Democratic Party not to participate in New Hampshire’s Jan. 23 GOP primary election.</p>
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<p>Republicans have been trying to push nonpartisan and Democratic voters to participate in their primary. What a bunch of malarkey. We know the value of voting Democratic when our votes count. It’s important that you save your vote for the November election. We’ll need your help in electing Democrats up and down the ticket. Voting this Tuesday only enables the Republicans in their quest to elect Donald Trump again. Your vote makes a difference in November, not this Tuesday. If you would like to be removed from future calls, please press two now.</p>
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<p>The call <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/22/us/politics/nh-primary-explainer-how-vote.html">falsely implies</a> that a registered Democrat could vote in the Republican primary and that a voter who votes in the primary would be ineligible to vote in the general election in November. The state does allow unregistered voters to participate in either the Republican or Democratic primary.</p>
<p>The call, two days before the primary, appears to have been <a href="https://apnews.com/article/new-hampshire-primary-biden-ai-deepfake-robocall-f3469ceb6dd613079092287994663db5">an artificial intelligence deepfake</a>. It also appears to have been <a href="https://www.doj.nh.gov/news/2024/20240122-voter-robocall.html">an attempt to discourage voting</a>. Biden is <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4418655-biden-new-hampshire-democratic-primary-ballot/">not on the ballot</a> because of a dispute between the Democratic National Committee and New Hampshire Democrats about New Hampshire’s position in the primary schedule, but there is <a href="https://www.npr.org/2024/01/23/1226172266/biden-nh-write-in-ballot">a write-in campaign</a> for Biden.</p>
<p>Robocalls in elections are nothing new and not illegal; many are simply efforts to get out the vote. But they have also been used in <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/michigan-ag-files-felony-charges-again-jack-burkman-jacob-wohl-for-alleged-voter-suppression-scheme">voter suppression</a> campaigns. Compounding this problem in this case is what I believe to be the application of AI to clone Biden’s voice.</p>
<p>In a media ecosystem full of noise, scrambled signals such as deepfake robocalls make it virtually impossible to tell facts from fakes.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The New Hampshire attorney general’s office is investigating the call.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Recently, a number of companies have popped up online <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2023/03/chatbots-deepfakes-voice-clones-ai-deception-sale">offering impersonation as a service</a>. For users like you and me, it’s as easy as selecting a politician, celebrity or executive like Joe Biden, Donald Trump or Elon Musk from a menu and typing a script of what you want them to appear to say, and the website creates the deepfake automatically. Though the audio and video output is usually choppy and stilted, when the audio is delivered via a robocall it’s very believable. You could easily think you are hearing a recording of Joe Biden, but really it’s machine-made misinformation.</p>
<h2>Context is key</h2>
<p>I’m a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=yu4Ew7gAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">media and disinformation scholar</a>. In 2019, information scientist <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=WHtDxZsAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">Brit Paris</a> and I <a href="https://datasociety.net/library/deepfakes-and-cheap-fakes/#">studied how generative adversarial networks</a> – what most people today think of as AI – would transform the ways institutions assess evidence and make decisions when judging realistic-looking audio and video manipulation. What we found was that no single piece of media is reliable on its face; rather, context matters for making an interpretation.</p>
<p>When it comes to AI-enhanced disinformation, the believability of deepfakes hinges on where you see or hear it or who shares it. Without a valid and confirmed source vouching for it as a fact, a deepfake might be interesting or funny but will never pass muster in a courtroom. However, deepfakes can still be damaging when used in efforts to suppress the vote or shape public opinion on divisive issues. </p>
<p>AI-enhanced disinformation campaigns are difficult to counter because unmasking the source requires tracking the trail of metadata, which is the data about a piece of media. How this is done varies, depending on the method of distribution: robocalls, social media, email, text message or websites. Right now, research on audio and video manipulation is more difficult because many big tech companies have shut down access to their application programming interfaces, which make it possible for researchers to collect data about social media, and the companies have <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/26/tech-companies-are-laying-off-their-ethics-and-safety-teams-.html">laid off their trust and safety teams</a>.</p>
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<h2>Timely, accurate, local knowledge</h2>
<p>In many ways, AI-enhanced disinformation such as the New Hampshire robocall poses the same problems as every other form of disinformation. People who use AI to disrupt elections are likely to do what they can to hide their tracks, which is why it’s necessary for the public to remain skeptical about claims that do not come from verified sources, such as local TV news or social media accounts of reputable news organizations. </p>
<p>It’s also important for the public to understand what new audio and visual manipulation technology is capable of. Now that the technology has become widely available, and with a pivotal election year ahead, the fake Biden robocall is only the latest of what is likely to be a series of AI-enhanced disinformation campaigns.</p>
<p>I believe society needs to learn to venerate what I call TALK: timely, accurate, local knowledge. I believe that it’s important to design social media systems that value timely, accurate, local knowledge over disruption and divisiveness.</p>
<p>It’s also important to make it more difficult for disinformers to profit from undermining democracy. For example, the malicious use of technology to suppress voter turnout should be vigorously investigated by federal and state law enforcement authorities. </p>
<p>While deepfakes may catch people by surprise, they should not catch us off guard, no matter how slow the truth is compared with the speed of disinformation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221744/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joan Donovan is on the board of Free Press and the founder of the Critical Internet Studies Institute.</span></em></p>Deepfake technology is widely available, and a pivotal election year lies ahead. The fake Biden robocall is likely to be just the latest of a series of AI-enhanced disinformation campaigns.Joan Donovan, Assistant Professor of Journalism and Emerging Media Studies, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2210112024-01-22T20:18:30Z2024-01-22T20:18:30ZWhy New Hampshire and Iowa don’t make sense as the opening rounds of presidential campaigns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569408/original/file-20240115-224994-2eqxn5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C0%2C5973%2C3997&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Nikki Haley in a crush of reporters after filing paperwork to enter the New Hampshire primary, Oct. 13, 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/republican-presidential-candidate-former-u-n-ambassador-news-photo/1733696158?adppopup=true">Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://apnews.com/article/desantis-iowa-caucuses-election-2024-b41c967b94fda070dfb70dfb1bdcfa44">Iowa</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/new-hampshire-primary-date-secretary-state-scanlan-552decd9c90f1e434d4141ad44bc1322">New Hampshire</a> have long been the first states to hold presidential contests in election years. </p>
<p>But should they go first? </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=FeSk64QAAAAJ&hl=en">political scientist who studies Congress and elections</a>, I know that this largely unquestioned influence of the two states raises serious concerns around fairness, diversity and political representation. Here they are:</p>
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<h2>They don’t represent the country</h2>
<p>White, non-Hispanic residents make up <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/IA">84%</a> and <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/NH/PST045222">89%</a> of Iowa and New Hampshire respectively, compared with just <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045223">58%</a> of the nation as a whole. Iowa and New Hampshire are not representative of the U.S., particularly on the basis of race. </p>
<p>This matters because the presidency is a national office that affects everyone. Because of the boost in <a href="https://rollcall.com/2024/01/10/iowa-vs-new-hampshire-which-matters-more-in-predicting-presidential-nominees/">political momentum</a>, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1532673X9101900103">media coverage</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15377857.2011.540189">donations</a> that a win in Iowa or New Hampshire can provide, their choices have a bigger effect on the race than most other states. Candidates recognize this and campaign accordingly: <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/538/busy-campaign-schedule-save-trumps-gop-primary-opponents/story?id=106292772">Nearly 80% of all Republican candidates’ events</a> through mid-January 2024 had taken place in Iowa and New Hampshire. </p>
<h2>Staggering the primaries isn’t fair</h2>
<p>American elections are carried out by a <a href="https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/election-administration-at-state-and-local-levels">decentralized system</a>. States and parties choose to hold primary elections at different times throughout an election year leading up to the party conventions. </p>
<p>Even if Iowa and New Hampshire were a perfect demographic mirror of the country, the process would still be unfair to states that don’t vote early. In almost all modern cases, the primaries in both major parties have been all but wrapped up by April, leaving dozens of states that had not yet held primaries essentially without a voice in the process. </p>
<p>In the 2020 Democratic primary, for example, Joe Biden’s main rival – <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/08/bernie-sanders-suspends-his-presidential-campaign-175137">Sen. Bernie Sanders – suspended his campaign</a> before 26 states and territories had even held their contests.</p>
<p>Later states might have a kind of information advantage. For example, some states will likely have the benefit of seeing the outcomes of some of Donald Trump’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/trump-investigations-civil-criminal.html">many legal cases</a>, while Iowa and New Hampshire voters will not.</p>
<p>But this advantage cuts both ways. Voters in later-voting states often don’t even see the same slate of candidates on their ballot as Iowans do. Now that Gov. Ron DeSantis has suspended his campaign, most of the country’s voters will never have gotten a chance to weigh in on him. </p>
<h2>What are the alternatives?</h2>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">After Joe Biden’s win in the 2020 South Carolina primary, Democrats moved that state’s 2024 primary to an earlier date.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Different, more diverse states could go first on the primary calendar. For example, frontloading bigger states like California, Illinois or Texas would certainly bring a broader swath of voters into the mix; but it also would make person-to-person campaigning more difficult. It’s also politically fraught: Democrats moved South Carolina earlier in their own primaries in 2024, but it was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/10/us/politics/iowa-new-hampshire-democrats.html">perceived by many</a> as a move to boost incumbent Biden, who lost Iowa and New Hampshire in the 2020 primaries, but won South Carolina.</p>
<p>A more substantial reform could create a single primary election day for all states – how the U.S. does every other election in this country. </p>
<p>Small states would surely dislike this reform: By the current method of staggering elections, these states can shine individually, rather than get lost in the mix of larger states with more voters and delegates. Staggered primaries might also help voters get to know the candidates on a more intimate basis, and political science says voters think of politics <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11109-020-09592-8">in personal terms</a>. </p>
<p>But the current cost – essentially disenfranchising people in later-voting states – might not be worth it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221011/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charlie Hunt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Two states that are not representative of the US, particularly in terms of race, have outsize influence in the presidential campaign.Charlie Hunt, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Boise State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2215512024-01-22T13:31:51Z2024-01-22T13:31:51ZNew Hampshire voting doesn’t look like other states − here’s why that matters for the Republican primary<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570399/original/file-20240119-19-k20she.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Campaign signs sit in the snow along a highway in Concord, N.H., on Jan. 18, 2024. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/campaign-signs-alongside-the-highway-in-concord-new-news-photo/1935914491?adppopup=true">Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images </a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>There isn’t the <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/19/new-hampshire-primary-bust-00136525">usual frenzy</a> that New Hampshire voters are used to in the days leading up to the presidential primary, which this year takes place on Jan. 23, 2024.</em> </p>
<p><em>But even without the traditional debates between candidates and back-to-back public appearances by candidates, voters are still being inundated with advertising, including by mail, explains <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=AEdvQqwAAAAJ&hl=en">Dante Scala</a>, a political science scholar and expert on elections at the University of New Hampshire. Voters there understand the particular significance of their participation in the first primary of the election season, Scala said.</em> </p>
<p><em>The voter makeup in New Hampshire has some unique aspects, Scala explained in an interview with The Conversation. This is the main factor that could shift the expected results of Tuesday night’s election.</em> </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person sits on the floor of a hotel hallway with a red hat that says USA in white and an upside down campaign banner that says 'Live free or die.' People, some also wearing red hats, walk nearby him." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570400/original/file-20240119-17-qtjmd5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Supporters of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump leave a campaign rally in Portsmouth, N.H., on Jan. 17, 2024.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/supporters-of-republican-presidential-candidate-and-former-news-photo/1941350554?adppopup=true">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Every four years, the national media descends on New Hampshire. What do they get wrong about the state’s voters?</h2>
<p>The chief misconception is media outlets tend to group undeclared voters with independent voters. Voter registration works differently in different states. In New Hampshire, <a href="https://www.sos.nh.gov/elections/frequently-asked-questions/voting-party-primaries">you can register</a> as a Democrat, Republican or an undeclared voter. Undeclared means that you are undeclared toward either party, Democrat or Republican. Undeclared voters make up the largest portion of the New Hampshire electorate. </p>
<p>What polling reveals is that a lot of undeclared voters are really partisans. They behave as partisans, their voting patterns are partisan – except for the fact that they choose not to declare as such on the voter rolls. </p>
<p>Political campaigns will aid and abet that perception, saying that their candidates will be very popular here because their strategy includes reaching independent voters. That kind of strategy goes back decades. </p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/18/us/politics/nikki-haley-nh-independents.html">true independents here</a>, but they are a minority of those undeclared voters.</p>
<h2>What is the purpose of registering as an undeclared voter?</h2>
<p>They are the free agents of New Hampshire politics. People might want to be discrete about their political identity. It also allows them more freedom. </p>
<p>As an undeclared voter, I could go to the polls and ask for either a Democrat or a Republican ballot and can essentially become part of either party for the five minutes it takes me to vote. I can then fill out a form that then reverts me back to undeclared status. </p>
<p>Right now, former South Carolina Gov. <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/new-hampshire/">Nikki Haley is losing</a> badly to former president Donald Trump <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/01/18/new-hampshire-nikki-haley-battle-00136196">among Republican voters</a> in New Hampshire. She is hoping that a lot of the undeclared voters show up and vote for her.</p>
<h2>Do undeclared voters make polling less accurate in New Hampshire?</h2>
<p>Even at the last minute, there can be volatility in turnout and voter preferences. The best example of that is in 2008, when there was a Democratic presidential primary debate just before the New Hampshire primary. Famously, a panelist asked Hillary Clinton about her likability. Clinton answered, and then candidate Barack Obama interjected, saying, <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwiYyYHbh-qDAxUTFlkFHZMRDXIQwqsBegQIDhAE&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.com%2Fvideo%2F2013%2F01%2Fobamas-likable-enough-moment-with-hillary-009551&usg=AOvVaw1YsY2fpTRIlkPxz6r1Ob6w&opi=89978449">“You’re likable enough.”</a> </p>
<p>That became the stuff of legend. Women voters in New Hampshire felt that Obama’s remark was condescending to a female candidate, and there was backlash against Obama. Who’s to say what really moved the vote, but <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwiZl-Lkh-qDAxWGF1kFHXdVB3IQFnoECA4QAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2Felections%2F2016%2Fresults%2Fnew-hampshire-president-clinton-trump&usg=AOvVaw2JEMmVecZn17ryJTXjT0pE&opi=89978449">Clinton won in New Hampshire</a>.</p>
<p>There can be a lot of last-minute volatility in a primary that polling might not catch. </p>
<p>To me, it feels as though the undeclared voters are the only flipping point in this election. Republicans, and especially conservative Republicans, make up a majority of the electorate here – there are a lot of moderates, but conservatives outnumber them. And current polling suggests, over and over, that conservative voters have made up their minds.</p>
<p>The flipping point could be an unexpectedly high turnout of undeclared voters, as well as independent voters and Democrats, registered as undeclared, who participate in the primary because they want to disrupt the Trump train and vote as undeclared. This is the biggest variable out there. </p>
<h2>Do New Hampshire voters feel any pressure leading up to the primary?</h2>
<p>A lot of them do. The electorate is relatively politically attentive and well educated. </p>
<p>This time around, though, when I turn on the evening news on the statewide TV station, there is a vibe that this is not an especially competitive race. And the national political media, as well, is saying that this New Hampshire primary is not very competitive. Will the mood on Tuesday be what it is today, which is that the outcome is all but inevitable and Trump will win? </p>
<p>More attentive voters will show up <a href="https://apnews.com/article/new-hampshire-primary-what-to-expect-f767927784a82d54328de4d212eb15cc">regardless on Tuesday</a>, because they feel like it is their obligation. My question now is how will this attitude affect the more casual voter, if they think that the election is already determined?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Nikki Haley walks through a doorway, waving with both hands, to a crowd of people. Several video cameras and phones are pointed closely at her." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570402/original/file-20240119-15-35ut1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley enters a county store in Hooksett, N.H., on Jan. 18, 2024.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-un-ambassador-and-2024-republican-presidential-news-photo/1935911425?adppopup=true">Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What’s the question the media asks about New Hampshire that you never want to hear again?</h2>
<p>Different types of media will ask different things. International media will want a primer on how the presidential nomination process works, which admittedly is complicated and hard to explain. A news site like Politico may want to do a dive on independent suburban voters.</p>
<p>I am getting a little tired of talking about independent voters. It is the right focus, but I am mostly tired of hearing myself talk. I have been asked repeatedly about independent voters, and my answer is not going to change much from Monday to Friday. To me, my favorite part of what happens on Tuesday night is after the polls close and I see what I got right and what I was wrong about. When all is said and done, there is this quiet, and the voters speak.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221551/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dante Scala does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A New Hampshire election and politics expert agrees that independent voters are important in the state’s primary − but they shouldn’t be misconstrued with people who are registered as undeclared.Dante Scala, Professor of political science, University of New HampshireLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2197782024-01-18T13:28:38Z2024-01-18T13:28:38ZWomen presidential candidates like Nikki Haley are more likely to change their positions to reach voters − but this doesn’t necessarily pay off<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568066/original/file-20240105-19-uz1nkq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley greets supporters on Jan. 3, 2024, at a bar in Londonderry, N.H. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/londonderry-nh-former-south-carolina-governor-and-news-photo/1902583157?adppopup=true">Erin Clark/The Boston Globe via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>While Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has said that she is “<a href="https://apnews.com/article/nikki-haley-abortion-republican-primary-1827870a52349f3ee2f0c2b50e110b3b">very pro-life,</a>” she has also said that abortion is a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2023/12/18/nikki-haley-democrats-republicans-presidential-2024/">“personal choice</a>.” Her wording on different thorny political issues such as abortion has left <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2023/12/18/nikki-haley-democrats-republicans-presidential-2024/">some voters confused</a> about where she actually stands.</p>
<p>This has led some political observers, such as Politico journalist Michael Kruse, to say that Haley has “made a career of <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/09/29/nikki-haley-profile-trump-gop-00118794">taking both sides</a>,” citing her positions on issues such as identity politics, Donald Trump and abortion.</p>
<p>In the weeks leading up to the Iowa caucuses, an Iowa voter praised Haley for pursing a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2023/12/18/nikki-haley-democrats-republicans-presidential-2024/">“political middle,”</a> noting this allowed the former South Carolina governor to “compromise” and work “both sides.” Conversely, some conservative commentators have also suggested that Haley’s approach is <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/republicans-brace-nikki-haley-ron-desantis-showdown-debates-rcna117786">“inauthentic</a>.” </p>
<p>Haley placed third in the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 15, 2024, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/01/15/us/elections/results-iowa-caucus.html">drawing support from 19% of voters</a> there. </p>
<p>Polls on Jan. 16, 2024, showed Trump’s lead over Haley in the New Hampshire primary, set for <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-r/2024/new-hampshire/">Jan. 23, narrowing</a>. </p>
<p>We are <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/scientific-contributions/Shawn-J-Parry-Giles-2037362650">communication and English</a> scholars <a href="https://www.cmu.edu/dietrich/english/about-us/faculty/bios/david-kaufer.html">who study</a> the role of language and persuasion in politics. We are particularly interested in the ways that speakers and writers adapt their messages and language in different situations and among various voters. We call this concept rhetorical adaptivity. </p>
<p>Our research shows that women presidential candidates, more than the men they run against, often speak differently to different audiences in pursuit of moderation and common ground. They also tend to shift their strategies and messages in response to criticism. And they often pay a price for it.</p>
<h2>Rhetoric and presidential campaigns</h2>
<p>Politicians changing their words and messages to appeal to different audiences is the subject of a book we co-authored in 2023, <a href="https://msupress.org/9781611864663/hillary-clintons-career-in-speeches/#:%7E:text=Hillary%20Clinton's%20Career%20in%20Speeches%20combines%20statistical%20text%2Dmining%20methods,political%20women%20in%20U.S.%20history">“Hillary Clinton’s Career in Speeches</a>: The Promises and Perils of Women’s Rhetorical Adaptivity.”</p>
<p>This project examined how Clinton, her presidential opponents in 2008 and 2016, and the <a href="https://cawp.rutgers.edu/election-watch/presidential-watch-2020">Democratic women</a> who ran for president in 2020 campaigned differently. We found that women more commonly adjusted their language and reshaped their positions to appeal to more voters and to manage the controversies they faced.</p>
<p>In 2016, for example, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/08/hillary-clinton-abortion/494723/">Hillary Clinton tried to find more of a middle ground</a> on abortion by referring to the “fetus” as an “unborn person” and talking about restrictions on “late-term abortions” – even as she defended a “pro-choice” position. </p>
<p>Both Clinton and Haley opponents have questioned their authenticity, citing the politicians’ shifting language and positions. Such challenges aimed to undermine their candidacies by suggesting they lacked the character to be president.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Hillary Clinton wears a red pantsuit and gestures while standing at a podium, in front of a large crowd of people." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568069/original/file-20240105-29-hul4co.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Hilary Clinton, the Democratic nominee for president in 2016, speaks to a crowd in North Carolina shortly before Election Day on Nov. 8.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/democratic-presidential-nominee-former-secretary-of-state-news-photo/621754706?adppopup=true">Zach Roberts/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Haley’s rhetorical maneuvers</h2>
<p>Haley’s critics also cite her shifting positions, including on issues such as abortion, Palestinians in Gaza and Donald Trump to argue she lacks a political core. </p>
<p>Former Vice President Mike Pence, for example, was quick to condemn Haley’s “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/23/us/abortion-pence-haley-debate.html">compromising stance</a>” on abortion during the August 2023 Republican debate. </p>
<p>Haley’s opponents have also challenged her changing positions on the Israel-Hamas war. As the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Haley supported Israel and disparaged the U.N.’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/15/us/politics/nikki-haley-israel-trump.html">Palestinian refugee agency</a> for “using American money to feed Palestinian hatred of the Jewish state.”</p>
<p>Yet, in the early days of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/15/us/politics/desantis-haley-gaza-refugees-israel.html#:%7E:text=%2C%E2%80%9D%20he%20said.-,Ms.,a%20longstanding%20relationship%20with%20Hamas.">Haley showed more sympathy for the Palestinians</a>. </p>
<p>Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ridiculed Haley’s compassion as being “<a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/16/desantis-haley-gaza-israel-hamas-war-00121869">politically correct</a>.” Haley reaffirmed her pro-Israel priorities in response during a <a href="https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2023/10/20/nikki-haley-says-she-would-support-israel-strengthen-u-s-military-as-president/">speech in Cedar Rapids, Iowa</a>, in mid-October 2023. Haley said she supported Israel and called for the elimination of Hamas. Concern for the Palestinians slipped down the ladder of her priorities.</p>
<p>As a U.N. ambassador, meanwhile, Haley was unwavering in her support for Trump. In her 2019 book, “<a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250266552/withallduerespect">With All Due Respect</a>,” Haley concluded: “In every instance I dealt with Trump, he was truthful, he listened and he was great to work with.”</p>
<p>Since then, Haley has carved a <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/nikki-haley-embraces-trump-in-her-vision-of-gop-future-11633424400">middle ground</a> approach to Trump. She has argued, “<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meetthepressblog/timeline-nikki-haleys-trump-statements-rcna70456">We need him in the Republican Party</a>. I don’t want us to go back to the days before Trump.” </p>
<p>Yet, in other contexts, she <a href="https://apnews.com/article/jewish-republicans-trump-desantis-2024-45ee4b88592754dfd6ed5332612373b6">disparages Trump</a> for <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/nikki-haley-embraces-trump-in-her-vision-of-gop-future-11633424400">sowing “chaos, vendettas and drama</a>.” </p>
<p><a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/abc-nikki-haley-opens-trump-israel/story?id=105523630">Trump called her out</a> on this discrepancy in the fall of 2023. “She criticizes me one minute, and 15 minutes later, she un-criticizes me.” </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Nikki Haley wears a white jacket and stands in front of a group of seated people, with the backdrop of the American flag. She holds a microphone and points her finger towards the crowd." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568068/original/file-20240105-24-l84j8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley speaks at a campaign town hall event in Rye, N.H., on Jan. 2, 2024.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-un-ambassador-and-2024-republican-presidential-news-photo/1895740236?adppopup=true">Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Haley’s character woes</h2>
<p>Other critics frame Haley’s positions as “flip-flopping.” They don’t interpret what she is doing as moderating her positions or using the language of compromise to build consensus. </p>
<p>Time magazine ran a headline in February 2023 that read: “A Brief History of <a href="https://time.com/6252040/nikki-haley-donald-trump-relationship-history/">Nikki Haley’s Biggest Flip Flops on Trump</a>.” In March 2023, The New York Times featured an opinion piece titled, “The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/02/opinion/nikki-haley-president.html">Serene Hypocrisy of Nikki Haley</a>.” </p>
<p>Challenging the authenticity of presidential candidates is commonplace, but it is especially piercing when the challenge is directed against women candidates. In presidential politics, research shows that <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/glennllopis/2014/02/03/the-most-undervalued-leadership-traits-of-women/?sh=3b7e486338a1">women are conditioned</a> to be uniters, consensus-builders and mitigators of any negativity they face. </p>
<p>Yet, efforts to do this and still “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2023/12/31/desantis-christie-haley-slavery-comments-acostanr-brownstein-vpx.cnn">be all things to all people</a>” often result in women candidates falling into gaffe traps. </p>
<p>Haley’s <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/12/30/1222272908/week-in-politics-haleys-gaffe-trump-on-primary-ballots-biden-and-southern-border">initial refusal to associate “slavery” with the Civil War</a> in December 2023 reinforced a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/28/us/politics/nikki-haley-civil-war-slavery.html">southern trope</a> that some Republicans of color called a “<a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2023/12/28/republicans-of-color-nikki-haley-civil-war-00133286">tactical blunder</a>.”</p>
<h2>Women’s election challenges</h2>
<p>More leadership experts are recognizing the benefits of political candidates integrating multiple perspectives into their thinking and speech. The <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/09/20/2-views-on-leadership-traits-and-competencies-and-how-they-intersect-with-gender/">Pew Research Center</a> found in 2018 that in politics as well as business, women are perceived to be more “compassionate” and “empathic” and are more likely to work out “compromises” than men. </p>
<p>Yet, in presidential campaigns, and especially primaries, compromise, adaptivity and problem-solving are exchanged for hubris, rigidity and ideological purity. Playing to the political middle is treated as politically evasive and opportunistic. </p>
<p>Eventually, women playing to the middle become more gaffe-prone as the campaign unfolds. Women, more than the men they run against, are granted minimal room by opponents and pundits for unforced errors before they are quickly dismissed as “<a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2112616119">unelectable</a>.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219778/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Nikki Haley is the latest American female politician to shift her language, depending on whom she is talking to and where. But this tactic has a flip side, prompting criticism of her as inconsistent.Shawn J. Parry-Giles, Professor of Communication, University of MarylandDavid Kaufer, Professor Emeritus of English, Carnegie Mellon UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1832012022-07-05T12:15:38Z2022-07-05T12:15:38ZDemocrats aim to design a presidential nomination process that gives everyone a voice – and produces a winning candidate<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471215/original/file-20220627-20-qgljn7.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C24%2C5447%2C3596&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Supporters of Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg prepare to caucus for him in a high school gym, Feb. 3, 2020, in Des Moines, Iowa. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/supporters-of-democratic-presidential-candidate-democratic-news-photo/1203889098?adppopup=true">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>For the past few election cycles, the quartet of <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/06/democratic-primary-2024-dnc-early-states-00030560">Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina has had a lock</a> on the early spots in the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination process.</p>
<p>But that may be about to change.</p>
<p>Like clockwork every four years, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/michigan-might-have-edge-for-early-slot-on-democrats-2024-calendar-11655904600">Democrats hunker down to tweak their rules for presidential nomination</a>, and right now they’re finely tuning the 2024 calendar. The party has routinely pinned its hopes on nomination rules to pave the way for a November win.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.grinnell.edu/user/trish">As a longtime scholar of the presidential nomination process</a>, I have observed that the rules battles aim to find that sweet spot that is likely to churn out a nominee with broad appeal both within the party and outside of it. </p>
<p>The party needs to balance the legitimacy that comes with a process making it easy for average Democrats to insert their voices with the safety valve that lets savvy party insiders weigh in on the selection. All those pieces must produce a process long enough to ensure real competition, but not so long that internal party fences can’t be mended well in advance of the general election.</p>
<p>This time around, the Democratic National Committee is targeting that mix of states that will start the nomination process, hoping for something better than what’s been in place. It’s taken the unusual step of setting up a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/13/us/politics/democrats-presidential-primary-calendar.html">competition among state parties</a> to help it set the 2024 calendar. Sixteen states and Puerto Rico just made their pitches to the national party to be among the first to hold contests, with a decision expected later this summer.</p>
<p>It’s tempting to flag this all as a ploy to dislodge the Iowa caucuses from their leadoff role, <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2020/01/13/iowa-caucus-everything-you-need-know-first-nation-voting-state/4423552002/">a position they’ve held since 1972</a>. In fact, Iowa’s claim on that privileged position is very much at risk, especially given its <a href="https://theconversation.com/iowa-caucuses-did-one-thing-right-require-paper-ballots-131181">2020 caucus counting fiasco</a>, which I detail in my book, “<a href="https://www.routledge.com/Inside-the-Bubble-Campaigns-Caucuses-and-the-Future-of-the-Presidential/Trish-Menner/p/book/9780367429782">Inside the Bubble</a>.”</p>
<p>Going early matters because it gives Democrats in those states a larger voice in the nomination. Candidates flock to the early states, <a href="https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/02/19/democrats-flood-tiny-new-hampshire-with-a-year-to-go/">interacting with voters</a> and sometimes <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-elections-nevada-idINKBN1XR0DY">tailoring their policy appeals</a> to the needs unique to a state. The first contests <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/us-presidential-nominating-process">don’t determine who will win</a>, but they typically knock some candidates out of the running. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="People on one side of a table, listening to a woman talking to them from the other side." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471224/original/file-20220627-26-zg7260.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Election workers at the Elks lodge, Ward 4, in Dover, N.H., on Feb. 11, 2020, when the New Hampshire primary was held.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/moderator-kate-hill-left-talks-with-election-workers-at-the-news-photo/1200330291?adppopup=true">Craig F. Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Who gets to choose?</h2>
<p>The two major U.S. parties are <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/04/27/why-are-there-only-two-parties-in-american-politics/">federal in nature</a>, their organizational structures reflecting the array of elective offices for which they compete, from county sheriff to the president. Even so, the national party is well positioned to call the shots at the state level, shored up by a now decadesold Supreme Court decision establishing the <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/419/477.html">national party’s superiority over state parties</a>.</p>
<p>The national committee has kept control over the calendar for a long time, starting down that path when it <a href="https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93937947">overhauled nomination rules after the contentious 1968 Democratic national convention</a>. The package of reforms, implemented first in 1972, sought to take presidential nominations out of the proverbial back room and make them more open, more democratic.</p>
<p>Technically, at the primaries and caucuses, <a href="https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/elections/presidential-election-process/political-primaries-how-are-candidates-nominated/">voters select the delegates who support the presidential candidate they favor</a>. At the party convention, the candidate with the <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Democratic_delegate_rules,_2020">majority of delegates</a> wins the nomination.</p>
<p>Before the 1972 reforms, delegate selection wasn’t always tied to outcomes in primaries and caucuses. According to nomination expert <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/book/primary-politics-3/">Elaine Kamarck</a>, 25% of 1968’s presidential delegates were selected in 1967, well before what’s now considered the formal start of the nomination race.</p>
<h2>From caucuses to primaries</h2>
<p>Under the initial terms of the 1972 reforms, the national party didn’t limit how early in the election year a state could hold its nomination contest. That Iowa went first in 1972, though, was not so much a deliberate move for positioning as an unintentional byproduct of another national party rule.</p>
<p>The reformed system, in the interest of allowing time to publicize contests, required 30 days’ notice of delegate selection contests. That meant Iowa had to start early, since the state’s process involved a series of contests, not just the prominent precinct caucuses. But Iowa started even earlier than dictated by the new rules, essentially because of a fluke involving <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/why-iowa-gets-to-go-first-and-other-facts-about-tonights-caucus/2011/08/25/gIQAJtygYP_blog.html">high demand on hotel rooms</a>. </p>
<p>By 1980, Iowa had secured its role as <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/why-iowa-and-new-hampshire-go-first">the first caucus and New Hampshire was designated</a> as the first primary. For that election cycle, the Democratic National Committee imposed a rule condensing nomination contests into a 13-week window, beginning in early March. But then-President Jimmy Carter, seeking reelection and with sway over his party, <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2019/08/30/iowa-caucus-a-brief-history-of-why-iowa-caucuses-are-first-election-2020-dnc-virtual-caucus/2163813001/">pushed for an exception for Iowa and New Hampshire</a>, states that had jump-started his 1976 campaign and might serve as a firewall. The national committee ultimately granted the exception. </p>
<p>Back in the 1970s, the Democratic National Committee had no beef with caucuses, and <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/01/31/what-to-know-about-the-iowa-caucuses/ft_20-01-28_iowaexplainer_3/">more states held caucuses than primaries</a>. They were seen as settings for deliberation and activist engagement.</p>
<p>But in 2022, caucuses are under fire for being <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/01/31/801251408/for-some-iowa-voters-caucuses-remain-a-barrier-to-participation">exclusionary</a>, and most states hold primaries. The switch from caucuses to primaries in the 1970s and 1980s was largely an unanticipated consequence of the initial reform, because complying with those new rules from 1972 was easier with primaries than caucuses. In 2020, the Democratic National Committee pushed states <a href="https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/URC_Report_FINAL.pdf">to expand the use of primaries</a>, asserting that they are more inclusive, transparent and accessible than caucuses.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Ten people on a brightly lit stage." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471225/original/file-20220627-26-6plgjr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Caucuses and primaries aim to winnow down large fields of candidates. These 10 Democrats were only half of the field when this debate was held on June 26, 2019, in Miami.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/democratic-presidential-candidates-new-york-city-mayor-bill-news-photo/1158519177?adppopup=true">Joe Raedle/Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Losing sway</h2>
<p>The irony is that in moving to a primary, a party relinquishes power. </p>
<p>Caucuses are party-run and party-financed events, while primaries are state-run party elections. In <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Partisan_composition_of_state_legislatures">an era dominated by Republican-controlled state legislatures</a>, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/08/13/1026588142/map-see-which-states-have-restricted-voter-access-and-which-states-have-expanded">some of which have passed restrictive voting laws</a>, Democratic primary states put themselves at the mercy of the opposition party.</p>
<p>This summer’s actions by the Democratic National Committee could shake up the 2024 calendar. Iowa’s at risk of losing its privileged position, but so far the committee hasn’t guaranteed any state an exception to the 13-week window. The committee says that up to five states will be able to hold contests before the window begins. The other three traditional early-goers, I believe, are positioned a little better than Iowa to nab one of the early slots. </p>
<p>There’s no reason to think that White House pressure would prevail as it has in the past, but if so, the <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/02/05/joe-biden-iowa-caucus-gut-punch-110837">“gut punch”</a> Iowa delivered to then-candidate Biden in 2020 and his <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/01/joe-biden-south-carolina-118379">“resurrection”</a> in South Carolina would likely carry weight in the deliberations.</p>
<p>Iowa Democrats <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2022/06/03/iowa-caucuses-democrats-propose-major-changes-caucus-presidential-election/7484775001/">submitted their proposal</a> to the Democratic National Committee in early June 2022, describing a process that retains the caucus label yet complies with stated committee criteria of fairness, transparency and inclusivity. Notably, Iowa’s new plan provides for a period for participants to express presidential preferences before the actual caucuses, meaning there would be a way for voters to participate without attending the caucuses. This would make the process a little more inclusive. </p>
<p>A final decision on which states will be able to hold early contests is expected from the Democratic National Committee in early September. </p>
<p>Whatever the shape of the new calendar, it’s a safe bet that things won’t play out precisely as planned, given that unanticipated consequences have marked the party’s reform efforts in the past.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/183201/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Barbara A. Trish does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Iowa caucuses have traditionally heralded the start of the Democratic Party’s presidential nominating contest. But the party, eager to maintain the White House, is redesigning that process.Barbara A. Trish, Professor of Political Science, Grinnell CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1314502020-02-11T12:32:01Z2020-02-11T12:32:01ZThe opioid crisis is a big issue in New Hampshire – 5 questions answered on what voters want the candidates to do<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314597/original/file-20200210-109887-xqm1eg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=14%2C9%2C3232%2C2140&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">At the New Hampshire primary debate, America's opioid crisis came up as an issue.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Election-2020-Debate/452cf965ccb24d25b03304498e910d47/15/0">Elise Amendola/AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>America’s opioid crisis has hit New Hampshire hard, creating an epidemic of overdoses and addiction-related health issues in the early primary state.</em></p>
<p><em>We asked Amanda Latimore, an <a href="https://www.jhsph.edu/faculty/directory/profile/3091/amanda-latimore">opioid and behavioral health expert at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health</a>, to explain why the opioid crisis is important to voters and what candidates could be doing to address it.</em></p>
<h2>1. How important is the opioid crisis to NH voters?</h2>
<p>Drug misuse was the number one issue for New Hampshire voters <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2016/02/09/no-1-issue-for-new-hampshire-voters-may-surprise-you.html">in 2016 polls</a>, overshadowing jobs, the economy and health care. At the time, the state was second in the nation for drug overdose deaths. Four years later, New Hampshire remains among the states with the highest rates of <a href="https://www.drugabuse.gov/drugs-abuse/opioids/opioid-summaries-by-state">opioid-</a> and <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/data/statedeaths.html">total drug-related deaths</a>. Yet according to <a href="https://d279m997dpfwgl.cloudfront.net/wp/2020/01/Crosstabs-2020-01-WBUR-NH-D-Primary-Politics.pdf">a January 2020 poll</a> only 1% of voters want Democratic candidates to discuss opioids, while nearly half (48%) want to hear more from candidates on health care. </p>
<p>Is this a signal that addiction and the opioid crisis are no longer an important issue for the New Hampshire primary? Not likely. </p>
<p>I suspect that New Hampshire voters are recognizing that addiction is not a moral failing, but a chronic illness that is part of a broader health care discussion. There may be greater awareness that effective medications are available to treat addiction and that supportive conversations about substance use disorder can happen in your primary care doctor’s office. </p>
<h2>2. Is concern split evenly across party lines?</h2>
<p>Regardless of their political affiliation, the opioid crisis has likely affected everyone in New Hampshire either directly or indirectly. Drug pricing is one area that seems to <a href="https://socialsecurityworks.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Drug-Pricing-Swing-District-Poll-Results.pdf">cross party lines</a>, with 84% of Republicans and 96% of Democrats agreeing that drug prices are an important issue. Collaboration in Congress on this issue could reduce the price of the overdose-reversing medication, naloxone, which is currently so expensive that it <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/2017/11/21/as-opioid-crisis-worsens-a-drug-used-to-reverse-overdoses-can-be-difficult-to-access/">strains government agency budgets</a> across the U.S. and deters the average American from picking up naloxone at their pharmacy.</p>
<h2>3. What remedies to the crisis are popular among voters?</h2>
<p>Requiring insurers to cover addiction treatment was <a href="https://d279m997dpfwgl.cloudfront.net/wp/2020/01/Crosstabs-2020-01-WBUR-NH-D-Primary-Politics.pdf">the most popular strategy</a> cited by likely voters in the New Hampshire Democratic primary, according to a poll conducted for Boston-based WBUR. With 90% approval for that measure, candidates would be well-advised to campaign on enforcing laws which already require insurance companies to cover behavioral health services at the same level as other medical benefits.</p>
<p>Other popular solutions include expanding needle exchanges (71% in favor); taking legal action against pharmaceutical companies for their role in the opioid crisis (80%); supervised consumption spaces, where people can safely use drugs under medical supervision (57%), and decriminalizing possession of small amounts of drugs (66%).</p>
<p>Harm reduction strategies, like needle exchange programs, recognize that not everyone is ready to stop using drugs, but still help people stay safe. This approach is essential for <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23975473">preventing the transmission</a> of infectious diseases like HIV. Supervised consumption spaces have been <a href="https://harmreductionjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12954-017-0154-1">found to reduce overdoses</a>, particularly in the area near the program site. They also create an open door for people who are typically poorly served by traditional health care settings, if and when they’re ready to seek treatment.</p>
<p>The state of New Hampshire primed its voters to understand that accessible behavioral health does not operate in a silo. The state takes a “no wrong door” approach to supporting those affected by the opioid crisis. This includes initiatives like <a href="https://www.wellsense.org/-/media/1019ec4c0a6d43e9bb826607c3df2d5d.ashx">Safe Stations</a> and <a href="https://thedoorway.nh.gov/home">The Doorway</a>, through which those seeking addiction treatment or support for themselves or a loved one can get a referral. </p>
<p>New Hampshire laws that explicitly protect syringe service programs and the participants they serve and Medicaid coverage for opioid use disorder medications like methadone and buprenorphine make it easier for people to get access to the support they need when they need it.</p>
<h2>4. What policies do health experts recommend?</h2>
<p><a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2760032">Medications for opioid use disorder</a> help reduce both overdose deaths and use of high-cost medical services, but only 12% of people with opioid use disorder are treated with these life-saving drugs. While those medications are covered by New Hampshire’s Medicaid expansion, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6330240/">several barriers still exist</a>. Doctors currently must undergo additional training to prescribe buprenorphine and are further restricted by having a cap on the number of patients to which they can prescribe the medication. Removing these unnecessary barriers, that don’t exist for most other chronic illness medications, would improve access.</p>
<p>To win over New Hampshire voters, candidates should consider supporting efforts to create national standards for behavioral health services. Individuals seeking care should have access to information about the quality of a treatment facility and whether it offers evidence-based services.</p>
<p>State adoption of Medicaid expansion in the U.S. between 2001 and 2017 was associated with a <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2758476">6% decrease</a> in opioid overdose deaths. Any action that restricts or eliminates coverage could reverse progress.</p>
<h2>5. How do the candidates positions differ?</h2>
<p>Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg all propose increasing funding to support treatment and harm-reduction initiatives.</p>
<p>Joe Biden seeks to build on the existing health care system and enforce insurance coverage rules. </p>
<p>Decriminalizing addiction may be the single most important factor for reducing stigma on addiction. And once we stop seeing those who are addicted as criminals, resistance clears for implementing evidence-based strategies.</p>
<p>Pre-arrest diversion programs recognize that people need treatment not jail time. It is encouraging to me that this sentiment has been shared by nearly all Democratic primary candidates. </p>
<p>Andrew Yang takes a bold stance on decriminalizing several drugs, but he also suggests imposing mandatory treatment after an overdose and significant restrictions on those who can prescribe opioids. Neither of these approaches are supported by evidence and, in my opinion, may do more harm than good. </p>
<p>Amy Klobuchar is one of the few candidates talking about early prevention. The evidence suggests that problematic drug use in adulthood is less likely if youth reach age-appropriate academic and social milestones. Candidates should develop strategies that ensure families and communities get the economic and social supports they need to help youth reach these goals. </p>
<p>In the debate ahead of the New Hampshire primary, opioids got a mention. But the conversation – taking place in a state that is 94% white – didn’t go deep into how drug policy, along with inequitable economic and health outcomes, works against black and brown Americans. To be truly transformative, candidates must show how their solutions for the opioid crisis will uproot the country’s legacy of inequity to improve health and well-being for all. </p>
<p>[<em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amanda Latimore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In 2016, drug misuse was cited as the top concern among New Hampshire voters. What remedies are the Democratic primary contenders putting forward to combat the opioid crisis?Amanda Latimore, Assistant Scientist, Johns Hopkins UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1195712019-07-30T12:37:56Z2019-07-30T12:37:56ZHow did the US presidential campaign get to be so long?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545384/original/file-20230829-9973-huoio9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=121%2C363%2C4932%2C3530&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley holds a town hall in South Carolina on Aug. 28, 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/following-a-strong-performance-in-the-first-republican-news-photo/1629838244?adppopup=true">Peter Zay/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Four hundred and forty-four days prior to the 2024 presidential election, millions of Americans tuned into the first Republican primary debate. If this seems like a long time to contemplate the candidates, it is. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/10/21/450238156/canadas-11-week-campaign-reminds-us-that-american-elections-are-much-longer">By comparison</a>, Canadian election campaigns average just 50 days. In France, candidates have just two weeks to campaign, while Japanese law restricts campaigns to a meager 12 days. </p>
<p>Those countries all give more power than the United States does to the legislative branch, which might explain the limited attention to the selection of the chief executive. But Mexico – which, like the US, has a <a href="https://www.annenbergclassroom.org/glossary_term/presidential-system/">presidential system</a> – only allows 90 days for its presidential campaigns, with a 60-day “pre-season,” the equivalent of the US nomination campaign. </p>
<p>So by all accounts, the United States has exceptionally long elections – and they just keep getting longer. <a href="https://www.drake.edu/polsci/facultystaff/rachelpainecaufield/">As a political scientist living in Iowa</a>, I’m acutely aware of how long the modern American presidential campaign has become.</p>
<p>It wasn’t always this way. The seemingly interminable presidential campaign is <a href="https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/01/22/as-length-of-presidential-campaigns-increases-2020-might-follow-suit/">a modern phenomenon</a>. It originated out of widespread frustration with the control that national parties used to wield over the selection of candidates. But changes to election procedures, along with <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2960400?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">media coverage</a> that started to depict the election as a horse race, <a href="https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/01/22/as-length-of-presidential-campaigns-increases-2020-might-follow-suit/">have also contributed to the trend</a>.</p>
<h2>Wresting power from party elites</h2>
<p>For most of American history, party elites determined who would be best suited to compete in the general election. It was a process that took little time and required virtually no public campaigning by candidates. </p>
<p>But beginning in the early 20th century, populists and progressives <a href="https://conventions.cps.neu.edu/history/the-progressive-era-reforms-and-the-birth-of-the-primaries-1890-1960/">fought for greater public control over the selection of their party’s candidates</a>. They introduced the modern presidential primary and advocated for a more inclusive selection process of convention delegates. As candidates sought support from a wider range of people, they began to employ modern campaign tactics, like advertising. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, becoming the nominee didn’t require a protracted campaign.</p>
<p>Consider 1952, when <a href="https://millercenter.org/president/eisenhower/campaigns-and-elections">Dwight Eisenhower</a> publicly announced that he was a Republican just 10 months before the general election and indicated that he was willing to run for president. Even then, he remained overseas as NATO commander until June, when he resigned to campaign full time. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286096/original/file-20190729-43145-6bapdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Harry S. Truman points to Adlai E. Stevenson, as he introduces him at the 1952 Democratic convention in Chicago.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-A-CVN-IL-USA-APHS420172-DNC-Stevenson-/7a7a2497ac6648e1a05f9bd8914ba958/11/0">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On the Democratic side, despite encouragement from President Harry Truman, <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1996-07-26-9701150606-story.html">Adlai Stevenson</a> repeatedly rejected efforts to draft him for the nomination, until his welcoming address at the national convention in July 1952 – just a few months before the general election. His speech excited the delegates so much that they put his name in the running, and he became the nominee. </p>
<p>And in 1960, even though <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/kennedys-nomination-was-a-big-moment-for-the-primary-system/">John F. Kennedy</a> appeared on the ballot in only 10 of the party’s 16 state primaries, he was still able to use his win in heavily Protestant West Virginia to convince party leaders that he could attract support, despite his Catholicism.</p>
<h2>A shift to primaries</h2>
<p>The contentious <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/1960s/1968-democratic-convention">1968 Democratic convention</a> in Chicago, however, led to a series of reforms. </p>
<p>That convention had pitted young anti-war activists supporting Eugene McCarthy against older establishment supporters of Vice President Hubert Humphrey. Thousands of protesters rioted in the streets as Humphrey was nominated. It revealed deep divisions within the party, with many members convinced that party elites had operated against their wishes. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20452374?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">The resulting changes to the nomination process</a> – dubbed the McGovern-Fraser reforms – were explicitly designed to allow rank-and-file party voters to participate in the nomination of a presidential candidate.</p>
<p>States increasingly <a href="http://crystalball.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/the-modern-history-of-the-democratic-presidential-primary-1972-2008/?upm_export=print">shifted</a> to public primaries rather than party caucuses. In a party <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/caucus-system-us-presidential-nominating-process">caucus system</a> – like that used in Iowa – voters meet at a designated time and place to discuss candidates and issues in person. By design, a caucus tends to attract activists deeply engaged in party politics. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2015/05/12/everything-you-need-to-know-about-how-the-presidential-primary-works/?utm_term=.eb8b072ce77c">Primaries</a>, on the other hand, are conducted by the state government and require only that a voter show up for a few moments to cast their ballot. </p>
<p>As political scientist Elaine Kamarck <a href="https://www.npr.org/books/titles/471571510/primary-politics-everything-you-need-to-know-about-how-america-nominates-its-pre">has noted</a>, in 1968, only 15 states held primaries; by 1980, 37 states held primaries. For the 2024 election, only Iowa, Nevada, Idaho, North Dakota, Utah and Hawaii <a href="https://www.270towin.com/2024-presidential-election-calendar/">have confirmed that they’ll hold caucuses</a>; the remaining U.S. states and territories will likely hold primaries.</p>
<p>The growing number of primaries meant that candidates were encouraged to use any tool at their disposal to reach as many voters as possible. Candidates became more entrepreneurial, name recognition and media attention became more important, and campaigns became more media savvy – and expensive. </p>
<p>This shift marked the beginning of what political scientists call the “<a href="https://newbooksnetwork.com/brian-arbour-candidate-centered-campaigns-political-messages-winning-personalities-and-personal-appeals-palgrave-macmillan-2014/">candidate-centered campaign</a>.” </p>
<h2>The early bird gets the worm</h2>
<p>In 1974, as he concluded his term as Governor of Georgia, just <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=4XKu7rZVG1AC&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=jimmy+carter+name+recognition+1974&source=bl&ots=8jlO6tdIuz&sig=ACfU3U3TgTIDwPyhGezopzRq5_uG05YxcQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi1wayNldvjAhWKZ80KHUC1C0w4FBDoATAJegQIChAB#v=onepage&q=jimmy%20carter%20name%20recognition%201974&f=false">2% of voters</a> recognized the name of Democrat Jimmy Carter. He had virtually no money. </p>
<p>But Carter theorized that he could build momentum by proving himself in states that held early primaries and caucuses. So on Dec. 12, 1974 – 691 days before the general election – <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/12/13/archives/georgias-gov-carter-enters-democratic-race-for-president-governor.html">Carter announced his presidential campaign</a>. Over the course of 1975, he spent much of his time in Iowa, talking to voters and building a campaign operation in the state. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/286095/original/file-20190729-43118-1bf5wv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jimmy Carter speaks to a crowd of supporters at a farm in Des Moines, Iowa.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/Search?query=jimmy+carter+iowa&ss=10&st=kw&entitysearch=&toItem=18&orderBy=Newest&searchMediaType=allmedia">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>By October 1975, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1975/10/27/archives/carter-appears-to-hold-a-solid-lead-in-iowa-as-the-campaigns-first.html">The New York Times was heralding Carter’s popularity in Iowa</a>, pointing to his folksy style, agricultural roots and political prowess. Carter came in second in that caucus – “uncommitted” won – but he yielded more votes than any other named candidate. Carter’s campaign was widely accepted as the runaway victor, boosting his prominence, name recognition and fundraising. </p>
<p>Carter would go on to win the nomination and the election.</p>
<p>His successful campaign became <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/01/jimmy-carter-iowa-caucuses/426729/">the stuff of political legend</a>. Generations of political candidates and organizers have since adopted the early start, hoping that a better-than-expected showing in Iowa or New Hampshire will similarly propel them to the White House. </p>
<h2>Other states crave the spotlight</h2>
<p>As candidates tried to <a href="http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/06/jimmy-carter-is-emerging-as-a-role-model-in-2020-primaries.html">repeat Carter’s success</a>, other states tried to steal some of Iowa’s political prominence by pushing their contests earlier and earlier in the nomination process, a trend called “<a href="https://www.uakron.edu/bliss/docs/state-of-the-parties-documents/Wattier.pdf">frontloading</a>.” </p>
<p>In 1976, when Carter ran, <a href="https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1083&context=polisci_pubs">just 10% of national convention delegates were selected by March 2</a>. By 2008, 70% of delegates were selected by March 2.</p>
<p>When state primaries and caucuses were spread out in the calendar, candidates could compete in one state, then move their campaign operation to the next state, raise some money and spend time getting to know the activists, issues and voters before the next primary or caucus. A frontloaded system, in contrast, requires candidates to run a campaign in dozens of states at the same time. </p>
<p>To be competitive in so many states at the same time, campaigns rely on extensive <a href="https://www.thecampaignworkshop.com/paid-media-vs-earned-media-how-do-they-fit-campaign-budget">paid and earned</a> media exposure and a robust campaign staff, all of which require substantial name recognition and campaign cash before the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary. </p>
<p>The parties exacerbated these trends in 2016 and 2020, using the number of donors and public polls to determine who is eligible for early debates. For example, <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rnc-debate-rules_n_647a532ae4b091b09c32a9b9">to earn a place on the stage</a> of the first Republican debate in August 2023, candidates had to accumulate at least 40,000 donors and at least 1% support in three national polls.</p>
<p>So that’s how the U.S. got to where it is today.</p>
<p>A century ago, Warren Harding announced his successful candidacy 321 days before the 1920 election. </p>
<p>In the 2020 race, Democratic Congressman John Delaney announced his White House bid a record 1,194 days before election.</p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of an article originally published on July 30, 2019.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/119571/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachel Paine Caufield does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While other countries set strict limits on the length of campaigns, American presidential races have become drawn-out, yearslong affairs. It wasn’t always this way.Rachel Paine Caufield, Professor of Political Science, Drake UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/544612016-02-10T18:43:20Z2016-02-10T18:43:20ZDid independent voters decide the New Hampshire primary?<p>Last week, the diehards had their say in Iowa. Last night in New Hampshire, the independents took their turn. </p>
<p>The Iowa caucuses are time-consuming, and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/02/03/ted-cruz-and-bernie-sanders-had-a-good-caucus-but-primaries-are-another-matter/">only the most committed or ideological partisans show up</a>. </p>
<p>But New Hampshire’s election laws allow people to vote in the primaries even if they are not registered with one of the parties. These voters – the “undeclared” – make up just over 40 percent of potential primary voters in the Granite State. The fact that these undeclared voters could participate in voting has <a href="http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2016/02/07/independent-voters-are-important-in-new-hampshire-primary-origwx-al.cnn">led some to suggest</a> that the New Hampshire primary lay in the hands of independent voters.</p>
<p>But were these voters pivotal? Research that <a href="http://www.samaraklar.com">Samara Klar</a> and I did for our new book, <em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Independent-Politics-American-Political-Inaction/dp/1316500632/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1455078365&sr=8-1&keywords=krupnikov">Independent Politics</a>,</em> indicates the answer to this question is more complicated than simple exit poll numbers suggest.</p>
<h2>A good-sized minority</h2>
<p>According to CNN’s exit polls, of those who voted in the <a href="http://www.cnn.com/election/primaries/polls/nh/Rep">Republican primary</a>, 60 percent were registered Republicans and 35 percent were undeclared voters. </p>
<p>Among those who voted in the <a href="http://www.cnn.com/election/primaries/polls/nh/Dem">Democratic primary</a>, 41 percent were undeclared, while 54 percent were registered Democrats. </p>
<p>In both parties, exit polls had no information about the registration status of about five to six percent of the primary voters – which explains why these numbers don’t total 100 percent.</p>
<p>Exit polls ask respondents to describe their registration status – Republican, Democrat or undeclared. But they also ask people how they describe their own political leanings. A person, for example, may be an undeclared voter but freely report that he or she is a Democrat or Republican. </p>
<p>When we look at exit poll questions that allowed people to describe their own political leaning, about 40 percent of the voters in both primaries identified as “independent.” </p>
<p>On the Republican side, the independents and the party enrolled both favored the same candidate, Donald Trump, by about 35 percent. In other words, exit polls suggest that independent voters didn’t change who won the Republican race. </p>
<p>What’s more, we see few divides between independents and Republicans as we go down the list of GOP candidates. John Kasich, for example, takes second place at similar rates among voters who consider themselves Republican and those who consider themselves independent.</p>
<p>Independents do appear much more pivotal in the Democratic primary. </p>
<p>Although Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders split the self-identified Democrats’ vote nearly evenly (48 percent to 52 percent), Sanders took 72 percent of the independents.</p>
<h2>Motivation is key</h2>
<p>It’s important to understand that a person’s choice to be an “undeclared” voter does not mean that he or she has no particular preference for a party. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Independent-Voter-Bruce-Keith/dp/0520077202/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1455078542&sr=8-1&keywords=myth+of+the+independent">Political scientists</a> have demonstrated that people who are independent or “undeclared” often clearly like one party better than the other. For some, this classification may reflect the fact that their political positions do not fit neatly with either party. For others, the label may simply be a way of hiding their ideological connection to a party. </p>
<p>Our research shows that people’s desire to hide their partisan connection stems from dissatisfaction with the two political parties. Media coverage that highlights partisan bickering and polarization, we argue, leads people to believe that there is nothing positive about the party establishment. If that is the case, it should not be surprising that the large number of independents voting in the New Hampshire primaries threw their support behind candidates with no experience in either party machine.</p>
<p>The New Hampshire exit polls suggest that the independence of the primary voters is – at least in part – a mirage. Among those who voted in the Republican primary, 71 percent identify as conservatives and 27 percent report they are moderate. Of those voting in the Democratic primary, 69 percent reported they were liberal and 27 percent report that they were moderate. These patterns suggest a notable connection between party and ideology that has remained undiluted by the presence of independent or undeclared voters. </p>
<p>Indeed, the majority of New Hampshire voters who believe that the next president should come from “outside the establishment” supported Trump and Sanders. Among Republican voters who wanted an “outside the establishment” candidate, 61 percent supported Trump. Meanwhile, 86 percent of those on the Democratic side who wanted an “outside the establishment” candidate supported Sanders. Notably, however, only 27 percent of those voting in the Democratic primary reported this sentiment, while 50 percent of Republicans did. </p>
<p>As Klar and I <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/01/26/trump-and-sanders-allow-partisans-to-stick-with-their-parties-while-also-rejecting-them/">have argued</a>, the same forces that lead people to avoid associating with parties would also lead them to candidates like Trump and Sanders. </p>
<h2>A weakening force</h2>
<p>As interesting as independents are in New Hampshire, it’s difficult to draw any conclusions about the remaining primaries from this first one. Due in part to its unusual primary structure, New Hampshire may draw more independent voters than primaries in other states. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, New Hampshire hints at an emerging relationship between the independent voter and the nonestablishment candidate. It is only reasonable that voters who avoid publicly identifying with established parties would be drawn to candidates who seem to care little about what their party wants or thinks. </p>
<p>Only time will tell if this connection between independents and the establishment will change the party system. Decades of political science research show that when it comes to the general election, most independents fall into party lines and vote for whichever candidate the party they prefer has <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Independent-Voter-Bruce-Keith/dp/0520077202/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1455128849&sr=8-1&keywords=myth+of+the+independent+voter">nominated</a>. </p>
<p>On the other hand, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/01/26/the-easy-test-for-the-party-decides-suddenly-doesnt-look-so-easy/">political science research</a> could not have predicted that nonestablishment candidates like Trump and Sanders would win primaries. So perhaps the lesson of independents in New Hampshire is that the parties in 2016 are heading toward uncharted territory.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54461/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Yanna Krupnikov does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>NH’s election laws allow people to vote in the primaries even if they are not registered with one of the parties. How pivotal are these unenrolled voters? We look beyond the exit polls for answers.Yanna Krupnikov, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Stony Brook University (The State University of New York)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/542102016-02-10T05:18:56Z2016-02-10T05:18:56ZRepublican race remains congested after a New Hampshire pile-up<p>The <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/09/politics/new-hampshire-primary-highlights/">New Hampshire primary</a> is over, and the contest for the Republican nomination remains tumultuous and muddled. The Granite State may have a reputation for winnowing the election field, but it seems likely that most candidates will go on to the next contest in South Carolina on February 20. </p>
<p>Donald Trump won comfortably enough. <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-election-what-do-the-iowa-results-actually-mean-53574">Iowa cacuses</a> winner Ted Cruz slipped, but not fatally. Marco Rubio crashed, perhaps catastrophically, into fifth place. Two governors did respectably, while another was effectively counted out. So what next for the Republican contenders?</p>
<h2>The outsiders</h2>
<p>Trump’s hearty showing may do something to staunch a flow of <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/trump-team-struggles-with-candidate-who-wont-adjust-218983">skeptical stories</a> about the efficacy of his threadbare organisation and freewheeling campaigning style. He tends to dismiss criticism of his ground game as irrelevant, since his success is fuelled principally by his money and personality: as he told CNN on the eve of the primary, “<a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/08/politics/trump-rubio-momentum-interview/">I’m the product</a>”.</p>
<p>The muddle for second place and Rubio’s tumble certainly helped Trump. For now, his chances are next to impossible to predict, since there is precious little precedent for his campaign. What’s clear is that he benefits from the pile-up behind him: the more candidates in play for the consensus lane, the stronger his chances of clinching the nomination.</p>
<p>Ted Cruz, meanwhile, was always going to struggle in New Hampshire, since his Iowa win relied heavily on that state’s much larger evangelical population. And so his team spent the week-long New Hampshire campaign <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/new-hampshire-primary-2016-live-updates/2016/02/new-hampshire-primary-ted-cruz-marco-rubio-donald-trump-219003">dampening expectations</a>, already keen to get to South Carolina and begin what they hope is a successful swing through favourable states in March. </p>
<p>Cruz has a potentially plausible path to the nomination, and will hope to rack up delegates and build an unstoppable momentum over the next month. He has strong organisation in many Southern states, with support from Tea Party activists in many instances. But he’ll face severe challenges if he can’t broaden his appeal: <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2015/11/03/chapter-4-social-and-political-attitudes/">only around 8% of Americans identify as “very conservative”</a>, the core of his vote.</p>
<h2>The governors</h2>
<p>The most interesting performances were those of the race’s three governors. John Kasich, Jeb Bush and Chris Christie all want to be the successful “consensus” candidate, appealing to moderate conservatives and receiving establishment support. As experienced executives with moderate records, they should have the best claims to the throne – but this logic seems not to apply in a year when voters are furious with the government and uninterested in experience claims. Bush, Kasich and Christie have duly found their resumés all but useless so far.</p>
<p>The governors needed results strong enough to allow them to make a plausible case for staying in the race: ultimately, two of them did. </p>
<p>Kasich exceeded expectations by coming second, which will easily propel him to South Carolina. He fought a positive campaign in New Hampshire, upbeat in style. He presented himself as the most moderate of the Republican candidates, preaching pragmatism and bipartisanship. But he has a long way to go to be the leading consensus candidate; so far, he has a paltry campaign organisation and limited national support.</p>
<p>Bush’s team, meanwhile, spent the run-up to the primary saying he only needed to do well enough to justify continuing to South Carolina, where his operation is <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/jeb-bush-south-carolina-ads-219014">well advanced</a>. While some donors are apparently itching for him to withdraw, Bush has built a national infrastructure and still has a hard core of supporters. In particular, he’ll be looking forward to his home state of Florida’s winner-take-all primary on March 15 – but he has to make it there first. </p>
<p>Christie <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/chris-christie-works-to-build-on-his-new-hampshire-debate-performance-1454887184">won admirers</a> for his gutsy performance in the last debate, but it came too late to bump him up the rankings in New Hampshire. He’s duly let it be known he is withdrawing, and it’s not hard to see why: he had raised little money and assembled only a weak campaign infrastructure, and would have had to pull in a lot more donors quickly to plot a credible path to the nomination.</p>
<p>For now, the other two governors muddle on, but probably with little enthusiasm for the looming primaries. As long as they’re chasing the same pool of centre-right votes and cannibalising each other’s support, Cruz and Trump will be free to take the initiative. </p>
<h2>The boy in the bubble</h2>
<p>The biggest disappointment was Florida Senator Marco Rubio. His team have long been pushing him as the candidate who <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/429092/marco-rubio-conservative-polls-beats-hillary-clinton">can beat Hillary Clinton</a>, and the only major Republican candidate who could win the national vote. After coming a surprisingly strong third in Iowa, he began picking up endorsements, and there were signs the media were ready to anoint him as the chosen establishment candidate. </p>
<p>He needed a strong showing in New Hampshire to maintain a sense of momentum, to stall critics and put the debate behind him, and to maybe knock Bush, Christie or Kasich completely out of the race. But then came the <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/08/politics/rubio-debate-new-hampshire-2016/">Republican debate on February 6</a>, and the conservative commentariat and GOP donors soured on him after he robotically repeated a pre-prepared line four times. That humiliation’s now been borne out with a drubbing at the polls, and they’ll now be asking if he really has what it takes to win the presidency.</p>
<p>The result has left him facing some big questions. Will the party establishment give up on him? How will he perform at the next debate on February 13? And will he end up remembered as a freshman senator who over-performed in Iowa, or in Christie’s words, as “<a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/02/politics/marco-rubio-attacks-chris-christie/">the boy in the bubble</a>”?</p>
<p>The Republican battle has a long way yet to run. To be sure, there are 28 states in play between now and mid-March, but they may not be enough to end the saga. Republican Party rules require states that vote before March 15 to award delegates proportionally (though each state interprets this in its own way), which makes it difficult for a candidate to pull far ahead of the rest.</p>
<p>As the campaigns swing south, the mainstream lane to the nomination is still congested. The Republican establishment has yet to anoint its candidate of choice – and as long as it waits to do so, its outsiders will keep running amok.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>This article has been updated to reflect Chris Christie’s decision to end his campaign.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54210/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Liam Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With the results in, Trump stands proudly on top of what looks like a five-way car crash. What now?Liam Kennedy, Professor of American Studies, University College DublinLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/543172016-02-10T03:26:15Z2016-02-10T03:26:15ZSanders wins New Hampshire: why the time is again ripe for American socialism<p>Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has handily beaten Hillary Clinton to win the New Hampshire primary – and after being dismissed as more or less an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/20/us/politics/a-socialist-in-2016-for-bernie-sanders-at-least-its-a-question-worth-asking-.html">ideological sideshow</a> when it first began, his campaign has become an unlikely but remarkable movement.</p>
<p>With the Republican Party in a seemingly unstoppable rightward spiral, as the likes of Ted Cruz and Donald Trump dominate its race, the seemingly unexpected rise of as such a proud left-wing candidate as Sanders might seem inconsistent with every trend in recent American politics. At the beginning of the race, he was unknown to many voters outside his home state of Vermont. He is also the Senate’s only self-proclaimed socialist, a label that many once thought would make him utterly unelectable.</p>
<p>But Sanders’s support for “<a href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/bernie-sanders-democratic-socialism">democratic socialism</a>” hasn’t just been surprisingly popular: it’s rapidly changing the way America perceives socialism and all it stands for.</p>
<p>A major strength of Sanders’s campaign is an economic argument against <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/insiders-bernie-sanders-is-winning-the-economic-argument-218913">income inequality</a>. This message is at the heart of Sanders’s self-described democratic socialism, but the “revolution” he’s advocating isn’t a Marxist seizure of the means of production; it’s a democratic political uprising. </p>
<p>But this in itself is hardly anything new by the standards of American politics, even at the presidential level.</p>
<h2>Right place, right time</h2>
<p>Sanders has explicitly placed himself in the tradition of liberal icon <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/bernie-sanders-socialism-speech-216071">Franklin Delano Roosevelt</a>. The comparison is apt indeed: FDR’s liberalism was not only “socialist” by the standards of realigned American politics, providing the foundation for modern liberalism and the foil for modern conservatism. His conservative opponents in the inter-war years labelled him a “socialist” for his bold initiatives to combat the Great Depression and revive the country from economic collapse. </p>
<p>The Sanders-FDR affinity even extends to specific policies. Sanders regularly cites the <a href="http://www.federalreservehistory.org/Events/DetailView/25">Glass-Stegall Act</a> and <a href="http://docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/odssa.html">social security</a>, two of the 32nd president’s better-known initiatives, and Sanders frequently <a href="https://berniesanders.com/yes-glass-steagall-matters-here-are-5-reasons-why/">references</a> <a href="https://berniesanders.com/issues/strengthen-and-expand-social-security/">both</a> during debates, town halls, and stump speeches. </p>
<p>By linking himself to FDR, Sanders is betting that the American public will accept his proposals as anything but radical. In fact, the big government solutions he offers to voters are <a href="http://www.salon.com/2015/07/11/america_is_ready_for_socialism_massive_majorities_back_bernie_sanders_on_the_issues_and_disdain_donald_trump/">popular</a> with the American public, as is his brand of socialism in general. And yet, this is largely overlooked by his opponents on both sides. Programs such as social security and Medicare have been portrayed as “socialist” by some, yet are both “<a href="http://kff.org/medicaid/poll-finding/medicare-and-medicaid-at-50/">very important</a>” to many Americans across the political spectrum. </p>
<p>This is all testament to the fact that <a href="http://www.thenation.com/article/how-socialists-built-america/">socialism runs deep in America</a>, and that broadly socialist ideals have proven their appeal many times. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=570&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=570&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110893/original/image-20160210-3274-17qq2hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=570&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Big dreams.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Debs_campaign.jpg#/media/File:Debs_campaign.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<p>American socialists have been elected and become noted national figures before. Look back to early-20th century Milwaukee, Wisconsin, which elected the first “<a href="http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/tp-043/?action=more_essay">sewer socialist</a>” mayor in America, Emil Seidel, in 1910. Seidel was also Eugene Debs’s running mate for the Socialist Party in the <a href="http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/showelection.php?year=1912">1912 US presidential election</a>. </p>
<p>But we need not look a century back to see American socialism in full flower, provided we look in the right place. We could point to the <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/04/21/troops-of-the-uniform-unite-the-military-is-a-socialist-paradise.html">US military</a> – a massive government-owned programme that provides its workers with social benefits for higher education, housing, and specialised, dedicated healthcare.</p>
<p>So various of socialism’s core ideas live on in America’s most visible institutions. And yet, the Democratic Party has backed mostly economically moderate candidates for the past four decades. All the while, Sanders has been articulating this worldview, first as <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/10/bernie-sanders-mayor/407413/">mayor of Burlington, Vermont</a> then from the US House of Representatives and now the US Senate.</p>
<p>So why are he and his brand of out-and-proud socialism suddenly looking so viable? His groundswell of support from younger voters perhaps reflects that <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-young-democrats-love-bernie-sanders/">more of them view socialism favourably than view it unfavourably</a>. But his success reflects something deeper besides.</p>
<p>A substantial proportion of voters across the political spectrum, and not just younger ones, believe that <a href="http://www.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/189026/cruz-sanders-americans-agree-government-not-working.aspx">the status quo is not working for them</a> and that <a href="http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2016/02/04/most-americans-say-government-doesnt-do-enough-to-help-middle-class/">government needs to do more</a> to remedy this – including by <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/182987/americans-continue-say-wealth-distribution-unfair.aspx">redistributing wealth via taxes</a>. </p>
<p>America is primed to find Sanders’s call for “political revolution” appealing. His economic argument offers a chance for actual change, <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/01/the-decline-and-fall-of-hope-and-change/283454/">not just hope</a>. His call for bold action to make government work for the middle class, rather than against it, appeals to many struggling Americans, and while his brand of socialism truly marks him as an “FDR liberal”, that isn’t the warning label it might have been before the 2008 financial crisis.</p>
<p>It remains to be seen if he will garner enough support to overcome first Hillary Clinton, then the conservative GOP presidential candidate – but win or lose, it is clear that his campaign has captured the imagination of an American electorate that still dreams of a more equal society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54317/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Espinoza does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>“Socialist” has been a dirty word in American politics for decades – so why does socialism suddenly seem alive and well?Michael Espinoza, PhD Candidate, Institute of the Americas, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/543232016-02-09T03:36:46Z2016-02-09T03:36:46ZYou’re fired! Donald Trump shows rivals how it’s done in entertainment politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110582/original/image-20160208-5242-1p6n0pm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Trump's performances never fail to make breaking news, securing him the public's attention.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcQofjJgwvU">World News Today/youtube</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> series, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> with the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>It was yet another twist in a US <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/2016-us-presidential-election">presidential race</a> overflowing with the unexpected and the unbelievable. Donald Trump headed into the Iowa caucus as the clear Republican frontrunner, but left <a href="https://theconversation.com/four-key-takeaways-from-the-iowa-caucuses-54054">defeated</a> though not – in his mind – <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/nation/2016/02/02/79732372/">humiliated</a>. He <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/02/donald-trump-explains-iowa-loss">admitted</a> that “we could have used a better ground game, a term I wasn’t familiar with”.</p>
<p>Trump’s contrition was typically short-lived. Taking to Twitter, he <a href="http://hollywoodlife.com/2016/02/03/donald-trump-wants-rematch-iowa-caucus-ted-cruz-fraud-election/">accused Ted Cruz</a> of committing electoral fraud to win in Iowa. </p>
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<p>Cruz branded the outburst the latest in a string of <a href="http://hollywoodlife.com/2016/02/03/ted-cruz-mocks-donald-trump-rant-trumpertantrum-twitter-iowa-caucus/">#Trumpertantrums</a>.</p>
<p>This episode in the reality drama of US politics has reaffirmed two things. </p>
<p>First, it’s incredibly difficult to pin Trump down as a character. He remains highly unpredictable and almost impossible to categorise. Now he’s embroiled himself in fresh scandal <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/feb/06/donald-trump-waterboarding-republican-debate-torture">by saying</a> he’d bring back a “hell of a lot worse than waterboarding”. </p>
<p>As a leading man, Trump fascinates and infuriates. Branded a <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/edward-goldman/trump-president-no-trump_b_7974018.html">performance artist</a> by many, he demands an audience. And he’s got one – millions of spellbound Americans.</p>
<p>Vanity Fair columnist James Wolcott <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2015/11/wolcott-trump-insult-comic">observed</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Watch Trump on the televised stump or during debates with the sound off (your blood pressure will thank you) and observe how he grips the lectern, employing a battery of shrugs, hand jive and staccato phrase blurts – it’s like being teleported back to an old Dean Martin roast, those medieval days of yore when Foster Brooks hiccupped through his drunk act, Phyllis Diller cackled, or Orson Welles shook from underground rumbles of Falstaffian mirth.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110704/original/image-20160209-12822-1f3xvwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Sarah Palin takes the stage to endorse Donald Trump.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ajhanson/23864003884/in/photolist-CSb6Jh-CKN5Qn-DgYzvf-CSb6F1-CKN5Pk-CmMfWQ-DgYzBN-CKN5Nt-D9HSym-D9HSB7-DjhQUn-DjhR3P-CmUnpV-D9HSL5-DjhR7B-D9HSQy">Alex Hanson/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Trump gets under your skin. No other politician (at least in the West) comes close to matching his cult of personality. Aside from maybe Sarah Palin, with whom Trump recently <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/20/us/politics/donald-trump-sarah-palin.html?_r=0">teamed up</a>, there’s no one else quite like him.</p>
<p>The second observation coming out of Iowa is that we had better get used to unexpected plot twists this election season. Trump confounds commentators who stake their professional credibility on predicting electoral outcomes. Yet he has the rest of us hooked: there’s no telling what will happen next. It’s good drama even if it’s bad politics.</p>
<h2>Applying the tricks of the reality TV trade</h2>
<p>According to <a href="http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=10124077&fulltextType=DS&fileId=S1049096515001225">new research</a>, these observations may explain why Trump’s substantial lead in the polls <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/268544-poll-trumps-lead-grows-in-nh-days-before-primary">has grown</a> on the eve of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-the-new-hampshire-primary-and-why-does-it-matter-53412">New Hampshire primary</a>.</p>
<p>This research suggests electoral battles are now no different to theatrical entertainment. If their policies aren’t to fall flat, the candidates must learn the tricks of the showbiz trade. </p>
<p>Theatre is all important when political popularity is pegged not only to policies but also to the performances one gives. Mediated by “camera angles and online producers”, politics is now all about creating the right kinds of “narrative trajectories” to unite and divide the masses.</p>
<p>During election campaigns, political performances have to go a step further and entertain the people as well. As Charles Guggenheim, former campaign adviser to Robert Kennedy, once observed:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The people expect drama, pathos, intrigue, conflict, and they expect it to hang together as a dramatic package.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Those capable of ticking all these boxes, of putting on a good show, are more likely to draw a crowd. To see Trump as the mercurial lead in a Republican drama may help us understand why this unlikely candidate has won such widespread support.</p>
<p>More than most, Trump knows how to exploit theatrical tropes. He’s done it for years on his reality TV show, The Apprentice. With his characteristic “You’re fired”, Trump has won more than ratings battles. He’s won a loyal following. </p>
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<p><a href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/donald-trump-reality-tv-show">Commentators</a> have noted that the presidential race, particularly on the Republican side, is playing out like a reality TV drama. Election watchers are given “what they love, the chance to see recognisable human beings sweat it out for the big stakes”.</p>
<p>Even longtime Survivor host Jeff Probst <a href="http://time.com/4186326/donald-trump-sarah-palin-ted-cruz-duck-dynasty-2016-election/">commented</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This year does seem to be unique … at times, it does feel as though we’re watching a reality show and not a presidential campaign, and I don’t ever remember feeling that way.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>People who aren’t “super interested in changing our country”, Probst said, are drawn in by the “promise of the great story that’s about to be told to us, the public spectacle we’re going to witness”.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=790&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=790&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=790&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=993&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=993&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/110706/original/image-20160209-12837-1cu3kao.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=993&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The theatrical master at work on the political stage.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jbouie/21447930665/in/photolist-8SFTjC-8SCMEP-8SFSjG-8SFTpS-8SCKLZ-8SFQGy-8SFTBN-8SCMdM-8SFTV1-8SCLjz-8SFSGY-8SCMrB-8SCLbt-8SCLKz-8SFTvA-8SCLxT-8SFSN9-8SFQNf-8SFRKC-yoEqTo-yCXPEo-xJfKqd-yCXN2U-8SCNr2-8SFSU3-8SFRbQ-8SCKTe-8SFRRE-8SFSAu-xJoWH6-yoLmGK-yFhfy2-yEj6tY-yEj7jA-yEj6hL-xJoVGD-yEj5Pm-yoFymf-yG2NiK-yG2NuM-yCXNU5-yoEqjY-yoLmW2-yFhgL2-yoEpo9-yoLn22-yEj6cq-yoEpFU-yEj579-yEj4Uf">Jamelle Bouie/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As a long-time master of the theatrical arts, Trump has turned the presidential race into his own mediated spectacle. He knows that if he gets his presidential narrative right he can – to paraphrase <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/donald-trump-reality-tv-show">JFK</a> – manipulate, exploit and seize on the public’s emotion, prejudice and ignorance.</p>
<p>As for the things he can’t control – the twists and turns on the campaign trail – they also work to keep audiences on the edge of their seats. When things are too predictable, they become boring and people lose interest. </p>
<p>A Trumpertantrum every now and then can do wonders for ratings. Losing a caucus most expected him to win only adds to the intrigue.</p>
<h2>Should we keep watching?</h2>
<p>As the primary season heads from New Hampshire to Nevada and South Carolina, some question whether we should watch the political coverage at all. Given that it’s all a show, purposely mediated to draw us in, aren’t we better off tuning out for something a little more substantive?</p>
<p>Our response is the same as the one New York Times columnist Rob Walker <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/magazine/electoral-politics-and-reality-tv.html">has offered</a>. For him, it’s a fantasy to think elections would all of a sudden become more “high-minded” if we got rid of the “reality-showbiz fireworks”. Getting rid of the theatrical is not only impossible, it also wouldn’t make Americans and their presidential candidates any more willing to take part in rational debate that’s backed by verified evidence.</p>
<p>No. Elections-as-entertainment do not detract from policy substance at all, as Walker sees it. What they do distract from “is who won The X Factor, the deeper meaning of Tim Tebow’s quarterback rating and whatever Zeppo Kardashian is up to this week”. That is “the reality of the situation”, and he’s all for it.</p>
<p>We agree with Walker, though we’d add one point. Precisely because contemporary elections are mediated spectacles that can entertain and deceive, it’s important for citizens to become more aware of the tropes and techniques used in showbiz to pull an audience. To go from passive observers to active spectators, we must know what to watch out for.</p>
<p>For this reason, more space needs to be provided this election season for theatre and performance experts to educate the rest of us about the drama of electoral politics. </p>
<p>Luckily, there are theatre scholars who are keen to do this work, including Princeton-based <a href="http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/tt/summary/v011/11.1dolan.html">Jill Dolan</a>. Her point is that those “trained to look critically at performance, to study its links to ideology and culture” can offer themselves as:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… experts who study the election and the debates through a performative lens – not one that stresses entertainment value, but one that looks at gesture, narrative manipulations, contexts and ‘spin’ with an eye toward the politics they convey.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>We need this sort of coverage in the coming weeks and months. We might then just get to the bottom of this twisted electoral tale.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54323/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Donald Trump has applied the lessons of winning a TV audience to politics. Much as we might deplore the theatre of entertaining voters, we can’t wish it away.Mark Chou, Associate Professor of Politics, Australian Catholic UniversityMichael Ondaatje, Associate Professor of History & Head of the National School of Arts, Australian Catholic UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/534122016-02-08T13:08:47Z2016-02-08T13:08:47ZExplainer: what is the New Hampshire primary, and why does it matter?<p>While the <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-are-the-iowa-caucuses-53353">Iowa caucuses</a> are the first electoral event in the US’s presidential process, the New Hampshire primary is the candidates’ most important early test before the action explodes across the rest of the country. </p>
<p>The stakes are high. If the nominations aren’t decided soon, the campaigns will be damned to a marathon of costly state primaries and caucuses; New Hampshire is their first best chance to avoid that fate. But it didn’t always work this way.</p>
<p>Primaries only became the key element of the nomination process relatively recently. Until the postwar era, presidential candidates were chosen at the national conventions in the summer: in the run-up to the 1960 election, future president John F Kennedy famously entered only one primary (<a href="http://www.jfklibrary.org/Exhibits/Past-Exhibits/Winning-West-Virginia.aspx">West Virginia’s</a>) to prove that a Roman Catholic could win a Protestant state. </p>
<p>It was only after the turmoil of the 1968 nomination, <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93937947">widely perceived as an establishment fix</a>, that the <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2003/11/23/primary_colors/">McGovern-Fraser Commission</a> changed the Democratic party’s rules to end the power of the “smoke-filled room” over the nominating process, prompting many states to adopt meaningful primaries for both parties’ nominations.</p>
<h2>First in the nation</h2>
<p>Unlike caucuses, which generally are used in smaller states that would rather not pay for full-scale ballots, primaries are secret-ballot elections that allow voters to choose who will be their preferred nominee. But not all primaries are the same. </p>
<p>The parties sometimes hold their votes on the same day, as they do in New Hampshire, or on different ones. A primary may be open (allowing any voter to register a preference) or closed (allowing only pre-registered party supporters to vote). New Hampshire has a mixed system which allows voters to register in a primary on the day before voting without declaring a party affiliation. </p>
<p>That means that while all voters registered with a party must vote in that party’s ballot, the New Hampshire result often hinges on these unaffiliated voters. Because they can vote in whichever ballot they like and can register so close to primary day, the state is <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/new-hampshire-primary-polling-218781">notoriously difficult to poll</a>.</p>
<p>New Hampshire has cemented its <a href="https://www.nh.gov/nhinfo/primacy.html">first-in-the-nation status</a> by passing a law that requires its lawmakers to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/02/opinion/02sun1.html">move the state’s primary to pre-empt any other state’s</a>, no matter how early. That means it’s traditionally been not just an important indicator of how candidates are faring, but a way of winnowing the field and generating or killing funding. Candidates who perform poorly generally find their access to money suddenly dries up.</p>
<p>The arguments against New Hampshire’s outsize role are many. Like Iowa, it’s hardly representative of the US as a whole, being a small state with an overwhelmingly white population. And while (unlike Iowa) it has no powerful evangelical Christian element, it retains a very distinctive tradition of <a href="http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/077977in.html">small-town New England politics</a> that demand a particular kind of face-to-face, low-to-the-ground campaigning. </p>
<p>But this time around, other factors have cut into New Hampshire’s significance. </p>
<p>On the Republican side, the primary’s winnowing role was in large part pre-empted when the TV networks holding debates <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2015/05/20/fox_cnn_set_criteria_for_gop_debates.html">allowed only the higher-polling candidates on stage</a>, effectively creating a two-tier system that tarred lower-polling candidates as also-rans long before voting began. Meanwhile, the financial calculations have been transformed by <a href="http://www.npr.org/2015/01/13/377024687/five-years-after-citizens-united-superpacs-continue-to-grow">campaign finance reforms</a> that allow for almost unlimited outside fundraising – allowing candidates to build up the reserves they need to withstand a humiliating defeat.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, a truly surprising New Hampshire result could still change everything. </p>
<h2>Shuffling the deck</h2>
<p>New Hampshire hasn’t always chosen the winner in either the nomination contests or the general election. But it has provided more than its share of political upsets and key turning points, from <a href="http://www.unionleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/99999999/NEWS0605/110509966">persuading Lyndon Johnson not to stand again</a> in 1968 to resurrecting the candidacies of <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/22551718/ns/politics-decision_08/t/stunner-nh-clinton-defeats-obama/#.VrhueDaLSAI">Hillary Clinton</a> and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/08/us/politics/08cnd-campaign.html?_r=0">John McCain</a> in 2008. </p>
<p>The incremental campaigns for the nominations are all about the perception of momentum, and a notional front-runner can be dislodged or destabilised by a poor performance early on. That’s especially true in this year’s cycle, in which both major parties are grappling with huge surges of support for outsider, anti-establishment candidates. </p>
<p>Mainstream Republicans have spent months trying to end <a href="https://theconversation.com/whether-or-not-trump-wins-the-republican-party-may-never-recover-53151">Donald Trump’s noisy domination of their crowded field</a>. Trump was indeed defeated in Iowa, but not by a moderating force: instead, it was radical conservative Ted Cruz who overturned him. </p>
<p>Cruz is loathed by the party establishment, and he stands little chance of appealing to mainstream voters. <a href="https://theconversation.com/iowa-caucuses-rubios-the-real-winner-and-the-democrats-will-stay-united-54066">Marco Rubio’s strong showing in Iowa</a> briefly made him something of a standard-bearer for the party’s moderates, but a <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/caucus-republican-debate-marco-rubio-lost-chris-christie-won-218891">disastrous turn</a> at the last debate before New Hampshire has thrown the future of his candidacy into doubt.</p>
<p>The primary will also reveal who, if any, of the more moderate Republican candidates – among them <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/will-new-hampshire-be-the-last-stand-for-jeb-bush/2016/02/06/11a2f190-cbb2-11e5-a7b2-5a2f824b02c9_story.html">Jeb Bush</a>, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-kasich-idUSMTZSAPEC277BZMJY">John Kasich</a> and <a href="http://www.unionleader.com/For-our-safety,-our-future:-Chris-Christie-for-President">Chris Christie</a> – will survive. While Bush has a massive funding advantage (albeit with precious little to show for it), Kasich and Christie both need a strong showing in New Hampshire to reinvigorate their financial reserves. </p>
<p>On the Democratic side, the key question is whether Bernie Sanders can make good on the surprising energy of his populist, grassroots challenge to Hillary Clinton. He is currently the <a href="http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/election-2016/primary-forecast/new-hampshire-democratic/">heavy favourite</a> in New Hampshire: even if Clinton somehow pulls off a miracle win there as she did in 2008, the closeness of the race is already stimulating both campaigns’ national organisation and spending. And with <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2016-02-05/dems-ready-for-long-pricey-primary-between-clinton-sanders">what could be a long race</a> between them heating up, the two’s <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/new-hampshire-primary-2016-live-updates/2016/02/clinton-sanders-explode-2016-democratic-debate-218788?lo=ap_c1">growing mutual acrimony</a> may yet start to undermine the Democrats’ national appeal.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53412/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gillian Peele does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With Iowa out of the way, the first true primary ballot is finally here.Gillian Peele, Associate Professor in Politics and Tutorial Fellow, Lady Margaret Hall, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/538422016-02-05T12:57:47Z2016-02-05T12:57:47ZWhy the US presidential primary system is no way to run a democracy<p>The US baseball season is infamously long. Each team plays 162 games from the first week of April to the last week in September. October is reserved for the playoffs and the World Series. Then there’s the pre-season: spring training starts in February, and the multi-million dollar trade deals consume much of the preceding winter months. November tends to be quiet, a reflective period to consider the year gone by and speculate on the one ahead. Yet the marathon season that follows, fans anticipate opening day as if it were the only event in the calendar. </p>
<p>America’s other favourite pastime, politics, works in much the same way. The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-election-what-do-the-iowa-results-actually-mean-53574">Iowa caucuses</a> are opening day, and if you believe all the hype, they can seem as important as the November main event. And then, once Iowa’s done with, everyone suddenly remembers the season is actually very, very long.</p>
<p>This would be less absurd if every election were not talked about as if it were exceptional. Journalist E J Dionne called this year’s road to Iowa a “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-long-painful-road-to-iowa/2016/01/31/e9b9e92e-c6e6-11e5-9693-933a4d31bcc8_story.html">painful</a>” implosion of party coalitions and public anxieties that demonstrated the end of political certainties. But when has this not been the case?</p>
<p>Iowa’s bizarre caucus system and the seemingly endless media frenzy have encouraged political mayhem since the state took its place at the start of the calendar in the 1970s. The unexpected is generally to be expected: think of <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/19/politics/iowa-caucus/">Rick Santorum’s razor-thin win</a> in 2012, or <a href="http://politics.nytimes.com/election-guide/2008/results/states/IA.html">Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee’s more convincing ones</a> in 2008, or the litany of “remarkable” second-place showings by anti-establishment candidates such as <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/10/us/the-2000-campaign-the-end-forbes-spent-millions-but-for-little-gain.html">Steve Forbes</a> and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/16/opinion/abroad-at-home-the-angry-man.html">Pat Buchanan</a>. </p>
<h2>Hyperbole and hype</h2>
<p>The “opening day” hyperbole quickly dissipates post-Iowa. The political season only begins in earnest when a bloated field of candidates starts to shed some dead weight. And for all the ink spilled over how this year is “different”, the same process is already well underway.</p>
<p>After nearly being knocked into third place by a surging Marco Rubio, the political poetry surrounding Donald Trump is already evaporating. Before Iowa, <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/124560/trump-wins">Jeet Heer</a>, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/428415/krauthammers-take-if-trump-nomineeparty-could-be-facing-another-goldwater-scenario">Charles Krauthammer</a>, <a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2015/1204/Donald-Trump-and-Ted-Cruz-Is-this-a-second-coming-of-Barry-Goldwater">Linda Feldmann</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/whether-or-not-trump-wins-the-republican-party-may-never-recover-53151">Liam Kennedy</a> were all calling him the new <a href="http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2014/07/barry-m-goldwater-the-most-consequential-loser-in-american-politics">Barry Goldwater</a>; <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/12/17/newt-gingrich-says-donald-trump-reminds-him-of-andrew-jackson/">Newt Gingrich</a> and <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/427536/donald-trump-appeal-jacksonian">Rich Lowry</a> likened him to President Andrew Jackson, and the Donald “shrugged off” comparisons to <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/donald-trump-shrugs-off-hitler-comparison/story?id=35645113">Hitler</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/donald-trump/12132320/Donald-Trump-is-the-Mussolini-of-America-with-double-the-vulgarity.html">Mussolini</a>, and Harry Potter’s <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/08/jk-rowling-on-donald-trump-voldemort-was-nowhere-as-bad">Lord Voldemort</a>. </p>
<p>Now, as Trump campaigns in New Hampshire, those comparisons ring rather less true. And while a blowout New Hampshire win could revive him, Trump’s own wisecrack that “no one remembers who came in second” might well materialise, as <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/02/opinions/republican-iowa-results-stanley/">some</a> already prepare to write off his candidacy as a historical blip.</p>
<p>Others, such as Martin O’Malley, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Rand Paul, have already suspended their campaigns after abysmally poor Iowa returns. Many Republicans polling in the low single digits in New Hampshire may well do the same. </p>
<h2>A corrosive process</h2>
<p>Today’s primary process has a deeply insidious effect on the country’s democracy. Even though Iowa and New Hampshire have relatively small populations and very homogenous demographics, they attract disproportionate attention from candidates and tend to set the tone for the long campaign. </p>
<p>Additionally, voting methods vary wildly from state to state. Open primaries such as South Carolina’s do not require voters to be affiliated with a party, and the spectre of one party’s supporters voting disruptively in the other’s contest is often raised by unhappy losing candidates. More astoundingly still, some primaries elect non-binding delegates to national conventions who can defy the will of the electorate if they so choose.</p>
<p>The principle behind directly elected presidential nominees was designed to do away with bossism, or the nomination of candidates in <a href="http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2008-02-20/news/0802200331_1_smoke-filled-room-nominee-party-conventions">smoke-filled rooms</a> of white, male, privileged party patrons. </p>
<p>This tendency was at its worst back in 1912, when the first primary elections took place. Theodore Roosevelt won nine of the 13 states then participating in primaries. Although Roosevelt served seven years as a Republican president, he wasn’t the establishment choice; the party ended up <a href="http://270soft.com/2012/10/15/1912-presidential-primaries-results/">re-nominating the sitting president</a>, William Howard Taft, in spite of the primary results. </p>
<p>But even the direct election of presidential nominees has regularly been subject to establishment review. “Compromise candidates” such as <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/1600/presidents/warrenharding">Warren G Harding</a>, <a href="http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=2&psid=3393">John W Davis</a>, <a href="https://www.gwu.edu/%7Eerpapers/teachinger/glossary/willkie-wendell.cfm">Wendell Willkie</a>, <a href="https://www.questia.com/library/7396119/how-we-drafted-adlai-stevenson">Adlai Stevenson</a>, and <a href="http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=25964">Hubert Humphrey</a>, as well as boss favourites such as <a href="http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5168/">Alf Landon</a>, <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/politics/chi-chicagodays-deweydefeats-story-story.html">Thomas Dewey</a>, and <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2007/09/remember_1984.html">Walter Mondale</a> clinched their party’s nominations despite losing or barely winning primary elections. </p>
<p>In especially close contests, notably the marathon 2008 Democratic nomination battle, questions tend to arise about <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/InsideCover/obama-voter-fraud/2008/10/27/id/326134/.">voting irregularities</a> This year’s first iteration of this problem is the <a href="http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2016/02/02/sometimes-iowa-democrats-award-caucus-delegates-coin-flip/79680342/">coin tosses</a> used in the shockingly close Democratic Iowa caucuses. Whether or <a href="http://www.npr.org/2016/02/02/465268206/coin-toss-fact-check-no-coin-flips-did-not-win-iowa-for-hillary-clinton">not</a> they affected the results, such methods are surely a mockery of representative democracy.</p>
<p>There are some obvious changes that could fix these problems. End the slow-drip of elections by grouping states in large blocs to ensure national participation; force states to elect nominees via fair ballot processes standardised across all 50 states and <a href="http://www.fairvote.org/puerto-rico-and-other-territories-vote-in-primaries-but-not-in-general-election">territories</a>; and either insist that national convention delegates vote according to primary results, or do away with the anachronistic delegate process altogether. </p>
<p>But of course, these are the very elements of the nomination process that make it lively, exciting, and attractive to new voters. And that is, in another very real sense, truly democratic. After all, the Trump and Sanders campaigns have seemingly brought thousands of <a href="http://time.com/4196622/trump-sanders-voters/">first-time voters</a> into the process.</p>
<p>The lull in excitement will come. The nominees will emerge. A winner will eventually be crowned. But, with Opening Day out of the way, it’s worth pausing to consider the absurdity of the political pre-season – and to wonder if this couldn’t all be done a little better.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53842/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Patrick Cullinane does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>America’s way of choosing its president is marred by murky voting methods, a warped calendar, and too much hype.Michael Patrick Cullinane, Reader in US History, Northumbria University, NewcastleLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/368712015-01-29T02:10:48Z2015-01-29T02:10:48ZThe invisible primary – number one<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/70334/original/image-20150128-22295-17kq3dg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Not as important as the invisible primary.... </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/donkeyhotey/6654399851/">DonkeyHotey</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>What’s the best predictor of which candidate will win the presidential nomination. The winner of the Iowa caucus? The winner of the New Hampshire primary?</p>
<p>Actually neither is as good a predictor as the winner of what political scientists call “the invisible primary” – the year or so before a single primary or caucus vote is cast.</p>
<h2>Iowa and New Hampshire - important but not decisive</h2>
<p>A fast start in Iowa or New Hampshire is important. A candidate with a poor showing in both states is in trouble. </p>
<p>As I wrote in the <a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Mass_Media_Election.html?id=5MggAQAAIAAJ">Mass Media Election</a> years ago, “there’s no time for losers.” Voters aren’t interested, donors aren’t interested, and reporters aren’t interested in a candidate who finishes at the back of the pack.</p>
<p>Yet, more often than not, the winner in Iowa has lost in New Hampshire. </p>
<p>Since 1980, of the twelve open nominating races —- meaning those without an incumbent president seeking reelection -— only John Kerry in 2004 and Al Gore in 2000 won both contests. In 1992, the eventual Democratic nominee, Bill Clinton, lost both, though he ran well enough in the opening states to retain a position as a credible candidate.</p>
<p>So, although a degree of success in Iowa and New Hampshire is a must, neither contest by itself is predictive of the nominee. </p>
<p>The better predictor of who will win nomination is how well the candidates position themselves in the year leading up to the Iowa caucus. This period —- “the invisible primary” -— is when the candidates try to put in place the ingredients for a winning campaign.</p>
<h2>Name recognition crucial ingredient</h2>
<p>Name recognition is one of those elements. Unless voters know of a candidate, they’re not going to back that candidate. Out of mind translates into out of luck for a presidential hopeful.</p>
<p>It’s hard for a candidate who lacks name recognition to acquire it. When George H W Bush ran unsuccessfully for the presidency in 1980, he campaigned long and hard before Iowa. Yet, <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=wZWHAAAAMAAJ&source=gbs_ViewAPI">an Eagleton Institute poll</a>, taken shortly before Iowa, found that only 8% of voters said they were “aware” of him while 53% said they thought his name sounded “familiar.” Nearly 40 percent said they’d never heard of him. </p>
<p>Candidates who start the campaign with poor name recognition are doubly disadvantaged because they inevitably end up at the bottom of the pre-campaign polls.<br>
The news media cue off the polls, focusing their reporting on those who are at or near the top, creating a classic Catch-22. You need press coverage to acquire name recognition, but if you don’t have name recognition, it’s hard to get press coverage. </p>
<p>At the start of the 2012 campaign, Mitt Romney, as a result of having run four years earlier, had the highest name recognition among the Republican contenders. Rick Santorum, who would win in Iowa, had one of the lowest.</p>
<p>In the six months leading up to the Iowa caucuses. Romney got close to ten times the news coverage of Santorum. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70385/original/image-20150129-22322-mx09ip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A recognizable smile.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mitt_Romney_laughing_at_rally.jpg">Gage Skidmore</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Not surprisingly, in the final national polls before Iowa, Romney was far ahead of Santorum as the preferred nominee among Republican voters.</p>
<p>National poll standing just before Iowa is a strong indicator of eventual success. Thirteen of the 16 nominees since 1980 have been at the top in the final pre-Iowa polls. </p>
<p>The only top-ranked candidates who lost the nomination were Democrat Gary Hart in 1988, who got derailed by a sex scandal; Democrat Howard Dean in 2004, who, though he still led in the final polls, had begun to slip in the month before Iowa; and Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2008, whose lead had been steadily shrinking in the months before Iowa.</p>
<p>Name recognition is critical. It helps a candidate withstand a setback in Iowa or New Hampshire and enables the candidate to pick up votes on the margin. </p>
<h2>The fundraising metric</h2>
<p>Fundraising is also a key part of the invisible primary. It takes a huge amount of money to mount a successful national nominating campaign -— estimates of the minimum run upwards of US$50 million. </p>
<p>Predictably, in the year before the Iowa caucus, candidates devote considerable time to fundraising, with varying degrees of success. </p>
<p>In 2011, for example, Santorum raised less than $5 million during the pre-Iowa period while Romney pulled in $60 million -— he would eventually raise and spend more than $100 million on his nominating campaign.</p>
<p>The news media, as they do with the polls, see money as an indicator of which candidates they should take seriously. And, as with the polls, money and media go together. The more press coverage a candidate gets, the easier it is for the candidate to raise additional money.</p>
<p>Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign illustrates the point. Even though Obama, a relative unknown at the time, trailed badly in the early polls to his main Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, he astonished pundits by raising $26 million in the first quarter of 2007. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=985&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=985&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/70386/original/image-20150129-22322-8dji8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=985&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A great fundraiser.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barack_Obama_-_2008.jpg">Steven Jurvetson Flikr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As a result, his news coverage shot up, boosting both his poll standing and his fundraising efforts. By the time the Iowa caucus rolled around, Obama had raised $102 million dollars, roughly what Clinton was able to raise.</p>
<p>So why is early money in large amounts so important? </p>
<p>Well, it enables the candidate to spend heavily in the first contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada, while also buying early TV advertising in the Super Tuesday states. Personally, a candidate can only be in one state at a time. Money allows the candidate to have a presence in a lot of states at once.</p>
<p>The candidate who wins the money game in the year before the Iowa caucus is the odds-on-favorite to get the party nomination. Of the sixteen presidential nominees since 1980, the only clear exceptions are Dean in 2004 and Romney when he first ran in 2008.</p>
<h2>Making the invisible primary visible</h2>
<p>Now I’m not suggesting that the “invisible primary” counts for everything in a nominating race. A candidate must still campaign effectively when the voting gets underway. But nominating races are not won by candidates who are poorly positioned at the start. </p>
<p>In 2012, for example, Santorum had almost no money and very little name recognition upon which to capitalize on his victory in Iowa. He was so underfunded, in fact, that his staff failed to meet the deadlines to get him on Virginia’s ballot and to have a full slate of delegates in Illinois and Ohio.</p>
<p>In the months ahead, I am going to be writing a series of columns on the status of the invisible primary, looking at how the various candidates are faring in terms of poll standing, fundraising, and media coverage. </p>
<p>In the last column, on the eve of the Iowa caucuses, I will assess the likely outcome of the invisible primary on the nominating races. </p>
<p>The past is not always a guide to the present but, more than any other indicator, the invisible primary holds the key to the candidates’ eventual success.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/36871/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
What’s the best predictor of which candidate will win the presidential nomination. The winner of the Iowa caucus? The winner of the New Hampshire primary? Actually neither is as good a predictor as the…Thomas E. Patterson, Bradlee Professor of Government and the Press, Harvard Kennedy SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.