Dems’ Iowa Caucus Comedy
Democrats botch first 2020 contest, as no winner yet declared in the Iowa caucuses.
And the winner of the Iowa Democrat caucuses is… President Donald Trump. That’s right, no Democrat Iowa victor is known following Monday’s debacle. After touting their “transparency” rule changes and a new app that was supposed to deliver voting results with greater efficiency and accuracy, Democrat Party officials were left Monday night bumbling for answers amidst a sea of confusing reports, a dysfunctional app (developed by former members of Hillary Clinton’s campaign team), and caucusing numbers that didn’t add up. One thing’s for certain — they’ll have a hard time blaming the Russians for this mess.
The official start to the Democrat presidential primaries couldn’t have gotten off to a worse start. The party claiming to know how best to lead the country into the future couldn’t even run its own first state caucus without things falling into disarray. After witnessing this disaster, who would trust these clowns with running a circus, let alone the country? Seeking to put the best spin on this embarrassment, Democrat Party leaders offered concerns over “quality control” and “an abundance of caution” as the excuse for delaying the results. Ironically, no matter who ends up being declared the winner, the DNC has effectively invited the very charge Chairman Tom Perez was seeking to fend off: accusations of a rigged system that erupted in 2016 after the DNC shenanigans favoring Clinton over Bernie Sanders came to light.
From what little information has been gleaned from precinct reporting, it appears that both Sanders and Pete Buttigieg had strong showings, followed by Elizabeth Warren. It also appeared that support for Joe Biden was weaker than expected, particularly notable given the time he had to campaign there while his rivals were stuck in a Senate impeachment trial. Could Biden’s poor showing be the real reason for the delay? Perhaps the “quality control” is that Sanders actually won and party officials are panicking.
The most telling statistic of the evening was the turnout. Around 172,000 Iowans showed up, which is nearly the same as the 2016 turnout and significantly less than the 2008 number of 240,000. It’s an ill omen for Democrats if voter enthusiasm isn’t as high as they need it to be to defeat Trump in November.
Meanwhile, the Republicans’ Iowa caucuses went off without a hitch. Trump easily won 97% of the vote, with the remaining 3% split between Bill Weld and Joe Walsh. Thus, as Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk quipped, “Donald Trump became the first president to win both the Democrat and Republican caucus.”
Updated.