Seen in USA Today:
Florida must comply with the national Democratic Party’s rules for selecting presidential election delegates or lose any role in picking a Democratic nominee for the White House, party leaders decided Saturday.
Members of a Democratic National Committee panel voted to give Florida 30 days to amend its plan to hold a binding primary on Jan. 29. Under DNC rules, only Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina may hold a primary election or nominating caucus before Feb. 5.
If the state doesn’t submit a new plan for selecting delegates, it will lose all of its 210 delegates to the party’s national convention in Denver next year — the harshest possibly penalty.
I’ve seen this bit of news featured on several of the blogs I follow, as well as the mainstream media. A few thoughts:
- It’s been reported that Florida Dems agreed to the rules. However, the GOP-domnated legislature voted to move the state’s primary up to 29 January to beat the February 5 rush, and the Florida Dems apparently don’t want to risk a smaller than expected turnout by heeding the call to push back to at least Mega Tuesday, 5 February.
- I’m a little surprised that no one else has noted that the standoff could technically be avoided if the Dems chose to make 29 January a “preference poll”, one which would not actually allocate delegates, but instead would provide guidance for the state party to do the formal elections on/after the 5 February date.
- Most of the blogs and many of the media reports seem to be focusing on the Democratic side of the mess. It is going underreported that the Florida Republicans are having similar problems with their national party, which is sticking to it’s guns in claiming that they will seat only half the allocated number of delegates for going “too early”
- It’s nice seeing someone with allegedly some power sticking to their guns and fighting back at least a little bit against primary season creep.