Florida is considering moving their primary date to become one of the earliest in the nation, as well as moving up their Presidential Straw Poll:
Tired of playing second fiddle to the likes of Iowa and New Hampshire in picking presidential nominees, Florida Republicans are positioning the Sunshine state to play a potentially huge role in the 2008 presidential race.
Not only are state legislative leaders working on moving Florida’s primary to be one of the earliest in the country, but the state GOP is planning a straw vote convention for October 2007.
If the plan moves forward, next year the state would be crawling with Republican presidential contenders wooing 3,500 party activists in hopes of getting a big, early shot of momentum from America’s biggest battleground stateThe state GOP already has blocked hundreds of rooms in Orlando for the non-binding “Presidency IV” gathering Oct. 17-20, hired a consultant to organize it and briefed potential presidential candidates about an event that could cost the campaigns hundreds of thousands of dollars to organize for a strong showingThe results are officially meaningless, but they play a big role in the crucial expectations game – who does surprisingly well or unexpectedly poorly – and campaigns work feverishly to win over delegates.
But frontrunners don’t necessarily relish such events because they have the most to lose.
So Republicans are closely watching how Governor-elect Charlie Crist handles the “Presidency IV” idea. While Crist has not endorsed anyone, he is widely seen as an ally of Sen. John McCain, the presumed GOP frontrunner for 2008 and the only presidential prospect who endorsed Crist during his gubernatorial primary.
This move would have to be seen as benefiting Rudy the most, who at last count was leading McCain by over 20 points in the state.
November 30th, 2006 at 10:57 pm
Crist, I believe, is a fiscally conservative, socially moderate Republican who is tough as nails on the bad guys in life. In that sense, Rudy would be the best fit for him, but McCain probably wins his endorsement through the age old dynamic of quid pro quo.
Still, endorsements aren’t really worth much at the voting booth. I was living in Michigan during the 2000 election, when highly popular GOP governor John Engler endorsed Bush wholeheartedly in both the primary and the general. Bush, of course, lost both in the state. Tons of Floridians are transplants from NY and other NE states. They’ll be the ones casting ballots, and I suspect they’ll cast them for Rudy.
November 30th, 2006 at 11:06 pm
Romney also campaigned for Crist, calling the Florida gubernatorial election “the most important in the nation.” He also, through the RGA, gave the Florida GOP 1 million, the most he gave any state. So I wouldn’t count him out, in the endorsement sense, either. That said, I do agree that unless one candidate has significant momentum by Florida, Rudy has a serious advantage there.
December 1st, 2006 at 12:07 am
Article in today’s Boston Globe about Romney and McCain at this week’s Republican Governors Association meeting in FL both competing for support – financial and otherwise. The link is (sorry I don’t know how to embed a link into what I’m writing):
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/city_region/breaking_news/2006/11/mccain_rains_on.html
Rudy will definitely benefit from the huge transplanted NY elder voter group. Not sure who the mostly Republican Cubans will support. The rest of Florida north of Miami-Dade and Broward are basically Southerners from what I’ve seen, so they may signify early who SC and the rest of the South will support. Should be interesting. Also makes Jeb another attractive VP choice.
December 1st, 2006 at 1:04 am
Anyone have any idea how this madness can be brought under control? I dont think it is in anyones interest to be choosing nominees earlier and earlier. The competition to be first has so frontloaded things already – I just dont see the end of it.
I think it would be better to choose nominees in the late spring or early summer. Why earlier?
December 1st, 2006 at 3:06 am
I don’t know, Tano. With all the money involved – for the candidates, the parties, the media, the behind-the-scenes folks – I don’t see how it will ever change for the better. There is a positive side, though. The voting public gets nearly two years now to learn about the candidates, and the candidates have two years to get their name and face out there. Granted this also means that the candidates have two years to screw things up for themselves, but that’s their own problem to worry about. One option is to do what’s done in some other countries (I think France may work this way): Hold one national primary to weed out the party nominee, then hold the general election one or two months later. It eliminates having 10 or 20 contests, where a small percentage of the states get to chose the nominee (as a PA voter I never get a say in who the nominee is since our primary is always much too late to mean anything). For a much more radical change, we could always switch to a Parliamentary form of government, where the Prime Minister can call elections, and a few months later the whole thing is over.
December 1st, 2006 at 12:37 pm
If anything, you’re understating the benefit of this move to Rudy.
A few cycles ago, Delaware tried stepping on New Hampshire’s toes by moving up their Primary. The net effect was that any candidate who actively campaigned in Delaware were greeted cooly in NH. The only candidate who defied NH was Steve Forbes in ’96; he won Delaware but did much poorer than expected in NH, given his high poll numbers and his general ideological compatability with NH voters at the time (at least the 96 version of Forbes).
If Florida is moved up over NH’s objections, it will be extremely difficult for any candidate who wants to win NH to campaign in Florida. And since NH is a must win for both McCain and Romney, they might be forced to write off Florida completely.
December 1st, 2006 at 12:53 pm
At some point NH and Iowa will have to give up their hold on the first contests. There’s an argument that is stronger on the Dem side that advocates dropping these two states because they don’t give minorities and big city residents a chance to chose a candidate who they prefer. That’s a valid point. New Hampshire and Iowa are great states – been to both, still hike NH mountains every summer – but as diverse populations go, they aren’t exactly America’s melting pots. Supporters of these states say it forces the candidates to meet thye people up close rather than the media, so it weeds out the bad ones from the good ones right at the start of the campaign. OK, I’ll buy that, but the same could be said for other states across the country. Whatever happened to that idea of rotating regional primaries? I thought that was brilliant. Gives everyone a chance to be first.
December 1st, 2006 at 1:29 pm
I like the idea of small, swing states as the opening shots in presidential races. Followed by, on the Republican side, a small conservative state (south carolina), and on the democratic side, a small liberal state. It helps create broad appeal to wide-ranging voters within the parties. But most importantly, it allows many competitors to enter races. Florida isn’t the only state that’s thinking of moving up their primary. California is as well. If California and Florida are two of the first primary states, then all but two or three candidates are completely eliminated from the possibility of competing due to funding issues. And the front-runners will have to spend as much as 100+ million in those two states, harming them for the general election. It makes very little sense from a party perspective, and everything possible should be done to insure these moves aren’t made.
December 1st, 2006 at 1:57 pm
Matt. . .you said the key phrase right there at the end of your paragraph: “And the front runners will have to spend as much as 100+ million in those two states.” If they’re spending 100 million, it only stands to reason that someone is making 100 million. Therein lies the real reason why states are fighting to be first. When 100 million is being spend in NH and Iowa, all other states are watching and wondering how they can get a piece of the political pie. So SC moved up. Now everyone will spend millions there. Then Nevada moves up. Now we have to shift money their way. Florida gets in the picture – with an even earlier straw vote yet – so now they get to rake in the millions. That leaves us with the wealthiest – not necessarilly the best – candidates moving on, while the messages of the other candidates gets drowned out for lack of $$$. Anyone think Kerry would have does so well early on if Gephart or Dean had Kerry’s millions to spend in 2004? And the big winners: the media. They charge outrageous rates for TV air time (trust me – I was a tv station manager for the last six years; we LOVE election season!) so it benefits them to have these early primaries. We get rid of this ridiculous race to be first in the primaries and we solve a lot of problems, and maybe we get some quality candidates still in the race by April.
December 1st, 2006 at 2:05 pm
Jake,
Well, yes, but my general point was that Florida, soon to the second most heavily populated state in the country, and California, the most populous state in the country, have exponentialy larger media markets then Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. The cost, therefore, to mount an effective campaign there (a necessity if they’re early in the process), is astronomically higher then the cost to mount an effective campaign in Iowa or New Hampshire. The process is already too heavily dominated by money, but allowing California and Florida in the door almost makes the campaigns entirely about money. That isn’t currently the case. Howard Dean raised and spent huge amounts of money, yet lost big in Iowa. If Florida and California move their primaries up, then I say the Republican Party vote not to seat there delegates. Discipline absolutely must be enforced on this matter.