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      Should Iowa or South Carolina Go First?

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      More from our inbox:Humans and Wildlife: The Messages Are MixedThe Decades-Long Struggle for Affordable Child Care Antonio Giovanni PinnaTo the Editor:Re “Democrats to Iowa: Get Lost!,” by Art Cullen (Opinion guest essay, Dec. 12):Maybe, just maybe, Mr. Cullen is revealing more about the problem with Iowa than anything about the Democratic Party when he complains that the Democrats’ proposed new primary schedule is set up to “dump the Iowa caucuses into the ditch.”It does no such thing, of course; it merely deprives the Hawkeye State of its guaranteed gatekeeper status at the head of the line. Mr. Cullen’s self-righteous huffing that “discarding Iowa is not a great way to mend fences in rural America” seems to suggest that he feels that somehow his state is read out of the Union if it isn’t allowed to speak first when presidential primary season rolls around.New Hampshire, which holds the first actual primaries, has a similar attitude. Neither state’s position on the electoral calendar was inscribed in stone, but you’d never know it from their champions’ zealotry on this issue.Personally, I’d prefer to see the order of the primaries and caucuses reshuffled before every presidential election. That way, at least Iowa would be at or near the front at least some of the time, but one of the smaller, whitest states in the nation wouldn’t get to fire the race’s starting gun every time. Surely Iowans can find something else about their state to be proud of.Eric B. LippsStaten IslandTo the Editor:Art Cullen’s critique of the Democratic National Committee’s proposal to put South Carolina ahead of Iowa on the nominating calendar is misguided. Democrats haven’t dumped “the Iowa caucuses into a ditch.” Rather, they’re considering leading with a state with voter rolls that better represent Democratic voters and the country as a whole.Mr. Cullen argues that diversity has a chance in Iowa, citing Barack Obama’s victory over Hillary Clinton at the caucus. But an overwhelmingly white electorate choosing a diverse candidate is not the same as a diverse electorate having its say in the process.Rural states like Iowa have challenges, but they don’t need symbolic support like keeping the Iowa caucus first. Instead, they need real solutions, such as the Inflation Reduction Act, which provides subsidies for renewable energy projects that will bring economic vitality to rural areas.John HorschOakland, Calif.To the Editor:Art Cullen’s essay was remarkably self-serving. Iowa goes first by tradition, which gives a rural, largely white state outsized importance.I get that Iowans want to hold onto their position, but why should the rest of the nation take cues from this one state? It is time to hold national primaries, all on the same day. Let everyone in the nation vote, at the same time. This has the side benefit of shortening the ridiculously long primary season.Katherine Jo GlavesSeattleHumans and Wildlife: The Messages Are Mixed Tom KrawczykTo the Editor:Re “My Mother Has Two Sons: Me and a Squirrel” (Op-Doc, nytimes.com, Dec. 5):What a joy to wake up to such a tender video of a woman responding to an abandoned newborn creature in her yard. Her son, Tom Krawczyk, is a gifted videographer whose obvious professionalism captured both his mother’s humanity and her concern for a wild animal’s future.At this time of year, especially this year, it is a balm to witness such a poignant gem as this, reminding me of all that is fresh and good in the world and that this sort of intimate connection, wherever we find it, is the ultimate healing.Marjorie HermanHamilton, N.J.To the Editor:I was frustrated by the mixed messaging in The Times about how to best care for wildlife. The Dec. 5 Op-Doc about a woman raising a newborn squirrel as a family member is heartwarming, but unfortunately has the potential to seriously mislead viewers.It counters the excellent advice found in a piece by Margaret Renkl (“Wildlife Rescue Heals the Human Heart,” Opinion guest essay, Dec. 7) about the importance of wildlife rehabilitation centers.The responsible — and legal — thing to do when encountering orphaned or injured wildlife is to place the animal with a certified wildlife rehabilitator.Home-raised animals can suffer from nutritional deficiencies or simply may not survive a well-meaning amateur’s aid. Animals that become acclimated to humans have been known to attack their caregivers or strangers who don’t understand their natural behaviors.Their instinctual response to potential predators might also be compromised. (In this video, the squirrel was friends with a cat.) The most compassionate response is to put an animal’s care into the hands of someone who has the educational training to best support their survival.Kim BaileyNashvilleThe writer is a retired metro parks naturalist.To the Editor:Re “Wildlife Rescue Heals the Human Heart”:Although it was heartwarming to read about the often heroic efforts of wildlife rehabilitators in helping injured and orphaned animals, I can’t help thinking about all the ways that other, less compassionate humans deliberately inflict harm and torture on our wildlife.The indiscriminate trapping and snaring of wolves, the barbaric wildlife-killing contests that still take place in many states and all forms of recreational trophy hunting reflect an indifference to the suffering of our nonhuman kinfolk, who like us value their lives, strive to take care of their families and have every right to share this earth with us.Mary Anne EricsonPortland, Ore.The Decades-Long Struggle for Affordable Child Care Eleanor DavisTo the Editor:Re “The Child Care Crisis Has Been ‘Urgent’ Since ’86. Just Ask Cosmo,” by Jessica Grose (Opinion, nytimes.com, Dec. 7):I read Ms. Grose’s excellent article with a sense of déjà vu — the more things change, the more they stay the same.In 1982, a group of friends and I started a day care center on the Upper West Side because there were few options for full-time working parents.We managed to receive support from a private foundation to help us set up the little center, secured space in a rundown synagogue, and founded one of the first Jewish all-day child care centers in New York City. We named it Yaldaynu, Hebrew for “our children.” (I am pleased to say it is still operating.)It is sad that 40 years later, my daughter, one of those first children, and now a mother, still does not have quality, affordable day care options for her daughter.When will the U.S. do what most of the rest of the West does and provide quality affordable child care for their citizens? Why is this not even on the agenda of urgent our country is facing?Now is the time for Cosmo, which ran a cover story on this issue in 1986, to put it back on the cover, and for politicians, corporations and nonprofits to take action.Jeanne B. KesAlbuquerque More

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      Want to Know Why Democrats Lose Rural America?

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      STORM LAKE, Iowa — Democrats are getting their derrières handed to them by the kickers and the Busch Light drinkers from out here on the edge of the Great Plains all the way to Appalachia, where the Republicans roam.So what do the Democrats do?Dump the Iowa caucuses into the ditch. At the hand of President Biden, no less. He decreed that South Carolina’s primary should go first on the presidential nominating calendar, displacing Iowa. The Democratic National Committee seems happy to oblige.We get it. Let someone else take a turn up front. But discarding Iowa is not a great way to mend fences in rural America — where the Democratic brand has become virtually unmarketable. The Democratic big shots hated Iowa’s pride of place since the caucuses rose to prominence a half-century ago because money couldn’t control the outcome. Jimmy Carter broke through from Plains, Ga., with nothing but a toothy smile and an honest streak. Candidates were forced to meet actual voters in village diners across the state. We took our vetting role seriously — you had better be ready to analyze Social Security’s actuarial prospects.Candidates weren’t crazy about it. The media hated Storm Lake ice in January. We did a decent, if imperfect, job of winnowing the field. Along with New Hampshire, we set things up so South Carolina could often become definitive, which it will be no longer.Iowa has its problems. We are too white. The caucuses are complicated, confusing and clunky. The evening gatherings in homes, school gyms and libraries are not fully accessible and not as convenient as a primary for people with jobs and kids at home.But diversity did have a chance here. Barack Obama was vaulted to the White House. Iowa actively encouraged Black candidates to challenge the white establishment. Mr. Obama beat Hillary Clinton here. Iowa had no problem giving a gay man, Pete Buttigieg, and a Jewish democratic socialist, Bernie Sanders, the two top tickets out to New Hampshire last cycle. Black, white or Latino, it’s organization that matters in Iowa. You have to herd your people to the caucus and keep them in your pen for an hour while other campaigns try to poach them. It’s town hall democracy. Mr. Obama won with it. Candidates who ran feeble campaigns have to blame something. Latinos in Storm Lake overwhelmingly caucused for Mr. Sanders. Julián Castro can complain all he wants.The talking heads say Iowa messed up by not reporting the results quickly. The problem was that a cellphone app suggested to the Iowa Democratic Party by the Democratic National Committee crashed. The democratic process worked — the app didn’t.Anyone looking for an excuse to excise Iowa and further alienate rural voters could find one. The time was ripe.Mr. Biden doesn’t owe Iowa a thing. He finished fourth in the caucuses. He did owe Representative James Clyburn, the dean of South Carolina Democrats, big time for an endorsement just ahead of the Palmetto State primary, where Black voters put Mr. Biden over the top. It was sweet payback. We get that, too.Actually, the caucuses haven’t been the best thing for Iowa. The TV ads never stop. It puts you in a bad mood to think everything is going wrong all the time. We asked good questions, and the candidates gave good answers, then forgot about it all. Despite all the attention, nothing really happened to stop the long decline as the state’s Main Streets withered, farmers disappeared, and the undocumented dwell in the shadows. Republican or Democrat, the outcome was pretty much the same. At least the Republicans will cut your taxes.So it’s OK that South Carolina goes first. Iowa can do without the bother. The Republicans are sticking with Iowa, the Democrats consider it a lost cause. No Democratic state senator lives in a sizable part of western Iowa. Republicans control the governor’s office, the Legislature and soon the entire congressional delegation. Nobody organized the thousands of registered Latino voters in meatpacking towns like Storm Lake. Democrats are barely trying. The results show it.The old brick factory haunts along the mighty Mississippi River are dark, thanks to Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton and everyone else who sold us out for “free trade.” Keokuk, the gate city to the river, was once a bustling industrial and shipping hub but recently lost its hospital. Your best hope in rural Jefferson was to land a casino to save the town. You essentially can’t haul a load of hogs to the packinghouse in a pickup anymore — you need a contract and a semi. The sale barn and open markets are quaint memories. John Deere tractor cabs will be made in Mexico, not Waterloo. Our rivers are rank with manure. It tends to frustrate those left behind, and the resentment builds to the point of insurrection when it is apparent that the government is not here to help you.It’s hard to feel from 30,000 feet. So Donald Trump landed in Sioux City on the eve of the midterm election to claim his stake before a large crowd buffeted by the gales out of Nebraska. “The Iowa way of life is under siege,” Mr. Trump bellowed. “We are a nation in decline. We are a failing nation.”They loved him. The Democrats view the crowd as deplorable, and told Iowa to get lost.Art Cullen is the editor of The Storm Lake Times and author of “Storm Lake: A Chronicle of Change, Resilience, and Hope from a Heartland Newspaper.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      How Democrats’ New Primary Calendar Changes the Chessboard

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      President Biden’s push to abandon Iowa for younger, racially diverse states is likely to reward candidates who connect with the party’s most loyal voters.When a panel of Democratic Party insiders endorsed President Joseph R. Biden’s preferred lineup of early presidential nominating states on Friday, they didn’t just shatter the exalted status of Iowa and New Hampshire voters.They also formally aligned themselves with a demographic reckoning decades in the making, reflecting the growing clout of the racially diverse coalition that brought Mr. Biden to power — and implicitly rebuking two overwhelmingly white states that rejected him in 2020.According to the proposal recommended by Mr. Biden and adopted by the party’s Rules and Bylines Committee, South Carolina would now go first, holding its primary on Feb. 3, 2024. Three days later, Nevada and New Hampshire would follow. Georgians would vote next on Feb. 13, then Michiganders on Feb. 27.For political obsessives, the change — which must still be voted on by the whole committee — feels sweeping and swift.“For the .000001 percent of people who follow this stuff, this is equivalent to an earthquake,” said Julián Castro, the former secretary of housing and urban development who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. “For it to change this much in one cycle is both impressive and will be very impactful in the years to come.”Mr. Castro spent years arguing that Iowa should lose its spot at the front of his party’s presidential nominating calendar, even starting his primary campaign with an event in Puerto Rico — an intentional symbolic rejection of Iowa. He praised the new schedule, saying the broader diversity of states would offer opportunities to a wider range of candidates.Donna Brazile, former acting chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, said the changes would offer myriad benefits to the party, “from hearing the voices of people who tend not to matter to candidates until the end to lifting up those who also might need to be part of the process.”Mr. Biden’s recommendations were perhaps the most telling indicator that he planned to seek re-election, despite the prospect that he would be reaching well into his 80s by the end of a second term. His proposed reordering of the political map, noted Mike Murphy, a Republican consultant, happens to be “very Biden-friendly.”Representative Debbie Dingell of Michigan, right, has pushed for her state’s inclusion among the early states for years. Under Mr. Biden’s proposal, Michigan would hold the fifth primary in 2024.Doug Mills/The New York TimesRepresentative Debbie Dingell, a Michigan Democrat who has lobbied for her state’s inclusion in the early states since the 1990s, said that Mr. Biden’s choices also reflected a recognition that the party must resist the tug of its bicoastal centers of power.“You cannot win the White House without the heartland of America,” she said.The panel’s decision is not the last word on the calendar. Democrats will need to somehow persuade Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to set the date of his state’s primaries according to the wishes of the Democratic National Committee, rather than those of his own party.The Biden PresidencyHere’s where the president stands after the midterm elections.A Defining Issue: The shape of Russia’s war in Ukraine — and its effects on global markets —  in the months and years to come could determine President Biden’s political fate.Beating the Odds: Mr. Biden had the best midterms of any president in 20 years, but he still faces the sobering reality of a Republican-controlled House for the next two years.2024 Questions: Mr. Biden feels buoyant after the better-than-expected midterms, but as he turns 80, he confronts a decision on whether to run again that has some Democrats uncomfortable.Legislative Agenda: The Times analyzed every detail of Mr. Biden’s major legislative victories and his foiled ambitions. Here’s what we found.Disgruntled Iowa and New Hampshire might stick to their first-in-the-nation guns, even if the party strips them of delegates in retaliation for their defiance. Democrats running in 2024 — assuming there are any candidates besides, or instead of, Mr. Biden — would then have to decide whether the resulting “beauty contests” were worth the bragging rights alone.If Mr. Biden runs again, a decision he has indicated is coming early in the new year, the state that set him on a path to the nomination in 2024 will offer a formidable first hurdle to any would-be challenger.“He’s created a firewall against any insurgency,” said David Axelrod, one of the architects of former President Barack Obama’s political rise. “It doesn’t mean he will run. But it certainly suggests he intends to.”Those seeking to unseat the president would need to connect with South Carolina’s majority Black primary electorate, which is more conservative than either Iowa’s prairie progressives or New Hampshire’s northeastern Brahmins. In the state’s 2020 primary, more than 60 percent of Black voters chose Mr. Biden over his rivals, according to exit polls.Mr. Biden’s triumph in South Carolina exposed not only the regional appeal of liberal candidates like Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, but also the limits of two billionaire candidates who sought to buy a grass-roots following: Michael Bloomberg and Tom Steyer. And it underscored the struggles Pete Buttigieg, then running as the whiz-kid mayor of South Bend, Ind., had in reaching Black voters in particular.Steve Phillips, a Democrat and author of several books on racial politics, said the changes would reward candidates who develop a deep bond with Black communities, rather than train them to appeal to rural Iowans who might not support them in November.“You want somebody who is going to inspire and understand Black voters to be your nominee,” he said.If Mr. Biden does not run, the new lineup is likely to scramble generations of electoral calculations.For decades, the Iowa caucuses were an early proving ground for upstart candidates, including starting Jimmy Carter and Mr. Obama on their roads to the White House. The state carried continued mystique as a kingmaker, even as it increasingly evolved to be older, whiter and more Republican than the Democratic Party. The chaotic counting of the state’s caucus voters in 2020, when final results took a week, marked its demise for many in the party.A number of party strategists argued the low costs of campaigning in South Carolina would allow underdogs to continue to surprise the country with a stronger-than-expected showing.“The state is not so expensive that you can’t go live there and get it done,” said Jeremy Bird, a Democratic strategist.Mr. Bird, who helped guide Mr. Obama to a nearly 30-point primary win in South Carolina in 2008, said the diversity of South Carolina would force candidates to spend more time in rural Black communities, historically Black colleges and universities and Southern cities, and less time in grange halls and the living rooms of caucus microinfluencers.Traditionally, skipping Iowa was viewed as a sign of weakness by pundits, donors and strategists. But the quick pace of the first three states, with Nevada and New Hampshire coming just three days after South Carolina, could reshape that calculation.“If it’s an open primary in the future, you could have lots of different strategies,” Mr. Bird said. “You could have someone that skips South Carolina altogether. You could have someone that skips Nevada. It will be fascinating to see.”The long-term impact of the changes is still very much to be determined. The party says it plans to revisit its lineup in four years, raising the prospect that the calendar itself has become less a function of tradition than political juice.For now, with Georgia’s fate uncertain and Iowa and New Hampshire in potential revolt, candidates will also have to learn how to run in a new entry to the early-state mix: Michigan, a state that has rarely been in serious contention in recent presidential primaries.Compared with pastoral, racially homogeneous Iowa, Michigan presents an emerging America in microcosm — an increasingly diverse state of 10 million people that boasts not just one of the country’s historical centers of Black culture, Detroit, but also one of the largest Arab American populations in the country, among other communities of color dotted in suburbs and smaller cities across the state, like Ann Arbor.Michigan, an increasingly diverse state with a mix of large and small cities, could scramble old ways of campaigning. Allison Farrand for The New York Times“It’s more like a jigsaw puzzle,” said Amy Chapman, a Democratic strategist in Michigan who ran Barack Obama’s campaign in the state in 2008.The state’s geographic diversity could allow candidates to essentially choose their own spending adventure, said Eric Hyers, who directed Mr. Biden’s campaign in Michigan in 2020.“It’s not like there’s just one media market and it’s wicked expensive,” Mr. Hyers said. Campaigning in Nevada means spending heavily in the costly Las Vegas market, and New Hampshire candidates must buy airtime in pricey Boston.Jeff Link, a Des Moines operative who served as a local guide for Bill Clinton and Mr. Obama, said that even Mr. Obama, who forever altered how presidential candidates raise money, might not have won the nomination in Mr. Biden’s proposed calendar. And yet, even as much of Iowa’s Democratic political world spent Friday wallowing in the loss of what many considered a birthright, Mr. Link predicted that as long as Republicans maintained Iowa’s first-in-the-nation status, Democrats would come to the state too, even if the state’s caucuses no longer officially mattered. That is, after all, where the media will be.“If you guys are in town covering the other side, candidates are going to show up because you can’t help yourself,” he said.Reid J. Epstein More

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      DNC Panel Supports Biden’s Plan to Make South Carolina First Primary in 2024

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      A key panel supported President Biden’s plan, which would remove Iowa as the first presidential nominating state. States with more diverse, working-class and in some cases more moderate constituencies are being elevated.WASHINGTON — Over objections from some Democratic state leaders, the Democratic National Committee on Friday moved one step closer to enacting President Biden’s vision for drastically overhauling the party’s 2024 presidential primary process, as a key committee voted to recommend sweeping changes to the calendar.At a daylong gathering of the D.N.C.’s Rules and Bylaws Committee in a Washington hotel ballroom, members voted to recommend supporting a 2024 Democratic presidential primary calendar that would begin in South Carolina on Feb. 3, followed by New Hampshire and Nevada on Feb. 6, Georgia on Feb. 13 and then Michigan on Feb. 27. That plan reflected a framework Mr. Biden delivered to the committee on Thursday that emphasized racial and geographic diversity. Representatives from Iowa and New Hampshire voted against the proposal, and officials emphasized that the move by the Rules Committee was one step in what might still be a prolonged and contentious process. The proposed early states have until Jan. 5 to confirm that they can hold a primary on their assigned date.The recommendation, which upends the traditional Democratic order of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, must be affirmed by the full D.N.C. at a meeting in early February, but Mr. Biden’s preferences carry enormous weight with the party committee. The proposed new order rewards some of the states that powered his political rise in 2020, elevating diverse, working-class and in some cases more moderate constituencies that were vital to Mr. Biden’s primary victory. At the same time, smaller states that have long emphasized retail politics — Iowa and New Hampshire — would be diminished. “Given the president’s strong interest in the design of the 2024 primaries, and the dates for them, I think it’s clear that he’s running,” said James Roosevelt Jr., a co-chairman of the Rules and Bylaws Committee, who said he had spoken with Mr. Biden this week about the early-state order.Mr. Biden has said that he intends to run again but plans to discuss the race with his family. If he does not run, the schedule, if adopted, would help other candidates with strong support from the voters of color who make up the backbone of the Democratic Party.Black voters accounted for more than half of the Democrats who voted in the South Carolina primary in 2020, according to exit polling. And they make up a significant share of the primary electorates in Georgia and Michigan. Latino voters play an especially central role in Nevada.But the shift could also hurt candidates without the campaign cash to compete quickly in early states with expensive media markets — like Nevada, Georgia and even New Hampshire, where Boston television stations drive up rates. The fast pacing of the proposed calendar could force contenders with smaller bank accounts to choose to compete in just one or two of the first three states. Scott Brennan and other Iowa Democrats criticized the proposed changes and suggested that the state party would challenge them.Shuran Huang for The New York TimesJoanne Dowdell, a D.N.C. member from New Hampshire, opposed the proposal.Shuran Huang for The New York Times“One of the things that New Hampshire is known for is our retail politics, and candidates having the opportunity to engage the electorate face to face,” said Joanne Dowdell, a D.N.C. member from New Hampshire who opposed the proposal. “By having three states, one on top of the other, I think causes a little bit of conflict for candidates trying to vie for the attention, get name recognition and also raise money.”The Biden PresidencyHere’s where the president stands after the midterm elections.A Defining Issue: The shape of Russia’s war in Ukraine — and its effects on global markets —  in the months and years to come could determine President Biden’s political fate.Beating the Odds: Mr. Biden had the best midterms of any president in 20 years, but he still faces the sobering reality of a Republican-controlled House for the next two years.2024 Questions: Mr. Biden feels buoyant after the better-than-expected midterms, but as he turns 80, he confronts a decision on whether to run again that has some Democrats uncomfortable.Legislative Agenda: The Times analyzed every detail of Mr. Biden’s major legislative victories and his foiled ambitions. Here’s what we found.Jeff Link, a longtime Des Moines operative, said cutting Iowa’s caucuses out of the Democratic presidential nominating process would diminish the importance of organizing, which is central to the state’s political culture.That could prove detrimental to the party nationally, he said, by eliminating a critical proving ground for Democratic field operatives.“Rather than having a big field operation, they’re going to have a big social media operation,” Mr. Link said. “There’s going to be less people talking to other people in the campaign. One of the benefits of having a caucus early is that for three decades, we’ve trained campaign staff on how to organize person to person.”Other objections have been far louder, especially from the two states accustomed to being at the front of the line. New Hampshire has long held the nation’s first primary as a matter of state law, and state officials have said they intend to follow that law rather than any party decision. And the chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party noted in a statement that the country’s longtime leadoff caucus state has a law that “requires us to hold a caucus before the last Tuesday in February, and before any other contest.” The decision on timing would be up to the state central committee and elected officials, said Scott Brennan, a member of the Rules Committee from Iowa.More than political clout and bragging rights is at stake: Studies of the economic impact of past caucuses in Iowa and New Hampshire primaries have found that spending was in the hundreds of millions of dollars, much of that on TV ads, though the figures were a drop in the bucket of each state’s annual economic activity.The party has powerful tools with which to compel states to fall in line.D.N.C. rules agreed upon earlier this year stipulated notable consequences for any state that jumps ahead to operate outside the party’s agreed-upon early window, including cuts to the number of pledged delegates and alternates for the state in question. Significantly, candidates who campaign in such states would face repercussions as well. “If a candidate chose to campaign in a state that operated outside the window, they would lose the delegates from that state,” Mr. Roosevelt said. “They could have other penalties, because the chair is empowered to go beyond that.”Some officials have suggested they are willing to take those risks.The D.N.C.’s Rules and Bylaws Committee gathered in Washington on Friday.Shuran Huang for The New York Times“For decades we have said we will bear any sanctions,” said Raymond Buckley, the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party.Republican willingness, or lack thereof, to change dates may also be relevant in several states, including in Republican-controlled Georgia. A spokesman for Gov. Brian Kemp did not respond to a question on Friday afternoon about his reaction to the Democratic proposal. The primary date is set by Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, who declined to comment on the Democrats’ process on Friday. “Our focus is on the security and integrity of the election that’s currently underway, and we will be looking at the entire process for possible improvements once this one is successfully complete,” said Jordan Fuchs, the deputy secretary of state, as Georgia hosts a Senate runoff. But, she noted in a statement, “Our legal team has continuously stated that both parties’ primaries must be on the same day and must not cost anyone any delegates.”Republicans have already agreed to their own early-state lineup of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.The Rules and Bylaws committee’s vote came a day after Mr. Biden sent a letter to members laying out his criteria for the early-voting window. In it, he rejected caucuses — effectively dealing a mortal blow to the troubled Iowa caucuses, which struggled for days to deliver results in 2020.After Mr. Biden came in fourth place in Iowa and fifth in New Hampshire, two states with high percentages of white voters, he showed new signs of political life in Nevada. And it was South Carolina’s primary, with large numbers of Black voters, that revived his candidacy and propelled him through Super Tuesday and to the nomination.“Defense, education, agriculture, manufacturing — South Carolina is a perfect laboratory,” said Representative James E. Clyburn, the South Carolina Democrat whose endorsement of Mr. Biden in 2020 played a vital role in the president’s victory in the state. “That’s why the people who do well in South Carolina end up doing pretty good in the general.”Mr. Clyburn said that he had urged Mr. Biden to keep South Carolina in the early-state window — “first, second, third or fourth, didn’t matter to me” — but that he had learned of the state’s possible elevation to the kickoff primary on Thursday from the president.Jaime Harrison, the chairman of the D.N.C., who is also from South Carolina, said he had found out at Thursday night’s state dinner.Mr. Biden has urged the Rules and Bylaws Committee to review the calendar every four years, and the committee embraced an amendment to get that process underway.“Nevada still has the strongest argument for being the first-in-the-nation primary,” Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen, the state’s senators, said in a joint statement. “We will keep making our case for 2028.”Reid J. Epstein More

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      Iowa Democrats Question Their Identity Without First-in-the-Nation Caucuses

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      President Biden’s push to start the Democratic presidential nominating process in South Carolina has inspired a rush of wistful memories and soul searching in the Hawkeye State.DES MOINES, Iowa — Every four years since 1972, Iowa has stolen the national spotlight as presidential aspirants infiltrated its coffee houses, parades, living rooms, high school gyms, community centers and the pork-grilling pavilion at the state fair.But after 50 years of being politically first-in-line — the site of caucuses that have been the Democrats’ initial contest on the presidential nominating calendar — one of the most idiosyncratic and consequential pageants in American elections has come to its likely end.Democratic Party officials on Friday moved a step closer to making South Carolina the first nominating state of 2024, followed by Nevada and New Hampshire, Georgia and then Michigan. The radical shake-up of the old calendar has the backing of President Biden and is aimed at giving voters of color a more powerful voice in the party’s presidential process.Iowa’s dethronement, which was not unexpected, has inspired a rush of emotions in the state — mourning, regret, nostalgia, reflections on Democrats’ weakening grip on the Midwest and a kind of who-are-we-now bit of soul searching.“We’ve always joked, If Iowa doesn’t have the caucuses, are we Nebraska?” said Mike Draper, the owner of Ray Gun, a quirky T-shirt store in Des Moines frequently visited by candidates and their staffs. His description of the caucuses was not quite political, yet fairly apt: “It’s like the dork Olympics.”“Every four years, it really is one of the most exciting things,” he added. “You so rarely see Iowa on the news. It’s surreal to be here, where nobody ever notices.”A T-shirt in the store read “Just Trying to Get Some Ranch,” a deep inside-Iowa political reference to a viral video of a young woman who in 2019 pushed past Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York campaigning in an Iowa bar, all in pursuit of salad dressing. Mr. Draper said the store paid the young woman “licensing checks every quarter” for years.The Drake Diner in Des Moines has long been a favorite handshaking stop for candidates during the caucuses.Rachel Mummey for The New York TimesThe caucuses are what started Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama on their roads to the White House, and where generations of party operatives and political journalists cut their teeth as a state that ranked no more than 30th in population became, for a time, the center of the political and news universe. That era’s seeming demise came as an increasingly diverse party, prodded by Mr. Biden, sought a kickoff state more representative than nearly all-white Iowa, and as Iowa has plunged off the map of general-election battlegrounds.“I love Iowa, but like all great love affairs it is very complicated,” said Lis Smith, who was senior adviser to Pete Buttigieg, whose razor-thin victory in the 2020 caucuses was not announced for nearly a week, after a chaotic counting snafu that helped taint Iowa in the hearts of many national Democrats.The Biden PresidencyHere’s where the president stands after the midterm elections.A Defining Issue: The shape of Russia’s war in Ukraine — and its effects on global markets —  in the months and years to come could determine President Biden’s political fate.Beating the Odds: Mr. Biden had the best midterms of any president in 20 years, but he still faces the sobering reality of a Republican-controlled House for the next two years.2024 Questions: Mr. Biden feels buoyant after the better-than-expected midterms, but as he turns 80, he confronts a decision on whether to run again that has some Democrats uncomfortable.Legislative Agenda: The Times analyzed every detail of Mr. Biden’s major legislative victories and his foiled ambitions. Here’s what we found.Democratic activists in Iowa, including county chairs whose counterparts in other states live quiet, anonymous lives, were already regretting the loss of all that future attention.“It is amazing, out of the blue I’ll get calls from Cory Booker or Elizabeth Warren,” Bret Nilles, the Democratic chairman of Linn County, said, remembering the 2020 cycle. “In 2018, the day after the election, I got a call from Eric Swalwell,” he said, referring to the liberal California congressman who briefly explored a presidential run. “He just wanted to say hello and say he might be in Iowa.”Ordinary Iowa voters also basked in the attention of presidential hopefuls, whose long and frequent sojourns in a largely rural state led to an intense style of retail politics, one with no real equivalent elsewhere in America.Ms. Smith, who also worked for the 2016 presidential campaign of Martin O’Malley, a former Maryland governor, said campaigning in Iowa was “a truly magical special thing,” with candidates who may be powerful governors, senators or billionaires brought face-to-face for hours with average citizens.Mike Draper, owner of Ray Gun, a clothing store in Des Moines that became a staple campaign stop for many political candidates.Rachel Mummey for The New York Times“At a morning event, they’ll ask about your 10-point rural policy plan,” she said. “At lunch they’ll grill you about mass incarceration. In the evening you get grilled about the war in Yemen.”“It’s a process that has been good for American politics,” she added, “but also really good for American politicians.”Jeff Weaver, a top adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders, whose 2020 presidential campaign contested the caucus results that put him in second place, said he supported making the more diverse Michigan the first Midwestern state to vote in the primary calendar. But he said there was a reason Iowans took the responsibility to weigh candidates so seriously.“It has to do with them being in the front of the line for so long,” Mr. Weaver said. “It became part of the culture.”Iowa’s caucuses provided some of the most indelible moments in American electoral history.In 2004, Howard Dean’s surprise defeat in the Democratic contest elicited a defiant cry, the “Dean scream,” which became perhaps the first viral meme in U.S. politics. Describing the importance of his 1980 victory in the Republican caucus, George H.W. Bush drew from sports to invoke the “Big Mo” that Iowa imparted, now a campaign truism. In 1976, a victory in Iowa transformed a little-known former governor of Georgia from “Jimmy Who?” to the overnight party front-runner, and eventually led to Mr. Carter’s election.Caucus defenders in Iowa have argued with the Democratic National Committee ahead of the reshuffling of the nominating calendar that while Iowa may lack racial diversity, its rural voters are a key constituency in the party’s coalition. To retreat from Iowa, their argument went, was to abandon a part of the middle of America dominated by white voters without college degrees, whom Democrats need to win back.Iowa lurched more forcefully to the right than any other U.S. state in recent years.Jenn Ackerman for The New York Times“If there are people who want to retreat because they haven’t had success or because there hasn’t been recent success in a state, then how do we continue to improve our ability to win everywhere?” Rob Sand, the Iowa state auditor, said.Mr. Sand was the sole Democrat to survive in statewide and federal elections in last month’s midterms. Democrats lost their last member of Congress from Iowa, Representative Cindy Axne. Tom Miller, a Democrat who has served nearly 40 years as the state attorney general and seemed invincible, was also defeated.As recently as 2014, Iowa was represented by Senator Tom Harkin, a progressive stalwart who introduced the Americans With Disabilities Act. The state twice voted for Mr. Obama. Yet it lurched more forcefully to the right than any other U.S. state. Thirty-one counties that voted for Mr. Obama in 2012 pivoted to Donald J. Trump in 2016. Mr. Biden failed to win back any of them in 2020.Explanations for the partisan reversal run the gamut from the economic distress of lost industrial jobs, to latent biases Mr. Trump enabled, to a broad malaise in rural areas that have been hollowed out by young people’s leaving.“The Democratic national message really isn’t resonating in those counties,” said Mr. Nilles, the party chairman of Linn County, which includes Cedar Rapids, the state’s second-largest city.Jeff Kaufmann, the chair of the Republican Party of Iowa, said the Democratic withdrawal will only cement the G.O.P. hold on the state. He argued that Iowa could still keep its place in the national spotlight in 2024, when national Republicans have committed to keep their own version of the Iowa caucuses first in the nation. “If we’ve got a competitive caucus, you all are coming out here,’’ he told a reporter. In Des Moines, the area around Drake University has been a hotbed of Democratic political activity for years. The campus was the site of nationally televised Democratic debates on the eve of recent caucuses. The nearby neighborhood of Beaverdale was such an organizing powerhouse it was known as Obamadale.In 2020, people arrived to caucus at the Drake University Fieldhouse in Des Moines.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesAnd because every Iowa political story must feature a diner, this one will end at the Drake Diner.The Drake has long been a favorite handshaking stop for candidates, as well as a meet-up spot for operatives and reporters, who traded gossip over chicken-fried steak and eggs beneath a band of red neon and a clock that urged, naïvely perhaps, “Don’t Worry.”At lunch hour on Thursday, years of political memories hovered over the booths and the counter.Kate Small, a longtime server, said that after Hillary Clinton dropped by in 2008, a photograph of her and Mrs. Clinton ran in The Washington Post. Scott Ford, a retired seed salesman and lunchtime patron, said he attended the state’s first Democratic caucuses in 1972 as a Vietnam veteran. When the nominee, George McGovern, ran on amnesty for draft evaders, Mr. Ford crossed the aisle to become a Republican.Tyger Nieters said Mr. Obama had dinner at the home of one of his father’s clients. “It’s a very cool thing that makes us special,” Mr. Nieters said of the caucuses.Mr. Nieters is a registered Republican. But he, too, declared himself “very upset” by the Democrats’ move to leave the state.“You know everyone’s watching Iowa at that point,” Mr. Nieters, who runs a youth soccer program, said of the caucuses. “We feel like we’re actually having an opinion in this giant nation.”Fairgoers waiting in line at the Iowa State Fair in 2019.Tom Brenner for The New York Times More

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      Biden Wants South Carolina as First Primary State in 2024, Demoting Iowa

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      Michigan would become the fifth primary. The plan came as the president asked that “voters of color have a voice in choosing our nominee much earlier in the process.”WASHINGTON — President Biden and the Democratic National Committee are moving to radically reorder the party’s presidential process by making South Carolina the first primary state in 2024, followed in order by Nevada and New Hampshire, Georgia and then Michigan.The plan, announced by party officials at a dinner Thursday in Washington, signals the end of Iowa’s long tenure as the Democrats’ first nominating contest, and it represents an effort to elevate the diverse, working-class constituencies that powered Mr. Biden’s primary victory in 2020. The move would also be an unmistakable reward for South Carolina, the state that saved Mr. Biden’s candidacy two years ago after he came in fourth in Iowa and fifth in New Hampshire, both of which are smaller and have a higher percentage of white voters. “We must ensure that voters of color have a voice in choosing our nominee much earlier in the process and throughout the entire early window,” Mr. Biden wrote in a letter Thursday to members of the D.N.C.’s Rules and Bylaws Committee. “Black voters in particular have been the backbone of the Democratic Party but have been pushed to the back of the early primary process,” he said. “We rely on these voters in elections but have not recognized their importance in our nominating calendar. It is time to stop taking these voters for granted, and time to give them a louder and earlier voice in the process.”The letter went on to note bluntly, “Our party should no longer allow caucuses as part of our nominating process.” Iowa is a caucus state and does not hold a primary. Iowa is still expected to remain the leadoff contest for Republicans, who have agreed to maintain the usual early-state order of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.The Biden PresidencyHere’s where the president stands after the midterm elections.A Defining Issue: The shape of Russia’s war in Ukraine — and its effects on global markets —  in the months and years to come could determine President Biden’s political fate.Beating the Odds: Mr. Biden had the best midterms of any president in 20 years, but he still faces the sobering reality of a Republican-controlled House for the next two years.2024 Questions: Mr. Biden feels buoyant after the better-than-expected midterms, but as he turns 80, he confronts a decision on whether to run again that has some Democrats uncomfortable.Legislative Agenda: The Times analyzed every detail of Mr. Biden’s major legislative victories and his foiled ambitions. Here’s what we found.Both Iowa and New Hampshire, whose famed diners and town commons are routinely overrun by candidates leading up to their nominating contests, have long promoted themselves as providing demanding tests of a candidate’s authenticity, preparedness and ability to connect in small gatherings with highly discerning voters.The new Democratic plan, by elevating several larger states, could reduce those opportunities and lead candidates instead to emphasize expensive advertising campaigns aimed at the broadest possible audiences.The proposal, reported first by The Washington Post, is subject to approval by the party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee and then by the full D.N.C. early next year, and there may be technical and legal considerations for some of the states. The plan met furious pushback from New Hampshire, long accustomed to hosting the first primary as a matter of state law. Statements from several officials suggested a coming clash with the D.N.C., raising questions about how the party will enforce its final order should states try to jump the line.“I strongly oppose the president’s deeply misguided proposal, but make no mistake, New Hampshire’s law is clear, and our primary will continue to be First in the Nation,” Senator Maggie Hassan, Democrat of New Hampshire, said in a statement.Ray Buckley, the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, declared that “we will be holding our primary first.”But the president’s preferences will carry enormous weight with the D.N.C., a group that often functions as the White House political arm. Mr. Biden urged the Rules and Bylaws Committee to review the calendar every four years “to ensure that it continues to reflect the values and diversity of our party and our country.”After Iowa’s disastrous 2020 Democratic caucuses, in which the state struggled for days to deliver results, the D.N.C. embarked on a protracted effort to reassess how the party picks its presidential candidates. It invited states to apply to host the kickoff primaries amid concerns that Iowa, and to some extent New Hampshire, did not reflect the Democratic Party’s diversity. The initiative led to an intense public and private lobbying effort involving high-ranking party and elected officials up and down the ballot.The current leadoff states are Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, in that order, chosen to represent the four major regions of the country: the Midwest, Northeast, West and South.Discussions throughout the process have involved several core questions: whether to replace Iowa, and if so, with either Michigan or Minnesota; the order of the early states, as Nevada sought to displace New Hampshire in the first primary; and whether a fifth state should be added to the early cluster.Earlier this year, the committee adopted a framework that emphasized racial, ethnic, geographic and economic diversity and labor representation; raised questions about feasibility; and stressed the importance of general election competitiveness.Some D.N.C. members worried — and Minnesota Democrats have argued — that having a large and expensive state like Michigan host a primary early in the nominating process could lead well-funded candidates to essentially camp out there and ignore the other states on the calendar.That concern is less urgent, though, if Mr. Biden seeks re-election. He has said that he intends to run but plans to discuss the race with his family over the holidays and could announce a decision early next year.Some Democrats have long been intrigued by the idea of promoting Michigan, a critical general election state that is home to diverse voter constituencies and a major labor presence, The Democratic sweep there in this year’s midterm elections helped bolster that idea. Earlier this week, the Michigan State Senate voted to move the primary from the second Tuesday in March to the second Tuesday in February. A senior Michigan Democratic official who spoke with the White House this week came away feeling that the Biden team was inclined toward Michigan’s bid to become an early presidential primary state.Lisa Lerer, Maggie Astor, Michael D. Shear and Blake Hounshell contributed reporting. More

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      Republican Chuck Grassley vows to vote against a national abortion ban

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      Republican Chuck Grassley vows to vote against a national abortion banThe longest-tenured US senator joins a growing chorus of conservative lawmakers opposed to such a restriction The longest-tenured Republican in the US Senate has pledged to vote against a national ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy which a prominent fellow party member and chamber colleague proposed last month, joining a growing chorus of conservative lawmakers opposed to that idea.Chuck Grassley, who’s been one of Iowa’s senators since 1980 and is seeking an eighth term in his seat during November’s midterms, expressed his opposition to such a ban during a televised debate Thursday night with his Democratic challenger Mike Franken.Anti-abortion Republican man says: I wish women could decide on lawRead more“I would vote ‘no,’” the 89-year-old lawmaker said in the verbal faceoff with Franken, a retired Navy admiral who’s thought to be more than 9 percentage points behind Grassley in the polls, according to the website FiveThirtyEight.Grassley’s remark during the recent debate is by no means an indication that he’s softening an anti-abortion stance that is typical among Republicans. He was among 43 GOP co-sponsors of a federal ban on aborting pregnancies beyond 20 weeks that was pitched last year by Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator from South Carolina.Graham last month introduced a bill aiming to ban abortions after 15 weeks with few exceptions, and just nine Republican senators co-sponsored the measure. Grassley was not among those nine.Graham’s fellow Republicans likely have met Graham’s bill with a cold reception because polling data show many voters disapproved of the US supreme court’s decision in June to eliminate the nationwide abortion rights that had been established by the landmark 1973 case Roe v Wade. In fact, one poll found that as many as 60% of voters support abortion rights in most are all cases.The Hill reported on its website that Grassley may have adopted his position on Graham’s more recently proposed ban out of fear for motivating opposition among Democratic voters in Des Moines and Iowa City, areas that are significantly more liberal than the rest of the strongly conservative state.Donald Trump won Iowa when the Republican captured the Oval Office in 2016 and then lost it to Joe Biden in 2020. The state had gone to Biden’s fellow Democratic president Barack Obama in the previous two elections.During the midterms, the Democrats are trying to preserve their advantage in a Senate that is evenly divided but which they control because of a tiebreaker vote in Biden’s vice-president Kamala Harris.Nonetheless, even if they lose the chamber to the Republicans, the party’s Senate leader Mitch McConnell has said that he doesn’t envision bringing Graham’s 15-week ban up for a vote in 2023. McConnell, of Kentucky, has said he believes each state should determine the legality of abortion in their jurisdiction.Since the supreme court’s controversial abortion ruling in June, the legislatures of 26 states have prohibited, severely limited or were expected to impede access to the termination of pregnancies, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights. Meanwhile, just 21 American states had laws protecting abortion access.The co-sponsors of Graham’s proposed 15-week ban are Steve Daines of Montana, Marco Rubio of Florida, Kevin Cramer and John Hoeven of North Dakota, John Thune of South Dakota, Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi, Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, Roger Marshall of Kansas, and Josh Hawley of Missouri.TopicsUS midterm elections 2022AbortionRepublicansIowaUS SenateUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      QAnon follower who chased officer on January 6 convicted of felonies

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      QAnon follower who chased officer on January 6 convicted of feloniesDouglas Jensen could face more than 50 years in prison after federal jury found him guilty A QAnon conspiracy theorist who led a pack of Donald Trump supporters that chased a solitary police officer around the US Capitol on the day of the January 6 attack has been found guilty of several felonies.Douglas Jensen – the bearded 43-year-old Iowa man who appeared in several media photos of the attack while wearing a black T-shirt with a large “Q” – could in theory face more than 50 years in prison after a federal jury in Washington DC convicted him on Friday, US justice department prosecutors said in a statement.However, it is rare for convicts in US district court to receive the harshest available punishment, even if they chose to stand trial rather than plead guilty in advance. And the harshest sentence handed out so far to anyone found guilty of having a role in the deadly Capitol attack has been 10 years.Antisemitic army reservist gets four years for role in January 6 Capitol attackRead moreProsecutors alleged that Jensen formed part of the mob of Trump supporters who gathered at the Capitol on the day in early 2021 that Congress was meeting to certify Joe Biden’s victory over Trump in the previous year’s presidential election.Clad in a navy blue knit cap and the T-shirt paying homage to QAnon, the conspiracy myth that Trump is locked in secret combat against a cabal of leftist pedophiles and its deep state allies, Jensen scaled a wall at the Capitol, watched as fellow mob members broke the Senate wing entrance’s windows and doors, and was among the first 10 people to invade the facility, according to prosecutors.Jensen went around a few corners and joined a crowd that encountered a lone Capitol police officer near a stairwell, prosecutors said. Jensen squeezed his way to the front of the group, essentially came face to face with the officer, Eugene Goodman, and helped chase him up the stairs to a hallway just outside the Senate chamber.Prosecutors said that Jensen – carrying a knife with a three-inch blade in his pocket – barked at Goodman as well as other officers to “back up” and ordered them to arrest Trump’s vice-president, Mike Pence, whom the mob was threatening to hang if he didn’t halt the certification of Biden’s electoral college win.After 40 minutes, Jensen was made to exit, briefly re-entered another section of the Capitol and was forced out again, prosecutors said.Authorities arrested him two days later, after he returned to Iowa.At Jensen’s trial, concluding Friday, his defense attorney portrayed him as “a terribly confused man” whose mind was even more twisted by QAnon as well as Covid lockdowns. Jensen’s attorney also claimed his client had never physically hurt anyone during his time at the Capitol.But jurors needed just four hours to convict Jensen as charged of assaulting police, obstructing a congressional proceeding, interfering with law enforcement, entering a restricted building and disorderly conduct with a dangerous weapon, which are all felonies.Jensen was also found guilty of a pair of misdemeanors: picketing in the Capitol and disorderly conduct in that facility.Goodman testified during Jensen’s trial, describing how he had felt cornered and threatened by the mob. Prosecutors showed video of Goodman leading the mob away from the Senate floor while defensively holding up a baton with one of his hands.The Senate awarded Goodman a congressional Gold Medal, saying that the officer had led the violent mob away from lawmakers who ultimately did certify Trump’s defeat in the 2020 election.A bipartisan Senate report linked seven deaths to the Capitol attack and said it had left more than 140 police officers injured. As of this week, more than 870 people had been charged with roles in the insurrection.TopicsUS Capitol attackIowaWashington DCnewsReuse this content More