Caucusing 101

Never mind the votes. In caucus states in particular, it’s all about delegates.

Each precinct holds a caucus. Each precinct caucus sends some number of delegates to the meeting at the next level up the hierarchy – normally a county convention. The county convention acts just like a large caucus. The county convention sends delegates to one or more meetings up the food chain. In Colorado, each county convention sends delegates both to the Congressional District convention and to the state convention. These higher-level meetings, in turn, send delegates to the national convention.

The state Democratic Party allocates delegates to each precinct. In Colorado, every precinct gets at least two delegates to the county convention. A third delegate is awarded to precincts that exceeded some Democratic performance figure in either the most recent statewide race for governor or the last presidential election, whichever is the more recent of the two. Then an additional delegate is added for each five precinct caucus attendees.

The preliminaries now out of the way, let’s do some caucus arithmetic. A caveat: each state allocates delegates differently, depending on the state’s “Delegate Selection Plan,” but the principles are basically the same, since each state’s plan must conform to national Party rules. Another caveat: I’m using Colorado as the example since that’s the system with which I’m the most familiar.

Okay, so you waltz into your precinct caucus. The party has told you that your precinct doesn't merit a bonus delegate based on the 2006 governor’s election. So you start with two delegates from your precinct to the county convention. However, when the caucus opens, you see that there are 20 people in attendance, and the caucus leader (elected at the caucus as the first item of business along with the caucus secretary) notes that because of the delegate-per-five-attendees rule, your caucus will send six delegates to the county convention.

Next, the caucus holds a preference poll. In Iowa, people physically move to a designated place in the room or venue. In Colorado, the people stay put and announce their preferences.

You see that eight people support candidate A, six people support candidate B, four support candidate C, and one each support candidates D and E.

You calculate the percentages of each candidate’s support. A got 40% (8/20), B got 30%, C received 20%, and D and E came in with 5% each.

The national Party rule applies: a candidate must garner at least 15% of the caucus/convention support to be “viable.” Another term for the 15% rule is “making threshold.”

Sidenote: At least in Colorado, “Uncommitted” is considered a candidate, and "Uncommitted" must similarly get 15% of the caucus votes to stay viable.

Poor candidates D and E didn’t make it. Their supporters now select one of the viable candidates. You see that one has gone to candidate B and the other sided with candidate C. So the totals now read, candidate A remains at 8 votes, B moved up to 7 votes, and C comes in with 5. Once again, we calculate the percentages: A has 40%, B now has 35%, and C has 25%.

It’s time to allocate the six delegates. More arithmetic. Remember that the precinct will send six delegates to the county convention:

A: 40% x 6 = 2.40
B: 35% x 6 = 2.10
C: 25% x 6 = 1.50

Look only at the integer portion of the results. In this case the value is two for candidates A and B, while C's integer protion is one, so so far, A and B get two delegates each and C gets one. Then you ask, are there any delegates left over? Yes, there is one left over since the caucus merits six delegates. So now look at the decimal or fractional part of the result above. The largest decimal is candidate A’s 0.4. A gets the extra delegate, and the six delegates comprise three for A, two for B, and one for C. Had there been a seventh delegate available, B would get another delegate, and so on looking at the order of the fractional part of the value above.

Now pay attention. If the caucus only gets three delegates to the county convention and the percentages of support for A, B, and C were the same, you’d wind up with:

A: 40% x 3 = 1.20
B: 35% x 3 = 1.05
C: 25% x 3 = 0.75

Another rule comes into play. Even though the integer portion of C’s value is zero, any candidate who “makes threshold” in the first preference vote gets at least one delegate. Applying that rule, all three candidates get one delegate, and there are no delegates left over. So the caucus sends one delegate each pledged to candidates A, B, and C.

Notice what happened? The fact that A got 15 points (by percentage) more than C doesn’t matter at all!!!! The ONLY thing that matters is the number of delegates. But I submit that the media will ignore that little bit of trivia. They’ll report that A “won,” “beating” B and C, when in fact they ended up getting the same number of delegates.

Once the delegates are allocated, attendees “run” to become delegates pledged to their chosen candidates. The precinct will send six delegates allocated to candidates as above, and another six alternates allocated similarly. I should add that at the county, congressional district, and state conventions, almost all alternates get seated as full delegates on account of no-shows.

This arithmetic and process apply at every level of the system, by the way.

Eventually, Colorado will send 71 delegates to the national convention. Of those, 55 are “pledged” with 16 “unpledged.” At least on paper. The unpledged delegates are Party leaders and elected officials (PLEOs). Of course, they have a preference, and their support is usually factored in to determine what the convention looks like going in.

Of the 55 pledged delegates, 36 are chosen at the congressional districts while 12 are elected "at large" at the state convention.

After all this process and hoopla, and a year of campaigning and countless numbers of stories, polls, and predictions, and millions of dollars spent by the candidates, Iowa, for example, ends up with 57 delegates.

Now, you may ask, how many delegates will there be at the convention in Denver in August? FOUR THOUSAND FOUR HUNDRED SEVENTEEN. How’s that again? You got it. Iowa makes up a whopping 1.29% of the total delegate count.

Given the importance attached to the Iowa caucuses, you might conclude that the system is insane. I would have to put myself in the “it’s insane” camp.

By the way, the arithmetic in primary states is a little more straightforward. Delegates to the national convention are allocated to candidates as closely as possible to the primary results. A separate process, normally some kind of caucus or convention system, determines who the delegates will be. In California, caucuses are held for that purpose. Attendees of the caucus “run” to get elected as a delegate, but the primary replaces the preference polls conducted in pure caucus states. Other primary states would do more or less the same thing.

The bottom line: There really aren’t any “winners” and “losers” in the primary/caucus season. It’s all about the delegates. Sure, one candidate may get a few more delegates than the others, but it’s the national delegate count that really matters. The way the arithmetic works, a “win’ by a few percentage points may not make much difference in the delegate count.

Finally, all of this applies only to the Democratic Party. In some states, Republican primaries are “winner take all.” That is, a narrow win by a candidate would result in getting all the state’s delegates. The Democratic Party doesn’t find this system….well….democratic, and enforces proportional delegate allocation.

A final note. The presidential preference poll is just one item on the caucus agenda. After electing a caucus chair and secretary and selecting presidential delegates to the county convention, the caucus repeats the process for statewide and federal races. At the county, congressional, and state levels, there are two processes: for President, it's called a convention. For the other races, it's an assembly. At the higher-level meetings, the chair actually closes the convention and formally opens the assembly. Delegates to the convention and assembly normally are the same people, but not necessarily.

After selecting delegates to the convention and assembly, the caucus then votes on any proposed resolutions. Finally, the caucus elects one or two precinct committee-persons to serve for the next two years. These precinct committee-people automatically become members of the state Senate, House, and County Central Committees.

At the county assemblies, the meeting will break up into separate state House districts, then state Senate districts, and finally congressional district meetings. They nominate candidates for their respective races. It gets complicated and beyond the scope of this (already too-long) message when house, senate, or congressional districts cross county boundaries.

Clear as mud? Feel free to contact me by e-mail or phone, 303-989-3185, or contact your county party headquarters. I khow just enough to be dangerous. IMPORTANT: If you're interested in running your caucus or becoming the caucus secretary, please attend one of the state or county caucus training sessions nearby if you haven't already done so. If you learn something there that contradicts what I said in this message, they're probably right and I'm probably wrong.

HAPPY CAUCUSING!!