Opinion: Why Iowa is so important this time
Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke addresses a town hall in Shenandoah, Iowa, on May 5. By Jennifer Rubin Jennifer Rubin Opinion writer covering politics and policy, foreign and domestic Email Bio Follow Opinion writer May 13 at 2:30 PM The most underappreciated rule in the Democratic presidential primary race is the 15 percent threshold. To get any delegates from a congressional district in a caucus or primary, the candidate must win at least 15 percent of the vote.
Things get even dicier for lesser-known candidates as you get into the weeds of the Iowa caucuses. Many have focused on new rules allowing for “virtual caucuses” before the main caucus day. However, there will be only six of these, and no matter how many people use this option, virtual caucus votes will only count as 10 percent of the vote.
What does this all mean? There may be very few candidate who get any delegates in Iowa. While a candidate such as Buttigieg or former congressman Beto O’Rourke might claim bragging rights for third place, he might not get delegates. Failure to get delegates wouldn’t necessarily doom candidates going into New Hampshire, but if the pattern repeats in New Hampshire, you’ll see lesser candidates dropping out.
Second, Sanders is languishing in a distant second place. It’s not unforeseeable that he could be passed by Buttigieg and/or Warren and denied delegates in one of the first two states. That would be disastrous for his campaign, maybe fatally so.
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