Iowa GOP chair: State should hold first caucuses for both parties in 2024

Iowa Republican Social gathering Chairman Jeff Kaufmann on Sunday mentioned the Iowa caucuses ought to stay the primary nominating contest within the nation for each events within the subsequent presidential election.

“I can report again from Memphis, Tennessee, that the Republican Social gathering of Iowa will as soon as once more kick off the nomination calendar with our Iowa Caucus,” Kauffman mentioned in an opinion column printed within the Des Moines Register.

“Now that Republicans have set their calendar and the Democrats close to setting theirs, the time for sitting on the sideline is over,” he wrote. 

Kauffman criticized claims that Iowa was not a mirrored image of the remainder of the nation, arguing that “coastal progressives” ignore points essential to a large swath of the nation.

“They are saying we’re ‘not consultant sufficient,’ ‘not aggressive sufficient,’ and never essential sufficient to carry such an honor. All the things they’ve mentioned is incorrect,” Kauffman mentioned.

He added that it was “in no way shocking that they wish to skip over center America relating to important, essential contests that begin the nomination for who would be the subsequent President of america.”

“I consider that Ross Wilburn, Scott Brennan, and different Iowa Democratic Social gathering leaders will prevail. Iowa, and America, are stronger when Iowa goes first, and goes collectively,” he additionally mentioned. 

Whereas the nominating calendar on the Republican aspect will begin in Iowa in 2024, Iowa Democrats’ future because the first-in-the-nation caucus is much less sure.

Aside from considerations that Iowa, which is basically white and rural, doesn’t characterize the remainder of the nation, a extremely public know-how failure on the Democratic aspect sparked widespread confusion on the 2020 Iowa caucuses. 

That led the Democratic Nationwide Committee to open up an utility course of for the early voting calendar and despatched states jockeying for the coveted slots earlier than Tremendous Tuesday — that means that there isn’t a assure Iowa will likely be among the many first 4. Democrats have additionally thought-about including a fifth state to the early lineup, which has historically consisted of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.