The NPR Politics Podcast - After Decades Of Bipartisan Teamwork, Republicans Quit Presidential Debate Commission

Episode Date: April 18, 2022

And you might not have to go to Iowa in order to be the Democrats' presidential nominee anymore: the party is looking to reshape its primary calendar so the earliest states better represent the racial makeup of its voters.This episode: White House correspondent Tamara Keith, political reporter Barbara Sprunt, and senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro.Support the show and unlock sponsor-free listening with a subscription to The NPR Politics Podcast Plus. Learn more at plus.npr.org/politics Connect:Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Find and support your local public radio station.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Barbara Sprint. I cover politics. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. Some of the pillars of the presidential election process, as we know it now, could be changing in 2024. The Republican National Committee has left the Commission on Presidential Debates. That is the independent body that organizes those big general election presidential debates that we all watch on TV. Meanwhile, Democrats are changing their primary calendar with the goal of more diverse states going first. And both of these

moves say a lot about where the parties are these days. We will get to that big picture later. But Domenico, let's start with the debate thing. This ends something like three decades of bipartisan civic cooperation on backlash. But what we've seen now over the last decade is Republicans really grown irritated with the way the debates have gone. And, you know, it all came to a head really in 2020, when former President Trump, you know, was criticizing the debate, calling them never Trumpers and Trump haters, you know, accusing them of cutting off microphones and all the like when, you know, the debate commission has defended itself and said it wasn't doing that. These things are based on the rules. It doesn't matter though now because now the RNC has said that it is going to require

candidates to, in writing, say that they are not going to participate in any debates unless they're sanctioned by the RNC. So, Domenico, do you think that this means that there won't be any general election debates in two years? Or, like, what is going to happen? No, I don't think that that's necessarily going to be the case. I think that maybe the end of debates as we know them, as far as these, you know, Commission on Presidential Debates debates. But, you know, there's a model for this in the primaries, you know, they're not sanctioned or commissioned, you know, debates that are put on by a nonpartisan commission. These are debates that are done by the broadcast networks. They agree with the parties,

they, you know, come, they choose They essentially choose the moderators together. They figure out the rules that they want to have happen in these debates. And for as much as President Trump and the Republicans will criticize the TV networks, and we're talking about NBC, CBS, and ABC, they know that they have a huge audience and they need to reach voters. So I think that we're probably going to look at a model like that with what happens in primaries to try to move towards some model in the general election and kind of going back to a pre-standardized era for debates. Yeah, though, I'm just remembering all of the debate about debates that happened in the primaries. And that was like, it can be super

chaotic because somebody will say, oh, well, I don't want to do this CNN town hall. And somebody else will say, oh, well, I'm going to do this ABC thing. But, you know, like you end up with situations where not everyone is on stage. Wait, politics and chaos? Yeah, right. It's a little harder when you only have two candidates. When there's two, they kind of have to talk to each other. Now, they could choose not to participate. I mean, that's not unprecedented. I mean, what's really unprecedented, frankly, is the last 30 years or plus of having these standardized debates.

We may see fewer debates. There were three. There may be fewer debates. You know, there were three. There may be fewer. There may be more. I think we're in a little bit of the Wild West as far as our not just debates go. I mean, we know our politics have been in the Wild West a little bit over the last several years. So I think that's where we might be headed. All right. I want to take a quick break. And when we get back, how the Democrats are shaking up their primary calendar. And we're back. And Barbara Sprunt, I want to turn to your reporting now on the Democrats.

Talk about debates. There have been there's been hand-wringing and debates about the order of the Democratic primary for probably as long as we've all been covering politics. But it seems like this time they're serious about doing something about it. Yeah. So Democrats are out here changing it up, too. Last week, the Rules and Bylaws Committee of the DNC met here in D.C. and they talked about, among other things, that order, what exactly what you just said, the order that states go every four years for Democrats to pick a nominee. And as we remember, every four years that goes Iowa caucuses, New Hampshire primary, Nevada caucuses, South Carolina, and now that's not guaranteed.

You know, I mean, when we think about not just representation, because Iowa, New Hampshire, two of the whitest states in the country, and the Democratic Party has grown more diverse over the last, you know, 20 years. But we remember that giant mess that Iowa had in trying to count the votes with that app that was never to be. And I think there were a lot of people, reporters included, who were, you know, sitting there saying, yeah, I'm not sure we're going to be coming back here again this early. Yeah, we had an exceedingly long caucus night. That's right. In 2020, I was, I was there in Des Moines with our friend and colleague Scott Detrow. And we were wandering around trying to talk to as many, you know, campaign and election officials, like what is

going on? Why are the results not coming in? And so certainly that is a piece of why, you know, the time is right for Democrats, they say, to change this up. But there are other reasons as well. Iowa, New Hampshire, not very demographically diverse states. And as you'll remember, you know, back in 2020, it was South Carolina, when Joe Biden actually got, you know, his campaign was revitalized, and it was because of black voters. And that was really the first time in the four, you know, first early window states, that there had been that sort of representation in a state and look what happened, right. And so that's part of what Democrats point to when they

say, look, it's time to make a change here. And these states are really important for momentum for these candidates, because, you know, Iowa, New Hampshire don't give out that many delegates in the first place. But a lot of people have been able to use those as launching pads to show that they can win. But I think I think you make the point about President Biden now having won the primary despite losing both of those states very badly. I think has the party really reshaping and rethinking what they need to do here because black voters in particular are a huge part of the Democratic base. And they don't have a huge say very early on, even though South Carolina is in one of those in that early state window in the early four states. And, you know, this is a party that's grown way more diverse, Latinos, Asian-Americans. And I think that that's a huge, huge reason for why the party is rethinking this.

So, Barbara, how is this going to work? The DNC has said that taking into account the demographic diversity of a state is going to be part of it, right? They've given sort of a roadmap for states that do want to be part of that early window. And they say they're going to look at the demographic diversity of the state. They're going to favor, maybe no spoiler alert here, they're going to favor primaries over caucuses. And they're going to look at how competitive the state will be in the general election. So that's sort of like the criteria that they're looking for. And states that are interested have to submit, they have to make the case for themselves, they have to pitch themselves. So they have to submit an application in early

June, give a presentation to the committee later that month, and then the committee will announce its proposed schedule in July. And then of course, the full DNC has to vote to approve it. But I mean, that's a relatively short window in terms of like, you know, this happened last week, and in a couple months, we'll have a whole new way of looking at what 2024 will be. And, you know, I have to say it was like interesting listening into this meeting, because, you know, this is not a flashy committee hearing at all, right? This is not like made for TV. There's a lot of dialogue back and forth between members. It's pretty, you know, dry.

And then all of a sudden they vote on this resolution and you're sort of sitting there thinking, okay, wait, this is a big deal. This wasn't done with a lot of fanfare, but this completely upends what we think of as the traditional primary calendar for Democrats. So it is a big deal. wasn't done with a lot of fanfare. But this completely upends what we think of as the traditional primary calendar for Democrats. So it is a big deal. And it's a big deal for the states involved, too. You know, like in Iowa and New Hampshire, those voters get a lot of attention, a lot, a lot, a lot of attention from the presidential candidates. Like, you know, you can't be at a, you know, the Iowa State Fair or even a bar in Des Moines without stumbling across a presidential candidate

for some period of time in the year before the election. And if this changes, if you go to a different state, then it's a different state that's going to be getting that kind of attention. And it's not just attention. I mean, there is a lot of economic impacts that could come from this. It's, you know, like media markets and all the money that goes into state media markets for this kind of thing. I mean, I will say, you know, folks from New Hampshire and Iowa say, yeah, we go first, or we have gone first traditionally, and like, we take this really seriously. And maybe that's why in every bar in Des Moines and Portsmouth, you know, you can talk to people who have very intense feelings about the presidential race so early in the process. But, you know, folks from other states say, hey, there's no reason that we

can't also be as invested and, you know, excited and informed about the process that happens in our state. You know, one analysis I saw from the Washington Post said that Iowa and New Hampshire each would lose more than $20 million if there was no prime early primary or caucus in their state. So this is big money to all those restaurants, those bars, hotels. You know, it's a huge industry and it's been this way for a very long time. Yeah. I mean, and it's it's political tourism, too. There are people who go on vacation to these states or some people who volunteer for campaigns, other people who truly just want to see the democracy in action, now they might be booking a flight to Vegas or somewhere else. Yeah, I mean, we'll find out in, you know, a couple months where we will be as political

reporters and what the process is going to look like for different states. States are already making the case for themselves. Our colleague, Juana Summers, recently talked to Debbie Dingell, a Democratic congressman from Michigan. She's already making the case for her state to get early status. She points to the fact that it's a pretty purple state, much more demographically diverse than other states. And that, you know, former President Trump and current President Biden have won it by slim margins. So it is a it would be and, you know, as she argues, a competitive state in the general. Yeah. So so before we book any flights, we will be watching to see how all of this shakes out in the weeks ahead. Thank you, Barbara and

Domenico, for all your reporting. Thank you. You got it. And let's leave it there today. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Barbara Sprint. I cover politics. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.