A quick read of the Official Rules (source: PDF) tells us much information. Differences with Iowa are underlined:
As in Iowa, caucusgoers must be physically present at a given time and place, though in this case the caucuses are held at noon on Saturday the 19th. The caucus is open to all voters who will be 18 on election day in November.
This is interesting: any person wishing to participate in the Republican caucus must have registered as a Republican at least 30 days ago. The Nevada secretary of state’s website says of the Democratic caucus: “If you are not already registered but eligible to vote, you may complete a registration form and participate on the day of the caucus.” At least on Hillary’s website, that is presented as permitting caucusgoers to change their registration from Republican or independent as they arrive at the caucus.
Anyway, caucusgoers will form preference groups after hearing appeals from candidates’ subordinates in their meeting spaces. When the chair declares time for the formation of preference groups, caucusgoers fill out a paper “pledge card” that indicates their preference that will eventually be turned over to the officials, that they take with them. They form said preference groups. Candidates who attract less than 15% of the total number present at the caucus are declared “non-viable” and have the option to change preferences. (In smaller precincts, the viability threshold can be higher…in a caucus sending 3 delegates, the threshold is 1/6, in a 2-delegate precinct, 25%.)
Supporters of non-viable candidates, and only supporters of non-viable candidates, can then give up their pledge card and move to another group. This bears repeating: if caucusing for a viable candidate, one must stay there, and cannot be talking into joining elsewhere.
There is a significant affirmative action plank to the rules, including gender equity. I don’t know if that’s the case in Iowa.
Compare/contrast with Iowa:
- The viability threshold will not have the same distortive impact as it did in Iowa, where 5 candidates representing up to 15% of the initial vote were often affected, here it will only be two.
- This is Nevada’s first go at a large-scale caucus. We’re talking thousands of rookie caucus chairs. Though Spanish is commonly spoken in Nevada, a rookie caucus chair with poor Spanish may be in for a hard time.
- Many Nevadans will be working in the entertainment industry at caucus time. Casino management has been reluctant to make provisions for them in the schedule.
- It’s much harder to game the math as well, getting one more or less delegates. No longer can a viable candidate lift up another to viability in return for something.
- These are also in some ways rookie organizations. Can the nascent Nevada campaigns handle it? (The ultimate insider’s son — Harry Reid’s boy Rory is chairing Hillary Clinton’s effort)
First off, this post is great and informative. Thanks, Sabutai!
<
p>Second, this reminded of a story my wife was telling at dinner last night as we caught up after my long weekend away canvassing in New Hampshire. She teaches 8th grade physical science, and the Science MCAS on 4 different sciences is done in 8th grade, so they do review from the past years every so often. On the day of the primary, a 6th grade teacher had given the 8th grade a multiple choice life science question. To try to get some actually thinking out of the students, she used a caucus-based activity to have the students answer. The rules ended up being modified from Iowa’s and have a little bit of the Nevada changes in it:
<
p>She put up the question and the 4 choices for answers. For the first round, everyone had to write which answer they thought was correct on a “pledge card”, or if they didn’t know they would write so. Then they would stand in the corners of the room for the 4 answers and the uncommitted stood in the middle. The each group had to pick people to go to the other groups and to the uncommitted group to convince them why they had the right answer to the question, (which I thought was the best part in making them not only guess the right choice but to make an argument and explain why it was the correct answer).
<
p>After the discussion period, the uncommitted’s had to join one of the answer groups in the second round, and people in groups were free to change to another group. I believe there were too large groups, plus a small third group and the undecideds, in the first round, and then in the second round it ended with two groups, and fortunately a majority was in the correct answer group.
<
p>She made a strong argument for people not just to look at the biggest group, but to think for themselves. I thought it was a great activity to integrate civics and current events while encouraging critical reasoning and discussion in the topic of the class.