Evening Digest 5/1/23

2024 Primary Calendar and Rules Updates for May 1 -- Iowa, Missouri, Northern Mariana Islands & Pennsylvania

It has been a month since the launch of FHQ Plus, and the experiment seems to be going well enough so far. I don’t know that I knew what to expect or how to really measure success, but it has been a start toward both setting those expectations and hopefully working the whole thing into a success. So, before digging into all this May Day stuff, I just wanted to offer a note of thanks to everyone who has subscribed and followed along. Thank you, sincerely. —Josh

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Any Monday that starts with a big delegate selection story is a good day in FHQ’s book. And that is what Ben Jacobs delivered at Vox. It’s a good piece and an important reminder of the fact that at the root of all of this — primaries and caucuses, winner-take-all and proportional, or just plain nominating a presidential candidate — is the delegate selection process. Knowledge of it — putting together a campaign operation that accounts for it — separates the wheat from the chaff. In Barbara Norrander’s words, it is the end game. It can make all the difference in a close race and can spell the end for the unprepared. It is not everything and it is not the only thing. But it is an important facet of the process that often gets short shrift compared to ads and debates and polling — the horserace.

It is a harder story to tell and that is kind of why FHQ is here. The rules of that delegate selection process for 2024 are still evolving and there were a few items of note that came across the wires today. The return of vote-by-mail caucuses in Iowa, a death march for the primary in Missouri and delegate selection plans from the Northern Mariana Islands and Pennsylvania.

This is the FHQ Plus Evening Digest for May 1.