Illi-noise on first

Next week state parties will formally pitch the DNC Rules & Bylaws Committee to be included in early window of the 2028 presidential primary calendar. Those cases are starting to emerge.

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Over at FHQ…

• Missouri’s attempts to revive its presidential primary are off again until 2027

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Photo by Raf Winterpacht on Unsplash

Aside from a few legislative actions in the decreasingly small handful of states with active presidential primary scheduling bills, it has grown quiet this spring on the 2028 primary calendar front. That will change over the course of the next week or so as the next DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) meeting approaches. That is especially true considering this is the meeting when the 12 state parties whose primaries (or caucuses¹) are finalists for one of the four or five slots in the Democrats’ early window will make their cases to the panel.

In fact, that has already begun to change as Illinois Democrats have rolled out a brief video ahead of the DC meeting touting the Prairie state as ideal. Ideal not only as an early state in 2028 but as the first state in the order.

That’s news.

Up to this point in the Democrats’ early state selection process most of the reporting reflected a smaller subgroup of the 12 applicants as vying for the top spot on the 2028 calendar: Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina and South Carolina. But there was never any checklist from the DNC that required applying state parties to check a box if there was a desire to go first or otherwise those states would only be considered for “just” early window status. There was a checklist, but again, it did not mandate applicant state parties declare their intention for the first slot at that time or forever hold their peace.

Granted, some states — the usual early state suspects and North Carolina — made it known from the start, but the process never precluded any of the other state parties among the 12 from staking their own claim to lead off spot in 2028.

And Illinois Democrats appear to be staking such a claim ahead of next week. Will others join them?

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Below the fold FHQ will look at the Illinois case for the first spot on the 2028 calendar.