What to look for in Iowa’s presidential caucuses

“I do think it’s still important because what history has shown is that you can lose Iowa or you can lose New Hampshire, but you can’t lose both”, O’Connell said.

CNN will be featuring America’s Choice 2016: The Iowa Caucus beginning at 7 p.m. ET; additionally, Fox Business will be showing a special edition of Cavuto: Coast to Coast with host Neil Cavuto from 8:00 p.m. – midnight ET. He acknowledged that he needed a “strong showing” to remain competitive in the 2016 race. Any registered voter can vote in open primaries, on the other hand, not only party members, but you can only vote in either the Republican or Democratic party primary, not both. Only the Iowa people, but people nonetheless. Most gatherings will be in schools, community centers or other public locations, although at least two Republican caucuses will be in private homes and one Democratic caucus will be held at an equestrian center. The state’s new online voter registration system has been popular as well, with more than 5,300 people registering to vote on-line in January alone.

Winning Iowa may provide bragging rights (and a publicity boost) for candidates, but it doesn’t always foreshadow who will win the party nomination.

Even if the rules change works out in Trump’s favor, he should beware: The RNC showed Paul’s supporters at the 2012 Republican National Convention that the RNC can and will act – including by bending, breaking, or changing the rules – to keep down an outsider candidate and his supporters.

But for top Iowa political leaders, the Caucuses aren’t seen as a barometer of who will win in November. Voters group into sections designated for their preferred candidates and are then counted.

In the end, Iowa comes down to voter turnout (which is a dumb thing to say because literally every election comes down to voter turnout), which is predicted to be uncharacteristically low. None went on to win their party’s endorsement. If that candidate can’t make that threshold, his or her supporters are free to throw in with another, more popular candidate. Caucuses can take hours and also tend to draw impassioned supporters.

Let’s assume Candidate A gets support from 35 caucus-goers, B gets 20, C gets 30, and D gets 15. Iowa will send only a relative handful of delegates to the convention, but its contest is important simply because it goes first.

Iowa’s prominence in the presidential nomination process is a child of the 60s and 70s. Bernie Sanders across the aisle. (It’s like, come on, guy – your hammies aren’t going to shrivel if you skip a day.) That’s what traditional caucus-goers are like.

On Tuesday, Feb. 9, New Hampshire residents get to vote in primaries (not caucuses) for who they would like to see as their parties’ nominees.

Among Republicans, we have the showman, the ideologue and the next-generation man. Among Democrats: the avowed socialist who wants a democratic “revolution” and the avowed progressive/realist who says she wants to…

But Mike Huckabee won here in 2008, while eventual Republican nominee John McCain came in fourth.