Nevada Caving On Caucus Date

Ignore this entire post.

Nevada Caving On Caucus Date

With hours to go before the RNC's midnight "deadline" to choose a primary/caucus date, it looks like one of the official early states is crying uncle.

Nevada Republicans will allow Florida to jump ahead of them on the presidential nominating calendar to preserve the state’s full slate of delegates to the Republican National Convention, state GOP chairwoman Amy Tarkanian said Friday.

“Because we have such a small amount of delegates, we’ll probably stay at the beginning of February,” Tarkanian told POLITICO. “The biggest concern we have is to make sure we’re first in the West. If we can do [the caucuses] in the beginning of February, that’s what we’ll do."

The first other western event is a beauty contest caucus in Colorado on Tuesday 2/7.

Tarkanian, like her cohorts in the other authorized early states, heaped blame on Florida for throwing the calendar into chaos.

“We’re not happy with them, period,” she said. “We have what, 28 delegates? They have 99. So what do they care if they lose some? They didn’t have to be bullies about this.”

RNC rules strip early states of half the delegates. Those may not have been effective rules last cycle, but they were enforced at least.

(Suggestion to my Republican friends: Vegas could host a convention way better than Tampa...)

Nevada always seemed like the least "traditional" of the early states. Their status was a Democratic Party set in 2006; they were supposed to be the "Hispanic influence" state to go with the African American (on the D side) influence of South Carolina. New Mexico really had a better case than Nevada, but Bill Richardson was running.

Also to be noted: "South Carolina GOP Chairman Chad Connelly said he is now considering either a Tuesday or a Saturday."

Special note to Floridians blaming other states for "forcing" them to move:

But Friday wasn’t all bad news for the RNC’s rule-makers. Over the last 24 hours, a few other states have moved to avoid running afoul of the RNC’s rules.

On Thursday, Georgia’s secretary of state announce his state would hold its contests on March 6 rather than in February, while the Missouri Republican Party announced that it would hold caucuses in March to avoid the penalty of taking its turn on Feb. 7. The primary could still happen — unless the state legislature acts — but since it will not be tied to the allocation of delegates, the RNC would not penalize Missouri.

And on Friday, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) signed a bill that moves his state’s primary from Feb. 21 to April.

OMFG Scott Walker gets one right. (That's actually a return to the traditional Wisconsin date.)

So here's my calendar scenario, check back in an hour because they may change.

Saturday 2/4 Nevada
Tuesday 1/31 cheaters
Tuesday 1/24 or Saturday 1/28 South Carolina
Tuesday 1/17 New Hampshire
Tuesday 1/10 Iowa (Monday 1/9 is college football championship)

South Carolina's date doesn't matter to Iowa because New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner will insist on a full week after. South Carolina may decide they want the candidates in the state an extra four days.

So Nevada's sacrifice probably lets us go a week later. But there's time left today...

UPDATE: The hacked status of the Deeth Blog means I can't approve comments the conventional way. But I can post and edit so:

Lucas Draisey:
The RNC should refuse to seat ANY delegates from cheating states. And you're absolutely right. Vegas would be a great place for a convention, and would be pretty easy to plan on short notice, because the city is used to hosting things like that. RNC should throw the book at Florida.