The Democratic Party Fails Its Voters

Both parties have big flaws in organizations. But at least the GOP counts the votes.

By Wednesday afternoon, we were allowed to see 92 percent of the Iowa Caucus results. That’s better than the zero percent on Election Night, and the 62 percent released late Tuesday afternoon. But the full results of the caucus — which used to be available the night of the caucus, live, on television, late in the evening, in the era before the Internet — are apparently being collated so slowly, they may or may not arrive before the next George R.R. Martin novel.

The Iowa Democratic Party was entrusted with running the first and arguably one of the most consequential contests in the presidential nominating process, and it completely fumbled, prat-falled, and metaphorically set itself on fire in the process. Not only can the state party not provide the full results, not only can they not say when they will be able provide full results, but they also cannot explain why they cannot provide full results. The unnerving possibility from this inexplicable refusal to give answers is that the party doesn’t actually know if their data are accurate and that perhaps some staff in some precincts made errors during the recording of votes.

Who entrusted the Iowa state party with that privilege and responsibility? The Democratic National Committee, which controls and runs the nominating process. This is the same DNC that Democrats fume has changed the rules for the primary debates after the process began, whose efforts at ‘inclusivity” have somehow left only white candidates up on stage, who is generating “endless grief from fretting party regulars,” in the words of the New York Times, and who is apparently preparing a “generous exit package” for Chairman Tom Perez and top deputies.

In 2016, Hillary Clinton’s campaign secretly assumed control of the Democratic National Committee’s debts, effectively co-opting the DNC into its service. Incoming chairwoman Donna Brazile, according to Politico, was stunned to learn that “Hillary for America (the campaign) and the Hillary Victory Fund (the campaign’s joint fundraising vehicle with the DNC) had taken care of 80 percent of the DNC’s remaining debt, about $10 million, and had placed the party on an allowance.” Once this was revealed after the 2016 election, many supporters of Bernie Sanders concluded, understandably, that the committee was not merely biased — it’s not surprising that committee staff would prefer one presidential candidate to another — but in fact a tool designed to ensure the illusion of a fair nominating process.