Democrats and Republicans in New Hampshire are in strong agreement on at least one issue — they are prepared to fight the Democratic Party’s ripping away their status as the first-in-the-nation primary state.
The Democratic National Committee on Saturday unceremoniously dumped the battleground state from its leadoff position in favor of South Carolina. Their reasoning was to provide more influence for non-White voters in the primary’s early battles.
And New Hampshire politicians are none too happy at being sacrificed to the gods of diversity.
The DNC has decided to break a half-century precedent and cause chaos by altering their primary process, and ultimately abandoning millions of Americans in Iowa and New Hampshire. pic.twitter.com/QJo7oQDIPd
— Ronna McDaniel (@GOPChairwoman) February 4, 2023
As of now, the state is relegated to sharing a primary date on the new schedule with Nevada. That is despite New Hampshire law mandating that it hold the first U.S. presidential primary.
Iowa was able to work around this requirement in 1972 by holding a caucus instead.
But there have been rumblings since the last election of the Democrats’ desire to change the traditional launching point. President Joe Biden performed miserably in both New Hampshire and Iowa in 2020.
Furthermore, a new app designed to improve vote counting in Iowa failed, sending the tallying of caucus results into a state of turmoil.
In response to the DNC, every member of New Hampshire’s congressional delegation signed on to a statement slamming the unilateral change. The two senators and two representatives — all Democrats — argued that the DNC does not have the authority to institute the switch.
They agreed that the matter is far from settled.
The statement read that “no party committee gave New Hampshire the first-in-the-nation primary. Granite Staters created this process to put the power into voters’ hands and give every candidate a fair shot.”
They added that the effort by President Biden and the DNC “will not be successful in the end.”
Republican New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu agreed with the delegation, tweeting that “Joe Biden and the power brokers at the DNC in Washington think that New Hampshire’s time is up.” He wrote that is not the case and the state will indeed be the first to hold a primary in 2024.
Similar to New Hampshire’s statute, Iowa law stipulates that a caucus is held on the last Tuesday in February and predates any other contest.
Republican eyes are smiling at the fierce infighting Biden and the DNC unleashed within their own party. Changing course to favor the incumbent and appeal to woke voting advocates is only going to hurt the party’s chances in the next election cycle.
