In Wyoming the Republicans switched their primary and accepted the loss of half their delegates as a penalty. The Democrats held to their March date with a caucus. Florida Republicans also were penalized by the RNC with a loss of half their delegates but the Florida Dems decided to accept the loss of their delegates because they knew this power play was coming. Their reasoning was that they didn't want a caucus or mail in voting since it disenfranchised voters.
The Democratic National Committee voted last month to strip Florida of its delegates unless it decided by Sept. 29 to obey party rules and delay its primary until Feb. 5 or later. Then, under pressure from the four states permitted to hold contests in January, the major Democratic candidates pledged not to campaign in Florida if the primary was moved ahead.
Ever since, state party leaders have agonized over whether to accept the sanctions and stand firm on Jan. 29 or to yield and hold a smaller contest, like a caucus or vote-by-mail primary, later in the year. They decided to stick to January, said Karen Thurman, the party chairwoman, to ensure the largest possible turnout and to avoid accusations of disenfranchisement from Democrats still bitter about the 2000 recount.
“We came down on the side of having a fair and open election,” Ms. Thurman said at a news conference.
However this was obviously a power play since from the beginning they planned to have their delegates seated one way or another and force the DNC to bow to their desire to have the early primary date.
Whether to seat Florida’s delegates at the convention would ultimately be up to the presumptive nominee, said Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat from Broward County. Rather than risk the wrath of Florida voters, Ms. Wasserman Schultz said, the party nominee will undoubtedly seat the delegates.
“We’re going to make sure our voices are heard loud and clear on that convention floor,” she said, adding that the state’s entire Democratic Congressional delegation supported the decision to stick with Jan. 29.
So they went ahead with the primary
Florida Democratic Party officials announced Sunday that they’re sticking with Jan. 29 as the official primary date, even though the national party has ruled that the move will strip them of their delegates and the top candidates have pledged not to campaign there. Karen L. Thurman, the state party’s chairwoman, sent an email to Florida Democrats explaining the decision: There will be no other primary. Florida Democrats absolutely must vote on January 29th.
We make this election matter. Not the D.N.C., not the delegates, not the candidates, but Florida Democrats like you and me voting together. We make it count.Don’t let anybody call this vote a “beauty contest” or a “straw poll.” On January 29, 2008, there will be a fair and open election in Florida, which will provide for maximum voter participation. The nation will be paying attention, and Florida Democrats will have a major impact in determining who the next President of the United States of America will be.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/24/2008-florida-democrats-stick-to-primary-date/ Their complete disregard of, and FUCK YOU to, DNC rules rose to a new level when the candidates were pressured not to campaign in Florida.
State Senator Steven A. Geller, the minority leader, used the news conference to rail against Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina, which he called “rogue states” for putting pressure on the presidential candidates to skip campaigning here for a January primary.
“If they choose not to campaign here and they lose? Not our problem,” Mr. Geller said.
(all above quotes not referenced are from
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/24/us/politics/24florida.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=login&ref=politics&adxnnlx=1205255445-xET9oh3qk+1zxwaE0o7EhQ )
Once stripped of delegates they decided to take it to the courts to get their way.
The legal action didn't work.
Now there's a call for mail in voting?!? Give me a break!
It might be that my concerns over the security of vote-by-mail in Florida are overstated. After all, Oregon's vote by mail system has been touted as an excellent and fair system. Perhaps so for Oregon. But
what is true for Oregon is not so true for Florida. One need only think back to the
massive absentee ballot fraud in the 1997 Miami mayoral race that led a court to order a new election. And there's something especially worrisome about rolling out a new system for counting votes for the first time in a presidential contest. It is like debuting your new play straight on Broadway.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rick-hasen/worries-about-a-florida-p_b_90583.html Personally I would strip them of half their delegates and all of their super delegates since it was these super delegates that caused this problem with their arrogance. Then divide the reamaining half of the pledged delegates between Obama and Clinton.
Primaries are a function of the DNC and subject to DNC Rules. While the state legislature sets the primary date, it's up to the Dems in the legislature to support the DNC and select an alternative if their state chooses to go against their national committee, as the Repugs did in this case, choosing to lose half their delegates for a perceived benefit to the state. If the DNC loses control of the process then only chaos can result.
"We have 49 other states as important as Florida is to our democratic process and to our country," said Alexis M. Herman, co-chair of the DNC rules committee. "There is a fairness principle here."
"Are we going to uphold the rules, enforce the rules, or are we simply going to just have an open season on the entire process?" Herman said. "It's not fair to the candidates and not fair to the people."
Donna Brazile, who ran former Vice President Al Gore's presidential campaign in 2000 and is a member of the rules panel, said she hopes the vote will "send a message to everybody in Florida that we are going to follow the rules."
"I understand how states crave to be first ... but the truth is that we had a process," she said.
The rules were designed to maintain the traditional roles that Iowa and New Hampshire play in selecting the nominee, while adding Nevada and South Carolina to the early group to give more racial and geographic diversity to the selection process.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/2007-08-25-florida_N.htm They should have held a caucus or negotiated with the DNC for a different remedy like having half their delegates removed in exchange for the earlier date as Republicans did when they went against their party's rules.
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