The rule-making panel of the Democratic National Committee will meet Friday in St. Louis as the party works to implement President Joe Biden’s plan to revamp the 2024 nominating calendar and resolve the status of the longtime early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire.
Earlier this year, national Democrats shifted both states out of their traditional positions at the front of the calendar – New Hampshire lost its first-in-the-nation primary billing while Iowa was no longer an early-voting state. But neither state has said exactly when it’s planning to hold its Democratic nominating contest next year.
Iowa Democrats have submitted a plan to conduct their presidential preference vote entirely by mail, but they’ve yet to answer the key question of when that process will take place.
Without that information, the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee declined to approve the plan at its June meeting, and party staff said that for the plan to comply with DNC rules, the vote-by-mail period must end on or after Super Tuesday, or March 5 (the date on which every state is allowed to start holding Democratic contests).
“We’re continuing to work with the Iowa Democratic Party to navigate a system that complies with our calendar. We understand that the Iowa party will have additional updates for us ahead of the October” meeting, James Roosevelt Jr., the co-chair of the DNC rules panel, said at a meeting last month.
Shortly after that meeting, Iowa Democrats said they’d hold in-person caucuses on January 15, the same day as Republicans. Iowa law requires its caucuses to be held before any other state’s nominating contest, but under the plan proposed by state Democrats, those caucuses would only be used to conduct party business, not to vote for president.
Meanwhile, Democrats in New Hampshire continue to get closer to facing sanctions from…
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