Presidential Primaries

2005-2023 | 18 years

This episode is all about the democratic primaries, with Santos, Russell, and Hoynes all running against one another as Super Tuesday approaches to be the Democratic nominee. 2024, the year of our next Presidential election, is quickly approaching, and the election process is already in full swing as the Republicans hold their 4th primary debate today. Given this, I thought it would be a good idea for me to break down the election process.

The first thing to know is that the general election, or the election held every four years in November where people only have the option of one person from each party, is not the only time people get to have a voice in who gets to be President. The first place where people get to vote for President is in the primaries. The primaries are where all the people who want to run for President from a party run against one another to be that party’s nominee. We can see this now with the Republican Primaries, where different politicians from the Republican party are running against one another to be the Republican candidate in the general election.

Primaries are generally held the same way that general elections are held, except that not all primaries are open to everyone. In closed primaries, only people registered to a certain party can vote in their primary, in semi-closed primaries Independents or people not registered to a party can choose whether to vote in the Republican or Democratic primary, and in open primaries registered voters get to choose which primary they want to vote in.

Rather than primaries, some states hold caucuses. In a caucus, people can vote by ballot like in the general election, or by gathering together then physically separating themselves into categories depending on who they want to vote on. The candidates are then awarded delegates based on the amount of votes they got in the caucus.

Some primaries are more important than others. This can be most obviously seen in New Hampshire and Iowa, historically the first states in the primary process (although this may be different by the time we have a Democratic primary in 2028-read my post about Campaigning in New Hampshire for more). This means that if candidates win the primaries in these states, they can move into the rest of the primary process with a lot of momentum, helping them to win in future primaries and become their party’s nominee.

Another important part of the primary process is Super Tuesday, the name given to the same Tuesday that 14 States all hold their primaries. This is essentially the closest thing there is to a national primary, representing about 40% of the American population. The results of Super Tuesday often determine who wins the primaries, if not at least cutting the field of candidates down.