Greetings from the lower left corner of the Centennial State! We’re all nursing our caucus hangovers here, some happier than others…
I’d like to relate my experience of leading a Precinct Caucus here, in a rural precinct, yesterday. It was a really good experience for me, one I would heartily recommend. Especially so if you’re in a red area—the Dems you meet will be extremely grateful that someone, anyone, is willing to stand up and say “I’m a Democrat”. That alone makes it easier for others to come forward & feel comfortable in their views and publically expressing them, despite what a possible ‘majority’ of their neighbors think. And trust me, where ever you may be, there are more Dems than you think. At one point, I was sure I was the only Democrat in my entire County! Okay, not exactly, but it seemed that way to me…
After becoming involved (thanks to being inspired by Dkos & Meteor Blades), I learned LOT’S about my County, and then about my Precinct, and as such, also about my neighbors. There’s over 45,000 residents in my County, and roughly 30k are registered voters (very roughly). It generally breaks down as 1/3 each for Dems, Repubs, and Unaffiliated (again, very roughly)—although thanks to the work of the upstart Bernie campaign registering new voters, Dems now have surpassed Republicans in registered voters for the first time in recent memory here. Repubs held a slight edge in numbers until just a month ago.
Precincts are formed based on registered voters/population, and in my County, we have 32 precincts, having added 1 in the last year or so, after one precinct got too large population-wise. My precinct is quite spread out—it’s quite rural & could easily take a half hour--40 minutes to drive across, as there’s mostly dirt roads to drive on. I would expect to see more deer, elk, and cows than people or cars--by far, as I drove across the precinct. It is comprised of 379 registered Dems. I’m sad to say that not each of those folks votes—as it is everywhere I suppose. But we’ve had recent elections in my County decided by ~100 votes County-wide, so if I can turn out 3-5 more Dem votes in my precinct & others do the same, Dems can win here consistently. That is an achievable goal for a Precinct Captain, and one that can be surpassed with enough effort. But, even with mail-in voting where every registered voter receives a ballot in the mail in CO, we still have a hard time breaking 50% voters returning a filled out ballot--like many States.
~~insert sad face here~~
Further, when it comes to caucuses, CO averages between 8-9% of registered voters actually showing up to caucus—and in rural areas, it is often even less than that. So, imagine my delight when I had 34 folks show up to the precinct caucus last night! 3 or 4 more would have broken 10% in an area not known for turning out big numbers-→ moving in the right direction, yes? That is in large part due to the Sanders campaign registering voters & calling folks & urging them to attend, and to a lesser extent, the Clinton campaign doing the same, and...me & my co-captain calling every Dem in our Precinct we had a phone number for—quite a lot of time & effort on many folks part. To amplify this, our metric year for caucus turn-out was 2008, when 900 Dems caucused in my County. Yesterday, 2300 Dem caucuser’s turned out in my County! YOWZA! And of that 2300 folks, 1470+ voted for Sanders! So a hat tip is in order to the Sanders campaign for helping to turn out a MUCH larger than previous number to our Caucuses! Caucuses naturally keep the unenthused from attending—it starts at 7pm and goes until ~9pm on a Tuesday night. Compared to sitting down at home & having 3 weeks to fill out a mail-in ballot, well, it isn’t hard to see why caucus numbers are always much less than a Primary or General election…
I had attended 3 caucus trainings & watched a webinar, as this was the first caucus I’d be leading & wanted to get it right. There are plenty of rules, none of which are overly complicated, but all must be followed. I arrived at the caucus location at 4:45pm, as I needed to get the key before the Town receptionist left for the day. That left me an hour before anyone else arrived, so I got busy. First, as is often the case in rural areas, my precinct was sharing a room with the neighboring precinct. There are only so many rooms large enough to hold 30-40 people in a rural area, and--the Repubs also need a room to caucus at the same time. The Repubs grabbed the Grange & the fire station, and we were in the Town Hall chambers. Two caucuses in one room isn’t ideal, and it was crowded—very crowded--but it felt like a good kind of crowded. I was surrounded by my neighbors who were all Dems...all of whom came out to talk & vote for Dems. I can’t tell you how affirming that is! Seriously, it was moving! I moved some tables around to create 2 sorta separate rooms, re-arranged the chairs, set out bottled water I bought, made merry with a dozen red, white, & blue balloons I had gotten, put out all the candidate swag I had, along with flyers the candidates had created, put out trash bags, set up signs for local County Commissioners (who are running un-opposed by other Dems, therefore weren’t being caucused, if caucused is a word. Translation: they are not being ‘primaried' by other Dems)...and then got out The Precious: my caucus packet. It contained many things, from a copy of the rules to step-by-step caucus instructions to tally sheets to ‘math’ worksheets to election judge forms to sheets to list the folks going to the County Assembly as delegates for various candidates...and other stuff as well. Forms, forms, forms. If you know what they are, it’s no problem. If you’re seeing them for the first time at the caucus, it’s gonna be a long night.
People began arriving about 6:20, not including the 4 or 5 who stopped by earlier to see what was going on...it is a small town after all. I had a list of registered Dems in my precinct provided by the County Clerk, and as folks arrived, they told me their name. If it was on my list, they were golden & clear to participate after they signed in. No I.D. required, because mostly, someone knew someone else CONSTANTLY because...small town. It was cool. By 7pm-ish, we were all signed in & ready to roll.
The Caucus is called to order, and then the “Most Official Colorado State Democratic Caucus Rules” are read aloud, which is boring, legalese sounding, and takes a solid 5 minutes if you read them really, really fast. I read them aloud for both caucuses, and then we split into totally separate caucuses. Next, and just like in Church, we passed the hat to pay for the use of the facility & other facilities across the County, which is only partially true: No actual hat was passed. NO anonymous cash donations allowed, they save that stuff for SuperPac’s, so every contribution had to go in a sealed envelope with the person’s name...which took time. Too much time, but it is a necessary evil. I won’t give a blow-by-blow account, but we then talked about/voted on rules specific to our caucus (No profanity! Speak FOR your candidate, not only AGAINST the other! Half delegates to be used...), as well as setting time limits for speakers & the like. We then held a non-binding poll by show of hands for Hillary, Bernie, and Uncommitted. It was Bernie 19, Hillary 14, and Uncommitted 1. Then there was 10 minutes allowed for each side to speak in favor of their preferred candidate—including Uncommitted, who went into a soliloquy about each candidate...ugh. Two or three folks spoke for candidate, used up ~7 mins on one, the full 10 mins on the other. Then we had the binding show of hands for Presidential Candidates. Results were: Bernie 19, Hillary 15. A second show of hands for verification of numbers was done. That means the Uncommitted voter moved into the Hillary camp on the virtue of the Hillary surrogates speechifying (I suppose). We had 4 delegates from our precinct to send to the County Assembly coming up on 3-12-16. They were apportioned 2 for Hillary, 2 for Bernie. Actually—here’s ‘The Math’: Sanders received 2.24 delegates(19 out of 34)[19x4divided by 34 voters], Clinton received 1.76(15 out of 34). But since humans can’t be split that way, and because we are to round up from 0.5 & down from 0.49, it went to a 2-2 delegate apportioning split. {I won’t get into using 'half delegates', although it is allowed by our County Chair, & we did vote on using half delegates in our precinct if it came to it--but that was unlikely, as we had 4 delegates. If we had 2, 3, or 5 delegates, the need for a half delegate becomes important for a representative apportionment of delegates...but that alone is worthy of a separate discussion} Next folks signed up to be the delegates in human form to attend the Assembly & vote there for their represented candidate.
But wait, there’s more! We repeated the same deal for our 2 Dem District Attorney candidates, including the delegates. We voted for Precinct Captain & Co-Captain for the next two years. I, and my Co-Captain Laurie were both unanimous winners, as no one ran against us & a unanimous show of hands was given. We also voted on Resolutions, to be sent to the County Assembly, and if passed there, onward to the State Convention, and possibly onto the Dem National Convention for inclusion in the Dem Party Platform. One resolution from my County actually made the National Dem Platform ~12 yrs ago. It had to do with ‘dirty bombs’ and that’s all I know about it… Last night my caucus passed Resolutions regarding: updating the 1872 Mining Act, undoing Citizen’s United, moving back to Primaries instead of Caucuses, and...uh, I forget the 4th one at the moment. After the Presidential caucus vote, folks started to leave, as it always happens. By the time we got through the 4th resolution...my caucus was down to 6 folks including me & my co-Captain, and it was 9:00pm. Time to shut ‘er down. We could have proceeded if folks were interested...but even I was done for the evening. All consented, and I adjourned our Caucus. Almost done!
Next was filling out forms, and certifying our Precinct Caucus results--being the Caucus Leaders (more forms!!), and notifying our Dem Party Chair of the results. After cleaning the whole place up & putting it back the way I found it so as not to incur a cleaning fee for our Party, I turned out the lights & locked the door. 10 p.m. Done.
I’m sure I left out many things—it is an action-packed 2 (5?) hours, full of procedures, rules, questions, talking/persuading, and voting. It was really a heart-touching show of Democracy--for those able & willing to attend anyway. Truly, and I say this from my heart: It was awesome to be involved so closely in a Democratic Party election. Really great stuff. I very much felt like I was a good American, a good citizen, a good Democrat, and most especially & importantly, a good neighbor. --Even if I didn’t get an “I Voted!” sticker. And you better believe I voted!
How was your Caucus? For out-of-Stater’s, have you ever voted in a caucus? It is different—by far—from a Primary. It is much more like the Founder’s experience--who were “Publicans”, those who meet in Pubs to discuss politics, and a neighborhood meeting, than the standard form of voting.
Anything else on your mind this evening?
Lastly, I apologize for a lack of pictures of the caucus—I was way too busy to take any, although I did see some folks take my pic & pics of the caucus during the evening—as is allowed by CO Dem Party rules. But I will indulge you with a picture of the reason we Coloradoans live, and vote, and even caucus here:
Cheers!