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New Primary Schedule Brings New Challenges for Candidates

By Michelle Austein

With only a few days between contests, "momentum matters," experts say

With the presidential election primary season beginning - and possibly ending - earlier than ever before, candidates face many new challenges, political experts say.

Iowa and New Hampshire have state laws saying they must hold their nominating contests first. While past elections saw these events at the end of January or in February, Iowa will hold its caucus for the 2008 elections on January 3, and New Hampshire will have its primary on January 8. The two states kept moving their caucus and primary dates earlier to protect their first-in-the-nation status.

With the first race in the 2008 presidential contest just two days after New Year's Day, the candidates' final crucial days of campaigning in Iowa coincide with the holiday season. For those behind in Iowa trying to ramp up their efforts, "they are doing it at the worst possible time," Norman J. Ornstein, resident scholar with the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), said at a December 13 panel discussion.

Trailing candidates often turn to attack ads in the closing days of a campaign, but Ornstein noted, "I would not want to be a candidate putting ... negative commercials on the air during a time when people want to have at least a moment of good feeling."

This is one of the reasons why candidates in Iowa "are acting as if they're in the last week of the campaign," said Chuck Todd, political director for NBC News. Todd spoke at a Foreign Press Center briefing December 10 in Washington.

"None of them [is] risking the idea that somehow they have more time to make their ... closing argument," he said.

A victory in Iowa often provides momentum for a candidate to pick up wins in other states. In the 2004 election, for example, Democratic nominee John Kerry was behind in nearly every poll, Todd said, but a win in Iowa led him to victory in nearly every other state. "So momentum can be everything," he said.

With only five days between Iowa and New Hampshire's contests, momentum may be more important than ever, Todd said, because a candidate's momentum usually peaks about four or five days after the Iowa caucuses.

This likely will be especially true on the Democratic side, where Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are nearly tied in New Hampshire. "I think Iowa's going to be overly influential on New Hampshire," Todd said. "If Clinton wins Iowa, she wins New Hampshire. If Obama wins Iowa, he wins New Hampshire. It's that close."

In past years, with more time between Iowa and New Hampshire, candidates had "some opportunity to recover if they had stumbled badly," said Ornstein. "Now there isn't."

"Momentum in this case does matter," Ornstein said.

While states moved their primaries and caucuses earlier to try to limit the impact Iowa and New Hampshire have on the race, it is possible the opposite will be the case, Ornstein said. Candidates who do well in these states may be able to pick up quick victories in the other states holding nominating contests in January.

In past elections, a large number of states held their primaries on the same Tuesday in March, referred to as "Super Tuesday." With so many elections on the same day, "Super Tuesday" often could make or break a candidacy.

But this year, as states moved their primaries and caucuses earlier, "Super Tuesday" has been replaced by what some call "Super-Duper Tuesday" or "Tsunami Tuesday." On this day, February 5, 2008, some 22 states will hold nominating contests. These states are spread across the country and represent a diverse set of states including California, New York, Missouri and North Dakota.

Candidates will have to "campaign simultaneously in 22 states," Ornstein said, and have to put teams together quickly in these states to earn voters' support.

Candidates also will have to divide their advertising resources among different states. Yet, "the free publicity that comes to the early winners will probably overwhelm the paid advertising," Ornstein said.

While many states in the 2008 campaign season will hold their races on February 5, there is no guarantee that the nominees will be known by that evening. Political experts suggest that a longer race is more likely on the Republican side, where voters are splitting their support among a number of candidates. Several candidates each could win a handful of the February 5 states.

If this is the case, candidates will have to focus their efforts on the remaining state races, most of which will be in late February or March, although some will happen as late as June. Potentially, if no one candidate wins a majority of primary delegates, the nominee could be selected at the party's convention in September, although most experts think that is unlikely.

"[Republicans] want to hurry up and have a nominee," Todd said. "They feel like the longer there's internal strife that's out in the public, the worse it is for them in the long run."

Ornstein said one party's race affects the other. "If one contest is over early, every bit of attention will go to the other side." Some states allow independents to decide on Election Day which party's primary they will participate in, meaning that if the Democratic race ends early, those independents will choose to vote in the Republican primaries, or vice versa.

Source: U.S. Department of State