At 23 , buttigieg at 23 , warren at 16 and klobuchar at 7 . 6 00. Tails at [laughter] that is iowa . Cbs news. Yes, of the race in iowa. Buttigieg also 23 . I was right. Three white guys. [laughter] yes, you were. All right. I want to start with you. How do you see this race . You watched it from your perch in missouri. How do you see this contest . I havehing it from afar, no greater insight than if i were immersed in it right now. I just noticed that cbs poll. It seems consistent with the impression i have, which is we really dont know what will happen. There are lots of different scenarios, and several candidates who clearly seem to have enough support in the state that it is showing up. But one other thing i would want to caution people, and other people on the panel can talk about this, that survey work is very difficult these days. It is difficult to get people to respond. It is difficult because of land lines versus cell phones. It is difficult to try to predict who will show up on caucus night. And of course, if you have weather like today, turnout might be great, and if the weather is terrible, there is always the potential, particularly in one part of the state rather than another, that can have a big impact. So all we can tell you from the surveys done so far is that its really not at all clear what will happen on caucus night. For those of us who are political junkies, that probably adds to the fun. But as scholars we would like to be able to Say Something with greater certainty than that we have no better gas than you do. I have all the answers. [laughter] just kidding. Please share. I am keeping those and i will tell you on february 4th. No, i completely agree. We are all guessing at this point. Polling, especially when you think of who will show up that night, is pretty important. That has changed outcomes of both iowa caucus results and general elections, who shows up. I think it is interesting that diane was exactly right, the three top polling are white men, and two qualified women running. Im curious how it will shake out. Im curious heavy second choice picks will come, because there is support for booker, for yang, for klobuchar. Where they go can have a big impact. If they all go to warren, this is a fourway tie. If they all go to biden, it is a runaway victory for biden, so the second place will have a big impact on the final results. Explain why the second place showing in a poll is important to what will happen on caucus night . When i say secondplace, i mean their second choice at the precinct. On the those of you democratic side who havent done this before, what will be different this year is that whenever you make your first pick, if you dont have 15 of the people supporting that candidate, the candidate is considered nonviable, so either you need to get more people to reach that threshold and become viable, or you need to go to your second choice. It used to be that there could be multiple alignments and people could do more business. This time, it is one realignment, so that will really limit things. Maybe i really feel good about yang, and he is in viable, now i have to vote biden. That might cause a lot of shifting. What do you say to reporters calling you up saying, how do you see this race . I think the highly contested Republican Donald Trump will win that. [laughter] unless something happens between now and caucus night in iran that really shocks people. You have to look at National Polls as well as iowa. But as influential, very famous political analyst and journalist once said there were three tickets out of iowa. I think that was you. First class, second class, and the back of the cabin next to the toilets. But if you are seated next to the toilet, and the year is not the right year for the first and second class iowa caucus placers, you might end up getting the nomination. You might even end up winning the election. So in iowa, you dont have to win. You can come in first, second or third and still do very well politically. I wrote an article for the newspaper you formerly and sadly dont work for anymore, the Des Moines Register which ic has gone into tremendous decline since you left. I blame it all on you. Social media has nothing to do with it. You left, and the thing just collapsed. But i argue this may be one of those wonderful years where we have a brokered convention this summer where nobody has enough come in thereyou and have biden, sanders, buttigieg and maybe warren as well coming in with a chunk of delegates and fighting it out on the floor. That would be the greatest thing in my life, to see that happen, because it would be real democracy at work. Not literally fighting . May be literally. Foure things i hear every years, it will be the last time iowa will have caucuses and maybe they will be a brokered convention. Well, you heard it again. [laughter] i did predict earlier without hearing from cbs news that the three top vote getters in iowa at this point in time where the three white guys. Back to what i said earlier, one thing i worry about with the Iowa Caucuses is that it diminishes choices for other states. So, i think kelly made a good point. Whe i talked about caucus math earliern, and how candidates have been able to use it, thats not as possible this year. When you going, you have to put down your second choice and stick with it. I kids see recent data on sanders supporters basically did see recent data on sanders supporters and their donation giving. Earlier in the campaign you might give to biden but, also to warren and buttigieg. Sanders supporters typically dont have a second choice. So what could happen, as kelly said, with the second choice on these not viable, who do they go to . I think we will see some flocking basically to biden, buttigieg and warren. So, i think there is a couple things to keep in mind here. One, the race is incredibly fluid. Thats a good way to characterize it. It is fluid. Theres a lot of people, a wealth of candidates for the democrats. A a lot of people have a first choice, but also a second choice, and polling shows they are relatively open to changing their mind. The dynamics of caucus night could do that. Id like to push back about brokered conventions. I think thats a thing to talk about, but probably is rarely going to happen because it is not in a partys interest to get to that point. Even in 2008, Hillary Clinton and barack obama going into june, really late, it didnt go into the convention. Running against an incumbent, it is not in the partys interest to do that, so the party will do the things they need to do. The ruleing about changes and the earlier part of the session here, one of the other things the democrats have done is changed how superdelegates factor in. That could be an issue later on as well. Forgetrd thing, to not the gop has caucuses also. You could learn really interesting things by looking at the gop caucus. The diehard gop people are the ones who in years when they have incumbents tend to go, but there might also be people who want to show dissatisfaction. Its noticeable the iowa gop hasnt canceled caucuses. Many others stay gops have canceled primaries and caucuses because they dont want to publicize any kind of opposition within the party. These are party events. The gop in order to help them maintain first and the nation status didnt want to do that, didnt want to see the process as being rigged for the incumbent, so there will be gop caucuses. Also, for the democrats and the gop, at a caucus it is more than saying here are the candidates i like, its also about elevating platform planks, governance within the party, electing people to central committees and those types of things. These are important factors, that the National Media never really reports on. These are important in the Party Building aspect of what caucuses are, and the democratic nature of them as well. Nted to share with our audience, you have spent time since august going from event to event watching the candidates at work, so what is your sense of who is ahead and who is behind . I have been here since the state fair, and have been tweeting as i go, mainly to keep notes for myself. Ive probably been to 85 or 90 candidate events at this point. No more certain about the outcome than anybody else, as we are looking at this. The poll just reported makes sense to me, kind of tracks with what i think were seeing. Weve been doing some survey Research Work as well, and just did a second wave on that, and its very similar. But whats really, really important here, mentioning the second choice piece, there are key changes to the democratic rules that are going to change the nature of the caucus and what can actually happen on caucus night. In the first half, there was a comment about how barack obama nt voters to john edwards groups when they had more than they needed to be viable in a precinct, at least 15 to get a delegate. That can no longer be done. When people come into the Democratic Caucus and express their first preference, they will be locked into that first preference if their candidate is viable. There will be no more moving around for those people. The only people who will be allowed to move our are those whose candidates dont get at least 15 in the precinct. That really changes the dynamics of what happens on caucus night, which has a lot to do again with how the delegate counts are reported. The democrats are going to tell us the actual vote counts for the first time, both the initial vote count and what they call the realigned vote count after every candidate who doesnt reach 15 is dropped. So, the media is going to have three different numbers to work with. Im not quite sure where they are going to go with it. I was looking at the cbs poll, where they were emphasizing the number of delegates each candidate would win if poll numbers hold. I would suspect on caucus night the fallback will be what the vote looks like, but the question will be is it the initial vote or the final vote. That means a candidate like Amy Klobuchar, who is unlikely at the moment, although everything can change in the next few weeks, to be viable in many precincts, meaning she will get zero in those precincts on the realigned vote, but she will have had votes in the initial alignment. Willying all this, a, it be a lot more complicated to even know who the winner is, and b, even after 85plus events, its just not clear to me where iowans are going. One more point about that. 62 ofmost recent data, sanders voters say they are unlikely to change their minds. 56 of bidens. 39 of buttigieg, 33 of warring, and 33 of klobuchar voters say they are certain about who they are voting for. A lot of Movement Still possible here. As the reporter on the stage, i can tell you what number is going to be reported, the one we have first. I think the intention is to release it all at the same time. Whether they will be able to were not, i dont know. This gets into the discussion about not turning it into a primary. Will the Iowa Democratic party have this information, but sit on it until they have the delegate equivalent number, and release it all at the same time . The problem with that is that the caucuses are open events. Reporters can go to caucuses and watch the count themselves and have anecdotally some idea of what that initial body count is. But reporters will be standing editors,ines, directors, news producers will be screaming at them, whats going on. You go with the first information you get, and that shapes the narrative the rest of the evening. That has happened with every caucus i have covered. The republican story in 2012 is a great example. They went with romney, but that is not actually what happened. In the mediat center as midnight came and the democrats had not reported results yet. The party does intend to report all of the numbers at the same time. But we will see if that actually happens. The whole issue of the count is one of the biggest criticisms that has been made of these caucuses, from the very beginning. ,he counts are spotty, sporadic not like a primary that is run by government, they are run by party. It is one of the big criticisms. I didnt mean to leave you out of the conversation. Quite fine. Fall, a reporter asked me, what surprises do you expect . I said, listen to what you just asked me. [laughter] if it is a surprise, you cant expect it. It, it is not a surprise. I love what journalists do. I wish we still had newspapers. But i am not interested in the journalistic production of who will come in where. I dont want to hijack your question, but i am more interested in the water than the fish swimming in it. I think what we see right now with the democrats is a continuation of the problem, they still have not figured out who they are in a postreagan era. In the 1990s, i went back and looked at National Party platforms. I looked at the 1992 democratic republicanlinton, platform for george h. W. I didnt look at ross perot. I always thought of him a sort of a historical speedbump. But then i looked back at the 1968 platforms, humphrey, nixon someeorge wallace, whom see President Trump as the latest iteration of, pat buchanan in between. Foreignxclude affairs, vietnam, and look at social and domestic policy from 1968 and the 1992, when Foreign Affairs at that point were not a big issue, didnt have 9 11 yet, the soviet union was going. The 1992 democratic platform looked very much like the 1968 republican platform, in terms of social and domestic policy. The 1992 platform looked very much like the 1968 wallace platform. And democrats are still trying to figure out who they are, and how to talk about politics beyond just laundry lists of policies. I think we see that right now. There is a mere image going on in the democratic side as we sell with ted cruz and republicans in 2016. You have the warren, sanders arguing for a kind of base election, that we need to win the election by turning out progressives. I hate the terms left and right, but the more progressive kind of liberal. Whereas you have biden, buttigieg, klobuchar saying that there is still a kind of centrist liberalism that will win the election. Thats the big argument right now that we see between those two sets of candidates, playing out to some extent in iowa. How that will play out on election night, i dont know more than anyone else. One other thing i think it could impact the race, what is going on in the middle east. It impacted the 2004 race with john kerry. If there is an International Crisis still looming above us, that could help joe biden because hes typically perceived as the person with the most international experience. I see nodding. Venezuela now has finally admitted that maduro is a dictator, because they just shut down the legislature. No more opposition elections. The president of venezuela of the democratic constituency of venezuela, is now finished. I work with a lot of my former venezuelan students on the venezuela democracy project, and this is the end of that. Especially since the Trump Administration will concentrate on the middle east now. Venezuela is too much struggle. All the Foreign Policy challenges. Is their agreement here that the Foreign Policy crisis w hat do you think works to bidens benefit . To bidens benefit and perhaps buttigiegs as well. Y buttigieg . Because of his military experience, and a fair amount of his stump speech is related to being a leader in the world and kind of that moral american authority. An i think americans have Attention Span for things that arent in the united states. Some of the economic arguments that are appealing from sanders and warrens side of the party will continue to be important. It really depends. If the situation with iran escalates to the point of we are in a war, that is an advantage for biden, but short of now we are in a war, i dont think it will matter all that much. What do you think . I think that what the intorats may be forced thinking by all the activity that we see around the world is that their desire to get rid of trump, remove him from office, will lead them to support whichever candidate appears through the information that is available as most likely to be able to do that. At this point, biden. So electability . And beyond electability, there is an existential sort of notion that trump has to be removed, and Many Democrats will determine biden, even if he is not a preferred candidate, may be the only option. In regard that, of course, typically there is a rally around the flag effect with president s if we get into some sort of war. Whether that would occur in this particular case, i dont know. But in terms of the idea of removing President Trump from anice, there has been assumption in republican politics for quite a number of years now that no democrat can win an honest and legitimate election, and the corollary to that is that if the democrat won, it must not have been an honest and legitimate election. So if any of these people beat President Trump, there will be tremendous blowback arguing, his concern even in 2016, i think the process is rigged anyway. So democrats have to face that as well. No matter who wins the election, they will be blowback from the losing side. So the democrats should pick someone who will lose the election so there is no blowback . Not saying that. [laughter] back tot to go something you said earlier about the republicans, having caucuses, too. Why . Party building . Well, yes. Every party, when they have an incumbent president and even in the midterm elections the parties have caucuses. These are twoyear events. Typically when you have an election like this, compared to the democrats in 2012, the party diehards will come, but you know obama will get the nomination. Lets assume trump will get the party, the but the democrats in 2012 for instance, didnt squash opposition if there was any at a caucus to obama. The republicans are running up to that line in some ways. Walsh and weld. Both have experience, legitimate candidates in that sense challenging trump, that will be present in those rooms. What kind of percentage they will get if any in some of these precincts . They will get some in some places, and it will be interesting to see where the support comes from, and how strong it is. I think those are things, data points that will get lost because the attention will be on the democratic side. But i think theres a lot of interesting things that could happen on the republican side, related to that, potentially some platform issues, but those are secondary. I am glad you mentioned that. The caucuses have effects beyond just the president ial race. All politics is local. First of all, they are an important organizing tool. 1984. Senator harkin once told me one of the reasons he won in 1984 was that the democrats had a spirited president ial caucus aat year, and he had wonderful list of names of activists in every precinct and corner of the state, and the republicans didnt have a similar caucus battle. Reagan was getting reelected. Wasenator harkin said that a pivotal thing. The proof of that, on caucus night in 1984, that day, president reagan came to iowa and flew into eastern iowa, waterloo i think, did an event, and then flew into the des moines market. Left iowa 30 minutes before the republican caucuses started, which was it sucked allnt, the oxygen of the day out of the democrats and gave it to the republicans. I would not be surprised if we saw air force one in iowa on february 3. If it happens, it is a page out of reagans book. Thats an important point. This time around, the democrats are organizing, knocking on everybodys door in the state apparently, and there are a lot of them, so there are a lot of staff and volunteers. The republicans, even though they will hold a caucus, none of that is happening on the republican side. This may have real repercussions for the senate race in iowa in 2020, for the congressional races, all of which are likely to be competitive races. The democrats will be betterorganized, at least at the front end. And there is a real battle for the control of the iowa house. The legislature. All politics is local. I appreciate the audience member who called that organizing issue to our attention. So, what happens now . What tickets . We talk about who gets tickets out of iowa. I wonder, in this age of money in politics, in the age of social media, if that old rule still works . It is not three tickets out of iowa. Everybody has their own airplane to leave iowa. Sanders, biden, buttigieg finish in the top three, Elizabeth Warren gets a fourth ticket out of iowa, the fact is these candidates have so much money now that the original premise in iowa was that you came here, now these candidates have my to sustain these campaigns long after iowa. What is the big deal with iowa now if they have plenty of money . This is what the media has to cover, in addition to Everything Else in the middle east on the world. This is the first thing they are covering. If that is attention on i will because when you cover politics, where first . Not because we earned it, but because we are there. The media will cover it. Because things are so divided, there is not a clearcut leader. We have the top three people tied. If that comes out of iowa, this year there will be at least four tickets out iowa. It will be the top four right now. More milliond 30 dollars 34 million, that is enough to finance his campaign through june. 2018, 2016 he will do that. Bloomberg is buying his weight into it. There will be a bigger impact this year. In the first four states, we could see different results. After we get past those first four states and go into super tuesday, the democratic race will still be modeled. Do things have changed since the Iowa Caucuses started. As a campaigndia to a. Second, citizens united, which lifted the cork on money. If there is so much more money around politics. You take that plus the ability to raise money over the internet and small dollars, it changes a lot of the premises for why you wanted to come to iowa. Resent the idea that the more money you have, the better chance you have of winning. That is not necessarily the case. If that is the equation, there are two billionaires running, they should win in iowa and New Hampshire, South Carolina. It is personality, it is connection, it is tradition, it is history. In a New Hampshire, i have a property in New Hampshire, the equation is not very different from iowa. I was going to say, New Hampshire expects every contender to come to their town and their house and their veteran of the foreign wars plays. I go nuts because they come banging on my door on my cabin when i am trying to look at the sunset or something. I am not sure that money is necessarily what is going to get somebody denomination. Is not money, you need to delegates. If you do not get at least 15 support in primaries as well as the caucus, you win no delegates. This is across every democratic event. It is not unique to iowa. Iowaur people come out of at 20 each, maybe a little more, there is nothing left for anybody else in terms of winning delegates. They may continue a Zombie Campaign with their money for a wild, but they will have no realistic shot at winning the nomination. Earlier,talked about if people are not counting delegates, but are counting initial preferences the media does not decide the nominee. If you need a majority of delegates at the convention. No matter what the media is telling us, the issue is how many delegates have you won, and if you do not get at least 15 of the vote at the Congressional District or state level vote, you will have zero delegates from that state. There is a third fact that a third factor. I would pose it. Have the dncs debate criteria and these a series of debates had an impact on the caucuses . Have they diminish the importance of the caucuses or amplify them or not bothered them at all . It seems there is something important to look at. What is your answer . I do not have one. It is like a parallel track that in terms of coverage, my initial thought is it dampened attention to the caucuses. I think it has diminish the rule of iowa. It is the dncs debate rules on the field, not people in smalltown iowa expressing preferences during preferences. I agree. I think it diminish the effect of a caucuses and made it difficult for candidates who maybe could get a foothold in iowa without a lot of money are having to focus on getting these one dollar donations to get on a debate stage to maintain viability for a National Campaign have pushed them out on the field. Cory booker has hung on, he is an example of one that is on the bubble. Castro, kirsten gillibrand, some of these candidates that could have done better in iowa have been forced to spend time doing other stuff the party decided to do. Im skeptical that the debates have had much of an impact. I suspect that as we run up to the caucus date, the focus on iowa will be so overwhelming that any memory of the debates will have dissipated. If you recall from the debates, it was Kamala Harris who had the big moment and in the second or third debate, Julian Castro had a moment, and they are both gone. I think your characterization is a parallel track, it may be more correct. I also think the fact that the democrats have lined up in sequence for different events around the country has diminished the singular importance of iowa. Is, in an effort to diminish the significance of sidewalk, other states have contests closer to iowa. This has been a pattern. The unintended consequence of that has been to make iowa that much more important because the only way i contests closer to iowa. Candidate is going to compete in california is through media. Where do you get media if you do not have a big budget . You win iu up. There is free media. The bounce that comes out of these early states does have an impact. We have candidates that seem to be wellfunded, even Amy Klobuchar, who is running the risk of finishing fourth or below in the first contests, has money to hang on to super tuesday and we have this contribution of bloomberg being able to wait until super tuesday to make his entrance. I whatthink that does will be important, we will talk about it until the day after i well, that we will talk about New Hampshire up until the day after New Hampshire, then we will turn to South Carolina. Point, the wedding by high what will be done by the first three or four with nevada. Factor that enters into this question about should i you are be first and the role it candidate ise going to win the white house and some partys is going to lose. The winning candidate is likely to be someone who has come through this path. They are sitting in the white house and exciting, why do we want to mess around with changing peoples of a game we just want . In fact, we are sitting in the white house, we will make sure we do well and attend our fences and i was sure we do not get ambushed by a challenge of the primary. As kennedy found with carter, bill clinton found when he shut down and talked of Jesse Jackson in a 1996 over welfare up warm. They do not want to change the rules, they want the party out of power that just lost, two things happen. There is a debate, are we better off with a moderate message or an extreme message . Liberal and the Democratic Party, conservative and the Republican Party there is that argument over why they lost. The second reason they lost is iowa. Who gave us this turkey . They blame iowa. There is where you have the argument and the churning begins warmaking reforms. If they go to the rules to the next convention. The next thing that happens is, the two nominees go to the people who want to change the process and say, we got our job to worry about the november election. It is not to worry about the process in four years. Forget talking about taiwan and New Hampshire and these early states. We have to keep our eye on the ball. Isa is a test New Hampshire a battleground state, i want may be. Do not want to alienate those people. At inertia. Consensus inch a america on how this process ought to be changed. Criticisms. Two i know you agree with this. Iowa is not diverse enough, how did obama win . Liberalcrats have a perspective in this state. That is the only thing that counts. It does not matter of the state. There are a lot of latinos and africanamericans here. If obama had not one the caucuses is in iowa, i doubt he would have won the nomination. It credentialed him that a state with a lot of nonhispanic. Oters trusted him the argument that iowa makes the caucuses so complicated i got an email from a famous political consultant. People cannot afford to go for two hours at night and participate in caucuses because they are busy and so on. Caucuseshy the iowa turn out only about 10 of eligible voters. The pm center has great statistics. Primaries do not turn out many more voters. 12 , maybe 50 . That we have this academic argument, how you do statistics on turnout. Academics are crazy that way. Stopping at a polling place wherever it is and voting in a primary and not having to spend two hours in a caucus and only taking 10 or 15 minutes to vote in a primary is also too difficult for most people or they are not interested. Suppress theally percentage of people who participate. Doesnt suppress the people who participate. The people who cannot get off work to spend two hours doing a caucus or cannot get childcare ofdo that and to be people lower socioeconomic groups, more likely to be women, more likely to be people of color. When you are in a state that is already very white and you are suppressing the number of people of color that can vote, that is disenfranchising that group of people. I was selected obama does not mean people in this country are well represented by iowa. We have different life experiences. Is iowa a good place for women candidates . I would say no. , finallys last cycle iowa this year has gone up to one third of the women that one third of a legislature is women. For those of us doing work in and to run infrom iowa and successfully we had a lot of success in 2018, but there was a around the country. Over 25 hi what was of its legislature in my first time here, we got to 33 . That is hard work by organizations for recruiting and supporting women. In 2018, we were able to elect city a and abby finkenauer. Maybe have more influence because rule areas are conservative. There isnt an argument that the caucuses are undemocratic. Those are valid criticisms. There is another side of that coin which is the caucuses are democratic in the sense that states that hes primaries are doing the same things at the end of the day that we are doing in iowa. They are electing delegates to the national conventions. They are electing Party Leadership and platform planks. It happens in a different way and it is probably Smaller Party activists who are doing that in primary states because most people think, i will go to the primary, boat for my candidate, and it is done. If that is not actually what you are doing. An event and to electing delegates to go to the next level of conventions. It there is the indirect process of a National Election with the electoral college. If we think about democracy, when i teach a class and we talk about grassroots democracy, what do we hold up as the pivotal thing . New england town halls. This is like a new england town hall. It is regrettable that there are people who cannot come to those meetings. Those have real implications. At the same time, this is where deliberation takes place, where civic discussion takes place, where Party Governance takes place. That sometimes gets lost in talking about some of the antidemocratic nature of the caucuses. At the same time, there are other democratic aspects as well that we also need to factor in. Where these states things are taking place, those decisions are being made by a smaller pool of party activists. Add, i have done a real politics in new jersey, i was a local elected official, i did activists politics and iowa. Even as an elected official, i had no involvement in the state platform or decisions made by the state party. It was a small group of people of insiders. I came to iowa in 1999, a couple of months after getting here i was chairing my first precinct caucus and we were having discussions about the platform and sending things forward. Just to reiterate. I also want to note, no one can argue that iowa voters are descriptively representative of american voters, democrats, even republicans. You cannot make that argument. It is true. No one can argument that the caucuses do not make it difficult for some people to participate. It is a shame at the democratic unnecessarilyttee spike to the virtual caucus, which would have provided an opportunity for participating outside of the set time and physical location. Least, andmocrats at some degree republicans, in our research are highly represented, those who caucus, but it is a large turnout, as it was in 2008, are highly representative of Iowa Democratic voters as a , and, including on gender are ideologically representative of the Democratic Party as a whole nationally. Pushbacks we have thench of white guys left, nonwhite candidates are also not doing well in South Carolina, where independent campaigns are going on not directly influenced by iowa, but by campaigning. Of democratic voters in South Carolina are africanamerican, but none of the nonwhite candidates in South Carolina are pulling more than a couple of percent. It is not a unique situation to i that nonwhite candidates have not been doing well. I think it matters here. Some issuesays revolving around race and gender. That is thenk reason to say iowa should not play the role it plays. I want to let dennis 2008, when we did the caucus book, i look at the issue iowa is not demographically representative of the country as a whole. However, looking at 2008, Iowa Democrats, though more dovish than democrats nationwide, pretty well track Iowa Democrats nationwide in terms of what they thought the most important issues were. I what republicans were moderately more prolife than republicans nationwide. They to pretty much track where republicans were nationwide. Demography is not necessarily destiny. I want to switch gears. One of the things i want to talk about, we handicap the race and how we see that playing out this is a big field of candidates. Some of them are young enough that they will be around for future campaigns. It is true, many president s get there in their second or third go. And, reagan. Impresses youeld as someone who may not win, but who is going to be in good shape to run again or becomes comes out of this campaign as an enhanced political figure who winds up in the cabinet of the next president or is an enhanced figure, who will may lose on caucus night but will be longerterm winners . The obvious choice is Pete Buttigieg. Dashed hiseen ability to mount a National Campaign as the mayor of south bend has been impressive. It would suggest people have a future, although if he does not win and democrats do not take the white house, where he will be spending this time and what platforms will be available to him is uncertain. Another persons who, although did not do well able toe around, may be reformulate his approach and do better next time. Much, there is so uncertainty even between now and caucus day. I hesitated to bite anybody in or off. 2020have not gone to the for race, which has already started in this state. Arenames of candidates who not doing well but you impressed you as people who could be distance runners . There were some who dropped out of that were impressive. Kamala harris made a decision to drop out when she did to not put more resources into the race, focus on her senate job. Potentially beto orourke probably still has things to do, whether he alienates people or not is maybe a question. People who are not in the race, you happy a lot of people who could be chosen for cabinet positions, vice presidency. One thing to factor in with senators, if you have a sitting senator who will be tapped for a cabinet position or Vice President , what are the rules within that state for the appointment process . The senate is in contention. Seatsublicans have more republicans have more seeds to defend this time around. There will be factors in those calculations. Are petevious ones buttigieg, Kamala Harris will be back. My prediction will be, there will be a woman or person of color or both on the democratic ticket in one place or another. Cory booker as someone who we will see more of. I think is a great Vice President pig. Have been impressed by him i think she could be an energetic bottom half of the ticket. About it isoint likely a woman or person of color, Amy Klobuchar comes to get as someone whose names mentioned a lot as a good ticket balancer. Booker, but if the nominee is going to be someone from the east coast, unless it is Pete Buttigieg, that is what it looks like, the tendency to want to pick someone from the midwest or southwest another person is a stacey abrams. Speaker very persuasive. She did a great state of the Union Response in 2018. 2019. She is another person. On the republican side, no matter what the outcome of is in 2024,n 2020, republicans will have to come up with a candidate. President trump is finishing his second term or the democrats one and republicans will need a candidate. What sort of republican candidates look like people who might be people who could do well in iowa . We have seen nikki haley coming out here. A senator seems to have an interest, possibly mike lee from utah. Tom cotton from arkansas. For the republicans, is it going to be trumpism without trump or move in a different direction . They could face their own political civil war after trump. We will have to have another panel in four years. Marco rubio. He has been in the news a lot. Explaining what is going on and not quite on trumps side. He is a good speaker and charismatic. He is a latino. Democrats still have not finished the generational shift that republicans started some time ago. If you do the math, Pete Buttigieg could wait eight residential cycles to run and still be younger than Bernie Sanders and joe biden and Elizabeth Warren are now. Democrats still have to that generational shift. Republicans are ahead of them in it. A iought you had thought i saw your hand. I think nikki haley on the republican side. That have been predictions a first woman president will be republican rather than democrat. I think she is positioning herself. There are rumors in nebraska that ben sasse is trying to position himself for a run. He was a trump critic but has dampened that criticism and was endorsed by trump for a senate campaign. Why do you say the first woman president is more likely to be republican . Been ias just think the process is on the Republican Party over the Democratic Party, winner take all type of thing, the way the democrats to it, it is this confusing matter of splitting up delegates. The was going to add, process tends to favor republicans, but republican women tend to be viewed as more moderate than democratic women. Democratic women are often viewed as the most liberal of the party by sex component. If you are going to get a woman elected, you need a lot of people on board. Somebody more moderate is likely to that. That said, there are republican women that are extremely conservative that would have a hard time. Someone like nikki haley might be able to walk that line. Penceody things mike might be thinking about running in 2024 . He did visit the same flight twice here. We have to include him. He would do well. He could be a midwestern favorite. Whether depends on trump wins reelection or not this time in terms of whether pence is damaged or not going into 2024. It is true the Republican Party will have a debate that will start here over what it stands for the post trump era. Go back to the comment about the first woman president is likely to be a republican. Do you agree or disagree . I think it is a tossup. There is a valid argument. Thean look at i wellbeing first elected female senator in that sense. I would not discount on the theblican side, will heard, only africanamerican republican who is retiring because he is in a tough district. He is scheduled to visit New Hampshire coming up. That is not for this cycle. We couldilar argument, see another africanamerican president , and it might be a republican and he would be the one positioned at this point to go down that path and at least explore where we are going there. That we cannots discount in terms of thinking about the Republican Coalition of not being diverse, yet you could have the capabilities of candidates within that coalition to be diverse and still xl, will hurd,i haley they are female for people of color, they could try to unite that coalition what happens after donald trump . That is the key question. Party ofng to be the trump continuing or Something Different . The republicans have not made that decision yet. I want to ask if anybody has closing thoughts or comments about this question of iowa and being first. What should i will be doing what should i well be doing to hold onto its place where what is the alternative . Doing the caucuses on a saturday evening . Those kinds of questions. Primary is a national is not a viable alternative. There are a lot of issues and that we cannot get into. The real question is, what happens in 2020 . If donald trump wins, i think the Iowa Caucuses are in serious trouble. Continue tos will be arguing about whether the system works, the new rules are meant to open it up more, there will be additional pressure, a political ideological thing to have accessibility for democrats. Im not sure the caucuses can survive that for 2024. If donald trump loses and be democrat who wins once again in 2024, whatever democrats want about the caucuses will be irrelevant and it will be the republicans who drive it. They do about opening up the caucuses, making them more accessible. In that case, i think the Iowa Caucuses continue on. The losing party always has a andte about the message process. If the democrats lose, there will be more arguments about iowa in the process. I agree with david. But if democrats lose, there is going to be continuing pressure, i think, to do Something Different. There seems to be a lot of unhappiness. You see it on the media all the time about iowa. Be caucusgoers turn out to more representative of the total Democratic Party. Expanding the vote, you see that now with the rising electorate. States that had both a caucus and primary were washington and nebraska. In the nonbinding primary, there were 80,000 people. In washington state, 800,000 people voted in the primary and about 300,000 showed up for the caucus. If we are about expanding the electorate, a caucus does not do that. I want to thank all of you for being here and taking the time to participate in these discussions. I would like to thank the state of iowa historical museums. I would like to thank cspan and all of you in this audience for spending time with us today. Thank you all for being here. We are adjourned. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] campaign 2020. Watch our continuing coverage of the president ial candidates on the campaign trail. As the voting begins next month, watch live coverage of the Iowa Caucuses. Cspans campaign 2020. Your unfiltered view of politics. Back peter baker, chief White House Correspondent host i want to welcome back peter baker. I want to begin with david sangers piece. You retweeted him yesterday with the news over t p