9:27am Sunday The exit poll for Saturday’s Irish election has been released. The governing Fine Gael has 22.4%, the far-left Sinn Fein 22.3% and Fianna Fail 22.2%, so there’s only 0.2% between the top three parties. The Greens have 7.9%. The full exit poll is in the comments. No vote counting in Ireland until tonight AEDT.
5:15pm Friday With all precincts reporting, Buttigieg provisionally wins Iowa’s state delegate count by 0.1%. However, the AP will not declare a winner owing to irregularities. We will probably never know for sure who won Iowa’s state delegate count.
Sanders won both of the popular vote measures. He won the “initial” vote by 3.5% and the “final” vote by 1.5%.
4:37pm This tweet explains why Sanders is doing so well with these satellite caucuses.
4:35pm Late counting Iowa drama! I’m not sure what the “satellite caucuses” are, but there were four of them, one for each of Iowa’s Congressional Districts. Three of them have reported, and they are all very strong for Sanders. There’s still one to go.
With 97% in, Buttigieg now leads Sanders by just three state delegates or 0.15%. Sanders leads by 3.5% on the “initial” popular vote, and by 1.5% on the “final” popular vote.
10:41am In the FiveThirtyEight post-Iowa model, Biden’s chance of winning a pledged delegate majority has plunged from 43% to 21%, with Sanders up to 37%. The probability that nobody wins a pledged delegate majority (contested convention) is up to 27%.
10:20am Thursday More Iowa results! With 86% in, Buttigieg leads Sanders by 26.7% to 25.4% on state delegates, the measure the US media is using to call a winner. Warren has 18.3%, Biden 15.8% and Klobuchar 12.1%.
On two other measures, Sanders is still ahead. He leads Buttigieg by 24.3% to 21.6% on “initial” popular votes. He leads by 26.1% to 25.5% on “final” popular votes after realignment.
4:05pm 71% of precincts are now in for the Dem Iowa caucus. The latest 9% haven’t made much difference to the figures.
2:50pm My Conversation article on these caucuses is up. We need to see if there’s a significant impact on national polls from these results. The next contest is New Hampshire on February 11; polls close by 12pm February 12 AEDT.
There was a big moment in Trump’s State of the Union address today. At the end of the speech, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi literally tore it up.
10:30am New York Times analyst Nate Cohn says results reported so far are representative of the whole state.
10am Wednesday We FINALLY have more Iowa results. With 62% of precincts reporting, Buttigieg leads Sanders by 27% to 25% on State Delegate Equivalents, the traditional measure that most of the media has focussed on. Warren has 18%, Biden 16% and Klobuchar 13%.
On the two other measures, Sanders leads. He leads on the “initial” popular votes by 24.5% to 21.4% for Buttigieg. He leads on the “final” popular votes after realignment by 26% to 25%.
8:15pm More than EIGHT hours after the caucuses began, still only 2% has been reported! I hope we have better results by tomorrow morning.
3:57pm In Ireland, a new poll has Sinn Fein in outright first on 25%, with Fianna Fail on 23%, Fine Gael 20% and the Greens 8%.
3:43pm Nate Silver
At this point, it's been 3.6 hours since the start of the caucuses and 1.9% of precincts have reported results, which extrapolates out to knowing the results in a mere 189 hours, which would be at 9:30 pm next Tuesday, after voting in the NH primary has already closed.
— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) February 4, 2020
3:15pm Turnout at these caucuses in on pace for 2016. In 2016, 172,000 participated in the Iowa Dem caucuses, well down from the record 240,000 in 2008. In 2008, the Dems had a charismatic candidate in Barack Obama.
3:05pm With 1.9% in, Sanders is on top with 28% followed by Warren at 25%, Buttigieg 24%, Klobuchar 12% and Biden just 11%.
2:57pm On the Dem side, we’ve only got 32 of 1,765 precincts reporting their post-realignment votes. Much slower than in 2016, when 85% had reported by this time.
2:55pm In 2016, 187,000 votes were cast in the Republican Iowa caucuses. With 83% in, 29,000 votes have been cast in 2020.
2:35pm Still only 1.7% counted, with Buttigieg leading Sanders by 1.3% after realignment. Biden down to 14%. Hurry up!!
1:56pm In the Republican caucus, Trump has over 96% of the vote. Republicans love Trump.
1:54pm By “after realignment”, I mean after the initial division. Candidates polling below 15% in a particular precinct are declared unviable, and their supporters are asked to pick a viable candidate. Candidates originally declared unviable can become viable if they pick up enough to make it over 15% in the second round. It’s explained in this Conversation article.
1:50pm The AP has Buttigieg leading Sanders by 27% to 24% on final alignment numbers, followed by 19.5% for Biden, 15% Warren and 14% Klobuchar. 1.3% of precincts are in.
1:40pm The New York Times results page now gives Sanders 408 final votes (after realignment presumably), Buttigieg 380, Biden 310, Warren 277 and Klobuchar 176.
Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is an honorary associate at the University of Melbourne. His work on electoral matters for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.
The final RealClearPolitics poll average for Iowa gave Bernie Sanders 24.2%, Joe Biden 20.2%, Pete Buttigieg 16.4%, Elizabeth Warren 15.6% and Amy Klobuchar 8.6%. As I noted in Friday’s Conversation article, polling for these caucuses has often been inaccurate. The caucuses begin at 12pm AEDT, and the process is described in that article. I will begin commenting on the results about 1:30pm after I return from bridge.
Elsewhere, the far-left Sinn Féin has surged in the Irish polls ahead of this Saturday’s election. Sinn Féin is equal first with Fianna Fáil in one recent poll, and two points behind in another. There is a chance that the two dominant Irish parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, will fail to win a combined majority of the seats. Both these parties are conservative. Other parties likely to win seats are left-wing, so a left majority is a possibility.
Polls in Ireland close at 10pm local time (9am Sunday AEDT). Exit polls will be released then, but no votes are counted until the next morning (Sunday evening AEDT). As Ireland uses Tasmania’s Hare-Clark system, it is likely to take at least a few days to finalise all counting.
And in Britain, Boris Johnson appears to want a hard Brexit on December 31, when the transition period ends.
Gee they’re taking their time!
Dave Weigel, of the WashPo, commenting that older candidates, past their prime, is a factor tonight, so affecting Biden and Sanders’ numbers.
Only 1.7% of the vote counted? That can’t be right.
The conspiracy theories that will emerge from this cock-up are going to be something to behold.
Seems like a three horse race, two progressives and one regressive (?). Whatever the result that indicates a great deal of appetite for progress.
It’s amusing watching CNN in a holding pattern having no idea what the fuck is going on like everyone else. But seriously, this is a terrible look. The conspiracy theories write themselves. The far right will go nuts with this shit. Iowa needs the boot.
Russian interference……
Appzarently, the Iowa Caucuses have a history of counting problems, according to the Wash Po. 😆
Well, the Iowa party admin has ensured that none of the candidates is going to be the main story tonight.
As I understand it, the numbers are worked out by the organisers on the ground and then phoned in (and/or entered into the computer system), so why does there need to be “quality control” at party HQ?
The eyes of the world are on the Dem Party, and they appear to have demonstrated that they are totally unable to manage a small-scale logistical challenge. It immediately prompts the question of whether the party is up to managing large scale challenges like the US economy, the US military, the space program, etc.
The optics are so bad.
Sam Seder Majority report has been taking calls from Iowa.
The indications are Sanders Warren Buttigieg and Klobuchar are bunched together. The big story is that Biden is struggling to be viable.
How did they fuck this up this badly? Did noone take a minute to think “Hey, let’s have a plan B in mind just in case there’s an issue with this new app”? Why can’t they just report the results via email or text or a phone call, like they presumably did during every previous caucus?
I feel bad for whoever ends up winning – their victory may well end up losing a lot of credibility.
This looks like taking a while to finalise.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/03/us/politics/iowa-caucuses.html
UN monitors for Iowa?
Biden doing really badly in districts where the organisers can use a computer. Sadly that represents less than 2% of the vote.
😆
As often happens while watching international elections, I’m once again incredibly thankful for the consistently competent and transparent operation run by the AEC.
You have to be highly motivated to attend the Iowa caucus. Or at least impelled by a sense of obligation. And you have to have nothing else on that night, including looking after young children (or a grumpy husband who wants his dinner on time).
The Iowa caucus is NOT representative of the Democratic Party, or Iowa, or the US. It’s a shibboleth.
I found this comment quite revealing (from 538):
Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux
10:48 PM
“I will say, Sarah, I did not talk to a single caucusgoer who seemed truly excited about the idea of caucusing. And several told me they hate, hate, hate it. So I don’t know how much love would be lost for the caucuses even in Iowa if they ended.”
mb
“The eyes of the world are on the Dem Party, and they appear to have demonstrated that they are totally unable to manage a small-scale logistical challenge.”
Get a grip. It’s the Iowa caucus.
Kakuru:
It seems like such a strange, archaic system. Yet, it’s one that you’d think would be easier to tabulate results for than a traditional electional – it seems to literally just be head-counts of each precinct, with an added paper trail in the form of signed ballot papers. You don’t need a fucking app for that, just a calculator.
Ahahaha! They hung up on him!
After an hour!! Whatt the fuuuuuck are they doing? That’ll be going viral any second.
With all this bruhaha, results when they come through must be treated with suspicion (unless Amy wins).
All eyes now turn to the next big contest. England v Scotland, @ Murrayfield in the 6 nations 9th Feb, 3.15am. William, a separate thread for that one please.
This has just been updated.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2020/02/03/iowa-caucus-election-2020-live-coverage-democratic-candidates-results-photos-video/4618248002/
Edit: Worth for percentage results.
Kakuru @ #66 Tuesday, February 4th, 2020 – 3:12 pm
Exactly. The WashPo live feed had a historical perspective on the Iowa Caucuses for both parties. Apparently, wildly popular Ronald Reagan was beaten by George H W Bush in Iowa. 😆
Also, the Dems are doing paper returns so as to counter the potential effects by bad actors like the Russians.
The Republicans are going to have an absolute field day with this. They are probably hard at work brainstorming how best to spin this against the Democrats at this very moment.
The 3 data points the Dems are sifting through:
1. Raw vote totals.
2. Raw delegate allotmant. Based on a formula based upon number of people who turned out to previous caucuses.
3. Total Delegates. 44 in total go to the convention from Iowa.
Amy on WashPo live atm, SK. 🙂
Maybe we’ll get the New Hampshire result before the Iowa result is finalised. 😀
Apparently, free, open and transpaent applies to the voting. But, not the result.
It’s not about whether Iowa is representative or not of the greater Democratic party, or about how much influence this result will have on the rest of the race. Its about the look. Obviously, the apparent incompetence of the Iowa Democratic machine here has no real bearing on the eventual nominee’s competence as president. But you can bet that Trump and the republicans are going to do everything they can to make it look that way.
Its simply a pretty inauspicious start to the Democrat’s fight to take back the White House.
This cracked me up.
Asha:
I’ve said for ages now that you can always rely on Democrats to stuff up.
Good news for Sanders out of Iowa.
Front runner status confirmed. Biden bombed. Struggling to be viable
That electability argument worked real well.
We could see a Sanders v Bloomberg two horse race on Super Tuesday.
Edit: last sentence tongue in cheek.
Biden and then Warren speaking
Confessions @ #79 Tuesday, February 4th, 2020 – 3:26 pm
It’s not that they’re stuffing up, they’re being careful NOT to stuff up before they release the results.
Pencil and paper is the only tech needed for elections.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/02/03/us/elections/results-iowa-caucus-democrats.html?action=click&module=ELEX_results&pgtype=Interactive®ion=Navigation
“Sanders person so passionate she alienates Yang person who joins Buttigieg”
Be prepared for more of that. Sanders supporters tend to be insufferable.
Warren is speaking MSNBC not covering.
C@t:
Perhaps, but expect to hear more on the use of apps.
The Sanders supporters are the most loyal. This has been confirmed by polling.
Sanders speech on Guardian and periscope now
‘fess,
I also heard that a lot of the people in the precincts trying to use the app were grandparents who hadn’t ever seen an app before! 😆
Ann Coulter is trying humor
Ann Coulter
@AnnCoulter
32m
Well let’s see, the Democrats screwed an impeachment and now a caucus. Next up: They try to boil water.
#IowaCaucuses
Ann Coulter
@AnnCoulter
33m
The only possible explanation for the delay is: Donald Trump won the Iowa Democratic caucus!
#IowaCaucuses
“We found inconsistencies in the reporting of three sets of results.” Using photos & paper trail “to validate that all results match.”
So why not release the other sets of results?
I’m not surprised Biden bombed. He’s so wooden you get splinters from shaking his hand. I’m hoping for a Buttigieg or Klobuchar win. Klobuchar looks dead in the water though.
Sanders is popular with caucus goers, but I’m not convinced he has wider appeal.
C@t:
Good god! Does the Iowa Dem Party have bloody millennials running the show?
Would not want to be the Iowa Dem party chair at the moment.
Statement from the IDP:
https://twitter.com/DavidWright_7/status/1224550364256575488
Kakaru and c@tmomma: you might sneer at my view that this is an incredibly bad look for the Dems.
But here’s what seems to be the current state of play:
Caucus organisers are continuing to be unable to report in their results to the party HQ almost 3 hours after the most of meetings concluded.
It’s now looking likely that no results are going to be released until tomorrow US time.
Biden has clearly done very badly and his campaign management is putting a lot of pressure on the Iowa Dems re the process. As Biden is widely seen as being the candidate of the “party machine”, this is just going to make the whole thing a field day for conspiracy theorists.
There must be at least some possibility of the whole exercise being declared null and void and the Iowa Democratic leadership will end up deciding which delegates go to the convention.
In an era of live internet streaming ,this would seem to me to be a major embarrassment for the Democrat Party not only nationally, but globally.
But apparently I’m wrong and it’s only a minor local matter.
MB is right this is a bad look and already people are mocking the Dems ability to manage the leavers of government.
Kakaru
Bill Maher nailed it. Sanders has an army behind him.
That will make the difference. Enthusiasm is strongest with Sanders. The metric to assess will be how high was the turnout.
High turnout and South Carolina will vote for Sanders. Nevada is a Caucus. Sanders is leading in the polls in New Hampshire.
It is looking like Sanders is on the Carter and Obama path.
I still think the establishment Dems will back Warren or Bloomberg to try and stop Sanders.
Buttigieg won’t last. A pity I think if it had been him not Clinton for 2016 Trump would have lost.