Florida Democrats will hold their 2008 presidential primary Jan. 29, despite the threat of losing more than half their convention delegates for violating national party nominating rules, top state Democratic officials said yesterday.
State party leaders decided it would be far better for Democratic political prospects to participate in the early primary date set by the Republican-run state Legislature instead of holding caucuses in February to abide by the Democratic National Committee’s calendar rules when voter turnout likely would be much smaller.
“The proposal of some of the national party members that would have the [January 29] primary supplanted by a caucus, the perception of that, especially in a state like Florida, would be just awful,” Sen. Bill Nelson, Florida Democrat, said yesterday in a conference call with reporters and state party officials.
“When you add to the fact that January 29 is likely to be a very heavy turnout election, and not just because the Republicans will have their candidates on the ballot,” choosing a later date on the calendar as the DNC demanded was an untenable choice for the state party,” Mr. Nelson said.
DNC rules that govern the primary schedule permit only four presidential nominating contests in January: the kickoff Iowa and Nevada caucuses on Jan. 14 and 19, respectively, New Hampshire’s tentatively set Jan. 22 primary and the South Carolina Democratic primary on Jan. 29. All other states are free to hold their delegate-selection contests thereafter. Nearly two dozen — including California, New York and New Jersey — have moved up their primaries to Feb. 5.
When Republican legislative leaders in Florida elbowed ahead of these states in order to exert more influence over the presidential selection process, Florida Democrats were placed in a quandary. Participating in the Republican-engineered primary would trigger DNC penalties that would deny Democrats half their delegates and all their superdelegates. Weeks of negotiations with DNC Chairman Howard Dean to find a way around the impasse produced no agreement, Mr. Nelson said.
“I’ve spoken to [Mr. Dean] about this and tried to share with him that this is important to us in Florida. The fact is that the [January 29] primary is the law, and Floridians have to obey the law,” he said.
He indicated that Mr. Dean was unmoved by his arguments.
“Dean was pretty hard over this,” he said.
The overriding factor for the Florida Democratic Party’s Central Committee when it reached a decision Sunday was to open up the nominating process to the largest number of voters. Any DNC move to impose penalties on the number of delegates elected would be “another form of disenfranchisement of the voters,” said Democratic state Chairman Karen L. Thurman.
“The Central Committee’s board wants to request that the DNC not penalize the state and the presidential candidates,” she said. “Florida Democrats cannot and will not disenfranchise its voters.”
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