History & Political Science Students Traveling to Iowa to Observe Retail Politics

Despite the fact that candidates have been competing for the Democratic nomination for roughly one year already, and several have even dropped out, the nomination season has not officially begun.  February 3, 2020 is the official kickoff to the nomination season with Iowa caucusing for its favorite candidates.  Winning, or at least doing well, in Iowa is an important step to any candidate with hopes of becoming the nominee—especially among Democratic candidates, with the Iowa winner going on to win the nomination in every year since Bill Clinton took 4th place (out of 6 total candidates) in Iowa in 1992.  And in January 2020, 5 Daemen students and myself will be traveling to Des Moines, Iowa to get a first-hand look at why Iowa is so important in this process. 

Five History & Political Science students will be traveling with me to Des Moines, IA Jan. 16-21, 2020 to observe the importance or retail politics and learn about Iowa's role in the nomination process.  

With its vaunted status, Iowa voters tend to take their job seriously and candidates often welcome the vetting these voters provide.  Iowa voters expect candidates to visit the state repeatedly, shake hands, and convey to them that they understand the concerns of the average Iowan.  Oftentimes, Iowa voters will refuse to vote for a candidate they have not met in person, or at the very least not met with a staff member or been able to attend a rally of a particular candidate.  In fact, several Iowans will attend multiple rallies of several candidates to fully vet the candidates running for office.  And candidates tend to make this easy for Iowa voters.  Altogether, the Democrats running for the nomination have made over 1,600 appearances in Iowa over the course of 2019 thus far.  They have appeared in various cities and locales throughout the state—sometimes holding larger rallies and town hall meetings, while other times just popping in to a favorite coffee shop, restaurant, or pub. 

The value of these visits is twofold: 1) they allow voters to get a look at them in an up-close-and-personal way that advertisements and media appearances do not allow for and 2) they energize grassroots organizers and activists to volunteer for, and spread the message of, their favorite candidate.  My book, Campaigns That Matter, looks at the role of these visits in the 2008, 2012, and 2016 nomination contests and finds that visits impact a citizen’s likelihood to vote and which candidate they will ultimately vote for. 

Published by Lexington Press in 2017.  

Because Iowa plays such an important—and unique—role in the nomination process, I will be taking 5 History and Political Science students (Lindsey Hornung, Ricardo Marquez, Carlos McKnight, Tysai Washington, and Sam Williams) to Des Moines, Iowa from January 16-21, 2020 to observe the importance of retail politics.  We will be spending five days attending political rallies and town hall meetings, while also meeting with grassroots volunteers and party leaders to better understand retail politics and how much of a role they play in Iowa.  After we get back from Iowa, the five students will engage in a directed studies course, in which we will be exploring the uniqueness of the American presidential nominating process, through which they will prepare a paper for presentation at Daemen's Academic Festival on April 22, 2020.  We will be chronicling our experiences in Iowa on this blog along with our departmental social media pages, so I would encourage you all to follow along and learn with these students about how the road to the White House starts in Iowa.