Today, obviously, is a pretty big day for both parties’ presidential campaigns. On the Democratic side, Dems will caucus in Nevada this afternoon, and give one of the candidates a fairly significant boost going into South Carolina. At this point, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have each won one contest, and Nevada will break the tie — unless John Edwards wins, in which case we’ll have an even more muddled picture.
On the Republican side, Republicans caucused in Nevada this morning, and even more importantly, the South Carolina GOP primary is today. There’s arguably no Republican frontrunner going into the day, but there may well be one by the time we learn the results tonight. (Or, just as likely, the state of the race will be even more bewildering and hard to predict.)
In Nevada, Republicans gathered at 9 am pacific (noon eastern). Caucus participants heard a few speeches from campaign representatives and then voted in what is effectively a straw poll.
Apparently, the results are already pretty obvious.
Mitt Romney won the Republican presidential caucuses in Nevada Saturday, as Republicans were still voting in their South Carolina primary.
It was former Massachusetts governor’s third win in the early nominating contests – along with Michigan and Wyoming. He finished second in Iowa and New Hampshire, but had pulled back in South Carolina in the wake of poor showings in the polls. He was the only Republican candidate to campaign heavily in Nevada, and he had led in the recent polls there.
Whether Romney gets a significant boost out of this is unclear, but it’s unlikely — most of the GOP field focused its attention on South Carolina this week, making a Nevada victory nice, but only slightly more important than Wyoming.
On the Democratic side, the contest is likely to be far closer. Dems in Nevada will caucus at noon pacific (3 pm eastern). The process will work much the same way as it did in Iowa, with supporters of various candidates gathering together at their precinct. Those who support a candidate who does not meet the viability threshold will then be able to back their second choice.
How will “viability” work? That’s a little less clear than I’d like: “The exact number needed for viability is based on how many delegates are elected by that precinct and how many Democrats show up.”
As for South Carolina, it’s a little confusing that the Republican primary is today, while the Democratic primary is a week from today, but that gives Dems a chance to campaign in both states.
As for what to expect in the GOP primary, the contest will likely come down to John McCain and Mike Huckabee. The prior has enjoyed pretty solid leads in the polls, but the latter appears to be closing well.
John Zogby has his final numbers out for South Carolina. And things are looking really good for Mike Huckabee. As I noted last night, John McCain has been leading all the polls since New Hampshire. But the final few days have shown a swing back toward Huckabee. And this final survey shows the same trend. Zogby’s poll yesterday had McCain at 29% and Huckabee at 22%. Today’s has it McCain 27% and Huckabee 26%.
Needless to say that still has McCain slightly ahead. And these movements are within the margin of error. However, this same trend has shown up in several separate surveys. And the two final ones both show Huck either pulling even or moving ahead.
The pattern in each of these races has been for the candidate with the momentum at the end to overshoot his or her numbers. So, as I said, this could be a good night for Huckabee. And if Huckabee wins it’ll leave the Republican race in even more of a mess than it already is.
Cry me a river.
I’ll have plenty more on the results later in the day. Stay tuned.