As 2023 comes to a close, like all good Americans, we look forward, not backwards. And forward means 2024. 2024 in political terms means, of course, the Iowa caucus on January 15, and then shortly thereafter, the New Hampshire primary on January 23, very short space in between. Now, ironically, most of the people who win the Iowa caucus do not go on to become nominated. I don’t know why, just the way it tends to work. On the other hand, New Hampshire sometimes has actually helped launch campaigns. Other times it has put them in the tank. So here’s where we are.

President Biden, for all practical purposes, has no serious opponent. He has a young congressman from Minnesota, who has no money, no plans, no organization, no credibility. So, President Biden will almost certainly be coasting towards the nomination at this point. And barring some kind of major health incident, I think it’s very likely he’ll be the Democratic nominee. 

Now, obviously, you see people out, running around. The governor of California, for example, is doing everything he can, debating everybody he can, making as much noise as he can. He’s totally for President Biden, but should anything happen, he will be available. But other than that kind of thing — and of course, Kamala Harris has been working very hard, doing media appearances, doing interviews, making speeches, trying to prove that she could be the Democratic presidential nominee, if for any reason, President Biden did not decide to run again. But all the evidence we have right now is that that’s pretty much locked down. 

President Biden will run, his government is spending some amazing amount of money, I think it’s $6.2 trillion a year now. And so the number of people he can help, the number of favors he can do, pretty hard to see how he’s going to lose in that kind of a setting in terms of the nomination. And in fact, if you go back and look at history, you’ll find that Teddy Kennedy, who at the time was very popular, could not beat Jimmy Carter, even though Carter was very unpopular, but an incumbent president inside their own party has real strength. Similarly, four years earlier, Ronald Reagan, who was very popular, could not be Gerald Ford, who’s the only appointed person ever to become president. He replaced Richard Nixon after Watergate.

Because again, inside the party, incumbent presidents have lots of advantages. 

It starts with, they can invite you to the White House, they can invite you to be on Air Force One, they can make sure that the things you care about get funded. That the bureaucrats you worry about are nice to you. Lots of things that incumbent Presidents can do doesn’t carry over to a general election, which is a different kind of place, but inside a primary, inside a caucus, inside their own party, Presidents are very, very powerful. 

Now the Republicans have a semi incumbent president in Donald Trump. He has huge nationwide name recognition worldwide. He has huge name recognition across the whole country. He’s a known commodity, a substantial number of people dislike him. A substantial number of people love him. There’s a group in between this reluctantly being in to think maybe they’re going to be for him, even if they don’t want to be for him. And he’s well ahead.

You never can tell; both Iowa and New Hampshire have traditions where somebody can be a week out, and suddenly they surge. John Kerry did this in 2004, came from behind to win the Iowa caucus when people thought he would lose. So you just can’t be sure. I would say that right now, unless things change dramatically, the difference between a caucus and a primary is enormous. In a caucus, you actually have to go to a place usually, let’s say a school room, or a library or maybe the fire department in a small town. You have to stand around for hours. I mean, you got to be committed to go to a caucus.

In a primary you walk in, you vote, you go home. So the very different levels of commitment. The Iowa caucus is dominated in the end by sheer organization. Barack Obama was dramatically better organized than Hillary Clinton, pulled off a huge upset and really began his run for the White House by having organized. I think he had something like 90 offices around the state. By contrast, as recently as a week or two ago, Nikki Haley had one. I think that DeSantis may have four. Obama had 90. Big difference. 

Trump of course has been working in the state for years. He has a very strong statewide organization. On the other hand, the most successful fundamentalist, conservative, has endorsed DeSantis. Excuse me. On the other hand, the best organized, conservative religious group have endorsed DeSantis, and the governor who’s very, very popular, has endorsed DeSantis. So, he has some possibilities of doing pretty well. And of course, Nikki Haley is now on a roll, she’s gaining momentum. 

What’s happened there is that the moneyed class, the people who give 10s and 20s of millions of dollars, they have concluded that DeSantis had a shot and failed, and so they’re pulling out from him. And they’re so anti-Trump, they need to know they need a new horse. And so they’ve turned to Nikki and said, you know, we think you ought to be it. So the news media coverage the next few weeks are going to be how Nikki Haley is gaining momentum. She’s raising money, she’s opening offices, etc. And she’ll be able to buy a pretty large amount of TV advertising. 

The challenge for her is that back home in South Carolina, Donald J. Trump is very, very popular. He went to the Clemson University of South Carolina game, was wildly received by people standing and chanting Trump, Trump Trump. The very same day, he picked up 83 endorsements from South Carolinians, most of whom had been for Tim Scott out of affection, and went back to Trump as soon as they could. Right now he leads Nikki by about 40 points in South Carolina and most recent polling. 

So I think the odds are probably that Trump will be alright. But these first two primaries are important and worth your watching. If for any reason, Biden stumbles and you suddenly see an unknown Congressman with no money, getting votes, just because people say, not Biden. I have no idea who they’re voting for, but they know they’re not voting for Biden, then you see a problem. If you see the Democratic turnout drop, because people just aren’t enthusiastic, then they have a problem. 

On the Republican side, if Trump wins both Iowa and New Hampshire, he’s almost certainly going to be the nominee. If, however, he slips; if one of the two could somehow get more votes than Trump in either, either one Hampshire, Iowa, it will begin to be a horse race, because part of Trump’s strength is the sense of invincibility that he’s out. He’s ultimately going to be there, so you might as well before him, that started to slip. It’d be a very different race. 

So we have a lot to think about and look over as we’re having, you know, Christmas and New Year’s and getting together with friends. When politics comes up, just remember to tell everybody: watch Iowa, watch New Hampshire, and then we can have another conversation in March.