What Did — And Didn’t — Go Down In The Iowa Caucuses

In 2018, Democratic women won primary races all over the country, overperforming male competitors to make up almost half of all Democratic nominees for Congress. For open seats, women’s win rate was much higher than men’s, which many interpreted as a sign that women’s candidacies were resonating with Democratic voters.

And yet, despite that success in 2018, the national conversation has returned to the question of whether a woman can win. As we’ve written at FiveThirtyEight, congressional races are different from presidential races in ways that can make it harder for women to win that race than others. In the abstract, women are viewed by voters as less capable of handling issues like terrorism, national security and the economy — issues strongly associated with the presidency.

Moreover, according to a Gallup poll from November, more than half of 2020 Democratic voters are prioritizing a candidate who can beat Trump over a candidate who aligns with them on the issues, which can hurt the women because of “electability” concerns.

But assuming a woman is less electable in the general election than a man might be a psychological over-correction. A recent experiment found more Democrats said they would prefer to vote for a woman than a man, which suggests a female nominee would generate excitement. And either way, that idea certainly seems to be having an effect on vote choices in the primary. When YouGov Blue — a division of YouGov focused on Democrats — asked respondents who they would make president if they had a magic wand, Warren led the way, even though she’s behind Biden and Sanders in most national polls.

That said, an Iowa win, or even a solid performance, by Warren or Klobuchar might go a long way toward assuaging the notion that they can’t win in November.

Those numbers on late deciders aren’t particularly high for the Iowa caucuses, Laura. Maybe a bit on the low side, if anything.

IOWA CITY, Iowa — This year, Iowa voters have been spoiled for choice — and many have taken their time settling on their first choice. In the last 48 hours before the caucuses, several people told me they were still open to persuasion by the various candidates’ camps in the initial round of decision-making.

But there’s another kind of caucusgoer — the diehards loyal to a single candidate, who they may have been supporting with time, money and enthusiasm for months. Those are the people who have spent the past few days knocking on doors to convince others in their area to spend a not-insignificant chunk of their evening shuffling around a high school gym or public library, and who will be working hard tonight to draw their wafflier friends and neighbors to their side.

Here in Iowa City, students will play a big role in tonight’s local caucuses, many of which (including the one I’ll be attending) will actually be held on the University of Iowa campus. So last night, I dropped by the campus center to talk to a group of students as they prepared for one of their final rounds of door-knocking for Warren.

The event was bold counterprogramming for the Super Bowl, but there was a big perk for the students who showed up. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, a freshman congresswoman from Massachusetts and the only member of the “Squad” to endorse Warren, stopped by to rally the troops. “I know you’ve probably had a lot of uncomfortable conversations,” Pressley told the 30 or so young people crowded into a small meeting room. “Well those conversations — dig deep and keep having them, because there are lives literally hanging in the balance, depending on you.” The students were plainly starstruck. Pressley mentioned that today is her 46th birthday (no prizes for guessing what she said she wanted her present to be) — and a few minutes later, a birthday cake with a lit candle magically appeared from the back of the room.

As the students clustered around Pressley for selfies and began gathering forms and stickers for a last evening of door-knocking, I chatted with a floppy-haired junior named Lee who started volunteering for Warren last August. Like many other Warren supporters I talked to, he was persuaded by one of Warren’s many policy plans. “My mom recently had to quit her job because she had about 300 hours of unpaid wages — she’s still trying to get it paid back,” Lee said. “I was asking the candidates about that, and Warren had a very detailed answer that involved greater enforcement in the Labor Department and wouldn’t require congressional action. That really impressed me and that was sort of, like, the moment I knew I was locked in.”

Lee told me that volunteering for Warren hadn’t always been easy for him, but just a few hours earlier, he’d had one of his best experiences so far. “Literally my very last off-campus canvass today was someone I had canvassed twice before,” he said. “Both times they were undecided. Today they said they were decided for Warren. So that was a pretty good feeling.”