Grassroots Wyoming Republican Politics
This week the Teton County Republicans will be holding their precinct caucuses. This is politics at its most basic and grassroots level. The Republicans and Democrats usually hold their caucuses at the same time in March every other year. But this year, the Wyoming Republicans decided to move up their County Conventions to January 5, so that they will be the 2nd in the nation right after Iowa. It used to be that Iowa and New Hampshire were by themselves in January and then the other states started in February and went through June. The Wyoming Democrats did not move their date and are staying on March 8.
Because Wyoming moved to January 5 (a Saturday), this has caused some real problems for Iowa. By state law, Iowa must hold their caucus first in the nation, so they had to move to January 3. Students at their local colleges are still gone on Christmas break and they had to move to a Thursday rather than a Saturday. New Hampshire also has a state law that they must be the first primary. But since Wyoming does a caucus and not a primary, New Hampshire could still come after Wyoming on January 8. Other states have also moved to January for the first time. Michigan is on January 15, Nevada and South Carolina are on January 19 and Florida is on the 20th. Because Wyoming moved to January 5 without the National Republican Party permission, Wyoming was penalized by losing half of their delegates to the national convention.
The Wyoming Republicans will be electing on January 5, 12 delegates to the National Convention. Every presidential election Sublette and Teton Counties alternate which county gets to elect the delegate. This presidential election it is Teton County's turn and Sublette County will elect the alternate delegate. The Ron Paul campaign and Mitt Romney campaign have been the most active in Teton County heavily vying for that one delegate.
'The precinct caucus meeting that happens this week, elects one extra delegate to the county convention above and beyond the automatic county delegates of the precinct committee persons. Each precinct sends three delegates to the county convention on January 5, the two automatic delegates which are the precinct committeepersons and then one extra person elected at the Precinct Caucus held this week. That one extra delegate from each precinct is being pursued strongly by presidential campaigns, because then that extra person from each precinct (18 precincts in Teton County) can vote for the one national delegate at the county convention. Caucuses are certainly more complicated than primaries, but it has been exciting to see the presidential campaigns working so hard to earn those votes.
Because, I am a precinct committeeman for Rafter J, I get lots of phone calls from the campaigns and mailings. The Ron Paul campaign appears to be the most organized in Teton County, but the Mitt Romney campaign has been trying. Other than those two candidates, the other candidates appear to have written off Wyoming. We are just not enough delegates to worry about. At the precinct caucus, any registered Republican can show up and vote. It has a nice atmosphere, because we sit around as a small group, such as the Hoback Precinct or the Moran precinct, and we propose platforms to be debated at the county convention, and we discuss who we want to support as the Republican nominee for President.
The Democrats do theirs the same way in Wyoming. It is one of the last vestiges of truly democracy in action where neighbors just sit around as neighbors and discuss and vote as friends and neighbors. If you are a registered Republican in Teton County, stop on by at 5:30 p.m. at the Antler Basement Meeting Room and join your neighbors from your precinct in discussing politics. And if you are a Democrat, watch the paper for the Democrat's announcement for their precinct caucuses which should be scheduled some time in late February in order to prepare for their county convention on March 8. If you've never been to a caucus, you should try and go this year whichever party you belong to. It is definitely an interesting experience.