Caucus and Primaries: Who are the caucus members and the delegates?

Question

How are these people picked? Can any person join and have voting powers? Thanks.

Answer 1

Any registered democrat can show up to a caucus and support their candidate. Each caucus is set for a specific time, and the doors close at the EXACT time it is set to close. Make sure you show up with time to spare. If you reside in a caucus state, call the local campaign office for your candidate and ask them when/where the caucus is being held.

Answer 2

A caucus is a meeting of the local members of a political party. Because each state is a little different, I am going to give general rules here.

A caucus typically takes place at the precinct, ward, or county level (depending upon population). The caucus is held at a specific location designated and publicized in advance. At that caucus, all registered voters who declare themselves to be members of a particular party (or in some states only voters registered as members of the political party) who show up by the time set in the notice are allowed to participate.

At the caucus level, each unit is assigned a certain number of delegates to the next level (my county typically gets between 4 and 6 delegates) based on results in previous elections. The attendees at the caucus elect these delegates. How the delegates are elected depends on the rules of the national party and the rules of the state party (the Republicans tend to elect delegates out of the caucus as a whole -- with winner take all -- and the Democrats tend to break up into caucuses for each candidate -- with the delegates assigned proportionately to each caucus).

The delegates elected at the local caucus advance to the next level convention. Depending upon the state, there could be several levels of conventions. At each level, the delegates picked at the lower level meet and pick a smaller number to represent them at the next level. Eventually, the convention reaches the congressional district and state levels were delegates are picked for the national convention.

Primary states are a little bit different. In some primary states, the slate of delegates for a candidate are submitted as part of the candidate's filing to be on the primary ballot. In other states, the potential delegates are listed on the primary ballot and voters get to vote directly for the delegates. In a third group, the primary merely determines the allocation of delegates with the delegates themselves selected through the caucus system.

Any eligible voter (which as noted above may in some states be limited to voters registered as members of that political party) is eligible to participate and vote at the local caucus. It is not unusual for one or two new participants to be picked as delegates at the local caucus. As you work your way toward the state convention, however, while theoretically possible, it is harder for new participants to get chosen as many of the "old" participants know each other from past elections. However, a new participant from my county did get chosen as an alternate to the national convention in 2004, so its not impossible.

If you are interested in knowing more about the procedure in your state, most state parties have websites and the parties interested in increasing grass roots involvement tend to post the rules for delegate seleciton on their website.