Compared to the New Hampshire primary or the Iowa caucuses, Maine’s party caucuses next weekend will get much less national attention.
They fall after Super Tuesday, and will send relatively few delegates to the national nominating conventions. But both parties say they’ve made improvements to their caucus formats, which they believe will render a more transparent and accurate reflection of how the party faithful are feeling about the candidates for president.
Republicans will caucus on Saturday, March 5, and Democrats the following day.
Both parties have experienced problems in past presidential years that they would rather forget: Missing vote totals, weather-delayed caucuses and overcrowded caucus venues that prompted frustrated participants to turn around and head home. But party officials say they have learned from the past.
Republican Party chairman Rick Bennett says these are not your grandfather’s caucuses.
“It’s sort of a hybrid between a caucus and a primary, because for the first time in history, any Maine Republican can go to their caucus location and cast a secret ballot within a window of three hours for their preference for president of the United States,” he says.
In addition to the secret balloting, nonenrolled voters can show up at one of the 22 caucus locations in the state, join the Republican Party and cast a vote. On the Democratic side, party Chairman Phil Bartlett says participants won’t even have to show up.
“We do have a process that allows for folks to cast their ballots absentee,” he says. “There are some drawbacks, in that you are not there on the day of and can’t change your vote or move around to build coalitions. So there are some drawbacks to it, but it’s a great opportunity for folks who otherwise wouldn’t be able to participate.”
At least 16,000 absentee ballots have been processed by the party and will be counted alongside the votes of those that attend the caucuses.
Democrats are trying to caucus in every city and town, and they allow the process to go on throughout the day, until 8 p.m. While the new format will allow more flexibility and likely more participation, Bartlett acknowledges that collecting and tabulating all of the caucus results will be a daunting task.
There are other differences between the two party caucuses. Both elect so-called super delegates to their nominating convention, but Rick Bennett says only the Republicans will require that those delegates represent the candidate choices made by caucusgoers back home.
“I will be bound as a delegate to whatever the results of the March 5 caucus are,” he says. “The Democrats let their super delegates have a huge influence in the selection of their nominee.”
Democrats send more super delegates to their national convention, and they are not bound by the caucus results. But Bartlett dismisses the suggestion that he and other super delegates will ignore caucus or primary votes.
“So it simply means that we are not pledged to any particular candidate and we are free to vote as we wish at the convention,” he says. “Historically, these unpledged delegates have always gone with the winners of the caucuses and primaries.”
Democrats will automatically give super-delegate status not only to party leaders but also major office holders like U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree. Top-elected GOP officials like Gov. Paul LePage, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins and U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin will all have to be elected as delegates if they want to participate.
Republicans share Saturday primaries or caucuses with Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana and Nebraska. Democrats have Sunday all to themselves.
The parties have also taken different approaches to financing the somewhat expensive caucus procedure. Democrats are using party staff and money to conduct their caucuses. Republicans charged candidates, many of whom have since dropped out of the race, $10,000 each to be on the caucus ballot.
Both parties expect that some of the candidates may campaign in the state late next week, after Super Tuesday.
