Iowan working to keep caucuses first, expand GOP contest

Making the case for Iowa's first-in-the nation presidential caucuses is easy for Brian Kennedy.

As a new member of a Republican National Committee looking at the 2012 primary and caucus calendar, the Bettendorf Republican will argue keeping Iowa first is a smart choice for the party, especially if there is a role for the states that follow.

"My focus will be on maintaining Iowa's first-in-the-nation status," Kennedy, the former Republican Party of Iowa chairman, said Friday. "But also I'd like Republicans to have a healthy debate about the process after Iowa and New Hampshire. ... a system where lots of states have a great deal of influence."

Kennedy, who managed former Gov. Terry Branstad's campaigns and served on the national political staff of two GOP presidential campaigns, thinks Republicans might learn a lesson from the spirited, expensive and protracted primary battle Democratic candidates waged in 2008.

"I think there's some merit in the argument that because the Democratic primary continued longer, more competitive in more states and involved more states it benefitted the party and the candidate," he said. In Indiana, for example, the Barack Obama-Hillary Clinton battle probably helped Democrats carry the state in the general for the first time since Lyndon Johnson's victory in 1964.

"Let's thinks about what happens after Iowa and New Hampshire? How do we structure a system to keep the process going longer, so more people participate across the country?" said Kennedy, the president of Woodberry Associates, a Washington, DC-based public affairs advocacy firm with offices in Bettendorf and Nashville.

Although conventional wisdom holds long primary battles drain candidates' resources, divide parties and leave the nominee weakened for the general election.

"Generally, whoever comes out of a healthy competition is in a stronger position, not a weaker position," Kennedy said.

Of course, that comes after securing Iowa's lead-off spot in the nomination battle. Although the GOP approved rules that appear to preserve Iowa's spot, Kennedy said the plan adopted at the national convention last summer applies to caucuses and primaries in state contests where delegates are bound.

"Iowa takes a straw poll while we elect delegates who ultimately elect delegates who decide who the delegates are," he said. "So the rules that were passed don't necessarily protect Iowa."

The committee will begin meeting this summer and have hearings around the country before making a recommendation at the GOP summer meeting in 2010.

"Ultimately, the case for Iowa is that Iowa serves the process well," Kennedy said. "Iowa allows a level playing field where all the candidates can come in and compete, with relatively little money they can get noticed, citizens take the process seriously and it allows a lesser known to come in and compete."

He downplayed concerns that so-called moderate Republican hopefuls will skip the Iowa caucuses because the state GOP is dominated by social conservatives.

"That argument is made every four years," Kennedy said. If social conservatives rally around one candidate, such as Mike Huckabee in 2008, "they can have quite an impact. But if that vote is split among several, it doesn't determine the outcome."

The Iowa GOP does need to think about motivating additional participation in the caucuses, he said.

"The Democrats showed that can be done in 2008," Kennedy said. "A very spirited contest, with a lot of compelling candidates brought out a pretty big turnout."