Who screwed Iowa Democrats (besides Iowa Democrats?)

Iowa Democrats will no longer have the privilege of being first in the nation to hold a Democratic presidential nominating contest. It was finally confirmed after a vote was taken by the Democratic National Committee’s Rules and Bylaws Committee on Dec. 2. But many of us knew long before the decision came down that the Iowa Democrats had seen their last first-in-the-nation contest.

Displeased or not, most can agree that the fate of Iowa Democrats’ leadoff status was sealed three years ago on Feb. 3, 2020, when a meltdown of the reporting process left the party unable to report results, leaving all eyes on Iowa for all the worst reasons.

Iowa’s fiasco was analyzed to death, its post-mortem officially detailed in a 26-page report commissioned by the Iowa Democratic Party, was researched and compiled by attorneys from a global law firm. Until last weekend, losing the coveted first-up spot was speculation. Now that it’s confirmed, it’s worth revisiting that report — and that fateful night — to ask: Did Iowa Democrats really screw things up for themselves, or should the blame extend beyond the state party?

The post-caucus report suggests that Iowa Democrats’ failures came with more than a little help from the Democratic National Committee, starting in 2018 when the DNC adopted a handful of new rules for states continuing with caucuses. The rules included a requirement for “non-present participation,” for voters unable to attend in person and “public reporting of results for each candidate based on the first expression.” The state party also had to submit to the DNC for approval their plan for selecting delegates to the convention. All of this was done in the name of making the process “less burdensome and more inclusive, transparent, and accessible to participants.”

The DNC’s idea of making the caucus process “less burdensome” was to apparently saddle the state party with some serious new tasks, then give them a hard time when it attempted to complete them. In April 2019, the IDP submitted its Delegate Selection Plan to the DNC, detailing plans for six virtual caucuses held both before and during the main event. Attendees would participate online or over the phone and would select (or in their case, rank) their preferred candidates.

In June, the DNC approved the state party’s Delegate Selection Plan but pushed back on the virtual caucus, citing security concerns. In July, the state party submitted a new plan, albeit with no major changes to the virtual process — clearly a mistake on the IDP’s end. In August 2019, the DNC rejected the proposal again.

The following month, the IDP submitted yet another plan replacing virtual caucuses with satellite caucuses: In-person caucuses held at the same time as the real thing, but away from the voters’ precinct (and outside of Iowa if needed.) That didn’t address the “inclusive” or “accessible” component for interested caucusgoers with who couldn’t leave their homes or had scheduling conflicts, but the DNC approved it, so … whatever.

Amid all that, the state party still had to plan for how they would report results. In 2016, Iowa Democrats (and Iowa Republicans) had partnered with Microsoft to develop a mobile smartphone app to report results. With Microsoft having declined to develop an app for their 2020 caucuses, the IDP reached out to a political tech company called Shadow, which was already being used by the Nevada State Democratic Party to develop a reporting app for its own upcoming caucus. The IDP secured a written proposal from Shadow and was ready to proceed in late June of 2019, anticipating a time frame of development to be completed by November, leaving all of December and January to test the app and train users.

But just as they did over the IDP’s plans for a virtual caucus, the DNC demurred, citing security concerns. Fearing that the DNC would outright veto its contract, the IDP froze their plans to proceed with Shadow while continuing to iron out the conflicts over their virtual caucus proposal.

After the virtual caucuses were officially rejected in August, the IDP sought formal permission from the DNC to contract with Shadow to develop the reporting app. Still dragging their feet, the DNC “required Shadow to submit lengthy written responses to very detailed questions about development and security,” a process that took about a month. When the IDP finally received approval from the DNC in October to contract with Shadow and begin development of the app, the seven-month time frame for development, testing and training was cut in half. It was rolled out on Jan. 18, 2020. The two months banked for the training of users was slashed to two weeks.

To their credit, the IDP “executed an excellent training program” for their caucus leaders. To their chagrin, that training did not include any focus on the app, other than to tell caucus leaders that it was still being developed. After the app was finally ready, caucus leaders would later face a fairly burdensome process of installing the app and setting up user accounts. The IDP did not make use of the app mandatory, so all things considered, it’s understandable that fewer than 1 in 4 caucus leaders actually reported their precinct’s results through the Shadow app. The rest opted to call their results in to the “boiler room,” a room at IDP caucus staging headquarters in Des Moines set up with phone lines and volunteers.

Unsurprisingly, call volume was high. The IDP was not prepared for it, despite having 40 VoIP phone lines, landline backups, and computers with the Shadow system for boiler room volunteers to input precinct results. IDP security procedures also made volunteers’ access to the reporting system on those computers extremely difficult, further impeding the process. Clearly, the IDP made a series of mistakes related to planning and execution of central caucus night operations. Those mistakes are outlined in detail in the post-caucus report.

Incredibly, though, those results that were reported through the app were accurate. The app didn’t fail, like so many thought. The process of reporting results to the public was what failed, because the DNC — not the IDP — shut that process down when the data on their end didn’t match what the IDP was reporting.

The numbers discrepancy that prompted the DNC to halt reporting sits squarely at the feet of the DNC, which insisted on having “independent and real-time access to the raw data” as the numbers came in. Ironically, the DNC demanded that access because it did not trust that Shadow’s app would accurately calculate it.

But the DNC and Shadow used separate computer systems that could not translate that data back and forth. To solve the incompatibility issue, “[t]he DNC required that Shadow build a ‘database conversion tool’ to convert the reporting data into a different format that the DNC’s own system could interpret.” The order to do so was given only weeks before caucus night. As is so easy with hastily-done projects, the conversion tool, which was “coded from scratch at the DNC’s demand by a lone Shadow employee in a matter of only a few days,” contained a coding error that caused a failure in the conversion of the data.

In the end, the only inaccurate totals were those coming from the DNC’s end, yet those inaccurate totals were all the DNC needed to shut down the reporting process. The move was incredibly damaging — and unnecessary. “If the DNC had not interjected itself into the results reporting process based on its erroneous data conversion,” stated the post-caucus report, “caucus night could conceivably have proceeded according to the IDP’s initial plan.”

Would the 2020 Democratic caucuses have gone off without a hitch without the curveballs thrown by the DNC? That’s makes for a long list of “what ifs” that won’t ever be confirmed. What is confirmed by the facts compiled in the post-caucus report is that while the Iowa Democratic Party made some significant mistakes in planning and executing the 2020 presidential caucus, they weren’t solely — or perhaps even primarily — responsible for its implosion.

An abundance of caution makes for careful planning. An abundance of interference makes for disaster. And an abundance of distrust makes for a political process in Iowa that will never again look the same.

Comments: 319-398-8266; althea.cole@thegazette.com

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