North Seattle Caucus: Lessons Learned
We showed up at Wilson-Pacific at 12:30, and there were already no chairs for the table where our precinct sat. And then the pressure just kept building. 46-2228 ended up with 111 people. A normal caucus is 15-20 people. And there were eight caucuses in the building — they had to move two elsewhere within Wilson-Pacific because of their sizes. In all, there were somewhere north of 700 people. The crush of people trying to get in eventually led to the caucus itself not even starting until 1:30.
And then I had to open my big mouth.
Look, when you caucus, remember this rule: If there are more people there than you can count on your fingers and toes, DO NOT say, “I’ve chaired a caucus before.”
The horror. The horror.
With a group that large in a gymnasium filled with 600+ people, you needed a lectern, a microphone, and some nice assembly-style seating. And we had none of that. So, I just tore up the rules and hoped for the best.
I cut debate to 60 seconds. That’s right. 60 seconds per candidate. If we’d let everyone have even 30 seconds, we’d have 55 minutes of debate. And honestly, in a big, hot, noisy room, there was no way we’d make it that far. And by then, I was already losing my voice from the screaming. I’m screaming at the top of my lungs and I still have people who can’t hear me.
My biggest mistake was to let the handful of Kucinich people remain viable. There were three. They eventually grew to 9, just short of the 10 that could have won them a delegate. But just leaving them in as power brokers led to some insane dynamics.
I had to count and recount the final tally because my math kept getting screwed up. The “cheat sheet” for determining how to allocate delegates only went up to 25 total people attending. No help on doing the math for 111. The Obama people were boisterous. The Hillary people didn’t like me. The independents just wanted to go home.
The second and final vote total, after everyone had moved around, was 68 Obama, 38 Clinton, 7 Kucinich + undecided. And this had to be divided into six county delegates. I finally ended up with a party official explaining to me how to correctly divide them. I was getting hung up on the Kucinich people still being in. But in the end, Clinton had 2 to Obama’s 4. Delegates were picked, papers were signed, and 1 hour, 40 minutes after the chaos began, it was over.
After attending four caucuses here in Washington and chairing two, I’m tired of them. They are strange, chaotic, arcane relics of machine politics. Primaries are simpler and far more straightforward, and there aren’t hundreds of people like me trying to do all the math.
I went to a four year old’s birthday party right after the caucus, and I thought to myself how much easier it is to control a dozen toddlers than it is to try and get 110 people organized. One of the family members there is a community organizer, and she lamented that here were hundreds of people from the neighborhoods all together and no one thought of using the opportunity to, well, organize.
The whole thing is still a blur to me. I’d never seen anything like today, at least not here in America. This is what democracy looks like. It’s messy. But in the end, it works.
The caucus I chaired in 2004 had 7 people, and even that was confusing… *shudder*. I’m glad I signed in, took photos, watched the crowd and left shortly after the woman leading the caucus talked about politics being run by Goldman Sachs :-/
Journalistic obligations kept me from caucusing, and I’ve never caucused before, but man — reading the coverage today and looking at pictures, it looks like such a exciting, dynamic process. I can only imagine how difficult it must be to organize.
I live in a newer part of Woodinville and signed up on the Deocratic Party website. I was sent a card in the mail telling me where to go to caucus. I got to the site and was told to check the map because many cards were incorrect. Mine was one of them. As a result I couldn’t make it to the correct caucus site.
what do you mean by "journalistic obligations?" were you covering the caucus for a story, or is it really considered unethical for journalists to be citizens when they are off the clock?
Ryan — it’s a tough issue. A really tough issue. But the bottom line is that if you’re a reporter who writes about the news and, on occasion, politics, you risk the credibility and perceived objectivity of your reporting by making your politics public in any way. The secret ballot is a-OK for most of us, but the caucus? That’s prickly.
I wish I would’ve been at your caucus location, Dylan. I would’ve liked to help you put a stop to that crazy caucusing Kucinich crew.
Ye gods. Makes me glad I chickened out at the last minute & went to a friend’s to play Settlers of Catan & watch Venture Brothers instead.
"Makes me glad I chickened out at the last minute & went to a friend’s to play Settlers of Catan & watch Venture Brothers instead."
Ha! Elaine, that has to be the nerdiest comment I’ve seen in a while, I love it!
I had to work Saturday. My company’s going through a sale and I had to work. I worked over a 100 hours that week and 100 hours this past one. I sent in my ballot. I VOTED for Hillary. Apparently my VOTE doesn’t matter one iota though because I was at work on Saturday, the day of the caucus.
It feels horrible, not just disenfranchised, I’ve been msinfranchised. Working women rise up.