Wednesday, December 7, 2022

2024 primary and caucus dilemma: Des Moines Register editorial demands Iowa Democratic leaders speak up for what white voters want

 
So here's the thing.   Of Iowa's nearly 3.2 million residents, 4.3% (138,000) are Black.  Of this number, 65% of them live in the following 5 counties:  Polk, Linn, Scott, Johnson, Black Hawk.   Iowa has 99 counties.  

Check Retiring Guy's math here, if you'd like.

Iowa’s reputation is on the line and under attack. The tradition of the Iowa caucuses, with both parties going first, allows Iowans to participate in the most basic form of our democracy. 
Neighbors meet with neighbors, in their community, to have open conversations about the future of their political party and our country. 
That is what we are fighting to preserve.


Moreover, rural Iowa's population has been declining for decades.

Only the states of Wyoming, West Virginia, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine have a higher percentage of residents who reported their race as white during the 2020 census. Nationally, the percentage of Americans who identify strictly as white, as opposed to mixed race or another race, is 61.6%.  [emphasis added]  
[snip] 
Two-thirds of Iowa counties lost population between 2010 and 2020. The Iowa county that sustained the greatest loss in population was, by far, Fremont County. Already one of Iowa’s least populated counties, Fremont saw its population drop 11.2% between 2010 and 2020, according to the bureau.
Source:   Wikipedia

Fremont County's population peaked at 18,546 in 1900.  Since then it has declined 64% to 6,605.  its current population corresponds to what it was in the early years of Civil War.

You can graph the population history of dozens of Iowa counties and end up with the same pattern.

What then becomes the point of this exercise, the so-called "full Grassley"?

New York Times, 9/6/2015

Just to get an earful of what older white folks want?  (Iowa's rural counties skew much older than average.  In Fremont County, nearly 25% of its residents are 65+.)

Time to put this anachronism to bed.

Who'll be the first in line?  (12/2/2022)

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