Pre-primary News Coverage of the 2016 Presidential Race: Trump's Rise, Sanders' Emergence, Clinton's Struggle

Thomas E. Patterson
Additional contact information
Thomas E. Patterson: Harvard University

Working Paper Series from Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government

Abstract: What's the best predictor of which candidate will win the presidential nomination? The winner of the Iowa caucus? The winner of the New Hampshire primary? Actually neither is as good an indicator as the winner of what political scientists call "the invisible primary"--the period before a single primary or caucus vote is cast. A fast start in Iowa or New Hampshire is important. A candidate with a poor showing in both states is in trouble. Voters aren't interested, donors aren't interested, and reporters aren't interested in a candidate who finishes at the back of the pack. Yet, more often than not, the winner in Iowa has lost in New Hampshire. Since 1980, of the twelve open nominating races--those without an incumbent president seeking reelection--only Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004 won both contests. In 1992, the eventual Democratic nominee, Bill Clinton, lost both, though he ran well enough in the two states to be seen as a viable candidate.

Date: 2016-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his and nep-pol
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?Id=1384

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ecl:harjfk:16-023

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Paper Series from Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().