2020 Iowa Democratic caucuses

The 2020 Iowa Democratic caucuses were the first votes to decide the nominee in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries for the 2020 United States presidential election, taking place on 3 February 2020. The winner was Pete Buttigieg, which made him the first openly gay person to win a presidential contest. The Iowa caucuses are closed caucuses, only allowing for people who are registered  in the Democratic Party to vote. Iowa gives 49 delegates to the 2020 Democratic National Convention, of which 41 are pledged delegates given to candidates based on the results of the caucuses.

After a three day delay in reporting the votes, the Iowa Democratic Party announced that Buttigieg had been awarded two more delegates than Sanders, but Sanders had won the popular vote in the state. Most of the media outlets would say that Buttigieg would be the winner, but the Associated Press declined to declare who would be the winner until all recount voting processes had been finished. The official result and calculation of pledged delegates was delayed again by a further six days after the election as they needed to correct the results from 3.1% (55) of the precincts. Both Buttigieg and Sanders then requested a recanvass for 8.1% of the official results, which narrowed Buttigieg's lead over Sanders to 0.08 state delegate equivalents.

The caucuses would be controversial because of the delays in the reporting of the results. Much of the delay was as a result of the mobile application used to report voting totals. More controversy started because of the errors and continued changing in the calculation and reporting of the state delegate equivalents. The Iowa Democratic Party chair would resign on the 12 February 2020 because of the criticism of the reporting.

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Category:United States presidential primary elections
Category:Controversies in the United States
Category:2020 in Iowa
Category:2020 United States presidential election