In the wild final days of the billion-dollar 2020 primary campaign in Iowa, there is a battle being waged for the future of the Democratic Party — and former Secretary of State John Kerry’s expletive-laden tweet is evidence that establishment insiders are increasingly nervous.
By day’s end, tens of thousands of Democrats will have participated in the famed Iowa caucuses, the premiere of more than 50 contests that will unfold over the next five months.
The caucuses will render the first verdict on who among dozens of candidates is best positioned to take on President Donald Trump, whom Democratic voters are desperate to beat this fall.
Leading in the polls heading towards the final vote is Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-V.T., a far-left Democratic Socialist that has ruffled the feathers of party insiders for more than three decades.
Kerry is reportedly so nervous about the prospect of a Sanders victory, he’s been overheard discussing entering the race himself.
NBC News reported Sunday that Kerry was overheard inside the Renaissance Savery Hotel in Des Moines, Iowa discussing the “possibility of Bernie Sanders taking down the Democratic Party — down whole.”
According to the report, Kerry — who is in Iowa as a surrogate for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden — also reportedly remarked that “maybe I’m f***ing deluding myself here,” but now that Democratic donors “have the reality of Bernie” to deal with, perhaps he’ll enter the race.
Kerry denied the conversation in an expletive-laden tweet that was quickly deleted and replaced with a clean version.
Warning: This contains inappropriate language.
John Kerry just fucking deleted a message and reposted a cleaner version pic.twitter.com/G3fJJ8qfNN
— Mathieu von Rohr (@mathieuvonrohr) February 2, 2020
The controversial tweet only adds to the cloud of uncertainty and deepening intraparty resentment that hangs over Monday’s election in Iowa. After a multi-year buildup, voters will finally begin to reveal who and what Democrats stand for in this tumultuous era.
Polls suggest that Sanders has a lead, but any of the top four candidates — Sanders, Biden, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg — could score victory in Iowa’s unpredictable and quirky caucus system as organizers prepare for record turnout. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., who represents neighboring Minnesota, is also claiming momentum, while outsider candidates such as entrepreneur Andrew Yang, billionaire activist Tom Steyer and Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard could be factors.
Iowa offers just a tiny percentage of the delegates needed to win the nomination but plays an outsize role in culling primary fields. A poor showing in Iowa could cause a front-runner’s fundraising to slow and support in later states to dwindle, while a strong result can give a candidate much needed momentum that propels him or her to the nomination.
The past several Democrats who won the Iowa caucuses went on to clinch the party’s nomination.
The 2020 fight has played out over myriad distractions, particularly congressional Democrats’ push to impeach Trump, which has often overshadowed the primary and effectively pinned several leading candidates to Washington at the pinnacle of the early campaign season. Even on caucus day, Sanders, Warren and Klobuchar were expected to spend several hours on Capitol Hill for impeachment-related business.
Meanwhile, New York’s ultra-billionaire former Mayor, Mike Bloomberg, is running a parallel campaign that ignores Iowa as he prepares to pounce on any perceived weaknesses in the field come March.
The amalgam of oddities, including new rules for reporting the already complicated caucus results, is building toward what could be a murky Iowa finale before the race pivots quickly to New Hampshire, which votes just eight days later.
With uncertainty comes opportunity for campaigns desperate for momentum. The expectations game was raging in the hours before voters began gathering at high school gyms and community centers in more than 1,600 caucus sites across the state.
Biden’s team sought to downplay the importance of Iowa’s kick-off contest the day before voting began amid persistent signs that the 77-year-old lifelong politician was struggling to raise money or generate excitement on the ground.
Biden senior adviser Symone Sanders said the campaign viewed Iowa “as the beginning, not the end,” of the primary process.
“It would be a gross mistake on the part of reporters, voters or anyone else to view whatever happens on Monday — we think it’s going to be close — but view whatever happens as the end and not give credence and space for New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina,” she said of the three states up next on the primary calendar.
The tone was noticeably more upbeat for Bernie Sanders’ campaign, which has repeatedly predicted victory and believes he’s running even stronger in New Hampshire. That’s despite increasingly vocal concerns from establishment-minded Democrats who fear the self-described democratic socialist would struggle against Trump and make it more difficult for Democrats to win other elections this fall.
In a fundraising message, Sanders campaign manager Faiz Shakir warned supporters to expect “an absolutely huge barrage of attacks from the political establishment” after Monday’s results are announced, implying again that Sanders would finish on top.
“We don’t know how personal the attacks will be. We don’t know how many millions will be spent. And we certainly won’t know who’s funding them until well after the damage is done,” he said. “But we know they’ll come. Because they want to stop Bernie. They want to stop our movement.”
The heated rhetoric underscores a dangerous rift between Sanders’ passionate supporters and other factions of Democrats who have clashed in recent days.
Joe Trippi, campaign manager for 2004 presidential candidate Howard Dean, suggested that Sanders may have peaked too soon, forcing some voters to seek a less controversial standard bearer.
“There are a lot of reasons this thing moves hard at the end,” Trippi predicted. “I think Bernie going into the lead is really kind of the disruptive thing that’s going to make a lot of people look at who they are for.”
New party rules may only fracture the party more. It’s possible there is no official winner come Tuesday morning.
For the first time, the Iowa Democratic Party will report three sets of results at the end of the night: tallies of the “first alignment” of caucus-goers, their “final alignment” and the total number of state delegate equivalents each candidate receives.
There is no guarantee that all three will show the same winner, which could further divide the party.
Though most of the attention will be on Democrats, Republicans will also hold caucuses on Monday. With no serious challenger and plenty of money to burn, Trump’s reelection team hopes to use voting in early states as a test run for its organizing prowess and to boost excitement for the president’s fall campaign. Trump held a rally in Iowa last week and dispatched surrogates to the state ahead of Monday’s vote.
The Associated Press contributed to this article