5 takeaways from the Nevada Democratic caucuses

1Nevada loves Bernie Sanders: It’s not just his barnstorming of the state. It’s not just his packed rallies and passionately devoted fans. It’s his message: health care for everybody, free public college and university for everybody, lower prescription drug costs for everybody and fixing the growing gap between rich and poor.

Nevada seems to gravitate to the populists, the politicians spurned by the mainstream. Republican ex-Congressman Ron Paul has a passionate following in Nevada, finishing second in the 2008 caucus and third in 2012. (Paul’s followers took over the party in 2012, and some rebel delegates voted for him instead of nominee Mitt Romney in 2012.)

Sanders seems to inspire that same kind of devotion. He split the state almost evenly with Clinton in 2016, and his appeal seems to have only grown since then. Sanders’ political organization in the state and campaign staffing are excellent as well.

2Caucuses are cumbersome: Unlike government-run primary elections, caucuses are party-run affairs that require plenty of organization, training and volunteer help. Delays, mistakes and problems are almost inevitable. Not only that, but they also require far more effort on the part of voters, who have to show up at a caucus site and go through a few hours of politicking.

This time around, Nevada’s Democratic Party offered early voting in an effort to make voting easier and get more people involved. There were long lines at early voting sites in Clark County. All told, 75,000 people participated in early voting.

But early voting may have been so popular because voters wanted to avoid caucus-day voting, which involves physically standing with like-minded neighbors to support your candidate of choice, physical counts of voter groups, and then — for supporters of candidates who didn’t reach a minimum threshold of 15 percent support in their precinct — realigning behind another candidate.

3Nobody likes caucuses (except the Democratic Party): Nevada’s Democratic voters would prefer a primary election instead of caucuses, according to The Nevada Poll™ conducted by the Review-Journal and AARP Nevada. Fully 67 percent of voters said they’d prefer a primary, with just 23 percent supporting caucuses.

But the state Democratic Party is an exception to this rule. During the first caucuses in 2008, the party was able to register 30,000 voters on a single day (there was no early voting that year). In part, that success was due to the excitement generated by then-Sen. Barack Obama’s candidacy and the epic battle between him and then-Sen. Hillary Clinton.

This year, the party says it registered 10,000 new Democrats during the four days of early voting, a party-building feat that would be much more difficult without the caucuses.

Then again, at least a couple of those new Democratic Party members may be Republicans in disguise!

4These may be Nevada’s last caucuses: Voters don’t want them, and political experts say this year is it when it comes to hosting caucuses instead of a primary election.

Gov. Steve Sisolak told the Reno Gazette Journal on Monday that he thinks the Legislature will look at switching from the caucus system to primary elections.

“The lines are way too long. Several people have contacted me. I think a lot of people want to look at it,” the governor told the newspaper. (Sisolak later walked back his remarks, telling a reporter on Friday, “(I’ll) leave that up to the Legislature. They come up with a lot of ideas, so I wouldn’t be surprised.”)

An effort to switch to a primary election in 2015 failed in the closing days of the legislative session.

5Nevada may be moving up: With Iowa’s problems in recent years, Nevada may get an even earlier date on the nominating calendar. The state’s diverse demographics make it a better bellwether than Iowa or New Hampshire, and its strong immigrant and union population are core parts of the Democratic constituency, too.

“I’m convinced that Nevada’s going to move up significantly,” former U.S. Sen. Harry Reid told The New York Times last week.

Contact Steve Sebelius at SSebelius@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0253. Follow @SteveSebelius on Twitter.