geeky
The Republicans
The Republican Party of Iowa's bylaws require that when more than one candidate is nominated at the Republican National Convention, all of Iowa's delegates are bound to vote "proportionally in accordance with the outcome of the Iowa Caucuses" on the first ballot at the national nominating convention, even if the candidate has withdrawn from the race. The actual ballot was a blank piece of paper, but the candidates vying for votes were:
Jeb Bush
Ben Carson
Chris Christie
Ted Cruz
Carly Fiorina
Jim Gilmore
Mike Huckabee
John Kasich
Marco Rubio
Rand Paul
Rick Santorum
Donald Trump
Just over 10 weeks earlier, on November 20, 2015, a forum was held in Des Moines, known as the Presidential Family Forum. It was held in the Community Choice Credit Union Convention Center in Des Moines. Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, and Rick Santorum attended the forum hosted by evangelical Christian advocacy group The Family Leader. It was hosted by politician and political activist Bob Vander Plaats and moderated by political consultant and pollster Frank Luntz. Vander Plaats later endorsed Marco Rubio on December 10th.
Four days before the contest, on January 28, 2016 the seventh debate (and the second debate to air on Fox News) was held in Des Moines. The moderators were Bret Baier, Megyn Kelly, and Chris Wallace. This was the last debate before actual voting began inthe Iowa caucuses. Donald Trump refused to attend the debate due to a personal conflict with Fox News. Instead he held an event at Drake University, to benefit veterans. At first it was not announced which groups would receive money. The event raised $6 million, with proceeds going to the Trump Foundation, who in turn promised to divide the proceeds among 22 veterans organizations.
During the debate, Ted Cruz made fun of Trump's absence, stating: "Let me say that I'm a maniac and everyone on this stage is stupid fat and ugly, and Ben, you're a terrible surgeon. Now that we've got the Donald Trump portion out of the way, I want to thank everyone here for showing the men and women of Iowa the respect to show up and make the case to the people of this state why each of us would make the best commander in chief."
In polls leading up to the caucus, Cruz had been leading by approximately 4%. When the caucuses were complete, Cruz received 51,666 votes (27.64%). This would ultimately result in 8 delegates. Others receiving delegates were Trump (45,429 votes, 24.3%, 7 delegates), Rubio (43,228 votes, 23.12%, 7 delegates), Ben Carson (17,394 votes, 9.3%, 3 delegates), Rand Paul (8,481 votes, 4.54%, 1 delegate), Jeb Bush (5,238 votes, 2.8%, 1 delegate) Carly Fiorina (3,485 votes, 1.86%, 1 delegate) John Kasich (3,474 votes, 1.86%, 1 delegate) and Mike Huckabee (3,345 votes, 1.79%, 1 delegate). Other candidates who received votes but no delegates were Chris Christie (3,284 votes, 1.76%) and Rick Santorum (1,779 votes, 0.95%). A further 129 votes were cast for others. In total, 186,932 votes were cast.
Controversy arose on the night of the vote as Ben Carson accused Ted Cruz's campaign of winning the caucuses using dishonest tactics. Carson alleged that Cruz's campaign falsely told caucus-goers that Carson had dropped out in order to get them to switch their votes to Cruz. In a tweet Trump said: "Ted Cruz didn't win Iowa, he stole it." Trump accused Cruz of other lies, including telling voters that Trump was in favor of ObamaCare. Trump later tweeted "Based on the fraud committed by Senator Ted Cruz, either a new election should take place or Cruz results nullified." In response, Cruz accused Trump of having a "Trumper tantrum". The animosity between the two candidates would continue as the race progressed.
The Democrats
By the time of the Iowa Caucuses, three candidates for the Democratic Party nomination had withdrew from the race: Jim Webb on October 20, 2015, Lincoln Chafee on October 23, 2015, and Lawrence Lessig on November 2, 2015. Another candidate, Martin O'Malley, would drop out following the results of the Iowa Caucuses.
For the Democrats, there was no actual ballot in Iowa. Instead, a unique form of debate was used in which groups met to choose delegates to county conventions. The Iowa Democratic Party does not release vote counts or the numbers of these delegates. They release the estimated amount of state delegates supporting each candidate. The county conventions select delegates to district and state conventions, which in turn select the delegates to the Democratic National Convention. The delegates at the county, district and state conventions are not pledged and are allowed to change their preference, meaning that the final result of the state delegates could be different from what was estimated at the Iowa precinct caucuses.
29 districts delegates are split up between the 4 congressional districts. The First and Second Congressional Districts received 8 district delegates, the Third Congressional District received 7 and the Forth Congressional District received 6. These district delegates are elected at the District conventions based on the result in their Congressional District.
At the State Convention, the 15 state-wide pledged delegates are elected based on the state-wide results. 9 of these delegates were At-Large and 6 were Party Leaders and Elected Officials. The Iowa delegation also includes 8 superdelegates who are not pledged based on the result of the caucus process, which include 1 U.S. Representative and 7 Democratic National Committee members.
On November 14, 2015, the Democratic Party held a second presidential debate at the Sheslow Auditorium at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, hosted by CBS News Political Director John Dickerson. The debate aired on CBS News and was also broadcast by KCCI and The Des Moines Register. Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Martin O'Malley participated. The day before the debate, November 13, was the day of the November 2015 Paris attacks. In light of this, CBS decided that the debate would focus on foreign policy and terrorism. A moment of silence was held at the beginning of the debate in memory of the victims. On January 11, 2016 the "Black and Brown" forum was held at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, a forum which focused on minority issues.
Poll numbers leading up to the debate were close, but most had Clinton leading by between 3 to 7 points over Sanders. But the final results were much closer than that. Hillary Clinton received 49.84% in the caucuses while Sanders received 49.59%. The resulted in 23 pledged and 7 unpledged delegates for Clinton (for a total of 30) and 21 pledged delegates for Sanders.
The Democratic caucuses were criticized for poor organization, including difficulty identifying volunteers. Complaints about the process were lodged by both the Sanders and Clinton campaigns. Clinton won by the thinnest margin in the history of Iowa caucuses.
Sanders' campaign "launched" a review of the results of the caucuses. In an editorial entitled "Something Smells in the Democratic Party", The Des Moines Register called for an audit of the results. The editorial said: "What happened Monday night at the Democratic caucuses was a debacle, period...Too many accounts have arisen of inconsistent counts, untrained and overwhelmed volunteers, confused voters, cramped precinct locations, a lack of voter registration forms and other problems. Too many of us, including members of the Register editorial board who were observing caucuses, saw opportunities for error amid Monday night’s chaos."
From Iowa, the candidates headed to New Hampshire, a state that had been the burial ground of many a previous candidacy.