Republican leaders might totally overhaul their primary process

GOP primary process may change for 2020.

(Image credit: STAN HONDA/AFP/GettyImages)

published 25 May 2016

The 2020 Republican primary schedule may look quite a bit different from this year's process if party leadership gets its way with rule changes at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this summer.

Following a chaotic nominating process and looking toward the possibility of the first contested convention in decades, the GOP is beginning to consider a substantial overhaul of the way it picks presidential candidates. In one proposal, Iowa and New Hampshire would retain their early voting status, but each would be paired with a rotating selection of other states from their region — Iowa with Minnesota in 2020, for example, and then with South Dakota in 2024.

Other suggestions are more radical, like abolishing these states' unique position altogether in favor of a fully rotating calendar of primaries which gives voters in all 50 states a chance to be early deciders every few years. One thing seems certain, though: Nevada will likely lose its early position on the primary calendar thanks to alleged "irregularity" and disorder at the state's 2016 caucuses.

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.

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