THE HILL
All eyes are on Tuesday’s first-in-the-nation New Hampshire primary — but President Biden won’t be on the Granite State’s Democratic ballot, even as he runs for a second term in 2024.
His absence comes amid controversy between state and national Democrats over New Hampshire’s place in the party’s presidential nominating calendar, driven by a national Democratic desire to diversify the early voting electorate versus a state law.
Here’s what happened.
DNC puts forth calendar shakeup
As part of a plan to reshuffle the long-standing party lineup, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) set forth a new schedule that booted New Hampshire from its first-place slot, moving up South Carolina’s primary to kick off the voting process.
The Biden-backed shake-up was intended to add more diversity to the party’s calendar, boosting voices of color by putting more demographically diverse states earlier in the timeline. States that vote or caucus first are widely seen as key to the trajectory and momentum of the cycle.
“Too often over the past fifty years, candidates have dropped out or had their candidacies marginalized by the press and pundits because of poor performances in small states early in the process before voters of color cast a vote,” Biden wrote in a 2022 letter to the DNC.
But the plan drew the ire of New Hampshire Democrats.
“The DNC did not give New Hampshire the first-in-the-nation primary and it is not theirs to take away,” New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Raymond Buckley said at the time…
