When the Democrats Come Marching In

A few days before holding a rally in downtown Salt Lake City earlier this month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren acknowledged her curious choice to visit a state that hasn't turned blue in a presidential election since 1964: "Presidential candidates don't always go to Utah because it isn't a battleground state," she wrote in a tweet. "But I'll be there this week because I'm running to be president of the entire United States. Join us and let's do this together."

Warren's visit comes on the heels of former housing secretary and fellow Democrat presidential hopeful Julián Castro's visit in February. "When candidates come here, they tend to come here to want to raise money," Matthew Burbank, an associate professor in the University of Utah's Department of Political Science, says. "There is some big money that can be raised on the Democratic side."

Rep. Patrice Arent, D-Millcreek, is more blunt. "There are many candidates that come, go straight to Park City, and leave," she says. But Castro and Warren's stops were notable because they weren't just mining donors for campaign contributions. Instead, they gave speeches to enthusiastic hordes, and tried to stand out in a crowded field before, most likely, challenging an unpopular incumbent president perennially mired in controversy.

Local votes matter more in 2020 than in years past, thanks to a bill Arent sponsored in the House last legislative session that puts Utah among the 12 states hosting a presidential primary on March 3, 2020, aka Super Tuesday. In 2016, Utah Republicans and Democrats held presidential caucuses before the November general election. Pandemonium ensued. Long lines, ballot shortages and limited parking burdened voters who took time to cast a ballot—in some ways a symbolic gesture since nominees had largely been decided by then. But next March will be different, Arent says, because, "it will give Utah voters more of a voice in who the candidates are for all of the parties."

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