Florida always seems to be an issue when it comes to the Presidential election, remember the whole vote counting issue that may have accidentally put Bush in office instead of Gore? Well now Florida is throwing a wrench into the entire election schedule! The Florida primary election of 2012 will now be taking place on Jan. 31, 2012, instead of March 6. Although the move was approved by a 7-2 vote, it is is in violation of both Republican National Committee guidelines and the mystic traditions handed down by the ancients that dictated that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina should always hold the first primary elections. Read more after the jump.
@Julie1205
Florida’s Republican presidential primary contest will be held on Jan. 31, 2012, instead of March 6. The scheduling change is likely to ruffle feathers among Republicans in other early primary states.
This week, as 2012 primary calendar watchers trained their gaze on the state of Florida — where the deadline to decide the date of its presidential primary loomed — it was anticipated that Florida would follow Arizona’s lead and move its primary up the calendar, thus placing Florida in conflict with the traditional early primary states and threatening to throw the agreed-to primary schedule into complete chaos. Well, this morning, the zero hour was reached, and Florida has opted to unleash havoc.
According to the reports bubbling up on Twitter, by a 7-2 vote, the Florida GOP has selected Jan. 31 as the date of its primary. This move is in violation of both Republican National Committee guidelines and the mystic traditions handed down by the ancients that dictated that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina shall be forever entitled to be the first four contests in every presidential election cycle.
As Florida’s decision contravenes the RNC’s rules, the committee does have the option of issuing sanctions, such as stripping Florida of a portion of its delegates, denying the delegates perks like hotel space or convention floor passes, or decertifying them entirely.
But Florida’s Republican officials believe they have sniffed out an opportunity of their own — by moving to Jan. 31, they figure that once the aforementioned early primary states make corresponding moves to earlier dates, Florida will be left as the fifth primary of the season. And they’re pretty sure that their primary will be a decisive one. With that opportunity on the horizon, it’s likely they’re looking past the notion that they’ll be punished.
The early states are likely to raise a ruckus over Florida’s decision and the leapfrogging could spark a stampede of election date changes. South Carolina GOP officials, already aggrieved by Arizona’s decision to move its primary to the same day as their own, had previously sought the stripping of the Republican National Convention from Florida. There will be sternly worded statements coming from them shortly, as well as their counterparts in Iowa. New Hampshire has a state law mandating that the state have the first primary in the nation, so New Hampshire’s forthcoming move is a fait accomplished…
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