Survey: Democrats confident the primaries are being conducted fairly despite Iowa caucus debacle
Despite the chaos surrounding Iowa's delayed caucus results, voters' confidence on whether the Democratic primary is being conducted fairly hasn't changed significantly.
More than half of Democrats believe their party's primary is being conducted fairly, according to new data released by Nationscape, a large-scale survey that aims to conduct 500,000 interviews leading up to the 2020 election.
In mid-January, 43% of all people surveyed said they were very or somewhat confident that the Democratic primary was being conducted fairly, including 57% of Democrats, the Nationscape data shows.The data was compiled Jan.16-22 from interviews with 6,395 people.
In the days directly after Iowa, 42% of Americans and 57% of Democrats continued to express their confidence in the fairness of the Democratic primary. That data was compiled Feb.6-13 from interviews with 6,395 people.
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Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucus results were delayed due to the software app used to record results malfunctioning. The backup phone hotline was also plagued with calls pranksters, reporters and precinct chairs alike, further delaying the process.
In addition, errors and inconsistencies were found in the caucus data released during the week of the caucus. There has since been a partial recanvass after requests from former mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Bernie Sanders, and there will likely be a recount at the request of Sanders' campaign.
Buttigieg and Sanders were the top two candidates for Iowa's state delegate equivalents.
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Preliminary results from the caucus did not come in until nearly 24 hours after the caucuses began in the evening of Feb. 3. Now more than two weeks later, the Associated Press has not called a winner in the Iowa race. Candidates have since competed in New Hampshire and are now moving on to the rest of the early voting states and into Super Tuesday.
As a result of the botched caucus, a number of Democrats, including some former and current presidential candidates, have called into question whether Iowa should hold the first-in-the-nation primary contest.
According to the Nationscape survey, among those who said they were not too or not at all confident that the Democratic primary was being conducted fairly, a similar percentage said that the process is not biased towards any particular before and after the caucus.
In mid-January, 33% of Democrats said the primary was not biased toward any candidate. That number was 37% when Democrats were asked the same question in the days after the Iowa caucus.
The data from January and February have a margin of error adjusted for design effect of +/- 2.1 percentage points.
Nationscape is a survey conducted by the Democracy Fund, a bipartisan foundation that aims to improve the Democratic process, and researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Iowa caucuses: Survey shows majority of Democrats confident in fair primary
