Why Is the Iowa Caucus First?

You're listening to Comedy Central.

Tonight's debate was in Iowa because in just three weeks they will cost the first votes in the Democratic primary, just like they do in every presidential election. And if you want to know what it feels like to be number one, our own Jordan Klepper went on the road to find out.

Last weekend, I went to beautiful Balmy, Iowa to see how they feel about kicking off primary season.

I cannot be more excited to be in the center of the universe right now, right here.

Baby, let's get this caucuss going boom.

It's caucuss tibby.

Caucus time.

Baby. The excitement for the Iowa caucus is like no other primary event. And that's for one reas access to the candidates.

Andrew Yan came to my house.

He was in my front yard.

He shook my babies and kissed my hands.

He was awesome be taking.

It.

They were robots, bien.

I got a Christmas card from him and Jill All I got one from Palm Styr too.

Oh, yelling from him, Well, you just don't count well, styref.

I mean I met Corey Booker last year spring Breaking.

You looked up with Booker over Spring Bay.

And I had the selfie video ingrets.

It seems like any jackass can get up close and personal with the candidates.

You have. You enjoyed your time here in Idaho.

Oh maybe you're new at this, but we are in Iowa.

What did I say?

You said, I've been in a lot of places. I was still learning and had one very important question.

Why is Iowa first?

Oh? God, I don't know.

We're not really sure why, and I think a lot of other people are thinking the same thing.

But just because we always have been?

Maybeer is that a good enough reason?

Not really?

Why do you guys get to be.

First because it's written into our constitution.

It's like, oh, I said it right, yes exactly. Just because you called shotgun on democracy doesn't mean you get to sit up front it.

Guess what it is?

What it is? Mat all right?

I needed some real Iowa background and a beer, so I sat down with local columnists Liz Lenz. How did Iowa become first?

It happened in nineteen seventy two because of paperwork, and then in nineteen seventy six Jimmy Carter came in won the caucuses and showed that if you came to Iowa, you could grab the attention of the nation. So it was basically thanks to Jimmy Carter that Iowa became a thing.

Yeah, so those poor little peanut farmers one day dreamed of being president.

They were like, now there's a place I can go, a place where there are farmers, but they're different than me. They farm corn.

Maybe I can do right, So you guys do soy as well.

Yeah, I mean it's very very.

It's very diverse here. That's what I've noticed.

It's actually not diverse.

And that's the problem. What's the problem with the caucuses.

We're not diverse.

In fact, Iowa is over ninety percent white. So Julean Castro, Mike Bloomberg and even the famously hostile USA Today say that Iowa doesn't reflect the country's demographics. Just look at these white aides who qualified for tonight's debates. I'm sure the rational folks of Iowa would agree. There's been some criticism of Iowa going first in the nation.

I think they're crazy. You understand that there's a diversity issue, right, but we're not giving up first place just so you know, that's American, isn't it? Though?

You know, Iowa isn't known for its diversity, but I really contend that Iowa is very diverse.

I like to think that Iowa has a good We represent the whole country where melting pops.

It's it's it's ninety percent white, right, but it's but the ten.

Percent that's not white is one hundred percent not white.

It is.

Iowa isn't the most diverse place.

This parle could be a minority right in the whole ocean.

Absolutely, rural could be a minority. That's that real hot Iowa.

Take You're gonna hear people say we're all white.

We're all I would never say that.

Well you probably do.

You just didn't tell me because you're being respectful.

Okay, I did, but it was two minutes ago. I've forgotten.

We try to be diverse.

And actually Perry, Iowa like has a huge Hispanic Latino population, like where we are now.

You can see it in there, right Yeah, well.

Well not in certainly, but they not in the maybe not.

The people in theory. It's definitely in theory.

Yes, in practicality of reality no, right, but theoretically one hundred percent it's almost in frankly fifty to fifty. Yeah, Okay, Look, Iowa is actually really engaged, and they take this seriously, but they've had the opportunity of being first for over forty years, and the rational people to all ask one more time. Wouldn't our country benefit from kicking off primary season with the state that's a bit.

More repre Okay, please don't go there with me.

I'm not even you don't want to go there?

I will.

I'll go there with you.

You want to go there there with me?

If you are, if you, if you are a state that has civil discourse and is compassionate and open minded, obviously, we are diverse in our heart and by nature. And I'm not doing that because I'm all white privilege. I'm saying that because it's real well.

But diverse in your heart. It's kind of a white privilegy thing. It is a white.

Privileging thing too. But we think when we discussed and we say, well we'reen is that best for all of us?

I would say the civil discourse here in Idaho is alive and well, okay, except we are in Iowa. Did I keep doing that?

Yeah?

Yeah, what did I say? Idaho, Idaho?

And we are in Idah, Iowa Iowa, Iowa whatever. At least I'm not in Ohio.

When it comes to presidential elections, nobody votes to Iowa votes. Iowa's have earned this position.

Or not.

Our Madrigal reports.

With the twenty sixteen presidential election a little more than a year away, candidates are getting their Iowa on, showing they're ready to be president by riding tractors, judging butter sculptures, and joining incredibly non threatening motorcycle gangs. Yet some think the state, with point ninety seven percent of our population shouldn't get this much attention.

Iowa should not be the first state to vote. Iowa's unrepresentative of the US. It has fewer minorities. It has a highly agricultural base, where we are largely in urban and suburban country.

Iowa's concerns represent the concerns of normal Americans. What do I do with all this korn? I'm bored? Where can I deep fry this? Oh my god, I'm having chest pains.

Most Americans don't wake up in the morning and worry about whether or not they're going to deep fry the corn. Stop you right there.

I am a half Mexican man from an urban area and that's all I'm thinking about.

So hell, you're wrong.

It's Iowan's down home nohow that makes them the right choice.

Let me tell you something about the people in Iowa. They have homespun wisdom, small town values.

To say they have a monopoly on the wisdom or a monopoly on small town values is to disregard the other three hundred million people in the United States.

What.

I've had enough of your Iowa bashing for one day.

I'm going to Iowa right now.

Oh why wah, Oh, that's all the corn Iowa.

There isn't a group of people in America more qualified to pick the next leader of the free world than Iowan's. Just ask Iowan, Stephen Schmidt.

It's an honor, it's a it's a job. It's kind of a responsibility to be first in selecting, or at least in voting for who we prefer for president.

You're being very nonchalant.

Come on, don't believe me.

You guys like being kingmakers.

Don't yet. We like being first because it's good for the economy.

Oh look, there's Ted Cruz, Hillary Rick Santorum's here.

It's interesting to see for a political scientists how people change their message.

You love it, don't you?

Huh?

I do love it.

I headed out to meet the non Jewish chosen Ones to see their in depth selection process up close.

Oh, queens of the caucus, keep us off the corn. Who will win the Democratic nomination for president in the next selection?

Hillary?

Hillary?

I haven't seen the face all hope for.

I don't know how long it's been since Hillary has walked down on all people who are on the ground where the rest of us are.

Ma'am, your convictions are as deep as everything on this table is fried.

Good day.

I was the perfect training ground to prepare our presidents for the world stage.

How does a candidate react to the largest hog in the world, which is always at the state fair?

Sure?

And how they react to the hog is possibly a reflection on how they're going to lead our armed forces, or.

How they might react to meeting unusual international leaders that give them surprises.

Yes, which of course is an extremely likely scenario.

There should be some rotation of the states and the delegate selection process. Rotation would make a significant difference so that every state has an opportunity.

So what states would you have us rotate too?

Well, you know, you might want to start in New York and at art to Dewey right, Alabama, then not chewy enough New Mexico, New Mexico wreck.

Really, I mean, I'm not going to have our candidates parade themselves around in front of some burnout hippieis in Santa Fe.

And besides, although Iowa almost never picks candidates who win, what's the harm.

Because Iowa was first in the nation. There are certain issues that are highlighted that may not have national importance. Take ethanol for instance.

Of course, wonderful ethanol. We're sure taxpayers pay six billion a year for a fuel source that environmentalists say is worse than gasoline. But they're wrong because Iowa says they're wrong.

Right, the ethanol lobby has a lot of power and a lot of money. Ethanol should not have such a significant importance in the issues facing our presidential campaigns.

But I'm talking about I'm crazy. Hey, you know, Rick, don't get us an a lot of trouble over this interview. It's not worth it. I'm coming in here talking smack about ethanols.

Here, I guess bof killed, but not before I enjoy my time in Iowa.

As we were saying, the Iowa.

Caulcast is. Tonight's both Democratic and Republican races are down to the wire. So this week presidential candidates went all around the states to make their final appeal to voters. Well except for Donald Trump. He just flew over the voters.

That's a real video, that's what he did. And those people lost their shit.

That's all it takes to get Trump's supports excited. In my opinion, if he's doing a fly by, at least do it in a spectacular way. You don't do it like Denzel would do it. You know, it would have been so great if he had just kept going and then like crashed into a school next door, and then Trump comes out from behind everybody. He's like it was a decoy plane, and everyone'll be like, yay, but wait the school whatever.

Yay.

So full caucus results will be in tomorrow, and here with a more background on what we'll be seeing is Runny Chang. Everybody seta So everyone in America right now is obsessed with Iowa.

All right, It's like the Kim Kardashian of states. So I looked into it, and it turns out Iowa is just like a Kardashian. There is no real reason for the obsession. It's just how things are for months now, It's been twenty four hours of.

This, the all important Iowa caucuses.

Iowa is very important.

All eyes are on the Hawkeye state Iowa.

Iowa, Iowa, Iowa, and the twenty sixteen candidates have been kissing Iowa's ass so hard at so many campaign stops that by now they've deep throated every freight food on a stick in existence, which isn't just disgusting, it's weird because.

Iowa is tiny.

I mean, he's got six times more pigs than people. Iowa's basically a giant farm that's ninety percent white people, and most of them are friendly old baseball ghost come on, pash. So why are these politicians risking hot attacks and diarrhea to panda to these people? Maybe it's because the Iowa Caucus is the single event where Democrats and Republicans actually choose their final presidential nominees. No, that's boring, although it would makes sense withf all the attention Iowa gets. But no,

Actually go out and vote.

Yeah, remember voting like the whole reason for all this in the first place. So Iowa is special because it votes first, and it's first for a good reason. Studies show that people in Iowa have better judgment than average Americans due to Iowan's brains being sixty percent larger. I made that up too. Iowa goes first because it's something they started doing in the early nineteen seventies. For a perspective,

It's who loses.

Someone can come in third and still end up president, but lower than that and you pretty much have to go back home to your job as some loser senator or governor. So in short, Trevor, the Iowa kawkuff is like an early round of Survivor, all right, except instead of being on a tropical island with attractive people, it's in a frozen wasteland with these guys.

Ronnie, you're not in Iowa anymore. You don't have to eat that.

I can't stop eating fried butter.

Oh man, thank you, Ronnie. You need to get that checked out, Ronnie. Check everyone stop eating.

We'll be right back. Stop eating, Ronnie.

Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by searching The Daily Show wherever you.

Get your podcasts.

Watch The Daily Show week nights at eleven ten Central on Comedy Central and stream full episodes anytime on Fairmount Plus.

This has been a Comedy Central podcast