The 2016 Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses were held on Monday February 1 in Iowa, as usual marking the Democratic Party's first nominating contest in their series of presidential primaries ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
The Republican Party held its own Iowa caucuses on the same day.
Despite a close challenge, Hillary Clinton was able to defeat Bernie Sanders in the first-in-the-nation Iowa Caucus by the closest margin in the history of the contest: 49.8% to 49.6% (Clinton collected 700.47 state delegate equivalents to Sanders' 696.92, a difference of one quarter of a percentage point). The victory, which was projected to award her 23 pledged national convention delegates (two more than Sanders), made Clinton the first woman to win the Caucus and marked a clear difference from 2008, where she finished in third place behind Obama and John Edwards. Martin O'Malley suspended his campaign after a disappointing third-place finish with only 0.5% of the state delegate equivalents awarded, leaving Clinton and Sanders the only two major candidates in the race. 171,517 people participated in the 2016 Iowa Democratic caucuses.
Procedure
There was no ballot; instead, a unique form of debate and groupings chose delegates to county conventions supporting Hillary Clinton, Martin O'Malley, and Bernie Sanders. The Iowa Democratic Party did not release vote counts or the numbers of these delegates. Instead, they released the estimated amount of state delegates supporting each candidate. The county conventions selected delegates to district and state conventions, which in turn selected the delegates to the Democratic National Convention. The delegates at the county, district and state conventions were not pledged and were allowed to change their preference, meaning that the final result of the state delegates could have been different from what was estimated at the Iowa precinct caucuses.
Delegates to the 2016 Democratic National Convention were selected at district and state conventions. The First and Second congressional districts received 8 district delegates, the Third received 7 and the Fourth received 6. These district delegates were elected at the District Conventions based on the result in each Congressional District.
At the State Convention, the 15 statewide pledged delegates were elected based on the statewide results. 9 of these delegates were At-Large and 6 were Party Leaders and Elected Officials (PLEO) who were pledged based on the proportion of At-Large delegates supporting candidates. The Iowa delegation also included 8 superdelegates who were not pledged based on the result of the caucus process, which included 1 U.S. Representative and 7 Democratic National Committee members.
Debates and forums
November 2015 debate in Des Moines
On November 14, 2015, the Democratic Party held a second presidential debate at the Sheslow Auditorium at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. Hosted by CBS News Political Director John Dickerson, it aired on CBS News and was also broadcast by KCCI and The Des Moines Register. With the remaining candidates Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Martin O'Malley participating, it was the first debate to be broadcast over nationwide network television, the previous debate having gone over cable.
As the day before the debate, November 13, was the day of the November 2015 Paris attacks, CBS announced that the debate would focus on foreign policy and terrorism. In addition, a moment of silence was held at the beginning of the debate in memory of the victims.
January 2016 forum in Des Moines
On January 11, 2016 the "Black and Brown" forum was held at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. Focusing on minority issues, it aired on Fusion.
Opinion polling
Results
Following a poor result in the caucuses, Martin O'Malley announced he was suspending his campaign.
Controversy
"Organizational issues around the caucus", including difficulty identifying volunteers to "oversee individual precinct caucuses," contributed to a "disorganized process that lent itself to chaos and conspiracy theories" according to The Guardian.