How the long road to Super Tuesday could shift the dynamics of the 2024 primary race

The full 2024 Republican presidential primary schedule has finally come together, stretching from mid-January to early June. And at least in terms of calendar days, it looks like the early part of the race is going to be an unusual slog.

In 2020, Democrats took 27 days to complete the early part of their primary calendar. That period covered the disastrously messy Iowa caucuses and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders's wins in New Hampshire and Nevada, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden's victory in South Carolina that led many Democrats to consolidate behind him. Following that South Carolina win, Biden had an impressive Super Tuesday showing and went on to capture the Democratic nomination.

This time around, Republicans are going to take a much longer time to get through the early contests. Overall, 41 days will pass from Iowa's Jan. 15 caucuses to the completion of South Carolina's primary on Feb. 24 — the longest it's taken a party to go from Iowa to Nevada or South Carolina (whichever voted last) since Nevada became an early-voting state in 2008. This early part of the GOP schedule will also feature some unusually long breaks between contests. Just how the lengthy and halting array of early races will affect the GOP contest remains to be seen, though. Candidates struggling to fundraise could find it even more challenging to survive until the meatier part of the calendar, but they could also have more time for voter preferences to shift following impressive — or underwhelming — early results. The extra days could also provide more space for former President Donald Trump's opponents to figure out how to best coordinate against him.

An unusually long early window

In recent years, Democrats and Republicans have usually taken three to four weeks to play out the early part of presidential primaries. On occasion, they've taken a little longer (Republicans took 33 days to go from Iowa through Nevada in 2012) or been a bit quicker (the GOP covered Iowa through Nevada and South Carolina in just 17 days in 2008). But in 2024, Republicans will take almost six weeks to get to their last early primary contest in South Carolina, which has often played the role of kingmaker in GOP presidential primaries and arguably wore that mantle for Democrats four years ago.

To be clear, these comparisons aren't cut and dry, as states and parties sometimes move dates around within the early primary calendar. For example, contests like Florida's big primary in 2012 or the U.S. Virgin Islands's less noteworthy territorial caucuses in 2024 pushed their way into the early window in an attempt to garner greater influence. But if you measure each primary from the time Iowa votes to Super Tuesday — the most crowded election date each cycle, which usually comes right after these early contests — the story is similar. In 2024, Republicans will take 51 days to cover that period, including the actual Super Tuesday date of March 5. This is notably longer than the 30 to 34 days it took each party to cover the same territory in the 2008, 2016 and 2020 cycles. The only exception is the 2012 GOP race, which took 64 days because more primaries and caucuses occurred between the early-state contests and Super Tuesday, which came later that year and had fewer races than in other years.

The 2024 GOP calendar starts off typically enough. Iowa and New Hampshire are eight days apart just like in 2016 and 2020 (Iowa's caucuses are usually on a Monday and New Hampshire's primary a Tuesday). But from the Granite State's Jan. 23 contest, the GOP will have a 16-day break until the Nevada caucuses on Feb. 8 (the U.S. Virgin Islands also vote that day), and then another 16-day gap before South Carolina's primary on Feb. 24. In recent cycles, the length of time between post-New Hampshire contests usually ranged from seven to 11 days.

Could these lengthier breaks alter the trajectory of the Republican nomination contest? "It's like anything else: It may matter a great deal, it may not matter at all," said Josh Putnam, a political scientist who studies the presidential nomination process, with a special focus on the primary calendar. On the one hand, if Trump comfortably wins Iowa and New Hampshire, Putnam felt these longer gaps would probably not matter much. However, an upset defeat over Trump in one or both of those states — or perhaps an especially close Trump win — could provide greater impetus for Trump's opponents to use that extra time to coordinate against him and clear the field to unify around a single opposition candidate.

The longer timeframe in 2024 could amplify many standard aspects of the early presidential primary season. In the sequential process of presidential primaries — in which one or more states vote, some days pass, then another vote happens — voters respond to the latest election result at least to some extent. Long gaps will leave more time for the positive or negative media feedback loop to revolve, and for candidates to potentially gain or lose support based on a strong or weak early result, before a subsequent contest alters the campaign narrative. Deep-pocketed megadonors, outside groups and party leaders will have ample time to judge the state of the race and potentially switch their support. And a candidate on a downward trajectory could also have a harder time surviving financially over the longer gaps between contests.

Past examples of shifts in endorsements, financial support and voter support abound. Democrats' consolidation behind Biden in 2020 looms large, as they managed to do that within two days of his Feb. 29 victory in South Carolina ahead of the March 3 Super Tuesday contests. Biden went on to effectively clinch the race in the March 17 primaries. In contrast, the 2016 Republican race took longer to play out. That year, big Trump victories on March 15 and March 22 prompted anti-Trump Republicans to push money and support over the next two weeks toward Texas Sen. Ted Cruz ahead of the next big race in Wisconsin on April 5. Cruz won in Wisconsin, which extended the GOP nomination contest until Indiana's primary in early May, when Trump put the race away. Republicans looking to oppose Trump this time around may need to circle the wagons sooner to have any hope of challenging him, but they'll have longer stretches of time during the earliest part of the calendar to deliberate over how to best proceed.

How the early calendar could play out

Putnam laid out some scenarios in which the longer gaps between races could affect the nomination battle. One that especially stuck out to him was a situation in which former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley managed to edge out Trump in New Hampshire after Trump won Iowa. Haley has run strongest in New Hampshire, where she's in a clear — if distant — second place behind Trump in the polls. If she were to win there, the extra time could present more opportunity for donors and party leaders to pressure Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to drop out and position Haley as Trump's main opponent. This scenario would effectively postpone a high-stakes Trump-Haley clash until the Feb. 24 contest in South Carolina, because Haley didn't file for the Feb. 8 Nevada caucuses (more on that in a moment). Such circumstances would also make South Carolina "a heck of a lot bigger," said Putnam — once again positioning Haley's home state as a Republican kingmaker. With a month between New Hampshire and South Carolina, there would be a huge amount of time for anticipation to build and for the campaigns to invest more time and money in the Palmetto State.

Alternatively, DeSantis could position himself as the main alternative to Trump by doing well in — or even winning — Iowa. There's little question that DeSantis has gone all-in on Iowa, where he recently completed the "full Grassley" — a reference to longtime Sen. Chuck Grassley — by visiting all 99 of the state's counties. DeSantis also has Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds's endorsement. Should DeSantis get a good result in Iowa, and Trump then win New Hampshire — where DeSantis is far weaker — the nearly two weeks ahead of the Nevada caucus would leave time for pressure to mount on Haley — and any other remaining candidates — to get out of the race. This scenario could then raise the stakes of Nevada's caucuses on Feb. 8, potentially making it the first contest where Trump and DeSantis face off as the only active candidates on the ballot.

While these differing scenarios could affect Nevada's importance, controversy over the caucuses may have already put a dent in the Silver State's clout. "There may be scenarios where Nevada doesn't matter because of this situation around the massaging of the rules, if we want to call it that, by the Republican Party there," observed Putnam. Critics have accused the Nevada GOP of maneuvering to help Trump easily win the Silver State. Led by Michael McDonald, a Trump ally, the Nevada GOP opted to use caucuses on Feb. 8 rather than the Feb. 6 state-run primary to allocate national convention delegates. As a result, the electorate determining GOP delegates will likely be smaller and more conservative than the primary electorate, likely to Trump's benefit. The Nevada GOP also barred candidates from participating in the caucus if they filed for the primary, and it restricted super PAC involvement in the caucus. The latter restriction may have most affected DeSantis, whose main super PAC has played a large role in his campaign.

Haley is the only notable candidate still running who is on the primary ballot, so she will probably win the "beauty contest" on Feb. 6. Putnam was skeptical that Nevada's primary will matter much to perceptions about the race, but he noted that because of higher primary turnout, Haley could win more votes than the winner of the caucus two days later. She could try to trumpet that result, especially in a scenario where she wins or puts in a strong showing in New Hampshire.

The longer period of time in the early part of the calendar might also give Trump's opposition more time to craft a strategy to keep him under 50 percent — a pivotal figure because that is often the winner-take-all threshold for later contests. For example, if DeSantis won, say, 30 percent in Iowa and Haley garnered around 20 percent, it could signal a situation where, at least for the time being, it's better for those hoping to stop Trump to have both candidates stick around. Given recent head-to-head polling that found Trump far ahead of either DeSantis or Haley, Trump's lead might simply be too commanding if the race quickly becomes a two-person tilt.

For his part, DeSantis is more closely aligned with the Trumpier vision for the GOP, so he likely stands a better chance of picking off Trump supporters in the early going. Tellingly, Morning Consult's most recent national poll found that 41 percent of Trump voters rated DeSantis as their second choice, well ahead of businessman Vivek Ramaswamy (21 percent) and Haley (13 percent). In light of this, DeSantis quickly dropping out would probably help Trump more than Haley, another reason why Trump's opponents — and particularly Haley supporters — might want both DeSantis and Haley to stay in the race for the time being.

Still, even if DeSantis and Haley together can keep Trump under 50 percent, something will have to give later on. "The problem from the non-Trump perspective at that point is someone's still got to figure out a way to win some contests," said Putnam. With a month to go until the Iowa caucuses, it's hard to see DeSantis or Haley doing that. Nevertheless, the fact that Trump isn't polling as well in Iowa and New Hampshire as he is nationally leaves a glimmer of hope that one of his two major rivals can achieve a shocking breakthrough at the start of an extra-long early window of the 2024 campaign.