On Friday, Dante Scala joined Boston Public Radio from the WGBH pop-up studio in Manchester, N.H., to weigh in on what Americans can expect out of the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday.
The University of New Hampshire political science professor and author of “Stormy Weather: The New Hampshire Primary and Presidential Politics” said he was confident in the state’s ability to conduct an efficient and accurate vote count, contrasted with the delays and confusion out of Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucus on Monday.
Watch: How Did New Hampshire End Up Hosting The First Primary?
"New Hampshire’s elections are publicly run by the government, whereas [with] Iowa, of course, it’s the Democratic Party running it,” Scala said. “You can really see the differences between an operation like ours that knows how to do things … and the Iowa Democrats, who were faced with a more complicated process, to be fair, but didn’t have the capability to pull it off.”
One 2020 candidate, meanwhile, has chosen to write off the New Hampshire primary altogether. Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is instead opting to focus on later primaries, spending millions of dollars from his sizable fortune on extensive ad campaigns.
Read More: Could The Uncertainty In Iowa Affect New Hampshire Voters?
When asked whether Bloomberg’s election model might prove the New Hampshire primary less significant, Scala conceded that the former mayor was, at least, experimenting with the idea.
“Typically, Iowa and New Hampshire provide this burst of free media, and how can you make up for that? Well, Bloomberg’s certainly trying … in terms of how much money he’s throwing at the problem."
But Scala stopped short of the notion that the media mogul, whose estimated net worth is around $54 billion, could change the nature of campaigns to come. “It’s hard to imagine anyone else duplicating what Bloomberg’s trying to do without Bloomberg money,” he said.
