The Democratic National Committee is expected to insert Nevada’s caucuses between Iowa’s and the New Hampshire primary when it adopts its 2008 primary and caucus calendar Saturday in Chicago.
Gov. Bill Richardson defended that proposal in Iowa Thursday, according to the Des Moines Register.
“The path to the presidency is through Iowa and New Hampshire,” Richardson told the newspaper. “I don’t see Nevada’s entrance in between, a caucus in a small western state, as going to affect either one.”
The issue was contentious during a recent Richardson visit to New Hampshire. He is one of the backers of the Nevada proposal, designed to raise the status of the west, but, at the same time, has worked hard to convince Iowa and New Hampshire they won’t be harmed.
Richardson was in Iowa to join a group pressuring Wal-Mart on salaries and benefits, and to campaign for the state’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate.
The New Hampshire secretary of state has said he would move the first-in-the-nation primary ahead of the DNC calendar if he believes the calendar diminishes it. Richardson promised to participate there and oppose sanctions by the DNC against the state party if that happened.
In Iowa Thursday, Richardson said he will compete in the state’s caucuses if he decides to run for president.
“It would be my intention to participate here,” he told the newspaper.
As for whether he’ll run for president, Richardson continued to insist he has not decided.
“After the (New Mexico gubernatorial) election, I’m going to make up my mind,” Richardson said in Iowa, according to the Albuquerque Journal.
The Democratic National Committee is expected to insert