DNC votes to restore New Hampshire’s delegates for this summer’s convention

The Democratic National Committee voted Tuesday to reinstate New Hampshire’s delegates ahead of this summer’s convention in Chicago, ending months of fighting over the state’s 2024 presidential primary.

“We as a committee and as a national committee have gone through a difficult number of weeks and months of getting to this point, and I know that New Hampshire has gone through a difficult number of weeks and months where some things we’d like to have seen take place did not,” Jim Roosevelt, a co-chair of the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, said at a meeting Tuesday. “As it happens, all that is behind us now. We have worked out compliance with our rules and with the charter.”

New Hampshire, which state law requires to hold the first presidential primary, had refused to comply with a new Democratic calendar that moved South Carolina to the front of the line. As a result, President Joe Biden did not file to appear on the ballot for its unsanctioned Jan. 23 primary, which took place more than a week before South Carolina’s contest. Biden still won New Hampshire with about 64% of the vote through a write-in campaign. 

Roosevelt told committee members during a livestream Zoom meeting, “We’re pleased to move forward in partnership with our colleagues from the great state of New Hampshire reaching a successful resolution that ensures that New Hampshire’s delegates are represented at the Democratic National Convention this summer.”

When Biden visited New Hampshire in March to open his first coordinated campaign office in the state, he told supporters that, without getting ahead of the DNC’s process, he expected New Hampshire’s delegates to count, according to two people in the room. 

Before the state Democratic Party held a delegate selection meeting Saturday, it invited members to participate in a party-run primary in which Biden was the only candidate on the ballot. Two dozen people participated, which the DNC viewed as a sanctioned primary affirming New Hampshire’s right to its delegates at this summer’s convention, said a source familiar with the process. 

“New Hampshire is delighted to express our support for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in Chicago,” state Democratic Chairman Ray Buckley told NBC News. “We are extraordinarily proud of the diverse and perhaps history-making delegates that have been selected to represent us.” 

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Buckley said many of the delegates being sent to Chicago are under age 36 and that some identify as LGBTQ.

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Asked about the chaos surrounding the order of the Democratic primaries this cycle, Buckley said the party was ready to move on.

“We prefer looking forward to the general election, where we’re going to re-elect Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, a Democratic governor, both congressional seats and majorities in the State House,” Buckley said. “We are so over this.” 

Buckley added that New Hampshire’s retaining its first-in-the nation primary status in 2028 will “be a worry after the election.” 

“We have got to save democracy first,” he said.