1. Nominations AP Government

2. Nomination  A nomination is a party's official endorsement of a candidate for office  Success is generally based upon having money, media attention, and momentum  The manipulation of these elements is known as campaign strategy  The goal of the nomination process is to win the support of a majority of the delegates at the national party convention

3. Convention  The convention does not provide the same type of drama it once did  Convention drama revolved around the open voting of delegates as they tried to select presidential and vice presidential candidates  In today’s primary races, by the time we get to the convention it is extremely apparent who the candidate for president and vice president will be  The national convention does help to setup the party platform  This is the party's statement of its goals and policies for the next four years

4. Caucuses  From January through June on an election year caucuses and primaries take place in each state in order to begin the process of determining who the nominees for office will be  In a caucus system, voters must show up at a fixed time and attend an open meeting where citizens openly discuss their candidate preferences  The meetings generally last between one or two hours  Because of such a time commitment, caucuses have lower turnout then primaries  Iowa has the first caucus of an election season and helps set a standard for those who get media attention

5. Primaries  There are two main types of primaries:  Open primaries allow anyone, regardless of party, to take part in the vote for a candidate  A closed primary restricts voting to the party that you are registered for  Other types of primaries include:  Direct primaries are preliminary election in which a party's candidates for public office are nominated by direct vote of the people.  Invisible primaries are the first phase of the presidential nomination process, where candidates attempt to gain front-runner status and raise money

6. Delegates  Delegates can be awarded through a winner take all system (a system in which if you win the election, you get all delegates) or through proportional representation (meaning that if you got half of the votes, you get half of the delegates.  How delegates are awarded varies based upon party and the state in which the election took place.

7. Elimination  Most of the delegates for the Democratic and Republican national conventions are selected in primaries and caucuses  In today's system 2/3rds of all delegates are chosen within 6 weeks of the Iowa caucus.  One major event, in which many states hold primaries and caucuses at the same time, is called Super Tuesday  This is a result of frontloading, or the process of moving up a primary in the calendar so as to be more influential  The amount of delegates and the proportion in which they are appropriated differs based upon party and state.  The primaries work as an elimination system in order to pare down the nominees down to one candidate for the republican and democratic party

8. Issues  Criticisms of the primary system:  Iowa and New Hampshire get a disproportionate advantage in setting the momentum for candidates  Prominent politicians find it difficult to take time out from their duties to run  Money plays too big a role in the caucuses and primaries  Participation in primaries and caucuses ins low unrepresentative  The system gives too much power to the media

9. Fixing the weaknesses?  Proposals to deal with the issues with the primary system include:  Holding a national primary  This would enlist all voters to vote in a primary election at the same  This could theoretically cut down on the large amount of candidate travel and would stop early voting states from controlling the agenda of the candidates  Holding regional primaries  This would allow for each time zone or region of the country to vote at the same time