DNC chair calls on Iowa Democratic Party to begin recanvass of caucus results

Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Tom Perez on Thursday called for a recanvass in Iowa following chaos and delayed results during the state’s Democratic caucuses earlier this week.

“Enough is enough. In light of the problems that have emerged in the implementation of the delegate selection plan and in order to assure public confidence in the results, I am calling on the Iowa Democratic Party to immediately begin a recanvass,” Perez tweeted early Thursday afternoon.

A DNC official told The Hill the recanvas, distinct from a recount, will be a hand audit of caucus math worksheets and reporting forms to ensure they were properly tallied and reported.

Perez’s message came shortly after a New York Times report that found caucus results released Wednesday contained errors and inconsistencies that contradicted caucus rules in some cases, although the newspaper noted that there was no evidence the inconsistencies were intentional.

The results of the caucuses, which were not immediately available the night of the contest, have been slowly released in the days since, with former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg (D) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) nearly tied in the delegate count and Sanders leading in the popular vote but with some of the vote still outstanding.

At the latest count, with 96 percent reporting, Buttigieg and Sanders were each projected to receive 11 pledged delegates at 26.2 percent for Buttigieg versus 26.1 percent for Sanders, followed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) with five delegates and former Vice President Joe Biden with zero, as of Thursday afternoon. 

Buttigieg initially declared victory in the caucuses Monday night, while Sanders proclaimed Thursday he’d won “a very strong victory” in Iowa and was looking forward to moving on New Hampshire.

An app used to report the results failed Monday night, with Shadow Inc. CEO Gerard Niemira saying he felt “terrible” for the problems, adding, “I’m really disappointed that some of our technology created an issue that made the caucus difficult.”

Perez addressed the technical failures earlier this week as well, tweeting, “What happened last night in Iowa should never happen again. We have staff working around the clock to assist the Iowa Democratic Party to ensure that all votes are counted.”

“It is clear that the app in question did not function adequately. It will not be used in Nevada or anywhere else during the primary election process. The technology vendor must provide absolute transparent accounting of what went wrong,” he added.

Buttigieg’s showing raises the stakes for the New Hampshire primary, where numerous polls show Sanders in the lead ahead of the Tuesday vote.

—Updated at 1:22 p.m.