Report from the CBS Early Show on the delayed Iowa caucus results.
Iowa Democrats were stunned and confused Monday night as technical issues surrounding the caucus forced a stumbling start to the battle for the Democratic nomination. Officials said they were confident Sunday night that nothing would go wrong, with the state party chairman assuring that Democrats were “probably the most prepared” they had ever been for a caucus.
Major Garrett takes a close look at what went wrong and what candidates are doing to move forward.
More reporting from ABC News
First-in-the-nation Iowa was supposed to be the first indication, based on votes and not polls, of where the candidates stand in the Democratic primary horse race.
But now, after the state party “found inconsistencies in the reporting” of the results, the candidates — and the country — are still in the dark regarding how caucusgoers felt Monday night.
“[T]he integrity of our process, and the results have and always will be our top priority,” Iowa Democratic Party (IDP) Chairman Troy Price told reporters during a 2 a.m. call. “At this point, the IDP is manually verifying all precinct results … We want to emphasize that this is a recording, not a hack on intrusion. And it’s exactly why we have a paper trail and systems in place to uphold the integrity of our process.”
The results are now expected sometime Tuesday, Price said, noting it’s “taking longer than expected” to validate the data they have against the paper trail.
“We have said all along, we have these backups in place for exactly this reason. We are updating campaigns and we will continue to provide updates as they are available,” he said.
Just ten minutes before the caucuses began, Price told reporters outside the media filing center that usually, results start coming in around 9 p.m., an hour after the contest kicks off. But 9 p.m. came and went, and then 10 p.m. came and went, and, at 10:45 p.m., an update from the Iowa Democratic Party finally arrived.
