Reply #8: They were not forced, and it would not matter if they were

[mohc]

Only one Democrat bothered to vote against moving the date, and when they held a show vote on an amendment to bring the date into compliance, they laughed down their own amendment. Read madfloridian's journal for details.

But it does not matter. Even if the Republicans in the Florida Legislature forced the Democrats to move the date, and all the Democrats voted against it, they still could have had a valid contest. What states are supposed to do in this case is hold an alternate delegate selection contest. This could be a caucus, but it could also be a party run primary, like what New Mexico did. This is just like any other primary, only the state does not run it and instead the party does. This way the party could set the date to whatever they wanted to, with no way of being "forced" by Republicans. The Florida Democratic Party (FDP) alone has control of the Florida Democratic Delegate Selection Plan, the legislature including the Democrats in the legislature have no say. No one else can tell them what to do. The FDP decided to use the invalid state contest instead of setting up their own contest. They were not forced to do this, they openly chose to do this. I am so tired of hearing that they were forced, the FDP did this on their own.