With just five days to go before the Iowa caucuses, several of the top Democratic campaigns and operatives are eyeing one another as potential, and limited, allies in their battle to win convention delegates.
"When you have this few days to go and the race is this close, you are looking for every tiny morsel of advantage that you could cobble together," said Lily Adams, who was a top Iowa aide to Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign and also worked for Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.) before she left the race last month. "It costs you nothing to reach out to candidates and ask. I'd probably reach out to everyone."
The supporter-swapping conversations stem from the system Iowa Democrats use for the more than 1,600 caucuses that will be held Monday night. In each, Democrats gather in clusters depending on which candidate they support.
Candidates who do not earn support from at least 15 percent of those in the room are not considered viable, and they do not earn delegates. Their backers are free to leave or to align with another candidate.
That can lead to negotiations between campaigns over the fate of the supporters of nonviable candidates.
Biden, Sanders, Buttigieg and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) have been locked at the top of recent Iowa polling, with Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) gaining momentum. For them and other candidates, even minimal growth in support could be meaningful in the final apportioning of delegates.
Caucus-night agreements, loose alliances and complicated strategies have been a recurring theme in Iowa. In 2016, operating under slightly different rules, the campaigns for Sanders and Clinton sent some of their supporters to former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley in places where they thought O’Malley would take support from their opponent.
Sanders’s 2016 team even had a sophisticated app that precinct captains downloaded on their phones to help calculate whether they should send support to O’Malley and how many people could be spared.
In the 2004 campaign, then-Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) and then-Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-Ohio) made a deal to support each other.
Those specific deals would be harder for campaigns to use this year because candidates who reach 15 percent aren’t able to shed voters. That potentially offers more power to less popular candidates.
Some suggested that it was far-fetched to think an Iowan committed enough to attend the caucuses would be likely to make their second choice based on the recommendation of a campaign staffer.
“Iowans are traditionally pretty independent-minded,” said Jesse Harris, a senior adviser to Biden’s Iowa campaign. “Results could be mixed. But in a close race, I don’t think you want to leave any stone unturned.”
Biden’s campaign has also been courting endorsements from two candidates who have left the race — Harris and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.).
Some within Biden’s orbit have been eager to win their public backing before the Iowa caucuses, as a way to showcase additional strength and add to his list of establishment-Democrat endorsements. Both former candidates also spent significant time in Iowa, and their backing could help Biden win over some of their former supporters.
Yet those discussions have been complicated by the Senate impeachment trial. Booker and Harris have appeared reluctant to make any endorsements while the hearings are ongoing, particularly when Biden is a focus in the proceedings and could still be subpoenaed to testify.
Biden’s team — like many of the campaigns — has put a big focus on carefully identifying voters where the former vice president is the second choice.
Warren’s staff made an early bet that they could identify Iowans who view her as a second choice, with an eye toward making a direct pitch to those people on caucus night if their first choice doesn’t have enough support.
Warren’s campaign declined to speak about caucus night strategy.
Yang spoke frankly on Wednesday about caucus strategy but also acknowledged the limitations of sharing supporters.
“The people who support my campaign are very diverse,” Yang said at a breakfast hosted by Bloomberg News. “I’d have a hard time getting them to do anything they’re not naturally inclined to do. I think most people are going to show up on caucus night with a few choices in mind.”
He confirmed at the Bloomberg breakfast that his campaign had been approached by more than one competitor. When pressed on where he thought his supporters would go, he was more forthright.
“I think many of my supporters would naturally head to Bernie,” Yang said. “I think that Bernie and I do have a lot of overlapping support.”
Biden’s team reached out to Yang’s campaign initially, according to two people who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss strategy. There was a later conversation in which Sanders’s and Yang’s teams spoke about a possible deal, according to a person familiar with those discussions.
Jeff Weaver, a top adviser to Sanders, acknowledged some talks have taken place.
“We’ve been contacted by a number of campaigns,” Weaver said. “We are not confirming which ones, and we aren’t going to comment on those discussions.”
A spokesman for Biden’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Steyer, who has about 3 percent in the RealClearPolitics polling average, has received calls from multiple campaigns, according to a Steyer staffer who would name only Buttigieg’s operation. “It didn’t go far,” the Steyer aide said.
Buttigieg’s team declined to comment on caucus strategy scenarios.
Conversations about gaming out where supporters should go on a second bounce are delicate, as it suggests weakness on one side or the other.
At a Yang town hall on the campus of the University of Iowa, 20-year-old Alex Aguirre told Yang he was concerned about his vote “not mattering.”
“I feel like a lot of people also support you but feel like they might be going toward Bernie just because they don’t want to waste their vote,” said the college junior, a finance major.
Yang didn’t counsel the student on caucus night strategy but acknowledged the challenge of reaching 15 percent.
“In terms of voting for me, obviously we have to be above a certain threshold to be competitive in the state,” the candidate said, before pivoting to an explanation for why he is a good matchup against President Trump.
Matt Viser and Isaac Stanley-Becker contributed to this report.