clown-car primary

English

Etymology

From clown car +‎ primary.

Pronunciation

  • (US) IPA(key): /ˈklaʊn kɑɹ ˌpɹaɪməɹi/

Noun

clown-car primary (plural clown-car primaries)

  1. (US politics, chiefly derogatory) A primary election with a large number of serious candidates, usually more than four, making it possible that the winner will have been chosen by only a small portion of the electorate.
    • 2012 March 5, Jon Ponder, “Two Months into Republicans' Clown Car Primary, WSJ/NBC Poll Finds Voters Turning against the GOP - Again”, in Pensito Review‎[1], archived from the original on 11 June 2012:
      Two Months into Republicans' Clown Car Primary, WSJ/NBC Poll Finds Voters Turning against the GOP - Again [title]
    • 2015, Michael Page, This Is Your Government On Drugs, Xlibris Corporation, page 282:
      The Republicans held a clown-car primary in 2012 with a dozen debates where their credo of hewing to the party line (more conservative than thou) prevented any candidate from emerging looking presidential.
    • 2016, Joshua Holland, “Big GOP Donors Are to Blame for Their Party's Clown-Car Primary”, in The Nation‎[2], archived from the original on 19 October 2016:
      They can shake their heads over the seething anger in the Republican electorate, but this nasty and never-ending "clown car primary" is a problem of their own creation.
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