Republicans saw massive turnout for the caucuses statewide and in Story County, breaking their 2012 record. Democrats also saw significant participation in Monday’s Iowa Caucus.

On the Republican side, reports early on during the caucus suggested high turnout. About 180,000 Republicans turned out, according to a tally of votes from the Republican Party of Iowa.

In Story County, several Republican precincts with a large student population saw a massive boost in turnout compared to 2012.

“We could tell as soon as they opened that we were going to have definitely record turnout,” said Brett Barker, chairman of the Story County Republican Party. “The turnout was hundreds of people higher than historical [caucuses in some precincts].”

Some precincts had more than double the turnout than 2012, according to a tally of votes from the Story County GOP. In Ames 4-1, which includes most of Campustown, 524 people voted compared to 201 in 2012. In Ames 4-2 and 4-3, which are the two precincts covering Richardson Court and Union Drive dorms on the ISU campus, 548 voted this year compared to 277 in 2012.

“What I’m pretty proud of is that our volunteers county-wide were able to handle all of the curveballs thrown and we had a smooth caucus,” Barker said.

He added that many volunteers in precincts near Iowa State were staffed by college-aged volunteers who were participating in their first caucus.

“A lot of the volunteers, especially the ones hit hardest, were college students running those precincts,” Barker said. “I was very impressed by those students being able to handle that, get everybody in and have a well-run caucus.”

Charlie Szold, a spokesperson for the Iowa Republican Party, said the party has been preparing for a large turnout for awhile now.

2016’s number shatters the attendance record that was set in 2012, when 121,503 turned out. 

“We expected record turnout, we expected to go over 120,000, but nobody could have expected we’d have 50 percent higher turnout,” Szold said. “We have been training for more than a year … we trained, trained and trained for such a scenario where something unexpected would happen.”

Democrats do not release the raw number of voters at individual counties or precincts, but they did report that 171,517 voters caucused for Democrats on Monday.

Both the Iowa Democratic and Republican Parties partnered with Microsoft on an app to report results. In 2012, the Republican race results were delayed because of some reporting issues.

Both parties did not have any major issues with reporting despite the large turnout.

“Everybody was able to get those reported through the app with no issue,” Barker said. Some rural precincts had issue with cell phone connections, he said, but no issues with the actual usage of the app. 

Szold said they did not have 100 percent usage of the app because, once again, some precincts had cell phone connection issues, or a volunteer had a problem remembering specific instructions for the app.

Mack Shelley, university professor of political science, told the Daily on Monday night that an official at a precinct he attended in Ames had trouble using the app because he was not properly trained. 

“One of our top goals this year was to train as many chairs as possible in using the app, and we saw lots of excitement for using the app last night,” said Josh Levitt, press secretary of the Iowa Democratic Party. “We are very proud of our partnership with Microsoft and the RPI.”