Reform in Court: Open Primaries on the Ballot in Idaho, Fight Continues in Arizona

IDAHO: Open Primaries will officially be on the ballot this November in Idaho. Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador’s lawsuit attempting to prevent the open primaries initiative from moving forward has been dismissed by an Ada County Judge: 

“The Court finds the Attorney General has not met his burden on summary judgment to establish a violation to the extent this Court has the authority to declare all signatures invalid.”

Idahoans for Open Primaries Spokesperson Luke Mayville: 

“AG Labrador has tried at every turn to suppress the voices of Idahoans and disrupt the ballot initiative process. But today, the people of Idaho prevail.”

Read Open Primaries Senior VP Jeremy Gruber’s full declaration of support statement that was submitted for consideration to the Idaho Supreme Court.

ARIZONA: The Make Elections Fair Campaign to adopt nonpartisan primaries is asking the Arizona Supreme Court to “set deadlines for filing legal challenges against propositions.” 

The Supreme Court has ruled challenges can come after the November ballots have been printed but as the campaign’s attorney Andrew Pappas points out this could set a dangerous precedent: 

“The order invites and indeed contemplates the risk that Arizona voters will vote for the initiative and later have their votes thrown out. By allowing this expedited election litigation to proceed beyond the start of the ballot-printing process, the order is at odds with eight decades of the court’s precedents, the court’s rules, and the court’s orders in two prior appeals in this dispute.”

The suit has been sent back to a trial judge and there will be a hearing on September 12th.

Explosive New Report from the New York Times Finds that Candidates are Running Unopposed in Half of All General Election Races  

A new report from the NY Times: “A Democracy with Everything but a Choice,” looks at the findings of three nonprofit organizations who analyzed the 2022 election cycle for more than 29,400 partisan offices nationwide and found that shockingly in half of all races for partisan offices, candidates are elected — often multiple times — without opposition.

Similarly, Ballotpedia has found that 58% of elections it covers are unopposed.

These are striking numbers–genuine democracy demands not only access to the ballot but access to meaningful choices at the ballot as well.  As the piece points out, uncompetitive elections depress voter turnout, and incentivize politicians to be less representative of and accountable to the people. 

FLORIDA: Florida Rep. Dr. Joel Rudman is planning to introduce legislation to address Florida’s fraudulent write-in loophole that allows phony candidates to close primaries and shut out voters. 2 million Florida voters have been shut out of election because of these write-in/ghost candidates. 

"You say you want election integrity? To me, that includes having only candidates on the ballot who actually intend to run. You will see an election integrity bill come from my desk next session."

–Rep. Dr. Joel Rudman

IDAHO: Hyrum Erickson, a Republican Precinct Committeeman came out in support of Idahoans for Open Primaries campaign and shared why he thinks republicans in Idaho should embrace this year’s open primaries initiative:

OKLAHOMA: Experts in Oklahoma have found that Oklahoma’s election laws inhibit voter participation and create more extreme candidates: “I think that we have to do something to have every elected official stand before every voter at some point. That’s the only way we can break this cycle.” Oklahoma United are working to make this a reality says our friend and the CEO and Founder of Oklahoma United Margaret Kobos: “Our movement really is all about giving people choices, giving all the voters all the choices, seeing all the candidates in front of them.” 

SOUTH DAKOTA: The only thing Republican and Democratic party leaders can agree on is uniting against open primaries. The Democratic Party of South Dakota has recently joined the Republican party of South Dakota in opposing Amendment H which would open primaries and bring more than 150,000 South Dakotans into the process. South Dakota Open Primaries Chair Joe Kirby weighed in on the parties uniting against reform:

“South Dakota politics is controlled by special interests, hard liners and party bosses. They don’t like Amendment H because it would take political power back from them and return it to the voters where it belongs. But polls like the ones conducted by South Dakota Newswatch show that most South Dakotans are in favor.”

NEXT PRIMARY BUZZ DISCUSSION: Change the Incentives, Change the Game Part II w/ Bradley Tusk

Wednesday September 11th 2024 at 1pm EDT

Meet Bradley Tusk: an investor, political strategist, philanthropist, bookstore owner, podcaster, author and founder of MobileVoting.org (that’s quite a resume!). His latest book is Vote With Your Phone: Why Mobile Voting Is Our Final Shot at Saving Democracy.

One key takeaway is that the only election that matters is the primary.

Tusk has a long history in politics: 

• Campaign manager for Mike Bloomberg’s 2009 mayoral race
• Deputy Governor of Illinois
• Communications Director for US Senator Chuck Schumer
• Advisor for Andrew Yang's campaign in the 2021 New York City mayoral election.

He has also been the country’s foremost champion of mobile voting since 2017. “If the electorate is made up largely of partisan voters,” Tusk said in a recent interview, “we end up electing tendentious, uncompromising politicians who do not represent the will of the people. We’re completely polarized, and nothing gets done. I don’t see how democracy survives absent radically higher participation… The greatest threat to our democracy is that nobody votes.”

On Wednesday September 11th at 1pm EDT Open Primaries President John Opdycke will sit down with Tusk for a deep dive discussion into the intersection between technology, voter participation and the rules of the political game.

REGISTER TODAY:

Have a great weekend,

The Open Primaries Team