NYC Should Respect Independent Voters 

Open Primaries Senior VP Jeremy Gruber appeared in the NY Daily News this week to discuss the barrage of outreach he and many other independents have received ahead of the registration deadline for this year’s primary, including from the Board of Elections itself, pressuring him to register as a Democrat.

Imagine the outrage, he suggests, if Democrats were targeted to change their voter registration to Republican to affect a race. Imagine if the NYC Board of Elections started targeting Republicans to change their voter registration because “Republicans can’t win.” Imagine if the press covered all of that without bothering to even question it. He calls for a new conversation on independent voters in NYC.

Gruber’s piece is already getting a lot of buzz–check out Pat Kiernan giving it a shout out on NY 1:

Read Gruber’s full piece here.

Are Independents Showing Us a Path Away from Political Polarization?

NY is not the only place seeing a large uptick of independent voters–it’s happening all across the country and in 2024 we saw a refreshing shift away from the straight-ticket voting that has long characterized support for the two major parties. 

Thom Reilly and Jacqueline Salit (ASU’s Center for an Independent and Sustainable Democracy) have done an analysis of the 2024 election cycle and found some eye-opening results including: 

• Self-identified independents accounted for 34 percent of voters in 2024, more than the 31 percent of voters who said they were Democrats and just below the 35 percent who said they were Republicans.
• Independents were twice as likely to split their tickets between their Presidential and Senate votes than Democrats or Republicans, with 10 percent doing so nationwide.

Read their full findings here.

Open Primaries Joins Unite NY in Albany

This week, Cathy Stewart joined Unite NY which brought over 2 dozen activists, from 10 counties, to Albany to spend the day lobbying for term limits for statewide offices; nonpartisan primaries; and citizen ballot initiatives. The event was part of Unite NY’s campaign – MORE VOICES, MORE CHOICES!

The morning began with a briefing from Tim Dunn, Unite NY’s Executive Director, who pointed out that NY is the worst state in the country in regard to ballot access laws and that it’s a state where “independents can’t vote in the primaries and independent candidates can’t get on the ballot.”

Activists met with many legislators over the course of the day, but the most heated conversations centered on the issue of nonpartisan elections and independent voters. Activists heard arguments that it was their choice to be independents, or that even if the primaries were open, how would that engage voter apathy. Needless to say, the team had a great deal to say about both of these issues.

Stay tuned as things unfold in the Empire State.

The League of Women Voters Host Meeting in Support of Open Primaries Campaign in Oklahoma

As support continues to grow in Oklahoma for SQ 836 to shift Oklahoma’s primary election system to open primaries, The League of Women Voters of Bartlesville are hosting a community meeting to learn about the campaign on Tuesday, February 11, 2025, at 6:30 PM at the Bartlesville Public Library. 

Margaret Kobos, Founder and CEO of Oklahoma United joined Fran Stallings with The Bartlesville League of Women Voters on the radio this week to discuss the campaign, the upcoming meeting and why it’s time to do things differently in Oklahoma: 

"So many of our elections, like 84% in 2024, were decided in partisan primaries. And in fact, certain elections like county sheriff races were 76 out of 77 counties didn't even have a general election for sheriff. When I'm saying that independents are prohibited from voting, I mean that this system of a closed primary does not permit an independent to participate fully in all elections.”

Listen to Margaret and Fran’s full discussion HERE. 

If you’re in Oklahoma and can make it to the meeting we encourage you to do so!

Building Trust, Not Better Mousetraps

Last week we had our first Primary Buzz Discussion of 2025, and we put Open Primaries President John Opdycke in the hot seat to be interviewed by our guest moderator Chloe Akers. Akers is the Founder and CEO of The Best of Tennessee–an organization focused on educating voters about the importance of participating in primary elections and bringing more “complexity” to political conversation.

Opdycke and Akers had a dynamic, no holds barred, forward-looking discussion on where we are as a movement and how we build a powerful going-forward strategy. We highly recommend you tune in for some insider insight on our organizing strategy for 2025-2026. 

You can watch the full discussion here:

Have a great weekend,

The Open Primaries Team