The War on the Open Primary has Arrived

This is something that urgently needs our attention right away.

There are people who want to install an open primary system in Idaho, like California and Colorado. If this is passed it will destroy our state.

Rep. Sage Dixon argued against ballot initiatives at the Lincoln Day Dinner saying that these ballot initiatives would supplant the state legislature and favor direct democracy which always leads to tyranny.

The Idaho State Journal stated the following:

“Earlier this month organizers with a new (leftist) coalition called Idahoans for Open Primaries filed a new ballot initiative with the state that is designed to replace Idaho’s closed primaries with an open primary election that all Idaho voters could participate in, regardless of party affiliation. Under the new primary format, the top four vote-getters from the primary would all advance to the general election, regardless of party affiliation.

The initiative would also transform Idaho’s general elections to include an instant runoff, or ranked choice, voting system. Under that system, Idaho voters would vote for their first-choice candidate in the general election and have the ability to rank the three remaining candidates in order of preference. If one candidate did not receive more than 50 percent of the vote in the first-choice voting, the last-place finisher would be eliminated and their votes would instead be transferred to voters’ second-choice candidate on each of those ballots, with the process continuing until one candidate receives more than 50 percent of the votes and is the winner.

Organizers of the new open primary initiative oppose the Idaho Republican Party’s closed primary election and say the new open primaries would allow more voters to participate in primary elections and force candidates to appeal to a broader base of voters in order to win election.

The Republican-controlled Idaho Legislature passed a law in 2011, House Bill 351, to close Idaho’s primary elections after the GOP sued the state. Closed primary elections are only open to registered voters who officially affiliate with the party. The law that closed primary elections also gave party leaders the choice to keep their primary elections open, and the Idaho Democratic Party opened its primary elections to all voters, regardless of party affiliation.

The Idaho Democratic Party was the only political party to hold open primaries in 2022, the most recent state elections. Both the Libertarian and Constitution parties held closed primary elections in 2022, said Chelsea Carattini, a spokesperson for the Idaho Secretary of State’s Office.”

Read the entire article at the Idaho State Journal here:

https://www.idahostatejournal.com/news/local/some-prominent-idaho-republicans-push-back-against-open-primary-ballot-initiative/article_9a34b35e-f4e5-11ed-8176-df4010e2700f.html