Open Primaries is an American 501(c)(4) and 501(c)(3) advocacy organization. Its headquarters are in New York City.
The group advocates for open primaries in the United States with a focus on the nonpartisan blanket primary. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] The group supported a successful ballot initiative in Colorado that created an open primary system in 2016. [8]
The group also publishes research on the benefits of public, nonpartisan primaries, as well as the harmful effects of closed primaries. During the 2016 presidential primary, the group declared that closed presidential primaries cost taxpayers roughly $287.8 million to administer, and that 26.3 million voters were locked out of the primary due to their unaffiliated or independent voter status. [9] [10] [11]
Primary elections, or direct primary are voting processes by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the country and administrative divisions within the country, voters might consist of the general public in what is called an open primary, or solely the members of a political party in what is called a closed primary. In addition to these, there are other variants on primaries that are used by many countries holding elections throughout the world.
The American Independent Party (AIP) is a far-right political party in the United States that was established in 1967. The AIP is best known for its nomination of former Democratic Governor George Wallace of Alabama, who carried five states in the 1968 presidential election running on a populist, hard-line anti-Communist, pro-"law and order" platform, appealing to working-class white voters and widely understood by political analysts as having pro-segregationist or white supremacist undertones, against Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey. In 1976, the party split into the modern American Independent Party and the American Party. From 1992 until 2008, the party was the California affiliate of the national Constitution Party. Its exit from the Constitution Party led to a leadership dispute during the 2008 election.
Elections in the United States have rules and procedures regulating the conditions under which a candidate, political party, or ballot measure is entitled to appear on voters' ballots. As election processes are decentralized by Article I, Section 4, of the United States Constitution, ballot access laws are established and enforced by the states. As a result, ballot access processes may vary from one state to another. State access requirements for candidates generally pertain to personal qualities of a candidate, such as: minimum age, residency, and citizenship. Additionally, many states require prospective candidates to collect a specified number of qualified voters' signatures on petitions of support and mandate the payment of filing fees before granting access; ballot measures are similarly regulated. Each state also regulates how political parties qualify for automatic ballot access, and how those minor parties that do not can. Fundamental to democracy, topics related to ballot access are the subject of considerable debate in the United States.
In the politics of the United States, elections are held for government officials at the federal, state, and local levels. At the federal level, the nation's head of state, the president, is elected indirectly by the people of each state, through an Electoral College. Today, these electors almost always vote with the popular vote of their state. All members of the federal legislature, the Congress, are directly elected by the people of each state. There are many elected offices at state level, each state having at least an elective governor and legislature. There are also elected offices at the local level, in counties, cities, towns, townships, boroughs, and villages; as well as for special districts and school districts which may transcend county and municipal boundaries.
An open primary is a primary election that does not require voters to be affiliated with a political party in order to vote for partisan candidates. In a traditional open primary, voters may select one party's ballot and vote for that party's nomination. As in a closed primary, the highest voted candidate in each party then proceeds to the general election. In a nonpartisan blanket primary, all candidates appear on the same ballot and the two highest voted candidates proceed to the runoff election, regardless of party affiliation. The constitutionality of this system was affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States in Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party in 2008, whereas a partisan blanket primary was previously ruled to be unconstitutional in 2000. The arguments for open primaries are that voters can make independent choices, building consensus that the electoral process is not splintered or undermined by the presence of multiple political parties.
A nonpartisan blanket primary is a primary election in which all candidates for the same elected office run against each other at once, regardless of the political party. Partisan elections are, on the other hand, segregated by political party. Nonpartisan blanket primaries are slightly different from most other elections systems with two-rounds/runoff, aka "jungle primaries" , in a few ways. The first round of a nonpartisan blanket primary is officially the "primary." Round two is the "general election." Round two must be held, even if one candidate receives a majority in the first round.
The McGovern–Fraser Commission, formally known as Commission on Party Structure and Delegate Selection, was a commission created by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in response to the tumultuous 1968 Democratic National Convention. It was composed of 28 members, selected by DNC chairman Senator Fred R. Harris in 1969 to rewrite the Democratic Party's rules regarding the selection of national convention delegates. Senator George McGovern and later Representative Donald M. Fraser led the commission, which is how it received its name. McGovern, who resigned from the commission in 1971 in order to run for president, won the first nomination decided under the new rules in 1972, but lost the general election to Richard Nixon.
Voter registration in the United States is required for voting in federal, state and local elections in the United States. The only exception is North Dakota, although cities in North Dakota may register voters for city elections. Voter registration takes place at the county level in many states and at the municipal level in several states. Most states set cutoff dates for voter registration and to update details, ranging from 2 to 4 weeks before an election; while a third of states have Election Day or "same-day" voter registration which enables eligible citizens to register or update their registration when they vote before or on election day.
Elections in New Jersey are authorized under Article II of the New Jersey State Constitution, which establishes elections for the governor, the lieutenant governor, and members of the New Jersey Legislature. Elections are regulated under state law, Title 19. The office of the New Jersey Secretary of State has a Division of Elections that oversees the execution of elections under state law. In addition, the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC) is responsible for administering campaign financing and lobbying disclosure.
Jeremy Gruber is a lawyer, writer, and public policy advocate and is the senior vice president at Open Primaries. He is the former President and Executive Director of the Council for Responsible Genetics. He has testified before the United States Congress on genetic privacy and discrimination issues. He was a leader of the successful effort to enact the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act as well as a number of state laws that preceded it and led the successful campaign to roll back a controversial student genetic testing program at the University of California, Berkeley. In 2011, Gruber led an effort to successfully enact CalGINA-a California law that extends genetic privacy and nondiscrimination protections into areas such as life, long term care, and disability insurance, mortgages, elections and other areas.
Some type of election in Idaho occurs annually in each of the state's cities and towns, the exact type of which is dependent on the year. Elections for federal and statewide offices occur in even-numbered years, while municipal elections occur in odd-numbered years.
Elections in Colorado are held to fill various local, state and federal seats. Special elections may be held to fill vacancies at other points in time.
The Colorado Caucus is the electoral process used in Colorado to appoint candidates for certain political offices and start the process of electing new leaders for political party leadership. It takes the form of a series of precinct caucuses, meetings of registered electors within a precinct who are members of a particular major political party. The purpose of precinct caucuses is to elect precinct committee persons and delegates to county assemblies, including those that elect delegates to the presidential nominating conventions.
The 2016 United States presidential election in Utah was held on November 8, 2016, as part of the 2016 United States presidential election which was also held in the other 49 states and in the District of Columbia. Voters were asked to pick 6 electors to be pledged for a candidate in the Electoral College. The two main tickets of the election were the Republican one, consisting of businessman Donald Trump and Indiana Governor Mike Pence, and the Democratic one, consisting of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Virginia Senator Tim Kaine.
Statewide elections in the U.S. state of North Dakota take place every two years. Most executive offices and all legislators are elected to four-year terms, with half the terms expiring on U.S. Presidential election years, and the other half expiring on mid-term election years.
The Independent Voter Project (IVP) is a 501(c)(4) United States nonprofit organization. It launched in 2006 with a $1 million grant from John Moores. IVP seeks to re-engage nonpartisan voters and promote nonpartisan election reform through initiatives, litigation, and voter education.
The 2020 United States presidential election in Oklahoma was held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. Oklahoma voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote, pitting the Republican Party's nominee, incumbent President Donald Trump, and running mate Vice President Mike Pence against Democratic Party nominee, former Vice President Joe Biden, and his running mate California Senator Kamala Harris. Oklahoma has seven electoral votes in the Electoral College.
The 2020 North Dakota Democratic presidential caucuses took place on March 10, 2020, as one of several states voting the week after Super Tuesday in the Democratic Party primaries and caucuses for the 2020 presidential election. While the contest has in effect been a party-run open primary for the first time in North Dakota's history, the state party retained the traditional caucus name, classifying it as a firehouse caucus. The state awarded 18 delegates to the 2020 Democratic National Convention, of which 14 were pledged delegates allocated on the basis of the results of the election.
The Center for Election Science (CES) is an American 501(c)(3) electoral reform advocacy organization. They advocate for cardinal voting methods such as approval voting and score voting. They consider themselves to be rooted in effective altruism.
The 2016 Louisiana Republican presidential primary was held on March 5, 2016, as part of the 2016 Republican Party presidential primaries. In this primary, voters in the United States state of Louisiana voted on who the Republican nominee for President of the United States should be in the 2016 United States presidential election. The Democratic Party held their Louisiana primary on the same day.