Articles by Open Primaries

Five years after adopting top-two, nonpartisan open primaries, California has seen its legislature transform from a state of dysfunction into a successful model for reform. Now, a new survey reveals that the people of California are noticing. Last month, the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) found that most voters in California are satisfied with the state’s nonpartisan open primary system, with 60% of likely voters in California saying it has “been mostly a good thing.” The PPIC’s ...

New York – Today Open Primaries, a non-partisan electoral reform organization, condemned the Democratic Party’s Unity Reform Commission (URC) for its inaction on opening primary elections nationwide. The URC was established at the 2016 Democratic Convention in response to voters’ frustration with the 2016 election season and the conflicts between supporters of candidates Senator Bernie Sanders and Secretary Hillary Clinton. It was tasked with offering recommended rule changes to the DNC Rules C...

Miami, FL – November 9, 2017 – A broad and diverse coalition, led by Florida-based reform groups Progress for All and Florida Fair and Open Primaries hailed Constitutional Revision Commission (CRC) member Bill Schifino’s newly introduced proposal to open Florida’s primaries to the 3.4 million independent voters who are currently barred from voting in the state’s primary elections. The coalition is now calling on the entire commission to embrace Mr. Schifino’s proposal and give Floridians the ch...

Americans everywhere are fed up with the state of politics. At the federal level, political paralysis and polarization prevent Congress from solving pressing issues every day.  At the state level, it can be just as frustrating. Yet, while polarization and paralysis impede the progress of many state legislatures, one in particular seems to be heading in the right direction and actually getting things done -- California. Earlier this year, California passed a bipartisan cap and trade emissions b...

Washington is a mess. Our politics doesn’t work. Politicians are pointing at the voters as the problem -- that somehow we’ve become less civil, more polarized and less able to come together across partisan divisions. But we know that’s not the case. Millions of Americans are now attuned to the ways that partisan gerrymandering and closed primaries exacerbate partisanship and gridlock, and allow Congress to get away with not doing their jobs. Roughly 95% of congressional races were determined ...

At long last, Colorado became the most recent state to open its primaries to independent and unaffiliated voters. This is a huge milestone, made even more momentous by the party obstruction that voters ultimately overcame. In the end, Colorado’s success was more than a triumph of democracy -- it was one of the people over the parties. It all started last November, when voters in Colorado successfully passed two statewide ballot measures. The first, Proposition 107, replaced Colorado’s president...

On September 12, New York held its primary elections, and once again, a quarter of the state’s voting population -- the 3.2 million independent and unaffiliated voters who refuse to join a party -- were barred from participating. Unsurprisingly, multiple seats went uncontested, with no Republican primary for the mayoral election. RELATED ARTICLE: How A State Can Prevent 3.2 Million Registered Voters From Voting In the race for mayor, incumbent Bill de Blasio easily won the Democratic primary ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94TTJxOQ_ts As a born and bred Jersey girl, it’s only natural that I’m stubborn about my politics. My friends and I all have ideas about candidates, issues, and New Jersey government. However, when we turned 18 and we could finally express our opinions through voting, we were met by pollsters who told us that we had to affiliate with a party in order to vote. I remember being caught off guard and enraged at the fact that I had to join a party I did not align wit...

You know you’ve made it when you become the subject of a Twitter war. Over the weekend, DNC establishment figures took to the Twittersphere to duke it out with progressive activists over the Party’s use of closed primaries. The three-day debate was provoked by Young Turks reporter Nomiki Konst, after she tweeted a series of statements in support of open primaries. You can see part of the exchange here. https://twitter.com/NomikiKonst/status/874320664018268161 https://twitter.com/NomikiKonst/s...