The nonprofit reform group Open Primaries hosted its first Primary Buzz Discussion of 2025 last week. But this conversation worked differently as Open Primaries President John Opdycke was the one being interviewed.

Over the last week, The Independent Center released the second and third installments to its 2025 State of the Union Poll, one of which compared and contrasted the views of independent voters and Republicans and the other compared independents and Democrats.

An Election Reformers Network (ERN) report covering a 13-year period has found that state lawmakers and elected officials are increasingly manipulating the ballot initiative process to block or impede citizen-led efforts. 

Last week, the Trump Administration sparked confusion across government agencies with a memo freezing federal funding. The confusion deepened when they rescinded the memo 45 hours later.

Though we come from opposite coasts, we share a painful reality that many Americans know all too well: our communities have been devastated by disaster. One of us lives in California, where historic wildfires have ravaged coastal cities - destroying thousands of homes and businesses, displacing tens of thousands of people, and claiming more than two dozen lives.

Ballotpedia reports this week that in 2026, Alaska’s independent voters will have the chance to solidify their role as election reform pioneers by voting on two initiatives.

Whether or not you like the filibuster probably depends on whether your “team” has control of the Senate. If your team has control of the upper chamber, you’re likely frustrated by this procedural motion. If you’re in the minority, you’re happy that the filibuster exists because it stops what you view as bad policy from advancing.

Trump kicked off his second term touting a mandate from the 49.8% of voters who backed him, using it to rename mountains, declare the U.S. a country with only two genders, and attempt to overturn a constitutional amendment via executive order.

Donald Trump will be inaugurated in a few days. In his second term, just as in his first, he’ll likely spark passionate disagreements about news media: what is “fake news” and what isn’t, which media sources should be trusted and which should be doubted.

Long before I moved to the United States from rural Greece and ever heard the phrase “we the people,” I grew up with a constant and clear illustration of the power of community. Although “we the people” wasn’t a phrase that translated into Greek, it was one of the cornerstones of Greek society.