Lawmakers to reconsider closing primaries

BOISE – Lawmakers on Monday will consider a resurrected plan to restrict crossover voting in Idaho’s partisan primary elections after efforts so far this year failed. It’s due to be introduced in the state Senate.

The bill wasn’t public as of Friday, but lawmakers and others familiar with it said the new plan would prohibit registered Democrats, Republicans and Libertarians from crossing over and casting votes in each other’s primaries for partisan offices. It would still allow independents to vote in any one party’s primary.

Since the early 1970s, Idaho has allowed registered voters, regardless of party affiliation, to vote in whichever party’s primary they choose.

The new scrutiny of Idaho’s primaries comes after Republican Party members last June voted at their state convention in favor of closing their primary elections. They were concerned Democratic voters were switching sides at the polls and casting Republican ballots to skew the results.

In March, Attorney General Lawrence Wasden said Idaho’s current open primary may be unconstitutional, because the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled political parties have a right to choose their own candidates.

The new proposal “is better than having the court do something you don’t want to,” House Majority Leader Mike Moyle, R-Star, told the Associated Press, following meetings among lawmakers, Gov. Otter and state Republican Party leaders.

Idaho Republican Party Chairman Kirk Sullivan said he was satisfied the approach is consistent with his party’s wishes to close Idaho’s primary, while still allowing independent voters to participate. He hadn’t polled all 480 delegates to last year’s convention, but Sullivan said he was optimistic they’d be satisfied with the new bill.

“This is going to be a major step in the election process in Idaho,” Sullivan said. “We’ve got to protect the rights of independent voters.”

While Republicans embraced the plan, some Democrats in the Legislature said they would oppose it.

“Senate Democrats are not in favor of forcing people to choose a party,” said Senate Majority Leader Clint Stennett, D-Ketchum. “I think it’s going to be highly unpopular.”

Idaho Democratic Party spokesman Chuck Oxley said party officials were still “sorting out where they stand on this.”

Two previous attempts this year to close Idaho’s open primary have fizzled, in part because of opposition from Secretary of State Ben Ysursa.

Ysursa didn’t immediately return phone calls seeking comment, though he told the Idaho Statesman this week that he was not fighting the new plan.

Keith Allred, director of a self-described group of political moderates called The Common Interest, has been working with lawmakers on the current proposal.

Allred said he feared that if the Legislature can’t arrive at an agreement, somebody from one of the state’s political parties this summer could challenge Idaho’s open primary system in court. Without legislative action, the Republican Party likely would adopt an internal rule closing its primary to all but party members, a choice that would likely trump state law, Allred said.

Allred said he was optimistic the proposal would lure a broader range of voters to the polls than if partisan primaries were restricted solely to party members.

“Research shows that in closed primaries, you get far-less-representative, more-ideologically-extreme winners,” Allred said.