Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

27 million voters are shut out of primary elections

Participants in Nevada caucus

Nevada held its presidential caucus on Feb. 8. Voters who are not registered with a party are shut out of the process in Nevada.

Noah Riffe/Anadolu via Getty Images

Fisher is senior director of policy and partnerships for Unite America. Macomber is research manager for UA.

Last week, Nevada voters went to the polls to cast ballots in the state’s presidential primaries — well, those voters who were allowed to, at least.

Because Nevada holds “closed” primaries for all offices, only voters registered with the Democratic or Republican parties can participate in the state’s taxpayer-funded primary elections. Independent and minor-party voters are left out. More than 777,000 of the state’s active registered voters (40 percent of the total) are not registered with a major party and, therefore, cannot vote in primaries.

In a new report we co-authored for the Unite America Institute, we unearthed the scale of the problem facing independent voters and the impact of closed primaries. As part of the project, Change Research conducted a first-of-its-kind poll of 2,224 registered independents from 20 states with closed presidential primaries or caucuses (we call these voters “Excluded Independents”).


First, Nevada is far from alone in leaving out independents: 22 states hold closed presidential primaries or caucuses. In these states, over 27 million voters who are not registered with a major party lack the right to participate in the presidential nominating process. They represent nearly 29 percent of all voters in these states, a share that is 20 percent larger than it was in 2010. Fifteen states also hold closed primaries for congressional and state offices, preventing 17.5 million voters from participating.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

To make matters worse, the vast majority of congressional districts are “safe” for either the Democrats or the Republicans (currently about 90 percent are safe, according to the Cook Political Report). Primary elections therefore effectively determine who will represent those districts. As a result, tax-paying independent voters lack any voice in who represents them.

The polling results demonstrated that independent voters find their exclusion to be unfair, and that these voters have strong opinions about the current political environment.

Both younger generations and those who served the country are disproportionately forced to the sidelines of our democracy. Nearly 60 percent of Excluded Independents are under 50, compared to just 18 percent who are over 65. And 16 percent of Excluded Independents are veterans, even though just 6 percent of all American adults have served in the military.

Excluded Independents are also “independent thinkers” who hold diverse views that do not align with either the Democratic or Republican party platforms. For instance, 70 percent said they “prefer to assess each candidate individually, rather than by their party affiliation,” while the same percentage acknowledged that they agree with Democrats on some issues and Republicans on others.

Specifically, majorities of Excluded Independents have more trust in the Democrats to address issues like education, health care and climate change, but they have more trust in the Republicans to handle immigration, the economy and public safety.

Asked to describe why they register as independents, Excluded Independents shared a variety of responses, including:

  • “Too many issues go unresolved because politicians are more interested in maintaining party allegiance than representing the people.” – 41-year old woman and veteran from Arizona
  • “I'm an independent thinker and willing to vote for anyone who reflects my beliefs.” – 68-year-old man from Nevada
  • “I share many beliefs with both parties and [have] many beliefs that neither party holds.”
    – 34-year-old woman from Idaho

Unsurprisingly, independent voters do not like elections they cannot vote in. Over three-quarters find it unfair that they cannot participate in taxpayer-funded partisan primaries, and 82 percent want to be able to vote in Democratic or Republican presidential primaries. An even larger share, 87 percent, support opening primaries to independent voters, as 35 states have already done. Colorado and Maine were the most recent states to do so in 2016 and 2021, respectively. New Mexico and Pennsylvania independents may be next to gain access to the primary franchise, as advocacy campaigns are underway in their states.

Excluded independents also overwhelmingly support primary reform. More than 80 percent support nonpartisan primaries, allowing all candidates to compete on the same primary ballot open to all voters. Nevada voters have the chance this year to correct the ill of closed primaries. If “final-five voting” is approved this fall, the aforementioned 770,370 voters will be able to vote in taxpayer-funded elections for state and congressional offices.

At a time when both of the major parties’ leading presidential candidates struggle to keep their national favorability ratings above 40 percent, it makes sense to allow all voters to have a say in who will win the major party nominations.

Voting is a cherished civic right, but 27 million registered voters cannot fully exercise the franchise. By remedying this injustice for those who have declared their political independence, the country will have a more functional government better representing the country’s views.

Read More

Hand Placing Ballot in Box With American Flag
Getty Images, monkeybusinessimages

We Can Fix This: Our Politics Really Can Work – These Stories Show How

As American politics polarizes ever further, voters across the political spectrum agree that our current system is not delivering for the American people. Eighty-five percent of Americans feel most elected officials don’t care what people like them think. Eighty-eight percent of them say our political system is broken.

Whether it’s the quality and safety of their kids’ schools, housing affordability and rising homelessness, scarce and pricey healthcare, or any number of other issues that touch Americans’ everyday lives, the lived experience of polarization comes from such problems—and elected officials’ failure to address them.

Keep ReadingShow less
Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump
text
Photo by Dan Dennis on Unsplash

Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump

Donald Trump wasted no time when he returned to the White House. Within hours, he signed over 200 executive orders, rapidly dismantling years of policy and consolidating control with the stroke of a pen. But the frenzy of reversals was only the surface. Beneath it lies a deeper, more troubling transformation: presidential elections have become all-or-nothing battles, where the victor rewrites the rules of government and the loser’s agenda is annihilated.

And it’s not just the orders. Trump’s second term has unleashed sweeping deportations, the purging of federal agencies, and a direct assault on the professional civil service. With the revival of Schedule F, regulatory rollbacks, and the targeting of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, the federal bureaucracy is being rigged to serve partisan ideology. Backing him is a GOP-led Congress, too cowardly—or too complicit—to assert its constitutional authority.

Keep ReadingShow less
One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

A roll of "voted" stickers.

Pexels, Element5 Digital

One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

The analysis and parsing of learned lessons from the 2024 elections will continue for a long time. What did the campaigns do right and wrong? What policies will emerge from the new arrangements of power? What do the parties need to do for the future?

An equally important question is what lessons are there for our democratic structures and processes. One positive lesson is that voting itself was almost universally smooth and effective; we should applaud the election officials who made that happen. But, many elements of the 2024 elections are deeply challenging, from the increasingly outsized role of billionaires in the process to the onslaught of misinformation and disinformation.

Keep ReadingShow less
MERGER: The Organization that Brought Ranked Choice Voting and Ended SuperPACs in Maine Joins California’s Nonpartisan Primary Pioneers

A check mark and hands.

Photo by Allison Saeng on Unsplash. Unsplash+ License obtained by the author.

MERGER: The Organization that Brought Ranked Choice Voting and Ended SuperPACs in Maine Joins California’s Nonpartisan Primary Pioneers

Originally published by Independent Voter News.

Today, I am proud to share an exciting milestone in my journey as an advocate for democracy and electoral reform.

Keep ReadingShow less