Open Primaries

Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt sat down with former RNC chair and MSNBC commentator Michael Steele to talk about the difference between the partisan politics in DC versus the more pragmatic outcomes at the local level.

Indiana lawmakers will consider a bill filed in the state's House of Representatives that seeks to the close the state's primary elections and condition full voting rights on joining one of two major political parties. 

While all eyes are on the speakers vote Friday, a bipartisan coalition of US lawmakers plan to re-introduce legislation that would represent the largest expansion of voting rights in modern US history.

This was a big year for the open primaries movement. Seven state-level campaigns and one municipal. Millions of voters declaring their support for open primaries. New leaders emerging across the country. Primary elections for the first time at the center of the national reform debate.

In 2024, a historic number of statewide initiatives appeared on the ballot to open primary elections to all voters and candidates. Most of the initiatives failed, but reformers were successful in Washington DC. 

In 2024, Gallup found for the first time in the history of its polling that more than half of the electorate identified as independent. The biggest driver of this political shift are young voters, who enter voting age more independent than the generation before them.

The nonpartisan group Oklahoma United announced Tuesday it has filed a citizen-led constitutional amendment to end closed primaries in the state and implement a nonpartisan primary system open to all voters and candidates.

Election Day was mostly a rough night for election reformers across the board, from primary reform to new voting methods to gerrymandering. However, it would be a mistake to suggest that this means voters are okay with the status quo.

Voters across the US had a chance to change the political landscape in the country forever. In 2024, however, the two major parties were mostly successful at stopping reform to the electoral status quo.

The first victory for election reform Tuesday happened in Washington, DC, where voters passed Initiative 83 to open primaries to independent voters and implement ranked choice voting.