Idaho GOP’s rule could push state toward minority rule. Top-two system offers way out | Opinion

The Idaho Republican Party has adopted a new rule to limit who can vote in the primary, a development that could further push Idaho into the grips of extremism.

Proponents say the rule is meant to prevent Democrats from crossing over and voting in the Republican primary.

As Kelcie Moseley-Morris of the Idaho Capital Sun reported, there is no consensus on the meaning of the rule. Some think it would require affiliation with the GOP over a year before an election, others a few months, others as much as two years. But the intention is clear: The party wants to exert greater and greater power over who can vote in its primary elections — elections paid for by taxpayers.

The rule on its own may not do much without follow-up either in the Legislature or the courts. It’s unlikely to be enforced by the county clerks unless lawmakers write it into law or the court system orders them to.

But that isn’t impossible. It’s essentially what happened in 2011 when federal Judge B. Lynn Winmill struck down state laws creating an open primary over the objections of the Idaho GOP. He ruled that the party’s right to freedom of association outweighed state law, creating an opening for the party to exert considerable control over public elections.

That 2011 decision, regardless of its legal merits, has been disastrous for Idaho’s political climate. The far-right has steadily grown in size and influence since then.

“I think it’s led to certainly some of the vitriol on the national level permeating down to the state level. It’s made the state’s whole election process more partisan, more confrontational, more loaded with vitriol,” said former Republican Secretary of State Ben Ysursa.

Primary turnout is usually quite low in Idaho, and those who do turn out tend to be highly partisan. Most general election races throughout the state are essentially coronations. The closed primary has promoted ever more extreme nominees, who then march into office with little or no opposition before the broader general electorate.

Perhaps this would just be democracy functioning if the views of the Idaho GOP were closely aligned with typical Idaho Republican voters, but they aren’t.

The Idaho GOP is a small group of people headed by Dorothy Moon, a John Birch Society member who failed to gain a plurality of Republican votes for secretary of state. Its platform supports revoking voters’ right to elect their U.S. senators, supports returning to the gold standard, opposes funding Medicare and Medicaid, implicitly supports raising federal taxes on the poor and opposes abortion regardless of the circumstances — all positions opposed by large portions or a majority of Idaho Republican voters.

Allowing this small group of people with rather unpopular views to exert ever-greater control over Idaho’s political landscape will have catastrophic consequences, especially for moderate Republicans. The far-right in Idaho more or less ignores Democrats. They view moderate Republicans — RINOs — as their primary enemies.

There is still time for moderate Republicans to push for an election system that puts in place government officials whose views broadly align with those of Idaho’s electorate.

The obvious model is Washington’s 2004 People’s Choice Initiative. That initiative created a “modified blanket primary” in which candidates are allowed to list their party preference, and voters can vote for any candidate they wish, regardless of affiliation. The top two vote-getters would then face off in the general election, even if both are from the same party.

The Washington GOP fought it in court, but they lost in the 2007 case Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party (the 7-2 opinion was written by Justice Clarence Thomas).

Such a system would put the state firmly back in the driver’s seat of administering fair elections and put the people as a whole in the position of controlling who runs state government — where they belong.

But if moderates wait too long, the day could come when it is no longer possible.

Bryan Clark is an opinion writer for the Idaho Statesman based in eastern Idaho.