Rep. Lauren Necochea Democracy thrives when every voice is heard and leaders gain broad support from an engaged electorate. With closed Republican primaries shutting out independents, Idaho operates far from this ideal.
Since the Idaho GOP closed its primary in 2012, the Legislature has grown increasingly extreme, favoring fringe agendas over public needs. Concerned citizens brought the Open Primaries Initiative, or Proposition 1, to pull politics back toward the median voter’s views. It would have opened primaries and created instant-runoff elections where voters can rank candidates in order of preference.
It’s like telling a server at the deli you want the chicken noodle soup, but if that’s out, your second choice is minestrone and so on. Naturally, far-right extremists benefiting from the status quo went into conniptions. Because the far-right controls the Idaho Republican Party apparatus, they used it to run a campaign against it.
What’s confounding is that the leaders who stood to gain the most from Proposition 1 — traditional Republican legislators — did not throw their support behind it. Proposition 1 would have rescued these legislators from their abusive relationship with their own party. Many GOP legislators vote for bad bills because they are scared of friendly fire: misleading attacks during primary elections and tribunals and sanctions from far-right party bosses.
One county party tried to prevent a sitting legislator from running with the Republican .
