Ted Simons sits down with Adrian Fontes, Democrat and Maricopa County Recorder, and Cathy Stewart, Vice President of National Development to discuss the effort to get Democrats to include independents in the party's Presidential Preference Election.
View the segment which aired September 19, 2019, HERE.
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September 5, 2019 |
Sarah Lyons: 917-658-9885 |
Provocative New Campaign Ad Featuring Wounded Veteran Highlights How One-Third of Arizona Voters Will Be Denied the Right to Vote Next Year
Without Rule Change, 33% of AZ’s Independent Voters
will be Excluded from the 2020 Presidential Primary
An explosive new television ad launches today to highlight the plight of Arizona’s 1.27 million independent voters, who are denied the right to vote in the 2020 presidential primary. The 30-second spot, created by the award-winning Salt & Lime Agency based in Phoenix, features a veteran turned away from the polls because of arcane rules that lock out independents. It calls attention to the fact that currently, one third of Arizona voters will be denied the right to vote in the presidential primary because they are registered as independents with no party.
Read moreIndependent voters in Arizona have sent letters to each presidential candidate outlining the looming voting rights injustice in which one third of the state’s voters will be denied the right to vote in the primary election because they are independents.
The letter notes that independents are permitted to vote in every other primary and general election held in Arizona and that exclusion from voting in the Democratic Presidential Preference Election is “punitive and arbitrary.” It also states that the “exclusion can be corrected by simple action of the Arizona Democratic Party.
The letter was signed by independent voting activists in Arizona and a representative of Independent Voting, a national association of independents with organization in 40 states.
It reads:
Dear _______:
On March 17, 2020 the Arizona Democratic Party will hold its presidential primary, known as the Presidential Preference Election (“PPE”). The Arizona Republican Party has closed ranks behind Donald Trump and decided not to hold a primary. However, as currently designed, the Democratic PPE will exclude fully one third (34%) of the state’s electorate from participating. These voters (1,267,340 as of July 1, 2019) are registered independents. As you may be aware, independents are permitted to vote in every other primary and general election held in Arizona. Thus, their exclusion from voting in the Democratic Presidential Preference Election is punitive and arbitrary. The good news is that this exclusion can be corrected by a simple action of the Arizona Democratic Party.
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August 23, 2019 |
Sarah Lyons: 917-658-9885 |
As Deadline Looms, Maricopa County Recorder Fontes
Presses Arizona Democrats to Open the
Democratic Presidential Primary
to Independent Voters
Independents’ Meeting with Arizona Democratic Party
Chair Felecia Rotellini & Secretary of State Katie Hobbs
Proved Promising
Calling open primaries a reform whose time has come, Maricopa County Recorder Adrian Fontes pressed the Democratic Party of Arizona to open the 2020 Presidential Preference Election to independents in a recent opinion piece published in The Arizona Republic. One third of Arizona voters are registered as independents and are currently barred from voting. Independents can vote in all other elections.
Fontes previewed his support for open primaries back in May tweeting: “Independent voters should be allowed to vote in AZ’s Presidential Preference Election next March...particularly because their taxpayer dollars fund it. Fair is fair.” In his op-ed, Fontes went further giving rationale for his support, addressing pragmatic issues in the political relationship between the Democratic Party and independent voters, and expressing the desire to avoid the mishap which marred Arizona’s 2016 presidential primary.
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Opinion: Adrian Fontes - August 7, 2019
It makes no sense to let independents vote in every primary election except the one for president.
Two things happened the day after Arizona’s disastrous 2016 presidential preference election:
Al Bell - June 10, 2019
In 2020, qualified independent voters who want to vote in the presidential preference election will be required to join a private organization, a “recognized party,” by February 19 to participate in the March 17 election. One-third of Arizona’s registered voters are independents. To be forced to join a party to vote for the president of all Americans violates the very idea of America. It is civic usury.
We are two women — one an independent and one a Democrat, one from New York and the other from Nebraska — who are perhaps unlikely political collaborators, but we share a view on a critical democracy issue.
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McKenzie Sadeghi and Guy Tiano - February 25, 2019
We are two of the 1.2 million independent registered voters in Arizona who pay taxes that fund the Arizona Presidential Preference election but are forbidden from participating in it unless we re-register.
Derek Staahl - January 22, 2019
PHOENIX (3TV/CBS 5) - At least seven big-name Democrats have now entered the race for president, but when the 2020 presidential primary rolls around, about one-third of Arizona’s electorate won’t be allowed to vote.
That’s because unlike other primaries, state law prevents independents from voting in the Presidential Preference Election. A newly introduced bill by Democratic state Sen. Martin Quezada aims to change that.
Quezada’s bill, SB 1057, would change the Presidential Preference Election to an open primary system, which would no longer limit it to registered members of a party.
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David Siders - November 14, 2018
Proponents of open primaries are mounting a new line of attack in their effort to weaken political parties’ grip on American elections.
The New York-based Open Primaries Education Fund, representing four voters in New Mexico, said it filed a lawsuit Tuesday arguing closed primaries — primary elections that limit participation to registered party members — constitute an illegal gift of public funds. Such primaries, they claim, benefit political parties while disenfranchising independent voters.
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