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The Tennessee Conservative [By Paula Gomes] –
The majority of conservative Republicans in Tennessee still do not want Democrats voting in GOP primaries.
In our poll, asking if Democrats should be allowed to continue voting in Republican primaries in Tennessee, just over 90 percent of those that answered, said no.
Grassroots efforts to ensure that candidate choices are not diluted by the opposing party have fallen on deaf ears for years. Over the last few years in particular, Tennessee GOP leadership has killed every reform bill to prevent crossover voting.
As of last November, a member of the GOP State Executive Committee (SEC), the governing body for the state party, is once again bringing up the issue of closing primary elections to state lawmakers.
SEC member for District 17 Terri Nicholson wrote to the Senate State and Local Government Committee, beseeching lawmakers to take up legislation aimed at closing primaries.
Citing the influx of new residents from blue states, Nicolson wrote, “The Tennessee Republican Party’s State Executive Committee has repeatedly requested the implementation of party registration to strengthen the integrity of our primaries. Simply put, Republican voters should participate in Republican primaries, and Democrat voters should participate in Democrat primaries.”
Bills aimed at closing primaries or curbing crossover voting in 2023 and 2024 were all killed in the committee process either through secretive voice votes or from being placed behind the budget.
Last year, a bill died when no one on the Senate State and Local Government Committee would second it so that it could be presented for consideration.
We have reported before that some Republican lawmakers take no issue with the current situation, having admitted that Democrat crossover votes keep them in office.
Before the May 2022 primary, Democrat voters were encouraged to pull a Republican ballot and vote for the more “moderate” Republicans on the ballot over openly conservative candidates, a process known as “crossover raiding.”
While this may sound unethical, it is not illegal because Tennessee currently has an open primary system. Section 2-7-115 of the Tennessee Code stipulates that a voter must either be registered with a political party or must declare his or her affiliation with the party at the polls on primary election day in order to vote in that party’s primary.
That said, the same code also states that it is a crime to vote in an opposing party’s primary in order to influence the outcome. Those who are neither bona fide members of the political party whose primary they wish to vote in, nor affiliated with it, or who declare allegiance to that party without the intent to affiliate with them could be charged with a Class C misdemeanor. However, the law is nearly impossible to enforce as it lacks a mechanism of enforcement that has any real substance.
While attempts to close primary elections have failed in recent years, in part due to critics insisting that independent voters could be disenfranchised, support for political party registration among conservatives has been strong and remains so.
About the Author: Paula Gomes is a Tennessee resident and reporter for The Tennessee Conservative. You can reach Paula at paula@tennesseeconservativenews.com.
