ORLANDO, Fla. – Florida has two primary elections this year: one in March for the presidential election, and one in August for federal, state and some local elections.
If you want to vote in a party primary, in Florida, you have to be a member of a political party.
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That’s because Florida is a closed primary state.
Primary elections happen when a political party has more than one candidate running for the same office.
For instance, on March 19 there will be a Presidential Preference Primary, but there will only be a Republican primary. Democrats are not having a primary in Florida because President Joe Biden is the only candidate the state party is recognizing.
In some states, you don’t have to be a member of a party to vote in the primary. That’s not the case in Florida. Democrats vote in Democratic primaries, Republicans in Republican primaries, and so on.
Still, if you want to vote in a specific party primary, you just change your party affiliation.
You can do this up to 29 days before any election. That’s Feb. 20 for the March primary. For the statewide primary on Aug. 20, the deadline to change your party affiliation would be July 22.
To change your party affiliation, go to RegistertoVoteFlorida.gov and update your voter registration information.
You will need a Florida drivers license or state ID to do so. If you don’t have one, you can print out a paper application and mail it to your county supervisor of elections office.
Why it matters
Say you live in a district where the majority of voters lean toward one political party over another. An incumbent is facing a party primary, and whoever wins that primary will face candidates that are not likely to win given the district’s demographics.
Being able to vote in the primary gives you more of a say over who will take that political office.
A good example is the 2020 election for Orange-Osceola state attorney. The race had a crowded field of Democrats and one lesser-known No Party Affiliate candidate. The odds were pretty good a Democrat was going to win in the general election, given the demographics in the two counties.
Monique Worrell won the Democratic primary for Orange-Osceola state attorney and went on to win the general election.
Only Democratic voters got to pick which candidate would face the NPA candidate in November, and likely win the general election.
If an election is important to you, you may want to choose a political party before the primary in order to have more of a say.
The loophole
There is a way to open a party primary to all voters.
If you have an election where only people from one political party have decided to run for an office, the election becomes open to every voter. This is called a universal primary.
The winner of this universal primary wins the office they were campaigning for.
This happens occasionally with state legislature or county seats.
But there is a loophole that closes a primary: get a write-in candidate to run for that election.
It costs a write-in candidate nothing to run, their name doesn’t even go on the ballot. But since there is a candidate with a different political affiliation in the race, there will be no universal primary, only primaries open to political party members only.
This tactic has been used by some factions to close voters out of elections. As elections officials have pointed out before, statistically, write-in candidates don’t win in county, state or federal elections, and many even drop out of the race before election day.
There have been several reports in recent years where write-in candidates with ties to a party candidate will run, thus insulating that candidate from the wider community of voters with a closed primary race.
“We’ve seen more of it being used as a political tool in different ways than a legitimate candidate who is seriously working to win the seat,” Orange County Supervisor of Elections Bill Cowles told News 6 in 2020.
Despite calls over the last few years to close the write-in loophole, Florida lawmakers have not taken the issue up.
Again, if you wish to vote in a party primary this March, you have until Feb. 20 to change your party affiliation. Head to Register to Vote Florida.gov to update your registration.
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