Connecticut’s Unaffiliated Voters Keep the Midterm Elections, Not Primaries, In Sight

As Connecticut Democratic and Republican parties prepare for their respective primaries ahead of the midterms, a number of voters who are unaffiliated with either party will be left on the sidelines.

That is because Connecticut has closed primaries, meaning only registered Republicans or Democrats can vote in their respective event. Unaffiliated voters — who outnumber both parties — cannot participate in primaries but can vote in general elections, Laura Smits, co-president of the Connecticut chapter of the League of Women Voters (LWVCT), told The Goshen News. “That's just the reality in Connecticut,” she said.

Across the country, however, there is a general trend toward opening up party primaries to allow more registered voters to cast ballots in any party’s primary, regardless of the voter’s party affiliation or non-affiliation, said Andrew Dowdle, a political science professor at the University of Arkansas whose area of focus includes election primaries.
That can be through open primaries like those held in Montana, Vermont and 12 other states that allow all voters to participate in any party’s primary, according to Ballotpedia. In addition, 19 states have at least one major party holding open primaries.

Open primaries can also be through multiparty or “jungle primary” systems, such as California’s, that allows any registered voter to select from a single ballot that lists all the candidates and advances the top-two finishers to the general election.

In rarer cases, Dowdle said, semi-closed primaries are held in which unaffiliated or independent voters are allowed to vote in either the Republican or Democratic primary.

“There is some evidence that open primaries do marginally end up increasing voter turnout,” he said, “but it’s only by a few percentage points.”

Proponents of these types of primaries often see them as less about voter turnout and more about promoting less polarized candidates and expanding the selection of candidates for the general election to a greater range of voters, Dowdle said. “It's supposed to give everybody a shot at participating,” he said.

Some groups in states with closed systems — including Oregon where, like Connecticut, nonaffiliated voters outnumber registered Democrats and Republicans — are pushing for change. In Oregon, two former state politicians (one a Democrat and the other a Republican) along with the co-chair of the state’s independent party are promoting ballot initiatives aimed at opening up the primaries to all voters.

Despite the national trend, there are a few states in the South, where open primaries were once more prevalent, now considering closing them, Dowdle said.

This is mostly occurring in states with large Republican majorities that are not trying to attract crossover voters — those who participate in a primary of a party that they do not usually affiliate with, he said. “They want to end up ensuring that their more conservative nominees get picked.”

That is the case in Arkansas where the state Republican party began closing primaries this year, a first in the state’s 100-plus-year history of holding open primaries, he said. The Democratic primaries, however, remain open.

There is a similar situation in Texas, which also has an open system. The Republican Party of Texas (RPT) recently sued the state in a bid to get it to allow the GOP to hold closed primaries. RPT charges in the suit that crossover voters may vote in the Republican primary for someone they believe is least electable in the general election or they may vote against the candidate they believe is most likely to win a general election.

The concern that a voter may try to sabotage the general election by voting for the weaker and easier-to-defeat candidate in the opposition party’s primary is a common among critics of open primaries, Dowdle said. “People talk about this all the time but it almost never happens,” he said. “Most people are voting sincerely, not cynically.”

The LWVCT does not take a position on either open or closed primaries, Smits said. “It is very unfortunate that unaffiliated voters don’t have much to say,” she said, adding that to change the situation would require changing “not just our Constitution but a lot of other things...”

As an example she pointed to Connecticut “finally” allowing early voting in 2024 “after I don't know how many tries,” and the fact that voters authorized the state legislature in 2024 to sanction no-excuse absentee voting but “we still don’t have it.”

Usually states decide in conjunction with the political parties on whether primaries are open or closed, Dowdle said. In Connecticut, where the parties have the right to determine the rules, voters — unaffiliated or otherwise —  are required to affiliate with a party to take part in that party’s primary, a process that takes three months after filing.
Last year, the state’s registration and enrollment statistics for active voters showed that unaffiliated voters numbered 935,892, compared with Republicans at 489,905 and Democrats at 792,887. In Connecticut, unaffiliated voters are separate from independents, who have their own party. The number of independent voters, which the state aggregates with other minor parties, was at 34,030.