A co-worker of mine just moved from South Florida to Portland, and the Oregon primary was in the news. This made me think…primary elections are state events, not national. There are registration deadlines, but they are probably scattered through the year, just like the elections/caucuses themselves. I have no idea if they are scattered enough to allow you to take advantage of the system by moving a few times.
So my question is…legally and logistically, how many primaries could a US citizen vote in, meeting various residency and registration deadlines? Let’s use the 2016 election cycle as the governing rule set. Is it more than 1?
(Could be Elections, but there should be a factual answer, and I hang out in GQ more than Elections…so hopefully this can stay here)
I haven’t found a clear answer to this, but I believe that the primaries are considered Federal Elections and it would be illegal to vote in more than one of them.
Just to nitpick a bit, the OP talks as if there is only one primary, for presidential electors. Primaries are held for almost all offices and they aren’t necessarily at the same time. In New York this year, separate primaries will be held for local, congressional, and presidential races.
Thanks, TriPolar. I fully expect that if it is, in fact, a federal regulation, then you can only legally vote in one primary. I haven’t been able to dig up a source that confirms that part, though. As far as I could tell, your link goes into detail about the actual presidential election, but not about the primary process.
Are the primaries state run and controlled, or are they actually regulated at some level by the federal government? I know there are federal limitations on money donated for the primaries, so there is certainly a role of some sort.
And yes, Exapno Mapcase - I did mean presidential primaries. Good catch on the nit, though…I appreciate a good nit when I see one.
I’ll be voting in two primaries this year. I voted for Bernie Sanders at the Maine Caucus on March 6, and I will be voting on June 14 in the primary election for the Maine State Senate.
No one actually votes for presidential candidates in the primaries, despite appearances otherwise. What you’re actually voting for in presidential primaries is either the delegates to the party conventions or, most commonly, instructions to the delegates for how they are to vote in the first ballot. They are party operations, but the states generally run them, so you have to follow state rules about registration deadlines. However,they are not federal elections, so there’s nothing to prevent one from moving around and voting in more than one.
Various states have different deadlines for registering, usually about a month before the election, but in some you can register on election day. Without doing too much work, I came up with a list of 6 primary elections you could legally vote in. I assumed there would have to be at least one day between voting in one and registering in another state. I also assumed no absentee voting and in vote-by-mail states, you stay in the state all the way through election day. I ignored caucus states. Here’s my list, although other lists of the same length could be made by various substitutions.
state registration election
======================================
New Hampshire Feb 9 Feb 9
Missouri Feb 17 March 15
Idaho March 22 March 22
New York March 30 April 19
Oregon April 26 May 17
California May 23 June 7
Is this the best? Don’t know. See if you can do better.
As far as I know, the time between registering and voting is the minimum residence time for voting in that state. Remember the Constitution (amendment 14) says that all US citizens are citizens of the state they live in and the state can’t abridge their rights, including their right to vote. A state may be able to require a minimal time for administrative purposes, but can’t legally add more than that.
There is a problem that you can qualify to be a resident of more than one state in all ways except for claiming residency in both. For non-voting purposes you may actually be a resident of more than one state. The states aren’t checking their voting registrations with the other 49 states and additional districts and territories.
I’m a little bit surprised that the answer to this isn’t clear considering the current political environment. On the other hand, the voter fraud issue isn’t a real concern anyway, and neither side of the aisle cares that much, if at all, if someone is voting in more than one state primary.
[ul]
[li]Missouri No durational residency requirement. Must be registered by the fourth Wednesday prior to election.[/li][li]Idaho 30-day residency requirement. May register 25 days prior to any election with County Clerk. Individual may also register on election day at polling place.[/li][li]New York 30-day residency requirement.[/li][li]Oregon Must register by close of business day of registering agencies (which varies), 21st day before the election.[/li][li]California 15-day registration requirement.[/li][/ul]
The exact dates may have changed without that site updating, but you can’t simply move into most states and register and vote immediately.
Checking that page, I find that in most states you can move there by the registration day, register, and then wait (typically 30 days) and vote. As they said at the top, the Supreme
Court ruled that 30 days was an ample period for registration and lengthy waits were unconstitutional.
In the cases of Missouri, Oregon, and California, the registration days I quoted reflect the days you cite above. My resource said New York only has a 20-day registration; not sure why it was different than the 30-day requirement in yours. As for Idaho, how do they know you’ve lived there 30 days if you don’t have to register that far ahead?
And note in the case of Oregon, you can actually move to the state just before the registration deadline, register, and then you will receive a ballot in the mail within about 3 or 4 days. You can then vote with only that much delay.
I found the KPCC transcript that claims this, but I’d be interested in seeing a cite of the actual law if anyone can find that. I’m not sure exactly how this is justifiable, when individual state parties are given so much discretion in so many aspects.
There may be some primaries that are considered federal. In Oregon here, the primary is not just for president, but for all positions up for election in November, including congresspersons and US senators. But not all states do it this way. I suspect most do not.
