Let's Find Common Ground - Primaries and Polarization: Is The Whole System Broken?

Episode Date: September 1, 2022

The primary election season in this midterm election year is now over in most states. Turnout was often very low— less than 20% of registered voters showed up in many places— while the partisan divide was as wide as ever.  In this episode, we hear from leading political strategists, scholars, authors, and journalists about the American system for choosing candidates who will face each other in November's election. We hear criticisms of closed party primaries and look at other ways to pick candidates for public office. Proposals aimed at reducing polarization include the introduction of ranked-choice voting and open primaries, where independent voters, and those who are neither registered Republicans nor Democrats, can participate.  Guests include Former Democratic Party Chair Donna Brazille, ex-Congressmen Will Hurd, David Jolly, and Barney Frank, Domestic Policy Council Director Susan Rice, constitutional law scholar Rick Pildes, author Tony Woodlief, and journalists Salena Zito, Christa Case Bryant, and Story Hinckley.

The primary season in this midterm election year is over. In most states and predictably turnout was low, often below 20% of registered voters, while the partisan divide was as wide as ever. On the Republican side, most Trump-induced candidates beat challenges and even incumbents who did not gain the support of the former president. The results were more mixed for Democrats, but in most states a very large number of voters, registered independence, all those who don't identify with either major party, were shut out of the primary process. Their voice has not even been heard.

You're listening to a special episode of Let's Find Common Ground. I'm Ashley Miltite. And I'm Richard Davies. We look at primaries as a way of picking candidates who compete for votes in November's general election that will decide whether Democrats keep control of both houses of Congress. We examine problems with the primaries and ask, is there a better way to pick candidates for public office? We'll hear from multiple guests

we've spoken with on our podcast and at public events organized by Common Ground Committee. Let's start off with Constitutional Law Scholar Rick Pilders who says that for most of its history America didn't even have primaries but then along

came the 1960s, and sweeping changes brought about by the movements for civil rights and women's rights, plus demands to end the war in Vietnam. In all this tumult, the old way of picking presidential candidates was swept away. One of the most radical changes we made to our political process in the last 50, 60 years was the change from the convention-based system for choosing nominees to the system we created in the 1970s, which basically is these primary elections choose the delegates to the conventions

and whoever gets a majority of the delegates and the primaries gets the nomination. That has huge ramifications for the kinds of candidates who run for president and the kinds of candidates who are capable of winning the nomination. It also had a huge impact on Senate and House races. Over the years, partisan divisions grew even wider. For 170 years, we had a system of choosing the party nominees that in one form or another gave the party elected officials some significant weight in deciding who their nominee should be. One of the things about that system is it required candidates to have the support

of local national state elected officials from the party, broad support within the party, as well as an appeal to the voters, because there were primary elections, they just didn't control all of the votes for the delegates to the convention. It left the party with some say over who represented the party. Before I heard what Rick Pildis was saying there, I really didn't know that there was anything before the primaries that the party bosses essentially chose those who were going to run. Yeah, primaries were supposed to let people in to the fairly closed off political process and give them a much bigger say in who becomes major candidates and elections. Under the old system, what was often referred to as smoke-filled

rooms where party bosses close the doors and decided amongst themselves who would be chosen. Rick Pildes is among many political scholars and legal experts who say the current system, which began with such good intentions, is now broken. Yes, so I think the primary system we have is itself one of the most significant threats to the democratic system as it's turned out over time. The concern is that candidates who have the broadest appeal in a general election aren't able to get through the primary process and get win-owed out, and the candidates who are left in the general election are fairly extreme candidates from either side.

Some would go even further. At a Common Ground Committee public event in 2019, Susan Rice, who served in several senior roles in Democratic administrations, had this to say. The way our system is structured at the moment, it rewards the extremes. And so whether we're talking about the role of money in politics and particularly dark money, whether we're talking about how our congressional districts are drawn, that are designed to feed the extremes.

Whether we're talking about the elimination of the earmark, which at the time seemed like a great idea, we're not going to have this guy be able to put pork-battle money into his own district. But guess what? Earmarks meant that members of Congress from both sides of the aisle had to work together to get something done that was mutually beneficial. It was actually a glue or better put a grease that facilitated actual legislation. At that event Susan Rice also

said that political polarization is the number one national security threat, because on so many issues, our divisions have prevented agreement on some of the most basic stuff. That is impeding our competitiveness, and it's impeding, frankly, our ability to remain an effective global leader. But the second thing I'll point you to is that our adversaries have come to understand that our domestic political divisions are something they could work to their own advantage. And that's what Russia has been doing so avidly for several years. And not just in the context of the 2016 or the 2018 or the 2020 election. But every day through social media and other means,

the Russians are pitting us against each other. They're throwing salt in the wounds of our domestic divisions. And whether the issues are race or immigration or gay rights or guns, they pick the most divisive issues. And they don't have a perspective on what is the right side. They just want people on both sides to doubt each other, to fear each other, to hate each

other. Susan Rice speaking there in 2019. Since that recording, she joined the Biden administration as director of the Domestic Policy Council. Journalist story Hinckley and Christa Case Bryant cover politics for the Christian Science Monitor. They say the people who vote in primaries often don't have the same views as most Americans. The way our system is set up right now, candidates in a primary have an incentive to go within a Republican primary as far right as possible. Candidates in a Democratic primary have an incentive to go as far left as possible because

the people who vote in primary elections are die hard voters, either die hard Republican voters or die hard Democratic voters. And then once the candidate wins a primary by either being far left or far right, they can quickly try to tack to the middle for the general, but most of the time, they don't have to because the way our political participation works right now is that they're trying to appeal to the voters who turn out and those are often the most extreme voters. And Jerry Mandering, which is the way that the districts, political districts are drawn, plays a huge role in that because that determines what constituents a candidate is trying to appeal to.

Yeah, I think story is making a really good point that if you're in a solidly blue or solidly red area, the election is really decided in the primary, not in the general election, because most people who are Republicans will vote for the Republican candidate, no matter who it is, and most people who are Dems will vote for the Democratic candidate, no matter who it is. So the people who are deciding which candidate to send to the state house or send to Congress are the people who vote in the primary elections. And I think a lot of average voters think like, I'm not that into politics, you know, I'll just wait till the general election, and then I'll weigh in without realizing that that essentially gives them very little

voice in what type of governance they're going to see in Congress. We just heard that partisan gerrymandering where both parties draw political maps that aim to increase the number of their representatives in Congress can increase political divisions. Former Democratic Party Chair and political strategist Donna Brazil takes up that theme. Jerem Mandarin has rendered us to essentially two major minority parties that make sense, as representing the country when indeed non-al aligned voters, independent voters of whatever there may be. They outnumber both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party and often they don't have a say in the primary process. They own the sidelines waiting for us to pick out

our players and they're often the extreme or more today, more the extreme of both major political parties versus the mainstream. And part of the mainstream independent voters, former Republican Congressman David Jolly is now a founding member of a new independent party simply called forward. He says the U.S. political system is an outlier. All you have to do is look at leading countries around the world and realize that the United States is kind of a loan on an island with an entrenched do-opily. Most leading nations today have multi-party democracies with three or four or five competitive

parties. The data demonstrates that voters feel better represented. We have better and more inclusive policy outcomes. Multi-party democracies give greater voice to more people within the body politic of a country or a jurisdiction. The United States stands alone. And in large parties, because we have allowed

the two major parties to protect the duopoly themselves. At another common ground committee public event, former Democratic Congressman Barney Frank said the system is not the only problem. There's apathy among voters who don't show up at the polls, especially during primaries. The failure of the more moderate Americans to vote during primaries because if everybody voted in primaries You would have a very different result It's a provocative argument that Barney Frank is making blame the people not just the system The stupidest thing in the world is to be someone who votes in the final election and not the primary

If you're too god damn lazy to vote in, then vote in the primary, because the primary has much more effect than the final election. But it is the refusal of most Americans to vote in primaries that allows the most extreme partisans and advocates to dominate who gets picked. And then they are the people who don't want to compromise, but also even if they are willing to compromise. This is a real problem for the Republicans now, one of the Democrats. They face this problem of being opposed in primaries if they compromise. So the voters are the ones who can change that

by voting in the primaries for people who do not fall into that category. Former Democratic Congressman, Bonnie Frank. This is Let's Find Common Ground. I'm Ashley. And I'm Richard. You've just heard body frank kind of scolding us really for not turning out to vote in primaries. Well, we're here with the resource to help you do that and maybe a bit more as well. There's a single

web page that presents four actions all of us can take before the midterm elections coming up in the fall. We can all register, then vote on election day, volunteer as election workers at polling sites, and help get out the vote. You can find the midterm elections participation guide at citizenconnect.us. That website aims to make it easier for all Americans to have their voice heard at the US. connect.us. And now back to our show. What we've been hearing is that in many cases, moderate voters are shut out of primaries, and that these elections can be more important in deciding the true makeup of Congress than what happens in November.

Actually, on this podcast, you and I spoke with Will Hurd, who is a former Republican congressman from Southern Texas. We asked him about turnout earlier this year in his state. We need more people voting in primaries. When you look at Texas, we had primary elections in March, three million people voted out of 30 million, 1.2 million Democrats, 1.8 million Republicans. That's terrible turnout. And so we need more people that are concerned with these issues to step

up and vote in primaries. What are you saying is that if more people did vote, we could get a different result. Conservative journalist Sillina Zito has an interesting perspective on American voters. The people she interviews live in small towns and cities in the middle of the country, well away from the big metropolitan centers like New York, Washington, D.C., or Los Angeles. Many of these people are populists, and they're deeply skeptical of college-educated professional elites who dominate many institutions, including the mainstream media. So Edizino says that West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, who has frequently been vilified by liberals and progressives, actually reflects the views of many Democratic voters that she speaks

with. And I will tell you, there are plenty of local Democrats that are out there that are the same as Joe Manchin, that have a buffet of issues that tend to be very rooted and grounded in the areas that they're from, and they reflect that, but with their votes. You see those kinds of Democrats in state legislative bodies, or state senate, state house, some governors where they more have the freedom to be reflective of the area they represent. But when it comes to federal office, whether it's Congress or Senate, those kinds of candidates

traditionally lose these races to be more progressive candidates in primaries, because most many of our primaries are closed, so only Democrats can vote in those primaries. And the most excited Democrats and or Republicans are always in a primary are always to the light or to the left of their party. That's Salinasito. So let's explore this theme a little bit more that moderates are not fairly represented in primaries.

As Salinasito said, primaries in most states are closed. You have to register as a Republican or as a Democrat to vote. In his recent book called, I Citizen, author Tony Woodleaf made the case that party activists and leaders are often attempting to undermine the freedom of Americans to govern themselves and make decisions that have a direct impact on their lives. The rub is because the people who determine the sort of slate of choices for both major parties in the U.S. they are the most extreme on left and right. These people are very far right and left, temperamentally as well.

They're the ones who decide the issue positions as a party and so then you've got most Americans who are more in the middle and You know, they don't most Americans don't want to choose between an Uncompassionate wall coupled with throwing people who've lived in the American their entire lives out of the country because they don't have the right paperwork They don't like that as a choice. They also don't like a completely unmanned border with greater COVID testing for citizens and for non-citizens. But those are the two choices they're given by their parties. And we say that all the way down the list of issues that most Americans would choose some

from each party, but they don't get that choice. They get an extreme this way or an extreme that way, and most of them just hold their noses on election day and choose the lesser two evils. Tony Woodleif, who says we Americans are actually less divided than we think, and certainly less divided than primary results make us appear to be. Diane Hesson agrees. She's a marketing research executive who conducted a series of conversations with hundreds of voters from all across the country. For more than four years, she checked in with these voters every week. One finding?

They're fed up with polarization. Absolutely. You know, the easiest question to ask is, do you feel that government is acting in your best interest? Are you upset about the divisiveness in our country? 95% of Americans hate the divisiveness, which is why the work that you're doing is so important? And there are just lots of other issues. You know, are you happy with your political party?

80% of my database said I'm very unhappy with my political party. 80% of my database said I'm very unhappy with my political party. There is tremendous common ground on those opinions and by the way. The large proportion of Republicans answer yes to the question, should government help people who are experiencing trauma and difficulty in their lives. Most Republicans say absolutely to that. What they object to is the notion that we're going to help those people forever unconditionally. So is there any alternative to our system of closed party primaries? Can we do better? For one answer, let's go back to the person we started with. Constitutional law scholar Rick Pildes.

He points to Alaska where the voting rules for elections were changed to reflect the views of the majority of voters, not necessarily those who are most politically involved. The turnout in primary elections is far, far lower than in general elections. It's about one-third of the turnout in general elections. And the people who tend to turn out for primaries are the ones who are most engaged with politics and with the party, and they tend to come from the more sort of act of this wings of each party. In order to get through the primary, you have to appeal to that kind of electorate,

which is not representative of the general election electorate. So a clear example we have of a candidate who could not get through a party primary, but actually was the candidate who appealed most broadly to the full electorate in their state as Lee Simmerkowski in 2010. She lost the Republican primary, but Alaska allows candidates to run right in campaigns in the general election, even if they have lost in the primary. And so she managed to mount a right in candidacy in the general election and she won the general election as a right in

Candidate, not as a Republican. Lisa Murkowski is one of the most moderate Republicans in the US Senate who won her primary this time around. Rick Pilters says Alaska's new system of voting may have some positive lessons for other states. Are there things we can do to not have primaries have such a stringle hold over our politics that they fuel extremism? Is measures like the one Alaska just adopted in this last election? The voters in Alaska adopted what's called a top four primary structure with ranked choice voting in the general election. And everybody runs in a single sort of primary election, you identify yourself as supporting the

Democratic Party or the Republican Party or an independent or whatever it might be. And the top four vote getters then go on to the general election. And in the general election, voters are given the choice of ranking candidates one through four. Under ranked choice voting, people can pick their candidates in order of preference, first, second, third, etc. On election night during the count after the first round, the candidate with the least support has his or her votes distributed to those who won more support.

The process continues until one candidate has more than 50% of preference votes. So, Richard, this means that if you vote for someone who may not have a great chance of winning, your vote won't be wasted. Exactly. That's one of the intentions of Rank Choice Voting. The person who was your second choice, who did better than the person you picked first, will end up getting your vote. And supporters say Rank Choice Voting and open primaries where anyone can vote are two reforms that might boost turnout and lead to less polarization in the future. And the debate goes on. That's it for this episode of Let's Find Common Ground from Common Ground Committee.

Hear more episodes and take on listener survey at commongroundcommittee.org. I'm Ashley Muntite. I'm Richard Davies. Thanks for listening. you