Politics Pay Attention, People
For the last 3 weeks, since The Stranger Election Control Board made its picks for this Tuesday’s primary election, we’ve been running a handy Cheat Sheet for you.
Just as important as our picks (Gerry Alexander in Supreme Court Justice position No. 8 ; Yes on Initiative No. 88, the education funding levy; Stephanie Pure in the 43rd District state house race) is this: Follow the damn directions we printed at the top of the page under the “Party Preference” choice.
As we wrote: “Voters must designate a party preference to vote in that party’s primary. You cannot vote in a Republican contest if you select Democratic.”
As The Seattle Times reported in an alarming article last week about Snohomish County:
A sampling of 250 ballots collected for Tuesday’s primary shows about 20 percent of voters did not select a party, invalidating the choices they made in partisan races.
Once again: In our new “Pick-a-Party Primary” voters must select Republican or Democratic before voting in partisan races. And you can only vote in the partisan races that correspond to your party choice. For example, if you check Republican, you cannot vote in the 6-way 43rd District Democratic primary. You can only vote in the Republican primary. If you don’t check either Democratic or Republian—your vote in partisan races will not be counted. Similary, if you pick one party, but vote in both party’s primaries—or in the opposite party’s primary—your votes in partisan races will not count. If you fail to pick a party, your vote will be counted only in nonpartisan races and for ballot measures, like initiatives and the Supreme Court races.
Got it? Good. Now vote, vote, vote! And remeber: Pure, Alexander, Susan Owens, and Yes on I-88.
Dammit ... why'd you have to go and alert all the Republicans to this?