Brack: Expand voting instead of trying to close it

The Republican political kerfuffle over whether primary elections should be only open to members of a political party or all voters is nothing more than election-year blather.

It’s a hot issue that tanked this week in the S.C. House, where some GOP members got all hot and bothered about whether anybody should be able to vote in Republican primaries and then be classified as a Republican or whether the state should have party registration so that only registered members can vote.

S.C. Rep. Brandon Newton, the Lancaster Republican who sponsored a more mainstream bill backed by the state Republican Party, classified the fervor inside the party as a kind of “civil war.”

“This has been the nastiest debate internally I’ve ever witnessed in the party structure,” he told the S.C. Daily Gazette. “The divide on this topic and the divide between two pieces of legislation have truly put, I believe, the party in a civil war.”

The issue essentially pitted some mainstream Republicans, who backed Newton’s bill to allow undeclared voters to participate in a GOP primary, but be classified as registered Republicans afterwards, against a bill by the S.C. House Freedom Caucus. It pushed a measure for party registration to be completed at least 30 days before a primary before participation was allowed. That bill would essentially would exclude anybody, including independents, who didn’t register well before the primary.

Both bills stalled in committee this week and are not expected to raise their heads again this session.

For most of us, this is all a bunch of narrow insider GOP politics to appeal to the far right wing of the base where some people get all bent out of shape about the possibility that a demon Democrat or independent might actually vote in a primary of Republican candidates.

“You’ve got this belief among some in the Republican Party that Democrats are coming over and adopting the mantle of being Republican and really not having the small government ideology that Republicans have,” one senior Republican elected official told us this week.

Really? Is it that big of a deal in a state where we have high poverty, inadequate education and substandard health care? Aren’t there bigger problems than trying to figure out who might be invited to an election party?

You’d think Republicans would want to attract new voters, including independents and Democrats, so that they might eventually switch their allegiance, especially if the non-Republicans move to a new primary because candidates seem better.

On a broader level, trying to curb voting is kind of dumb, too. As Americans, we should want to encourage as much voting as possible, not erect barriers to keep people out. Representative democracy works best when as many voices as possible are heard.

Fortunately, some senior leaders in the GOP, including Gov. Henry McMaster, aren’t having anything much to do with battling factions of S.C. House Republicans over the issue. McMaster has said he’ll veto any closed primary bill that might get to his desk.

And state senators seem to be less than impressed with preening election year politics by GOP members of the House.

“This is a good example of the House being a more populist body and the Senate being a more deliverable body,” one Democratic senator told us.

“It’s an election year. It’s to be expected. They can huff and puff all they want.”

And so they do. Cock-a-doodle-do!

Andy Brack is editor and publisher of the Charleston City Paper and Statehouse Report. Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com.