If we guarantee the American citizen a full voice in the selection of candidates, and shaping the policy of his party and the administration of government incident thereto, then shall we invest not only the primaries, but the elections as well, with an abiding interest for him, extending beyond the day of the primaries and the day of the election, the weeks of the campaign—indeed, we shall make the primary and the election of vastly deeper significance, appealing in a new way to his deliberate judgment, his patriotism and his personal responsibility.
Robert La Follette, “Peril in the Machine, February 23, 1897
It’s May 2026, and we are in the thick of primary season. Around the neighborhood, candidate signs are blooming next to the tulips. While early-bird states like Texas and Illinois wrapped up their contests back in March—and heavyweights like Pennsylvania and Georgia just finished theirs—the gauntlet is far from over. Between now and the end of June, dozens of states from California to New Jersey will head to the polls to decide who actually gets a shot at the big time in November. And for some states, like Massachusetts and Delaware, the finish line won’t arrive until September. The busy season is officially here.
What’s on the ballot this year? Every single one of the 435 House seats is on the line, along with 35 Senate seats. Further down the ballot are the many local races that hit closer to home: 36 governorships, state legislatures, and those powerful (but often ignored) offices like Secretary of State or Attorney General that basically run the machinery of our democracy. Scattered across these ballots are also the measures that actually change voters’ daily lives. Depending on where you’re voting, you might be weighing in on whether to hike the minimum wage, overhaul teacher retirement funding, or tweak judicial bail rules.
It is a complex and often overlooked gateway, yet in the American system, the primary is a decisive filter. It is where the direction of the country is decided, often by a tiny fraction of the people who will eventually show up in November.
What Exactly is a Primary?
At its simplest, a primary is a pre-election. While the general election in November decides who actually gets the job, a primary determines which candidate will represent a specific political party on the November ballot. It basically functions as the qualifying heat before the championship race. Instead of one giant field of 20 candidates, the primary allows each team (the parties) to narrow their field down to a single champion.
On average, only about 20% of eligible American voters participate in primary elections nationwide compared to the general election which might see a 60% or 70% voter turnout. For example, in 2024, only 23% of registered voters cast a ballot in the primaries, while 65% voted in November.
This means that in many states, the candidates who move on to the final ballot are chosen by a tiny, highly motivated slice of the population. However, that 20% average hides some wild swings depending on the year and the local rules. When a major issue or a high-profile race hangs in the balance, people do show up. In 2022, Kansas saw a turnout of nearly 48% driven by a constitutional amendment, and Wyoming reached 63% during the historically competitive primary for its at-large Congressional seat. On the other hand, in many states, primary participation can crater into the single digits or low teens. For example, during the 2024 presidential primaries, New York saw a turnout of just 4.2% of registered voters for the presidential primary and 10.1% in the state primaries, while only 12.7% of Mississippi’s registered voters turned out during the primaries.
Because turnout is so low from the primaries, even a small shift in the rules, like how voters register, can change who wins.
What Does the Law Say about Primaries?
Primary elections are not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. Because of this constitutional silence, the law regarding primaries is a constant tug-of-war between the rights of the political party and the authority of the state government.
On one side of the rope, political parties function as private clubs. The Supreme Court has ruled that parties have a First Amendment right to freedom of association, meaning they have the power to define the boundaries of their own group. In the landmark case Tashjian v. Republican Party of Connecticut, the Court ruled that a state couldn’t force a party to keep its primary closed if the party itself wanted to invite independent voters to participate. Essentially, the Court decided that the state cannot substitute its own judgment for the party’s decision on who is allowed to help pick its candidates.
On the other side of the rope, the state manages the primary process. Because we use public tax dollars, public buildings, and government poll workers to run these elections, state legislatures have the power to set the administrative rules. If a state wants to streamline the process or manage costs, it can mandate specific ballot types or set strict registration deadlines that the parties must follow.
A voter’s primary experience is the direct result of these two sides negotiating. In some states, the law leans toward protecting the autonomy of the party, ensuring that only committed members shape the ticket. In others, the state uses its authority to prioritize voter access, creating a system where any citizen can have a say in who makes it to the final ballot. This ongoing negotiation is exactly why the U.S. doesn’t have one single American primary system, but rather 50+ distinct versions.
The History of the Primaries
For most of American history, the idea that regular people should pick their party’s nominee would have sounded like a joke to the political elite. Throughout the 19th century, a voter’s choice really wasn’t his and was essentially made for him long before he ever reached the ballot box (“he” because only men were voters at this time of course). This was true for every position from the presidency to congressional seats down to local races like the county sheriff.
A voter in 1850 didn’t vote on a government-printed ballot. Instead, a local party worker, often a ward boss who knew exactly where the voter lived would hand him a party ticket. This was a pre-printed slip of paper listing the party’s hand-picked slate for every race. The voter simply dropped that slip into the ballot box. If a prospective candidate wanted to run for the House of Representatives and the local party boss didn’t like him, the candidate wouldn’t stand a chance of getting on the ticket. Candidates were chosen at District Conventions or neighborhood caucuses where delegates horse-traded favors and patronage behind closed doors. It was a closed loop: the party bosses picked the delegates, and the delegates picked the candidates.
The Senate was even more insulated from the public. Under the original Constitution, Americans didn’t vote for U.S. Senators at all, and state legislatures were responsible for picking them. This turned state capitals into hotbeds of deal-making. Candidates for the Senate lobbied state lawmakers in backrooms. It was a system that led to massive corruption and deadlocks during which a state would go months (or even four years as was once the case for Delaware) without a Senator because the legislature couldn’t agree on which insider to appoint.
The first real crack in this machine came from a fed-up Progressive named Robert “Fighting Bob” La Follette. At the turn of the 20th century, La Follette saw that as long as the party machines controlled the tickets, citizens had no real power. He argued that
the caucus, delegate and convention system is inherently bad. It invites to manipulation, scheming, trickery, corruption and fraud. Even if the caucus were fairly conducted, the plan of which it is a part removes the nomination too far from the voter.
In 1903, he pushed through Wisconsin’s first mandatory statewide primary in an attempt to drag the process into the light. This coincided with the rise of the secret ballot (also known as the Australian ballot), where the government, not the parties, finally started printing ballots. For the first time, the state could list multiple candidates from the same party and let the voters decide who made the cut for November.
While these reforms slowly trickled down to Congressional races and the Senate (thanks to the 17th Amendment in 1913), the Presidential process remained the final holdout. For decades, nominees were still picked in smoke-filled rooms, immune to the populist wave hitting lower offices. That finally broke for good during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. After the party handed the nomination to Hubert Humphrey, who hadn’t won a single primary, the resulting riots forced a total overhaul of the rules. While the Democrats sparked that revolution, the Republicans were soon swept along as state legislatures across the country began codifying these new rules into law for both parties. By 1972, the primary became the law of the land, a move designed to give the public more power.
Types of Primaries
Because there is no federal law for how a primary must run, every state has developed its own set of primary rules. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) generally groups these into a few key buckets:
Closed Partisan Primaries: This is the “members only” model. Voters receive a ballot for the party with which they are affiliated and can only vote for candidates on their party’s ticket. This type of primary is designed to ensure a party’s nominee is chosen only by its most loyal supporters. Unfortunately for anyone listed as an Independent (or a third-party voter), they are unable to vote in these specific races.
Open Partisan Primaries: In open partisan primaries, the voter’s registration doesn’t lock them in to voting for their affiliated party ticket. They can be a registered Republican, a Democrat, or a total Independent, but can choose which party’s ballot they want to vote on when they show up to vote. The catch? They can only pick one and cannot vote in the Republican Senate primary and the Democratic House primary on the same day. In some states you may need to publicly declare your choice of party ballot at the polling place; in other states, you can choose your party ballot privately in the voting booth.
Semi/Partially Closed Primaries: In some states, if a voter is already registered with a party, the voter will vote for that party’s ballot, but if the voter is an independent, they are invited to pick which primary they want to participate in. In states like Maryland, unaffiliated voters can now use “same-day affiliation” during early voting to unlock a party ballot on the spot.
Partially Closed & Partially Open Primaries: In Partially Closed systems, the party itself gets to decide if they’ll let Independents vote in their primaries (though not members of the other party.) In Partially Open systems, voters can vote for any party, but the act of doing so might change their official registration to that party on the spot.
Multi-Party or Top-Two Primary Systems: States like California and Washington, have thrown out the partisan primary altogether. All candidates, regardless of party affiliation, are listed on one ballot. All voters get the same ballot. The two candidates (or four in states like Alaska) who get the most votes move on to November, even if they’re from the same party.
Nonpartisan Primaries are used for nonpartisan local offices like judges or school boards. If one candidate gets more than 50% of the vote in the primary, they often win the seat outright; otherwise, the top two move to a general or runoff election.
Primaries Beyond the 50 States
While we often focus on the 50 states and the District of Columbia, the primary system also extends to millions of Americans living in five U.S. territories. In the 2026 cycle, residents in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands will conduct primaries to narrow the field for local governors and their non-voting Delegates to the U.S. House.
While most territories follow a partisan model where voters must select a specific party ballot, the lack of a federal mandate allows for local variation. For instance, Guam historically utilizes a partisan primary where voters must stick to a single party on election day, whereas American Samoa often foregoes a traditional partisan primary for its Congressional delegate in favor of a nonpartisan general election that moves to a runoff if no candidate secures a majority. It is also worth noting that while these voters participate in the primary process to shape party platforms and choose nominees, they do not participate in the general election for President in November. This makes the primary season one of the most critical windows for territory residents to exert their political influence on the national stage.
The 2026 Primary Shakeup
If you feel like election rules are changing mid-game, you’re right. Three major developments are defining this primary cycle.
The Redistricting Ripple Effect
In several states, primary calendars have shifted as states navigate a chaotic redistricting landscape.
Following the Supreme Court’s April 29, 2026 decision in Louisiana v. Callais, Louisiana suspended its planned May 16 House primaries in order to overhaul its congressional map, even though 42,000 absentee ballots had already been cast.
Leveraging the Callais precedent to try and revert to its 2023 electoral maps, Alabama voided primary results for four major congressional districts which had been cast on May 19. The Governor called for new primaries to be held for those districts using the 2023 maps on August 11.
Moving proactively to manage its own map volatility, Virginia delayed its traditional June primary slate to August 4, buying time to deal with its maps following an April statewide redistricting referendum, an issue that is still held up in the courts.
The Shift in Primary Types
We are witnessing a fascinating split as states further try to define who gets access to the primary ballot box:
In a massive departure from its famous, wide-open Jungle Primary, Louisiana officially transitioned to a closed primary format for high-profile federal and judicial contests, explicitly blocking unaffiliated voters from participating.
Conversely, New Mexico moved in the opposite direction for its June primaries, implementing a new semi-open system. The rule change allows an estimated 378,000 independent voters to participate in major party primaries without forcing them to permanently alter their voter registration.
Washington, D.C.’s voters passed a ballot measure in 2024 to transition to a semi-open primary which would allow over 75,000 independent voters to participate in party contests. However, a D.C. Council budget standoff left the open primary portion unfunded for this cycle, meaning independent voters remain locked out for now.
New Voting Rules
Even where calendars and party access rules stayed intact, some state laws have introduced stringent new verification protocols that are fundamentally changing the voting experience for voters and poll workers:
Following a series of legal challenges that previously complicated its rollout, North Carolina’s permanent elimination of its mail-in ballot grace period is in effect. Absentee ballots must be physically in the hands of election officials by 7:30 PM on primary night to count, regardless of when they were postmarked, narrowing the delivery window for mail-in voters.
Operating under a state law that permanently eliminates some voter identity alternatives (like utility bills or bank statements), Ohio now requires strict photo identification at the check-in table. Anyone without a specific state-approved photo ID must vote a provisional ballot
A new 2026 citizenship verification law has introduced “federal-only” ballots for South Dakota’s June 2 primary for any voters listing P.O. boxes or mail-forwarding addresses. This two-tiered system requires poll workers to navigate different eligibility standards for state and federal contests at the same time.
Do Other Countries Hold Primaries?
Outside of the United States, the primary as Americans know it is a global anomaly. While the U.S. relies heavily on state-funded, open public voting to pick party nominees, the rest of the world approaches candidate selection through a variety of different models, with only Latin America approaching a model similar to ours.
Europe & Canada
In these parliamentary systems, candidate selection is for dues-paying members, not a state-funded public right.
The United Kingdom: To run for Parliament, candidates are vetted and approved by a small committee of party insiders or local party members, though each party has its own process.
Canada: Parties host internal leadership conventions and local district nomination contests. For example, the NDP’s leadership selection relies entirely on an internal ranked ballot system managed by the party apparatus.
France: Instead of holding primaries, France uses a two-round election system and puts every candidate on a single ballot for the initial race. While anyone who meets basic filing rules can legally run, centralized party bosses tightly control candidate funding and brand endorsements to prevent internal competition. To move on to the decisive runoff election just one week later, a candidate must win votes from at least 12.5% of all registered voters in that district.
Voluntary Experiments: Some parties have voluntarily experimented with public outreach to boost civic engagement. Italy’s Democratic Party and various French coalitions have run independent, self-funded voting booths charging a €2 fee to let citizens select their national leaders or presidential candidates. Tech-forward parties like Spain’s Podemos and Austria’s NEOS utilize secured digital voting platforms where any resident can register online to rank candidate slates without paying formal party dues. However, these are entirely voluntary and easily scrapped if party funds run dry.
Asia
Asian democracies also don’t have a tradition of public primary elections.
South Korea & Taiwan: In both countries, major political parties independently hire professional polling firms to conduct massive public telephone surveys in order to determine candidate popularity and who will be their nominees. These surveys are heavily regulated by national election authorities to ensure data integrity, mandate methodology disclosures, and prevent external manipulation.
India: The world’s largest democracy bypasses public primaries. Candidate selection is tightly controlled by a tiny circle of national party elites, often referred to as the Central Election Committee. Voters only get to choose between these pre-selected party tickets on election day.
Africa
Across Africa, primary elections are almost never funded or operated by government electoral commissions. They are treated as strictly internal affairs—but in dominant-party systems, these internal votes carry massive weight.
Ghana: The country’s major parties hold massive, highly organized internal primary voting days. Instead of an open public ballot, hundreds of thousands of dues-paying party delegates cast secret ballots simultaneously at polling stations nationwide to select their nominees.
Nigeria: Under the strict mandates of the country’s Electoral Act, political parties must conduct highly formalized internal primaries via direct member voting, indirect delegate conventions, or written consensus.
Latin America
Latin America is the one region where public primaries do take place and look a bit more like ours.
Argentina: The country utilizes the PASO system (Simultaneous and Mandatory Open Primaries where primaries are not just mandatory for political parties to hold, but voting in them is legally mandatory for every eligible citizen age 18 to 70, even if a party only has one candidate on its ticket. The government fully funds and runs the day, treating it as a massive, nationwide dress rehearsal for the general election. However, because it is highly expensive to run nationwide, President Javier Milei’s administration successfully passed a law suspending the PASO entirely for the 2025 mid-term legislative elections, forcing parties to use internal mechanisms instead. His government has been actively pushing a bill to permanently eliminate the system nationwide.
Chile: The state manages a formalized, binding primary system, though participation remains structurally optional for political coalitions. When coalitions opt-in to field candidates, the national electoral service runs a unified election day where party members and independent voters can vote on candidates who will then move on to general election day. If parties choose not to hold primaries, they can choose their candidates through an internal selection process.
Colombia: While political parties usually bypass public primaries for their own legislative lists, preferring internal negotiations, the state funds concurrent inter-party consultations that hand the high-stakes presidential selection over to the public. This system allows voters to determine which coalition presidential candidates will survive to the first-round ballot. However, while all citizens can participate, they must choose just one coalition’s ballot to cast.
The Primary Matters
From La Follette’s Wisconsin to the jungle primaries of Louisiana, the American primary has never been a tidy or uniform institution. It is the product of constant negotiation: between parties and states, between access and control, between the ideal of popular participation and the practical reality that most people don’t show up.
But that messiness is also the point. Every quirk in the system — from the varying registration rules, the shifting calendars, the 50-odd variations on the same basic idea — reflects an ongoing argument about who democracy is actually for. Most countries never bothered having that argument in public. We still are, and that in itself is positive.
This primary season that argument is playing out and might be more important than ever. The rules are changing. The maps are in flux. And the outcome, as always, will be shaped by whoever decides to show up.