Lawmaker Proposes Closing N.H.'s Primaries, Cites Potential For Electoral Sabotage

The way Rep. Norman Silber sees it, a party primary is supposed to select the best person who represents the values and platform of that particular political party — and allowing undeclared voters to weigh in allows for too much electoral mischief.

“It’s not unheard of that some true members of a party who happen to be registered as undeclared choose to vote in the other party’s primary to try to get the worst candidate or at least the one notionally easiest to beat for the general election,” Silber, a Republican from Gilford, told his colleagues at a House Election Law Committee hearing Tuesday morning. “And this applies irrespective of what party you’re registered as.”

The first-term representative introduced a bill this week that would explicitly ban undeclared voters from participating in primary elections in New Hampshire, unless they change their registration before Election Day.

(The original version of Silber's bill would have eliminated same-day voter registration and imposed new rules for student identification cards used for voting, but he's now opting to focus solely on rules around party primaries. An updated version of his bill is likely to appear online soon.)

Read more: http://nhpr.org/post/lawmaker-proposes-closing-nhs-primaries-cites-potential-electoral-sabotage