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Secretary Wyman, disappointed by defeat of her plans to move the 2016 Washington Presidential Primary from late May to early March, said Wednesday she's nonetheless moving forward with a May 24 primary because "our voters want to vote; they want to be heard."
Wyman, the state’s chief elections officer, has been a strong advocate of the Presidential Primary and had praised lawmakers for including the funding in the state budget. But she had sought to move the primary from May 24, the default date in state law, to March 8 to maximize voter participation and visits from candidates.
But Democrats on the nine-member Presidential Primary Committee blocked Wyman’s proposal. All five Republicans on the panel backed the move. It takes two-thirds to change the date, or six votes. The Democrats also rejected an alternate date, for March 22, proposed by state Rep. Matt Manweller, R-Ellensburg.
Democrats said the primary is meaningless to them because the party already is committed to using their March 26 caucuses. Republicans said they want to use both caucuses and primary results to allocate national convention delegates.
The Democrats' opposition leaves the Presidential Primary at May 24, with mail ballots going out 18 days before that.
Wyman said the date is late in the primary season and could affect turnout and the appeal to candidates. But she said there is still value in having the election to engage and empower the electorate.
“I am very disappointed,” Wyman said. “We had wanted to give voters a real voice while the national hunt for convention delegates is in the early stages. Initially, I had been thinking about asking the Legislature to cancel if the date were not moved earlier. But after listening to the discussion today, I am reminded of two central important themes: Voters want to participate in a primary. Voters want to have a primary. Secondly, how the parties used the results is entirely up to them.
“Somebody has to stand up for the voters, and that’s what I intend to do. It has always been about the voters.”
The Presidential Primary, created as a people’s Initiative to the Legislature in 1989, has been a big hit in each of the four times it has been used in Washington, Wyman said. It has drawn roughly 10 times as many voters as the caucus process, she said.
The original law set a default date of the fourth Tuesday in May, but earlier this year, Wyman asked that it be moved to the second Tuesday in March, to put Washington nearer to the front of the line. Most of the state primaries and caucuses will have been held by May 24, 2016, she noted.
The House did not pass her plan, which also would have required both parties to use the primary results to allocate at least some of their national convention delegates.
The primary law does provide an alternative way to move the date – a bipartisan panel of legislative and party leaders. On Tuesday, Wyman convened that group at the Seattle Airport Marriott.
Wyman, the state’s chief elections officer, made a case for moving the date, saying the presidential nominating season has been frontloaded, and by the end of March, states representing 58 percent of the U.S. population will have voted, and by the end of April, almost 75 percent.
Republicans on the panel also supported the idea of an earlier primary.
“We want to have a voice for the people of Washington,” said state GOP Chair Susan Hutchison.
Her Democratic counterpart, Jaxon Ravens, said state Democrats already have committed to use their March 26 precinct caucuses entirely for the nominating process.
“The decision has been made,” he said.
