In the special session, the Louisiana Legislature passed a bill to change from jungle primary elections to closed party primaries but only for federal elections, and elections for State Supreme Court, Public Service Commission, and BESE. Public Affairs Research Council President Steven Procopio says the bill passed so quickly it left much room for confusion but at least it won’t be implemented until 2026.
“There are probably some errors in there that people are going to have work through so that part is good, in the sense that they could also come back and add some of the things they took out, they could take out even more,” said Procopio.
Unaffiliated voters will be able to vote in the party primaries, but registered Independents, Libertarians, and other Third party registered voters will not. Procopio says the changes will impact many Louisiana voters.
“We had an issue of disenfrancisement, there’s going to be a lot of people who won’t be able to vote in certain elections, that is still true all though it is a lot less, because this used to study everything at the state level,” said Procopio.
The bill passed in less than a week with little time for public input but Procopio believes it’s really up to the voters to accept or reject the changes.
“I think this will probably percolate through the public and the feedback could be either, no get rid of our jungle primary system or it could be what were you guys thinking and they could pull back more,” said Procopio.
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