IDAHO, USA — This article originally appeared in the Idaho Press.
The Idaho Attorney General is renewing his legal challenge of the Idaho Open Primaries initiative.
Attorney General Raúl Labrador filed a lawsuit Aug. 16 in Fourth District Court, just days after the Idaho Supreme Court dismissed his challenge on procedural grounds, saying he must first argue the case in district court.
The arguments in the new challenge are largely the same as his challenge filed to the Supreme Court — Labrador contends that the system proposed in the new initiative is not an “open primary” and that the supporters were misleading voters in their signature-gathering efforts.
He also says that the ranked-choice voting aspect of the proposal was downplayed.
The initiative, which received more than enough signatures to qualify for the November general election ballot, would create nonpartisan, top-four primary elections and allow ranked-choice voting in the general election.
Labrador is asking the court to declare all of the roughly 97,000 signatures gathered null and void, and to order Idahoans for Open Primaries to withdraw the initiative from the November ballot.
“This coalition obtained thousands of signatures for the initiative by telling Idahoans it would restore the open primary system Idaho had before 2011, even after the Idaho Supreme Court ruled that claim was false and that the initiative’s primary system is “significantly different” than an open primary,” Labrador wrote in an emailed statement. “In reality, the initiative abolishes party primaries and institutes ranked-choice voting in the general election—an unpopular and complicated system that many petition signers did not know was included in the initiative and would not support on its own.”
The Secretary of State's Office is facing a Sept. 7 deadline to submit initiative ballot titles to county clerks. The get ahead of this, the attorney general's office asked that the court deliver a decision by Sept. 2. The office suggested a hearing date of Aug. 29.
The previous challenge targeted Secretary of State Phil McGrane as a defendant, but the Supreme Court wrote that the attorney general failed to show McGrane had a “clear legal duty” to declare the signatures invalid. There had also been previous questions from the court about whether it was appropriate for the office to be suing the secretary of state while deputy attorney generals in the office were representing McGrane’s office.
Idahoans for Open Primaries has repeatedly defended the initiative and its efforts to gather signatures, saying that the system proposed is a type of open primary and that volunteers have fully explained every aspect of it, including ranked-choice voting.
Spokesman for the initiative supporters Luke Mayville said the group was confident they will prevail in court.
“AG Labrador is doing everything in his power to interfere with the election and deny voters a voice,” Mayville said. “Fortunately for Idaho voters, Labrador’s case is baseless and his desperate attempt is certain to fail again. The people of Idaho, not the Attorney General, will decide in November whether Idaho should restore the right of all voters—including independents—to participate in every taxpayer-funded election.”
This article originally appeared in the Idaho Press, read more on IdahoPress.com.
