South Dakota Has a Primary Problem
Joe Kirby, Chairman of South Dakota Open Primaries announced, “We have a primary problem in South Dakota. Only 17% of voters turned out for the June 2024 primary election. It appears over 70% will vote in the November general election. Why the difference? Because many South Dakota voters are denied a meaningful role in the state’s closed primaries.”
“Public officials are quick to criticize voters when turnout is low. But the problem isn’t the voters. South Dakotans have proven they love to vote in important elections. The state’s antiquated closed primary system prohibits them from doing that.”
“The closed primary system made more sense when there were two strong political parties in the state and very few independent voters. But the world has changed. The South Dakota Democratic party has become mostly irrelevant with no Democrat currently occupying statewide office and only about 10% of legislative positions. Meanwhile, the number of independent voters who choose not to affiliate with either party has skyrocketed to 155,000. The number of independent voters in the state far exceeds the number of Democrats.”
“Amendment H is on the November 5th ballot and would solve South Dakota’s primary problem. All candidates for an office would be listed on a single ballot. All legal voters would get that ballot. The top two vote getters would move on to the general election. Most importantly, all voters would get to vote.”
“The state of South Dakota estimates an open primary would attract another 50,000 voters. We think that their estimate is low. South Dakotans have proven at multiple general elections that they will turn out in large numbers when there are interesting and competitive races. Open primaries promise to increase the number of candidates as well the competition in our elections.”
The following chart uses data from the South Dakota Secretary of State’s website.
| YEAR | General Election | Primary Election |
| 2016 | 70% | 21% |
| 2018 | 65% | 27% |
| 2020 | 74% | 28% |
| 2022 | 59% | 32% (Amendment C drew a crowd) |
| 2024 | >70% estimated | 17% |
Kirby added, “We have a primary problem in South Dakota.155,000 independent and not affiliated South Dakota voters currently have little to say about who represents them and leads the state. That’s not fair. Nor is it good for our state. After all, democracy works best when all voters get to vote. Vote YES on H!”
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We need to fix our broken primary election system. Republican zealots will never allow independents to vote in “their” private taxpayer funded primary, so H appears to be the only answer.
Are the primary statistics of only potential primary voters or of all voters?
For example i couldn’t vote because nothing was on my ballot – no primaries. I would imagine many ballots were empty because of 0 statewide primaries. So I couldn’t vote even if I wanted to. It’s really not a fair statistic.
New round of official dumpster diver candidates being endorsed which is another reason why we need H!
Amendment H is just a better system for electing our elected officials. They will represent more South Dakotans. Yes on H!
Primary turnout is low because by the time we have it, it’s too late to matter.
we used to vote for delegates to our national conventions, to choose the nominees for President and Vice President.
We don’t do that any more.
The delegates are now chosen way in advance, to get them cleared for security.
By the time our primary takes place, the delegate counts are done and the nominees have secured their nominations.
So few of the state and local races are contested, those names don’t even appear on the ballot.
My primary ballot this year consisted of the State Senate race and NOTHING ELSE. No presidential or Congressional candidates, nothing. Other than the State Senate race, it was a blank sheet of paper. No wonder so few people bother to vote.
If you really want to increase voter turnout, move the primary to Super Tuesday. The fact that Joe isnt talking about that tells you he doesnt care about voter turn-out, it’s all hot air
Good points.
Two additional points
This doesn’t deserve to be part of hte Constitution. (I’d vote for it if it wasn’t a Constitutional Amendment)
Similar to moving the date, why aren’t these people interested in moving local elections to be voted on the same date as the primary?
Those who support this Constitutional Amendment have agendas other than what they say out loud (enfranchising Independents in the primary process). All of them.
17% isnt an accurate statistic because so many ballots didn’t have candidates running. It’s not an interest thing it wasn’t even possible to vote.
For example if Dusty Johnson and Taffy Howard were running then every gop ballot would have had a candidate. If democrats had two candidates running for congress they would have had a ballot. As is if there weren’t legislative primaries or a school board or city elections then voting wasn’t even an option.
The entire city of Pierre didn’t have anything to vote on.
H will fail. It takes away choices from voters on election day. We need choices in November not in June.