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The Purple Principle
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Nonpartisan podcast for independent-minded Americans exploring the perils of partisanship in U.S. politics, society and daily life.
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“The notion of getting rid of a closed primary system in Alaska appealed to me instantly,” says former Alaska House Speaker Bryce Edgmon who has represented Bristol Bay and parts of the Aleutian Islands for nearly two decades. “It overrode right there almost on the spot any trepidation I might have about having to rank candidates or anything else that would eventually become part of the ballot measure that narrowly passed in Alaska.”
Rep. Edgmon is referring to Alaska’s first-in-nation passage of a final or top four voting system with a unified open primary plus ranked choice general election. In this episode we examine the dynamics of the first state legislature in the country to have been elected by this system in 2022, even as a ballot measure to repeal the system has been put before Alaska voters in 2024.
We also discuss the dynamics of the Alaska legislature with Anchorage Daily News Reporter, Iris Samuels, and University of Alaska Southeast Political Science Professor, Dr. Glenn Wright.
“Alaska is fairly unique in that even before this election reform, we've had bipartisan and tri-partisan coalitions in the House and Senate,” says Samuels, who covers the Juneau State House. “But it has reinforced that phenomenon and made it possible for elected officials to envision doing that and not experience repercussions from within their party and from voters.”
“If you talk to incumbent politicians,” explains Dr. Wright, “ they will tell you that they're less concerned about the primary challenge now– that before the reform that was in the back of their mind. And they were thinking not about what do voters in my district want but what do party primary voters in my district want.”
AFL-CIO President Joelle Hall has also observed what might be a similar deepening of Alaska’s cross-partisan tendencies in the two years since passage of the top four reform.
“One of the ways that we are really different is that we have always come to a bipartisan coalition at the end of every decade,” observes Hall, a legislative lobbyist for nearly three decades. “Redistricting happens. Then slowly the two parties claw back to roughly even. So it's accelerated what is already a normal path in Alaska where we gravitate towards these coalitions.
But our final guest on this first of two Alaska episodes, Rep. Alyse Galvin of Anchorage, cautions that these post reform dynamics have not yet translated into legislative action. That’s partially because senior house leadership has blocked several bipartisan legislative efforts, while others were vetoed at the executive level.
“if we don't allow this to play out a bit more, I'd say one more cycle, maybe two,” says Galvin, previously a two time candidate for the US House, ”then we're really missing a big chance to get things done that will give Alaskans hope.”
Tune in for five different perspectives on the first legislature in the country elected by final or top four voting as citizens in four other US states (NV, ID, CO & MT) consider passing the Alaskan model for less divisive elections toward more collaborative governance.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
Election reform is officially on the ballot for voter approval in Colorado this year. This “Top Four” voting system is similar to the Alaska model of a unified open primary plus ranked choice general election. But there is a catch to this Colorado ballot measure, and it came via the state legislature in the final moments of the 2024 session.
“Well, the last couple of days of the legislative session are very hectic,” says Jeni Arndt, a three term Democratic House Member in Colorado before her election as non-partisan Mayor of Fort Collins. “And you don't know every amendment that you're voting on in the last few days. But this was clearly an orchestrated effort to put in a poison pill.”
The amendment in question requires at least 12 Colorado municipalities to pass and implement ranked choice voting elections before the state can do so. Thus it could delay citizen-will on this issue until at least 2028, even if voters overwhelmingly pass the initiative in November.
“When our legislature waits and passes a law with very little debate that no one basically really knew that that was in the bill,” says Republican State Senator Barbara Kirkmeyer, “that's wrong.”
Senator Kirkmeyer has not yet taken a position on the Top Four voting in Colorado. Both nationally and in Colorado her party has come out against any form of ranked choice voting. By contrast, Democratic opposition or concern around election reform has been more nuanced.
“I think the folks who brought the amendment, I've worked closely with them on lots of different things,” says Democratic Senator Chris Hansen, a former House Member and former candidate for Mayor in Denver. “I think they were trying to make sure there was not an implementation issue with ranked choice if that moves forward in November.”
Executive Director of Denver-based Unite America, Nick Troiano, is not so sure. He sees similar motivations behind both GOP and Democratic tactics in preventing or delaying these increasingly popular reform measures.
“The fact that they went out of their way in a midnight effort to try and undermine the people's will not only demonstrates the potential impact of this reform,” says Troiano, author of The Primary Solution. “But it also demonstrates the problem that we're trying to solve, which is politicians are largely in it for their self-interest.”
Was this Colorado amendment a self-interested poison pill or an effort to make RCV elections go smoothly once implemented? Tune in for three viewpoints on this question and make up your own independent mind.
And stay tuned for more upcoming episodes on the various ways party and legislative leaders in multiple states begin pushing back on nonpartisan election reform momentum in 2024, a potentially historic year for depolarizing ballot initiatives. It’s all part of our season long series on state and district level reform from Washington DC to Alaska with a record number of states in between, including Idaho, Nevada, South Dakota, Arizona, Oregon and now Colorado.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
“I've sat in rooms where we as Democrats have high-fived when a Libertarian party candidate gets into a competitive race,” recalls former Oregon House Speaker Dan Rayfield. “That's not democracy.”
“And Republicans high five when a Green Party candidate gets into the race,” says Rayfield, currently running for Attorney General in Oregon. “That's not democracy.”
Dan Rayfield is describing the spoiler effect of plurality voting, where a third party candidate with minimal support can determine the election outcome. Rayfield joined forces with Oregon-based campaign manager, Mike Alfoni, to do something about that spoiler effect. Namely, to promote ranked choice voting (RCV) first at the county and then the state level.
“I love the impossible, which is why I did this in the first place,” says Alfoni with reference to the legislature’s recent passage of RCV for state and federal elections. Oregon is the first state in the country to do so. “And because everyone told me we couldn't do this, and then we did it anyway.”
How did Rayfield and Alfoni blaze this Oregon trail for RCV? It took many years of patient effort in and outside the legislature, such as building a supporting network of community groups. And it took compromise, such as agreeing to remove state level legislature elections at the request of County Clerks.
Tune in to hear more about first-in-the-nation Oregon, the prospects there for citizen ballot passage in November, and whether this Oregon trail could be followed by other reform leaders and legislatures around the country seeking to depolarize our politics.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
In 2024, Nevada voters will see a ballot Question 3 strikingly similar to the question on Final Five voting that passed by 6 points back in 2022. That’s because a constitutional amendment must be passed by voters twice in succession, according to Nevada law.
And should voters approve Question 3 again this year, Nevada will become the second state (after Alaska) to implement this ambitious electoral voting reform system including a unified open primary and ranked choice general election.
“After we won,” recalls Cesar Marquez of Nevada’s first passage of Final Five Voting in 2022, “Sondra, Doug, and I and so many others, we felt, okay, we now have two years to talk about ranked choice voting.”
A former Tesla Engineer, Marquez is referring to his colleagues Doug Goodman of Nevadans for Election Reform and Dr. Sondra Cosgrove of Vote Nevada.
In this episode
We learn how Goodman, a retired military veteran, began working on election reform in the Silver State a decade ago. Initially, Goodman lobbied extensively for legislative action before pivoting to the ballot initiative process. He recalls:
“One of the questions I was posing to business leaders at the time was, if you had a more open electoral system, could that be a tiebreaker if a company was considering moving to Nevada?”
Sonda Cosgrove, a history professor at Southern Nevada College, soon joined Goodman in that effort. She had noticed an alarming and counterintuitive trend in her efforts at Vote Nevada. Yes, more voters were registering to vote. But they were not voting in larger numbers.
“And so we started realizing that they were being turned off right at the get-go in the primary,” says Cosgrove.” That's when.. .they were just kind of opting out.”
Marquez joined forces with Goodman and Cosgrove to place Final Five Voting on that 2022 ballot. But he came at political reform from a very different direction.
“The first thing I'll say is that I never liked politics, I still don't like politics,” admits Marquez. “ My background is in engineering, and I've worked in manufacturing for my whole career.”
What do a military veteran, academic historian and engineer turned reformer have in common?
Is ranked choice voting best demonstrated by a “rank the drink” event in English or “rank the taco” evening in Spanish?
The Purple Principles discusses these and other election reform questions in this latest episode of our season-long state election reform series. We began in Idaho then traveled to Washington DC, Alaska, South Dakota and Arizona, before landing here in Nevada.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
“Everybody likes to think about these reforms as being revolutionary,” says Paul Johnson, former Mayor of Phoenix, now Co-Chair of Make Elections Fair AZ, on the record number of state level election reforms in play this year. “They’re not. City governments have been doing these reforms for about 50 to 60 years.”
Johnson, a former Democrat turned Independent, is leading a third attempt at opening primary elections in Arizona to independent and unaffiliated voters through a 2024 citizen ballot initiative that also amends the state constitution to allow ranked choice general elections. He’s joined in this effort by GOP strategist Chuck Coughlin, a veteran of hundreds of candidate and issue campaigns in the Grand Canyon state and now treasurer at Make Elections Fair AZ.
“The very basis of our thinking is that if you're going to use taxpayer money to run an election,” says Coughlin, “you have to treat every voter the same. You have to treat every candidate the same. I mean, that is a principle part of our American jurisprudence and the way we govern ourselves.”
A Measured Approach
In this episode, we learn how Johnson and Coughlin initially hoped to pursue the Alaska election Final Five Voting model of a unified open primary plus ranked choice general election. Ultimately, they decided on a measured approach with higher probability of success.
“We did five statewide surveys trying to see if we could get that done, which would be a Final Five open primary, " says Coughlin. “I concluded in June of last year that that was not possible.... Paul and his colleagues came back and said, ‘Hey, we just want to do an open primary.’”
Listen to the episode as Chuck and Paul share the data behind their incremental approach to election reform.
Past Rivals Work Together
We also hear how two political rivals (Paul & Chuck) joined forces in advocating for more sensible elections and pragmatic representation in the highly polarized state of Arizona.
“I always liked to tease Chuck that the only job that he had in the governor's office was to destroy my career,” says Paul Johnson of two Gubernatorial campaign losses to candidates supported by Coughlin. “And he likes to tease me back, he did a pretty good job.”
Is this the year Arizona voters embrace the principle of treating all voters and candidates the same in their elections?
In fact, this Arizona amendment could precede further general election reform via the legislature or citizen ballot process. Opening party-run primaries could even happen in the near term.
Looking Ahead
This episode is part of our season-long non partisan election reform series. Previous episodes have visited Washington DC, Idaho and South Dakota. Upcoming episodes travel to Nevada, Colorado and Alaska.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
“I like to say the stars are aligned for open primaries right now,” says South Dakota Open Primaries Director Joe Kirby. “I think there’s a realization that closed primaries simply don’t make sense when you’re in a single party state.”
“I also think that Open Primaries will foster a more representative and functional government,” adds De Knudson, former Sioux Falls City Councilor and Co-Director of “Amendment H” - an effort to create a single unified primary of all candidates from which the top two advance to the general election. This 2024 South Dakota measure is more modest than reforms advanced by the same team eight years ago which failed by ten points on Election Day.
“We learned a valuable lesson in 2016,” admits Kirby, a business entrepreneur also involved in political reform efforts for three decades. “We tried to do two things at once. We tried to bring open primaries to South Dakota at the same time we tried to remove party labels.”
In this episode, John Opdycke, Founder and President of the national organization Open Primaries, explains why the 2024 crop of non-partisan election reforms is more robust and more diverse.
“Part of what I think is so healthy is that the national groups are saying, Hey, let us show you our research, let us show you what this looks like from up looking down,” says Opdycke, one of the nation’s foremost experts on election reform. “And the local people say, great, that's really helpful. Let us show you what our local polling looks like. Let us show you what our political culture looks like.”
For Joe Kirby, De Knudson and many other supporters, Amendment H is an effort to turn away from political extremism and divisiveness and back toward traditional South Dakota values.
“I really love South Dakota,” says Knudson. “I care lots about government. I just knew that I didn't have a choice. I had to give this one more shot, and I really am confident that we will win this on November 5th.”
Tune in to find out more about the 2024 South Dakota open primaries initiative– past lessons learned and prospects for passage this year.
This episode is part of our season long series on state level non partisan election reform ballot measures in 2024– from Washington DC to Alaska with numerous states in between– Idaho, Nevada, Colorado, South Dakota, and, next up, Arizona.
With a record number of state level reforms this year, stay tuned to see if the stars align in South Dakota and on a national level.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
In this bonus episode we revisit the vast nation-sized state of Alaska, model for election reform in numerous states around the country even as that voting system of an open, unified primary plus instant runoff general election faces a potential 2024 recall ballot measure back in the frontier state.
The Purple Principle has made three previous audio visits to Alaska, arguably our least partisan, most indy-minded state with 60% of voters choosing not to register with either major party. We first revisit our initial Alaska episode from the fall of 2020 to learn how campaign manager, Shea Siegert, was persuaded to take on that challenge by his own family’s enthusiasm for non-partisan voting reform.
“I was having a conversation with my mother who lives in Boise, Idaho the other day,” Siegert confides. “And she said, every time I look at the news, I think about your ballot measure. And it just makes more and more sense.”
Next we hear from independent Alaska House Member Calvin Schrage in the fall of 2022 as the Alaska voting model is put to the test for the first time. That election produced a pragmatic split ticket outcome with reelection of conservative governor Mike DunLeavey, moderate indy-minded US Senator Lisa Murkowski, and the pragmatic centrist House Democrat, Mary Peltola.
Our recent season four discussion with Native Alaskan Mary Peltola completes our trek across three episodes, highlighted by the advice she received some years before upon election to the Alaska state legislature.
“So when I was first elected, I was in my mid-twenties and I imagined, like most people do, that I was going to Juneau to fight, to fight against our enemies and fight for my district,” Peltola tells us. “And when I got there, one of my colleagues told me you have to have 59 best friends if you want to accomplish anything.”
Tune in to find out how Rep. Peltola broke bread across the political aisles in this bonus episode with Alaska-related insights from Katherine Gehl, architect of Final Five Voting, Eric Bronner of Veterans for All Voters, as well as Doug Goodman of Nevadans for Better Elections and Lisa Rice of Make All Votes Count DC, both of whom have looked to Alaska as a model for their own reform efforts.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
It was nearing summer temperatures on this early June primary voting day outside a polling station in Washington, DC. Lisa Rice, official Proposer of Initiative 83, is wearing a sandwich board with the message, “Ask Me Why I Can’t Vote Today?” “Why can’t you vote today?” asks a woman on her way to vote. “Because I’m an independent,” Lisa replies. “ I'm not affiliated with the Democratic party or the Republican party and we're barred from voting in the primary…”
“All day people came up to me and asked at every polling place,” Lisa tells us in this extended episode introducing several members of the Make All Votes Count DC team. “So people definitely wanted to know why and it was great conversations all day long.”
We also meet Philip Pannell, Make All Vote Votes Count Treasurer, on this episode. A long time Democratic Party official and activist, Philip was widely recognized at the Capital Pride Parade where we met him. Yet despite his storied credentials, Philip’s encountered no small amount of negative reaction to his support for Initiative 83 from longtime Democratic Party colleagues.
“Independents are pretty much left out of the decision making because all the action is pretty much in the Democratic Party,” Philip tells us, adding he still believes the Democratic party is the best vehicle for opportunity and justice. “They like to say that if you want to participate in our primary, you have to be a Democrat. That's not forward of thinking, that's not bringing more people in.”
Kenyatta Smith is a District Outreach Coordinator for the predominantly African American areas in East D.C, where gentrification creates added challenges for Initiative 83 outreach. “I want to keep it black too,” Kenyatta confides. “I want us to be in power still. I feel strongly about that. But I also want to challenge my community to educate themselves on something new.”
Meet these and other members of the Make All Votes Count DC team this episode, another in our series on the record number of non-partisan election reform initiatives in play for the 2024 election. And learn how leadership and teamwork have come together behind the Initiative 83 effort, now in its final stages of signature collection for the November 2024 Washington DC voter ballot.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guests:
From Make All Votes Count DC: Lisa D. T. Rice (Proposer of Ballot Initiative 83), Philip Pannell (Treasurer), Kenyatta Smith (District Coordinator), Miguel Deramo (Steering Committee Member), and Nate Roseboro (Volunteer Petitioner).
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Make All Votes Count DC social media accounts:
Make All Votes Count DC Twitter
Make All Votes Count DC Instagram
Make All Votes Count DC Facebook
Additional Resources / Fact Checking:
Ballotpedia – Initiative 83
Wikipedia – Initiative 83
Party affiliation among adults in the Washington, DC metro area. Pew Research Center (2014).
About Us. Make All Votes Count DC.
Registrant Disclosure for Make All Votes Count DC. The District of Columbia - Office of Campaign Finance E-Filing.
End Taxation Without Representation Tags. DC Department of Motor Vehicles.
Phillip Pannell, Longtime LGBTQIA+ Activist, Leader, Emphasizes Continued Advocacy for Local Communities. Washington Informer.
In April of 2024, Luke Mayville, co-founder of the grassroots organization ReClaim Idaho, addressed volunteers on the final day of signature gathering for this year’s Open Primaries and Final Four Voting ballot initiative.
“We are here today because we are tired of playing the same old game under a broken set of rules,” Luke told the 50 or so volunteers gathered in Boise’s IvyWild Park that morning.
“The root of the problem,” Mayville stated, “ is the fact that there are 270,000 independent voters who are blocked from voting in the most important primary elections. And the root of the problem is that we don't even have competitive general elections.”
Continuing our Purple Principle (TPP) series on the record number of nonpartisan state-level election reform efforts in 2024, this episode profiles the coalition working to advance Idaho’s Open Primary initiative. The initiative is patterned in part after the Alaska “Final Four Voting” model first proposed by Katherine Gehl, author, business leader, and TPP guest earlier this season.
Margaret Kinzel of Mormon Women for Ethical Government, or MWEG, represents another important member of this non-partisan coalition. “ One of the things that helped me sign on to being active in this effort was hearing how many of our races are uncontested in the 2022 election,” Margaret explains. “Nine of the 38 districts, the race for state senator and the two-state representatives were uncontested. So you had no choice to vote for; you either voted for the candidate or you didn't.”
Retired Attorney General and former Idaho Supreme Court Chief Justice, Jim Jones, is another important coalition leader. “After the 2022 Alaska election, “Jones explains, “ it appeared to me that this was the answer to Idaho's problem because we had gotten so involved in culture wars, and the culture warriors were essentially picked by the Republican Party, which had been taken over by extremists.”
Tune in to learn more about the Idaho coalition that collected and submitted over 90 thousand signatures toward election reform in a largely conservative state and meet coalition leaders Luke Mayville (Reclaim Idaho), Margaret Wentzl (Mormon Women for Ethical Government) and former Idaho Supreme Court Justice Jim Jones.
Sometimes a village is not enough and it takes a broad coalition to take on “a broken election system.”
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guests:
Luke Mayville, Co-founder Reclaim Idaho. Margaret Kinzel, Co-Liasson, Mormon Women For Ethical Government. Jim Jones, Former Attorney General Idaho.
Join Us for Premium Content:
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Resources:
https://www.reclaimidaho.org/
https://www.mormonwomenforethicalgovernment.org/
https://idahocapitalsun.com/author/jim-jones/
https://idahocapitalsun.com/2024/05/01/having-exceeded-goal-idaho-open-primary-supporters-submit-final-signatures-for-verification/
https://idahocapitalsun.com/2024/04/24/idaho-open-primary-supporters-make-final-push-before-may-1-deadline/
https://sos.idaho.gov/elect/primary_elections_in_idaho.html
https://represent.us/2024-campaigns/idaho-final-four-voting/
https://store.hbr.org/product/the-politics-industry-how-political-innovation-can-break-partisan-gridlock-and-save-our-democracy/10367
https://sos.idaho.gov/elect/stcon/article_I.html#:~:text=All%20men%20are%20by%20nature,POWER%20INHERENT%20IN%20THE%20PEOPLE
https://idahocapitalsun.com/2024/05/23/almost-24-of-idahos-registered-voters-voted-in-primary-election-initial-estimates-show/
Katherine Gehl, co-author of The Politics Industry and Founder of The Institute for Political Innovation, has always asked herself what she needed “to do in order to change the political situation.”
“So at first I needed to sell my business,” Katherine tells us. “Then I needed to make the intellectual case.. And then I needed to try to sell this reform to people. It just went like that.”
Today, in 2024, after many years of effort and adaptation, Katherine Gehl’s Final Four or Final Five voting initiatives are now poised to be on the ballot in another four states (Nevada, Idaho, Montana and Colorado) having passed in Alaska back in 2020, which then held the first such election in 2022.
Katherine recounts that in the time she’s been working on these reforms, “going all the way back to 2013, but really trying to raise money actively since 2015, the reception has changed dramatically.”
In this episode, which launches our extended series on 2024 election reform initiatives, we’ll learn how non-partisan, competition-based election reform has gained traction among donors, reformers and voters alike. We’ll also get a better understanding of how her institute and action fund “catalyze” grassroots leaders in reform-minded states, such the former Idaho Attorney General Jim Jones and Reclam Idaho founder Luke Mayhew.
“The combination of someone like Luke with Jim Jones is a bit of a dream that you could put that together,” Katherine recounts, while also detailing emerging efforts in Colorado and Montana and the second ballot initiative in Nevada this cycle as required by the state constitution.
Will this be the year Final Five Voting moves onto the national stage and transforms the incentives of elected officials in these pathbreaking states?
Tune in to learn more from Katherine Gehl, co-author of The Politics Industry (with Harvard Business School Professor, Michael Porter) and a central catalyst in the nation’s growing non-partisan election reform movement.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guest:
Katherine Gehl, Reform Strategist & Founder, The Institute for Political Innovation (IPI)
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Resources:
Institute for Political Innovation
https://hbr.org/2020/07/fixing-u-s-politics
https://ballotpedia.org/Alaska_election_results,_2022
https://www.uniteamericainstitute.org/research/alaskas-election-model-how-the-top-four-nonpartisan-primary-system-improves-participation-competition-and-representation
https://store.hbr.org/product/the-politics-industry-how-political-innovation-can-break-partisan-gridlock-and-save-our-democracy/10367
https://www.veteransforallvoters.org/
https://ballotpedia.org/Nevada_Question_3,_Top-Five_Ranked-Choice_Voting_Initiative_(2022)
https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/after-restructuring-is-nevada-ranked-choice-ballot-measure-ready-for-election
https://vote.nyc/page/ranked-choice-voting
https://www.rcvmontana.org/petition
https://rcvforcolorado.org/
https://idahocapitalsun.com/author/jim-jones/
https://idahocapitalsun.com/2024/05/01/having-exceeded-goal-idaho-open-primary-supporters-submit-final-signatures-for-verification/
https://www.reclaimidaho.org/
https://www.reclaimidaho.org/medicaid
https://kentthiry.com/about/
https://www.maine.gov/sos/cec/elec/upcoming/rankedchoicefaq.html
https://idahocapitalsun.com/2024/03/11/proposed-constitutional-amendment-to-block-ranked-choice-voting-fails-in-idaho-house/
https://wisconsinwatch.org/2024/01/wisconsin-republican-voting-senate-assembly-legislation-bill-watch/
“The Presidential race might get thrown into the House of Representatives,” says Dr. Sam Wang of the Princeton Gerrymandering Initiative in this episode. “And in the House of Representatives, every state gets one vote.”
Both a neuroscientist and recognized authority on gerrymandering, Wang is highlighting the connection between partisan gerrymanders in states throughout the country and following on effects at the national level in the US House but potentially also the White House.
“And certainly when I’ve done cases involving congressional delegations, a piece of it is the one Sam mentioned,” echoes Paul Smith, Senior Vice President at Campaign Legal Center. “Who’s going to control the delegation for this particularly unusual house resolution of presidential elections?”
In this two-guest episode, we’ll discuss the strategies behind partisan gerrymanders and the leading defenses against them. These include lawsuits argued by Paul Smith and other litigators and the establishment of independent redistricting commissions at the state level.
“A well-crafted citizens commission that's non-partisan is always going to do a more fair and balanced job than a partisan legislature,” says Smith, citing the cases of California and Michigan.
“Right now, we’re stuck playing small ball, getting small things locally like, say, rank choice voting or redistricting reform,” explains Sam Wang, whose gerrymandering report cards are often cited in legal cases. “The long game is to start implementing some of the bigger reforms and repairs.”
Tune in for two informed views on how the tide is turning against partisan gerrymandering in critical states like Wisconsin and how plugging the gerrymander leak in one state prevents even more significant problems at the national level.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guests:
Sam Wang, Founder & Director, Princeton Gerrymandering Project.
Paul Smith, Senior Vice President Campaign Legal Center.
Join Us for Premium Content:
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Find us online!
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Facebook: @thepurpleprinciplepodcast
Youtube: @thepurpleprinciple
Our website: https://bit.ly/2ZCpFaQ
Sign up for our newsletter: https://bit.ly/2UfFSja
Resources:
https://campaignlegal.org/
https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2012/11/09/house-democrats-got-more-votes-than-house-republicans-yet-boehner-says-hes-got-a-mandate/
https://history.house.gov/Institution/Election-Statistics/
https://ballotpedia.org/United_States_Congressional_elections_results,_2012
https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2012/results/house.html
npost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-says-federal-courts-dont-have-a-role-in-deciding-partisan-gerrymandering-claims/2019/06/27/2fe82340-93ab-11e9-b58a-a6a9afaa0e3e_story.html
https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/initiative-and-referendum-states
https://www.michigan.gov/micrc/about/meet-the-commissioners
https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-constitution/section-11.1
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/11/us/redistricting-map-utah-salt-lake-city.html
https://apnews.com/article/utah-redistricting-3cb3fb05e7253f3ec3d26749138bea9e
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/01/wisconsin-supreme-court-rejects-democrats-congressional-redistricting-challenge-00144529
“I’m still in it to hold a mirror up to my GOP colleagues,” former RNC Chair Michael Steele tells us in this episode. “To show them how unLincolnlike they have become.”
Michael Steele has borne painful witness to that transformation over the past two-plus decades as the first African American Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, then RNC Chair in 2009-2011, as well as US Senate Candidate.
Steele may have been one of the first prominent Republicans to push back on the populist redirection of the party back in 2009 when he tussled with popular right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh over who led the Republican party.
“It did say a lot about a base that had become very animated and defensively protective,” Steele recalls of the pushback from that episode, including a drop in RNC fundraising.
Steele reexamines that moment in recent GOP history and reflects on a GOP today that, in his view, has turned its back on conservative principles of personal liberty and freedom, and also long-held Republican positions on US foreign policy.
“Reagan is probably looking at their dance with Putin, Orban and others, going: who are these people?”
Join us for an informed, concerned discussion with Michael Steele, now an MSNBC host and commentator, on why Americans need to stay civically engaged despite the political theatrics of this 2024 election year and our current political era.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guest
Micheal Steele, MSNCB Political Analyst, Former RNC Chairman, and Former Lt. Gov, (Maryland). Twitter.
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“I'm the only candidate that was Head of the DEA, that was in charge of border security in the Bush administration, governor for eight years,” says our featured guest, Asa Hutchinson.
Yet despite possessing perhaps the most impressive resume among GOP presidential candidates, Hutchinson failed to receive substantial media attention or garner significant support from Iowa caucus goers.
There's just so much happening in his world that you have to say is newsworthy,” says Hutchinson of Trumpian media attention. It's hard to get any other message out.”
Hutchinson also speaks to the possibility of a significant third-party candidacy for president in 2024, such as from the bipartisan group, No Labels.
“Right now you’ve got two major parties that are giving Americans what they don't want– “They don't want another Biden Trump rematch,” says Hutchinson. “So I think there is a potential for a third-party candidacy this year”.
Full episode are available on our website (purpeprinciple.com), on YouTube with video highlights, and on all major streaming apps.
The Purple Principle is Fluent Knowledge Production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guest
Asa Hutchinson, 2024 POTUS Candidate, Gov. Arkansas (2015-2023), US House Rep. (R-AK) 2001-2003. Hutchinson’s Twitter.
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“I had been a conservative critic of mainstream media bias for many years,” says author and MSNBC columnist, Charlie Sykes, a “contrarian conservative” and our featured guest. “It suddenly occurred to me that we had succeeded in not just critiquing the liberal bias, but in destroying the credibility of fact-based media altogether.”
Sykes is the author of the notable 2017 book, How the Right Lost Its Mind. Within our interview, as in the book, he is unsparing of himself and other traditional conservatives for paving the way for MAGA populism. Yet he emphasizes there is still some degree of factionalism within the GOP.
A sizable number of these more traditionally conservative Republicans were in attendance at the 2024 Principles First Summit in Washington DC, where we spoke with Sykes. Held the same weekend as the feverishly pro-Trump CPAC event a few miles away, this year’s Summit included appearances by Adam Kinzinger, Alyssa Farah Griffin, and Cassady Hutchinson.
There are more than 700 people,” Sykes observes.” And you look at the panels, the people who are speaking, they represent some of the most prominent conservatives, influential conservatives of just the past few decades.”
Join us for this conversation with contrarian conservative, Charlie Sykes, author of How the Right Lost Its Mind and MSNBC columnist.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guest
Charlie Sykes, MSNBC Columnist. Author of How The Right Lost Its Mind. Sykes’s book, and Twitter.
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“My goal in this book isn't just to diagnose the problem,” explains Nick Troiano, Executive Director of Unite America. “But to give people a solution that is viable and can happen right there in their own states.”
That book is “The Primary Solution: Rescuing Our Democracy from the Fringes,” published this week by Simon & Schuster in time for another polarizing primary season. Yet Nick notes in the book, as in our interview, that a record number of 2024 state level efforts to reform primary elections may soon shift the US Congress from gridlock to governance.
“This will be the most robust year for election reform that we've seen in the modern era,” says Troiano who ran for Congress a decade ago in his mid twenties as an independent in Pennsylvania. “The people do agree that every voter should have the right to vote for any candidate in every election, and that elected officials have to win a majority of votes to get elected.”
Troiano also details the importance of Alaska’s Final Four electoral reforms, passed in 2020 and utilized in the 2022 election, as proof of concept for other state and city efforts.
“At the end of the day, we all have one vote,” says Troiano. “There's nothing so wrong with the state of our democracy that we can't fix with the tools that our democracy gives us to do so.”
Tune in to learn how as few as 6 state level initiatives could motivate Congress to tackle such long standing chronic issues as the fiscal deficit, gun violence and immigration reform.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guest
Nick Troiano: Bio, X (Twitter)
Executive Director, Unite America
Additional Resources
Nicks Book Information
Primary Elections
Alaska Case Study by Unite America
Problem Solving Caucus
Nevada and Open Primaries
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“Every time I talk to someone about running for office, the first thing they say is, Eric, you have to pick a team,” confides Navy veteran Eric Bronner, COO of the non-partisan group Veterans for All Voters.
“And something didn't sit right with me. So the pump was primed, as my parents would say, for some kind of awakening.”
That awakening occurred listening to a Freakonomics podcast episode with former Purple Principle guest Katherine Gehl, co-author of The Politics Industry. In that episode, as in our own 2021 interview, Gehl highlighted the lack of incentives our elected officials have to govern effectively.
To tackle that problem, Eric and his co-founders are forming a nationwide network of veterans to volunteer on behalf of state level election reform initiatives like opening primaries to the large percentage of registered independent or unaffiliated veterans unable to vote in primary elections and also to advance Final Four or Five voting as detailed in The Politics Industry.
“The last thing we need is more partisanship,” says Bronner who now works full time coordinating hundreds of volunteers in forty states and counting. “We can have differences of opinion, right? But the system itself is broken.”
Tune in to meet three other veterans behind this effort and find out how Bronner and Veterans For All Voters hope to mend the system in this 2024 election cycle and beyond. The Purple Principle is Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
SHOW NOTES
Our Guests
Eric Bronner: Bio, X (Twitter)
Co-founder and COO of Veterans for All Voters
Additional Resources
Show Me Integrity
Freakonomics: America’s Hidden Duopoly
The Politics Industry: How Political Innovation Can Break Partisan Gridlock and Save Our Democracy by Katherine M. Gehl and Michael E. Porter
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“I know that I would not be in this position if we didn't have the Final Four system,” Representative Mary Peltola (D-AK) tells us in this first Purple Principle episode of season four. “Because I would not have made it through a partisan primary.”
A native Alaskan, Representative Peltola gained re-election to the US House on the third ballot of the nation’s first Final Four election in 2022. Final Four Voting combines a unified open primary with a ranked choice general election. The intended goal is to replace the current system of polarizing party-led primaries.
Final Four Voting Across Party Lines
Peltola’s election to the US House may seem surprising from a vast, largely rural state with twice as many registered Republicans as Democrats. But the majority of Alaskan voters are registered as non-partisan or unaffiliated.
Final Four: Lessons for the Lower 48?
Prior to US House election, Peltola was a member of the bipartisan “Bush Caucus" within the Alaska House of Representatives. Now, after moving to what feels like a foreign country, she continues to work across the aisle in Washington, DC.
“I have had very few opportunities just to eat with Republicans and I am very eager to meet and collaborate with as many Republicans as I can,” she explains. “I'm a member of the Western Caucus, which right now is 106 Republicans and me.”
Peltola is hopeful US House polarization can be overcome yet clear-eyed about the current gridlock. “The entrenchment is so deep,” she tells us.
Does this vast, frontier state and it's current Rep. hold lessons for our divided nation? Tune in to learn more about Mary Peltola’s bipartisan efforts in the US House and the distinctive culture of her native Alaska.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
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“The American people want serious people to solve serious challenges,“ declares former Texas Congressman Will B. Hurd in this season finale on the U.S. House of Representatives. “That’s the lesson we should take away from 2022.”
But he’s quick to add, “I don’t think that lesson is going to be implemented in this new congress.”
Hurd then dissects the GOP factionalism at work in the contested house speaker’s election and confirms that most House members are more interested in “messaging bills” than progress on tough, important issues like immigration and climate change.
The Purple Principle covered the U.S. Senate in our previous episode with former centrist Senators Doug Jones and Bob Corker. This episode we turn to the unruly chamber next door in discussion with Will B. Hurd, former CIA officer, three-term Texas Congressman and author of American Reboot.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production; original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
How’d you hear about The Purple Principle? Let us know!: https://fluentknowledge.com/tpp-survey
SHOW NOTES
The Purple Principle has been nominated for three Signal Awards, but we need your help. Click here to cast a vote!
Our Guest
Will Hurd is a former three-term Congressman for Texas’ 23rd Congressional District, serving in the U.S. House from 2015 to 2021. A former CIA officer and cybersecurity executive, he’s the author of the recently released book American Reboot: An Idealist’s Guide to Getting Big Things Done. Find him on Twitter @WillHurd
More episode resources:
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Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney
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“It appears to me that the fever has broken,” observes Bob Corker, former two-term GOP Senator from Tennessee. ”And there's gonna be a real serious debate on the Republican side of the aisle as to where the party is gonna go in 2024.”
Fading GOP loyalty to former President Trump is the elephant in the room as we discuss the 2022 election, successes of the current Congress, and prospects for governance going forward.
“Right now you got a lot of folks feeling their oats over in the House” says Doug Jones, the Democratic winner of an Alabama special election in 2017. “And they have promised a lot of oversight, a lot of investigations… Who the hell knows? On the Senate side, though, it will be steady as she goes.”
Join the conversation with two centrist U.S. Senate alumni--Doug Jones, a storied civil rights litigator, and Bob Corker, who raised alarms during the Trump administration as Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee.
The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production. Original music by Ryan Adair Rooney.
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SHOW NOTES
The Signal Awards has recognized The Purple Principle as a finalist in three award categories, but we need your votes to win. Click here and search "purple principle" to find our nominated episodes and vote!
Our Guests
The Hon. Bob Corker is a former Republican Senator from Tennessee, serving for two terms in Congress. A commercial real estate developer, he began his political career as commissioner for the Tennessee Finance and Administration Department before being elected Mayor of Chattanooga in 2001. While a member of the U.S. Senate, Corker served as Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee. You can follow him on Twitter @SenBobCorker
The Hon. Doug Jones is a former Democratic Senator from Alabama, serving in Congress for three years after a high-profile special election in 2017. He was the first Democrat to represent Alabama in the U.S. Senate in over two decades. Jones was appointed U.S. Attorney for Alabama’s Northern District in 1997, and is known for his prosecution of two Ku Klux Klan members for their role in the 1963 Birmingham church bombing. You can follow him on Twitter @DougJones
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Happy Thanksgiving from The Purple Principle team! This week we’re revisiting an episode from November 2021.
In the aftermath of another fractious election season, and heading into the holiday season, it feels appropriate to bring psychologist Tania Israel back into the feed. She explains the active listening methods we need to have genuine conversations across the political divide and across the dinner table, when opposing viewpoints are in the house.
Are we Americans trapped in our end zones of polarized bubbles ever more motivated to reason away conflicting viewpoints?
Our featured guest, psychologist Tania Israel, thinks not and should know. Dr. Israel has been holding workshops over the past two decades to help participants bridge political and social divisions. In this Purple Principle episode, co-hosts Robert Pease & Jillian Youngblood speak with Tania about these workshops, her flowchart that (almost) solved political polarization, and her book, Beyond Your Bubble: How to Connect Across the Political Divide.
With Dr. Israel’s facilitation, we apply the bubble bursting toolkit to a serious in-house case of affective (aka negative) polarization -- Jillian’s deep dislike of the New England Patriots, especially ex-Patriot and presumptive GOAT (greatest of all time), quarterback Tom Brady, stemming from her identity as a New York Jets Fan.
“I’m so glad you brought up something that’s so central to our democracy,” quips Israel, who gamely plays along as we advance this metaphor down the political football field.
Family gatherings were never friction-free. Then polarization came along. Listen in for helpful advice from an all-star in respectful and compassionate dialogue, just in time for Thanksgiving.
Author and scholar Dr. Tania Israel is the first guest in our three-part Holiday Survival Kit. More here: https://fluentknowledge.com/holiday-kit
SHOW NOTES
Our Guests
Tania Israel: Website, Twitter, Book, Faculty page.
Additional Resources
How to Win a Political Argument | Dr. Tania Israel | TEDxSanLuisObispo
Moderates are less likely to post about their political views on social media | Pew Research
Bipartisan Public Consensus Offers Direction for US Foreign Policy in Second Bush Term | Dr. Steven Kull
The Bias Blind Spot: Perceptions of Bias in Self Versus Others
Motivated Skepticism in the Evaluation of Political Beliefs | AJPS
Tom Brady suspension case timeline
NFL History - Super Bowl Winners | ESPN
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