A national campaign to lessen polarization pushes states to ditch partisan primaries

DENVER (AP) — A national campaign is backing ballot measures in six states to end partisan primaries, seeking to turn down the temperature in a polarized country by removing a process that gives the most active members of both major parties an outsize role in picking the country's leaders.

The $70 million effort to replace traditional primaries with either nonpartisan ones or ranked choice voting is run by Unite America, a Denver organization dedicated to de-polarizing the country.

“People are losing faith in democracy itself,” said Kent Thiry, the group's co-chair and the former chief executive officer of the kidney dialysis firm DaVita Inc, during a Denver debate about the initiative on the Colorado ballot.

Nick Troiano, Unite America's executive director, said the goal is to end a system where 85% of congressional seats are effectively filled in partisan primaries because the districts are so overwhelmingly Democratic or Republican that whoever wins the relevant primary is virtually guaranteed victory in November.