Narrator: Presentation of Idaho Reports on Idaho Public Television is made possible through the generous support of the Laura Moore Cunningham Foundation, committed to fulfilling the Moore and Bettis family legacy of building the great state of Idaho.

By the Friends of Idaho Public Television and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Melissa Davlin: Tuesday's election isn't all about the top of the ticket race for the white House.

Tonight, we discuss competitive legislative seats and what might motivate voters on either side of proposition one.

I'm Melissa Devlin.

Idaho reports starts now.

Hello and welcome to Idaho Reports.

This week, Secretary of State Phil McGrane joins us to discuss early voting, as well as how the state and county clerks are preparing for an anticipated massive turnout for the election on November 5th.

But first, yes, Idaho is a conservative state, and not too many people are going to be wondering whether our four electoral votes will go to Donald Trump or Kamala Harris.

But there are a handful of competitive purple legislative districts across the state.

Plus, proposition one on open primaries and ranked choice voting.

And where voters land on those will have big implications for all Idahoans.

Joining me to discuss is Kevin Richert of Idaho Education News and Dr. Stephanie Witt and Jaclyn Kettler from Boise State University's School of Public Service.

Kevin, I want to start with you.

Proposition one big talker across the state this year.

What's your general sense on what voters are saying?

Kevin Richert: I think it's going to be fascinating to see how this comes down on Tuesday.

And you know, because you have so many forces at play here.

You have the state Republican Party, Dorothy Moon, you have made this into a cause.

Opposing prop one and getting it voted down has become their top priority.

It becomes what they've talked about almost to the exclusion of everything else.

Mike Moyle, House speaker Mike Moyle has a PAC that has put 300 plus thousand dollars into anti prop advertising.

There's a lot of pro prop one money out there, so you need to keep that in mind that they've the proponents have gotten a lot of money largely from out of state.

So you have this Republican infrastructure coming up strongly against this.

But initiatives by their nature are a populist movement, and they're a movement that is an expression of disdain or disappointment or frustration with the political establishment.

So do voters, you know, poke the Republican establishment in the eye and vote yes for prop one?

Or do they heed what they're hearing from a lot of Republican leaders around the state?

Not all, but but a lot.

Davlin: And doctor what?

We have two messages that are kind of running past each other.

You know, from the proponents of proposition one, you have a huge focus on the open primaries, part of the initiative.

And then from opponents, largely with the Republican Party, you have a lot of concern about ranked choice voting.

Stephanie Witt: Well, I wonder if after the election, we're going to be wondering why were these two things put together on this one initiative?

Because I think that we see a lot of support for the open primary.

In the Boise State poll last year, it seemed like there was solid interest, at least positive interest in opening the primary.

but confusion, uncertainty about ranked choice voting.

And so when you put them together, what does that mean?

I don't know, you know, I don't know how voters will respond to that.

Typically in the past, the rule of thumb was that when voters are confused, they just vote no on on things.

There's also the added challenge of the proposition I believe will be at the very end of the ballot.

And so, you know, there may be a little ballot mortality there where people don't get all the way to the end.

So the same number of people vote for president is not likely to be the same number of people vote for the initiative.

Davlin: And we see under votes with every single election, whether it's a general election during a statewide non-presidential election year with governor and other big names at the top of the ticket, or if it's a presidential election year.

And I know when I voted early, proposition one was at the very, very end of my ballot.

Jaclyn Kettler: Yeah.

And so that is a big question on whether you will how much ballot roll off you'll have.

But we also know there's been a lot of campaigning with prop one.

And I think people are aware of it.

They're interested in it one way or another.

So that may we may see more votes on prop one compared to some of those other down ballot races where people do kind of drop off.

Davlin: A whole in Ada County, certainly a whole page of judges on whether to retain them or not.

We also we we have a lot of money in this campaign as, as Kevin alluded to.

And we also have some really interesting messaging.

you know, again, a whole bunch of messages just bombarding voters whenever they turn on sports.

Certainly, every time I turned on a game, I saw a whole bunch of prop one ads.

Richert: We’ve been seeing a lot of Mark Hagedorn on TV and the TV ads supporting prop one.

There's a lot of money.

There's a lot of advertising, very different.

One of the things that really strikes me about this is, you know, it is a whole different world than we were in six years ago when we in Idaho got the Medicaid expansion initiative on the ballot.

And really, the opposition to Medicaid expansion at that time in that election was mostly coming from that freedom Foundation.

You didn't see as much really organized, I wouldn't say orchestrated, but certainly organized and certainly solidified opposition coming from the GOP, as we are seeing this year.

Davlin: You know, it's interesting because I can think of a number of Republicans, both sitting lawmakers and people who were running for office at the time in 2018 when Medicaid expansion was on the ballot, who were putting themselves out there saying, I support Medicaid expansion.

We couldn't get it done in the legislature, so let's do it with the voters.

We're not seeing that with sitting Republican lawmakers this year.

We're seeing a lot of former elected officials coming out of Hagedorn as a perfect example, former state senator.

but but also, you know, former, Supreme Court justice and attorney general Jim Jones, Bruce Newcomb, former speaker of the House.

We're not seeing sitting Republican lawmakers say, yes, I think we need to do this, at least not publicly.

In fact, it's the opposite.

You have a wave of Republican lawmakers saying, I don't want this.

Richert: And, you know, you can again.

How does that resonate with voters?

The voters take that seriously.

They say oh these these folks are just looking out for their own interests.

They like the the status quo.

They like the closed Republican primary.

That's how they got into office in the first place.

They don't want to see this system change.

You know, but it is a very different world than we were in in 2018.

Davlin: Very different world.

I, I imagine that we might see closer margins than Medicaid expansion with passed that which passed with a little bit more than 60% of the vote.

But I don't think anybody knows how this is going to land on Tuesday.

Witt: Well, at least the wording of the initiative is straightforward.

you know, sometimes in the past we've had initiatives where you, you know, like a yes, we have no bananas thing.

You have to you have to vote yes to me.

And you don't like the thing or no to me.

And you do like the thing.

And this is straightforward, you know.

Yes.

If you want the change.

No.

If you don't.

So I guess I was relieved when I saw the actual wording that that maybe there'll be a little less noise in terms of people being able to match their preference to their vote.

Richert: And harder to read because of all the component parts in this initiative.

I mean, I'm I'm glad Dr. Witt brought up the the Boise State survey from from January, which showed very strong support for the idea of opening the primary in some fashion.

I think if we had a straight up open primary initiative on the ballot, you we we may well see numbers and a statewide race similar to what we saw with Medicaid expansion passing with 60%.

But that's not what we've got on the ballot.

Jaclyn Kettler: And I think that's I mean, some of the questions about the ranked choice voting element in terms of what does this exactly mean, how would this work?

what would the effects of this be?

And I think that's where there are questions about, you know, that might make some voters very hesitant to support it.

Davlin: What about news on lawmakers wanting to overturn or amend it?

And they have they have not hidden the fact that that it is on the list.

If this passes and if it stands in court that that they are going to at very least amend it.

If not, throw the whole thing out right away.

Do you think that fire up voters?

Kettler: I mean, that's an interesting question, right?

Like if voters feel like, well, I'm already frustrated, now you're telling me my vote won't even count if it passes?

That maybe that does bring some motivation.

It could also bring some questions like, well, then why would I support this if it's not even going to be implemented?

And we have seen the legislature overturn term limits, for example, that was passed through initiative, in the early 2000, I think, something like that.

So there is precedent for this, right.

And so I do think it's an interesting question in terms of how voters respond.

They might be frustrated or they might be like, well, then what's even the point?

Witt: And I think it's helpful to point out, especially we have many newcomers in the state, that in Idaho, our initiatives are statutory only.

We don't have constitutional amendment initiatives.

But some of the, yeah, some of the states in our region do allow that, so that you can't change the Constitution in Idaho with an initiative.

Richert: And we've seen this before, you know, as as Dr Kettler pointed out, I mean, we have seen the legislature take initiatives and either dismantle them or just throw out entirely.

I mean, this goes back to the 1% initiative in the late 70s on property taxes.

The legislature decided the next year this isn't going to work.

So they came up with a whole different, different construct.

And since the passage of Medicaid expansion, you've seen the legislature try to, you know, do things to, to, you know, to change the, the scope of Medicaid expansion.

So we've seen this movie before.

Davlin: And again, too, when we're talking about things that are, you know, entirely statutory versus like Medicaid expansion, having involvement with the federal government when you try to amend Medicaid expansion or anything to do with Medicaid that automatically introduces so many complications because of the federal government, you can't just flip a switch and change everything.

It's a little bit different with proposition one.

It's a little bit different because we don't have to get the federal government's permission to change our voting structure or go back to the way it was before.

If they throw the whole thing out, if it does pass.

Witt: That's true.

there are some non-governmental certification measures to ensure, security, and I don't want to Jackie knows more about this than I do, but that you know, our voting processes are vetted by those organizations.

And they would be, again, if we made that change.

Kettler: But states do have the.

Kettler: Ability and the right to determine how they'll run elections.

Davlin: Right?

Right.

Which is the whole point of this in the first place.

We, if you missed our special on proposition one last week and find that at Idahoptv.org/idahoreports, you can also find extended interviews with Luke Masvidal and Representative Brant Crane, who is the House State Affairs chairman, on what they had to say about it.

Davlin: let's move on to the legislature.

34 or 35 districts in Idaho.

Most of them are not as competitive in the general election as they are in the primary.

But there are four big exceptions to that.

Let's start in district six in north Idaho, that Moscow Lewiston area.

Richert: Yeah, it is so much like America right now.

We've got seven states that we're watching in the presidential race, and we have four legislative districts that we're watching out of 35 in Idaho, starting with six.

And why it's interesting, it's right now an all Republican delegation, but it's kind of a purple ish district in terms of how the numbers break down.

You know, you have like campuses there.

You would think theoretically, this is a district where Democrats can make some inroads.

They have in the past, Dan Foreman, the incumbent senator, very outspoken, very hard line conservative, getting a real run, in that race from Julia Parker, who sits on the Moscow City Council.

That is a race Democrats clearly want.

They would like to take out their informant, as they have done in general elections in the past.

Davlin: Yeah.

and we're also watching whether Lori McCann, is going to retain her seat against Trish Carter.

Good.

sorry.

Trish Carter-Goodheart.

A member of the Nez Perce tribe.

that's always interesting to me, because post redistricting, you have Moscow, that and Lewiston that are paired with parts of the Nez Perce Reservation, very different district than it was ten years ago.

curious how that vote is going to, change, perhaps the outcome of that potential or, that match up.

Witt: Yeah.

I don't have any thoughts on on who's likely to win.

I mean, that district's getting a lot of, a lot of attention and not always in a good way.

you know, some outbursts from, some of the candidates.

Senator Forman.

Yeah.

You know, that were getting a lot of media attention and, Davlin: Witnesses saying at a public forum that after, Trish Carter-Goodheart, who isn't running against him, they’re running against representative McCann.

Yeah.

after she spoke out about racism that she had personally experienced, witnesses say that Senator Forman said, you know, I'm tired of talking about this.

Go back to where you came from.

Yeah.

And of course, the irony there is she's a Nez Perce member that she's very much from Idaho and very much from America.

Witt: Yeah.

Is he from Illinois?

Davlin: I'm not sure.

Witt: Yeah.

So.

So I suppose, you know, one can always return to Illinois.

Richert: And let's not lose sight of the other house race in district six.

Kathy Dawes, Democrat from Moscow running against the incumbent, Representative Brandon Mitchell.

A lot of money in that race that may be, erased.

That could flip, depending on what you have in the way of turnout.

Davlin: Further south in the Boise area, the kind of that Boise Meridian, mix.

We've got Codi Galloway versus Rick Just, that's a rematch.

from two years ago where Rick Just barely beat Codi Galloway.

There was a third, a conservative third party candidate in 2022 that most likely took all of those votes from people who would have otherwise voted for Codi Galloway, the Republican.

that third party candidate isn't running this time.

I imagine that could that makes it a little bit harder for Senator Just Richert: It's a different calculus when it's a one on one race like it is.

And there was so much money in this race.

I mean, the two candidates alone have raised upwards of $250,000 between them.

Now, you also have money, considerable amount of money coming in from a group that supports private school choice.

They are running ads and running messaging against Just in for Galloway.

This is such a hard race to handicap and it's such a hard district to handicap because for people who don't live in the Treasure Valley, you you've got district 15 that's kind of sandwiched between legislative districts in Boise that are blue and legislative candidates, eight legislative districts in Meridian west, Ada Canyon County that are solidly red.

This is the purple battleground in the Treasure Valley.

And, you know, anything could happen in that district next week.

It wouldn't surprise me if this went all Democratic.

Wouldn't surprise me if it went all Republican.

Right now it's a mix.

Kettler: And it's a presidential election year, which can affect the turnout and, you know, looking at the Democratic numbers in the legislature, it's there's small numbers.

They're probably trying to really protect what the incumbents they have in order to protect the seats they have on committees.

They need to defend, you know, a lot of incumbents in these competitive districts, like 15.

And so really key for kind of keeping their numbers up, Davlin: You know, and we'll be watching the House races in that district as well.

Another, another big battle ground for Republicans and Democrats, both as district 26.

So post redistricting, that's wood River Valley, the Ketchum Valley area, and Jerome, as well as a couple of the smaller counties in the area.

But those are the big population centers.

and another matchup.

Senator Ron Taylor, Democrat versus former Senator Laurie Lickley, Republican from Jerome.

The difference here is, once again, there is a third party candidate who could be a spoiler like we saw in district 15 a few years ago.

Richert: It definitely has that feel.

Kala Tate is that third candidate running as an independent, running to the right of Laurie Lickley, who's a very moderate Republican.

I don't think there's much secret here that, there are folks, on the far right, you know, hard line conservatives who really would rather not see likely get elected.

They'd almost rather see Taylor get elected, because we have to remember, it's not just who is in the legislature, it's who is in the Republican caucus.

In December, when Republicans in the Senate decide who the next Senate pro tem is and in turn, who are the committee chairs and the committee assignments?

I mean, there you know, that is the subtext that we're going to see unfold in a few weeks.

So 26 is a really interesting race to watch because of this three three person race and this this dynamic within the Republican Party that's kind of playing out behind the scenes here.

Davlin: Absolutely.

And that's another that's another split in, with the House members in district 26, where you have one Republican and one Democrat, both of them, Ned Burns and Jack Nelson, facing stiff competition from their competitors, Republican Mike.

Richert: Two years ago, both both Burns and Nelson won really tight margins in those races two years ago.

Davlin: Exactly.

moving on to district 29, what stands out to me most about this district is Senator James Ruchti is unopposed, a Democrat who is unopposed in the general election in an otherwise competitive district.

I mean, one of the House members is in House leadership for the Republicans.

Republicans have a chance in 29, and they didn't take it.

Richert: They had a chance.

I mean, I got back two years ago watching the election results.

It looked like he was going to lose to a very conservative Republican opponent in that district.

Now he's running unopposed.

And when you run unopposed, that gives a member of, legislative leadership like Senator Ruchti the chance to funnel some money here and there to Democratic candidates around the state who are in competitive races.

So, yeah, it really was a surprise that he got a free pass.

Davlin: And again, we'll be watching those House races too, with incumbents Dustin Manwaring and Nate Roberts and their opponents.

before we wrap up, Kevin, I want to touch on the school levy and bond issues that are going to be on the ballot in some areas of the state.

There are a couple of big ones.

And so two springs and Coeur d'Alene.

Richert: This is a low key, really big election for schools.

We have $244 million worth of bonds and levies on the ballot on Tuesday.

And if you're thinking that's a high number, it is a high number.

And it is uncommon to see these kind of bonds and levies on the November ballot.

Why are we seeing them in November?

Well, go back to what the legislature has done the past two years.

They've eliminated the March school election date.

They've eliminated the August school election date.

So if you're a school district, you either run an election in May or you run it in November.

So.

Yep.

So the spring's trying to replace a 59 year old high school.

they have a bond issue on the ballot.

That's the biggest ask on the ballot on Tuesday.

It's about $55 million.

Coeur d'Alene has a $50 million supplemental levy.

And it's a big deal in Coeur d’Alene.

This is about a quarter of their operating budget.

So there's a lot on the line for those two districts and a lot of districts around the state.

Davlin: And there are some medium and smaller ones.

You have the rundown at idaho@news.org.

I'm sure you're.

Richert: Going to be have the summary of all of the, all of the races.

So if you're wondering if you got something going on in your neighborhood.

Davlin: All right, we're going to have to leave it there.

Kevin Richard, Idaho education news, Doctor Stephanie Witt, Doctor Jaclyn Kittler, thank you so much for joining us.

Davlin: Nationwide, early voter turnout is hitting record numbers.

But what about here in Idaho?

Here to discuss that.

And Tuesday prep is Secretary of State Phil McGrane.

Thanks so much for joining us.

I know how busy you are.

how is early voting and absentee voter turnout in Idaho so far?

Phil McGrane: You know, it's been a really fun and awesome election to watch just because there's so much turnout.

just here, wrapping up the end of early in-person voting, I think two things really stand out.

Just the total numbers.

as of right now, we're over 350,000 Idahoans have already cast ballots in this election.

And that's way more than we saw.

Total turnout for the primary.

That's impressive.

We still have more voting to continue.

but also, I think one of the most interesting things to note this will likely be the first time we've had in-person early voting surpassed absentee mail voting.

usually you have more absentees than early votes and just all the participation.

Every county clerk I talked to across the state is seeing lines and people just really interested in this election, which I think says a lot, headed into November 5th.

Davlin: I know that when my mom went the other day, she said there were 60 people in line in front of her, which I've never seen in early voting, and it was like 10 a.m. on a Wednesday or something like that.

McGrane: It's still early in the process today.

You know, the end of early voting is always the longest lines, and that's where you're really going to see it.

but it is impressive to see so many people so engaged.

And these turnout numbers say a lot.

You know, we're growing state, but I think we're going to have really high numbers for turnout for this election overall.

Davlin: We're not a swing state.

What are the factors in Idaho that are driving specifically the early in-person voting turnout?

McGrane: You know, that's one of the interesting things.

I've talked to lots of people.

You and I were talking beforehand.

Just what is it that's driving this?

There is a national trend that we're seeing where in-person early voting is really being, popularly used.

but additionally, I think it's all over the state.

So it's not a local sheriff's race or a school bond or levy.

That's typically what we look at on our ballot.

there is the presidential election.

I'm sure that's driving a lot of the turnout.

Idaho's electoral votes, you know, aren't probably not as competitive as those battleground states you were referring to.

we do have the constitutional amendment in prop one, but I still think my conversations say the people who are really focused on, you know, the the high engaged voters are really following that stuff.

But the average voter, I can't pinpoint exactly what it is that's driving it.

Davlin: Does this mean that will likely have overall an overall voter turnout increase once we have all of the numbers, you know, very late on Tuesday night?

Or are these people who would have likely voted in person anyway on Tuesday?

McGrane: I think it's going to be a little bit of both.

I do think we're going to have record numbers in terms of total number of voters that we've been building up to, that we've been drawing attention to the election.

I think, on the percentage turnout.

That's one of the things for us to watch if this pace can continue all the way through Election Day.

We will set records.

the question is, how many of these people are choosing a different method?

in our people, who would have voted anyways?

And I don't know, but hopefully the information's getting out there that Idahoans, you know, there's still plenty more people to vote in this election, that they have the tools and resources they need to make sure they can vote on Tuesday.

Davlin: And this is super nerdy, but when we're looking at voter turnout, you look at registered voters, not people who are qualified to vote, but not registered voters.

And so I think the record is from 2020, where it's about 81% of registered voters turned out to vote.

You think it's possible that will hit more than 81%?

McGrane: I think, you know, here we are at 350,000.

And so we need to get over 800,000.

I think it's very achievable.

Most Idahoans typically wait till Election day to vote.

That's just consistent.

Usually we see about 70% of the people who vote vote on Election Day.

So if if that holds true, then yes, I think we will break those numbers.

Davlin: I know our neighbors to the West and Oregon and Washington are dealing with some ballot box security concerns after there were fires in ballot drop boxes.

if, first of all, if voters are concerned about that here in Idaho, if they still have their absentee ballot, what should they do?

McGrane: You know, probably the easiest thing is you can take it to your local elections office.

You can drop it off in person and hand it to a person.

that's the case whether you're doing it today, whether you're doing it on Monday.

also, if you're not certain and you're just, you know, the Postal Service probably isn't the right source at this point because we're so close to the election.

You can also spoil your ballot and vote in person, on Election day.

So if circumstances have changed, take advantage of that.

I will note so all of the drop boxes throughout the state are video monitored.

almost all of them are at election offices just outside.

anyways, they're also, you know, locally here in the Treasure Valley, I can say, having been in the clerk's office before, they have fire suppression systems in them, that's important.

And that actually proved out between the multiple instances when there were burned ballots, either one, that wasn't just because of some of the preventative measures.

We're taking those precautions.

We've really been working hard for this election to be ready.

So hopefully everything's all smooth here in Idaho.

Davlin: You just touched on an important point.

We're not like other states where if a ballot is postmarked by election day, that it counts.

Counting stops 8 p.m. local time here in Idaho.

So if it is in the mail on November 5th, that's not good enough.

It needs to be in the county clerk's hand.

McGrane: That's correct.

If you have about you need to get it.

So 8 p.m. voting ceases.

Doesn't matter what form of voting, whether it's at the polls or whether it's absentee voting.

The ballots must be in the hand of the clerk's office, by that deadline.

And so if you have it, now is the time to be thinking of that alternative plan to go on Election Day or something else, or to go drop it off at one of the drop boxes or the elections office.

I think we especially people coming from other states who've moved here and maybe used to that, know we have hard deadlines, which also means we'll have quicker results than many other states.

Davlin: That's right.

We're not going to be waiting for the most part for three days to get those results.

Counties or statewide, have there been any security concerns when it comes to elections?

McGrane: You know, we're very blessed to live in Idaho.

You know, I was telling you that earlier, really, it's gone very smoothly.

We have had some things come up where there's been some suspicious packages and others, but we've been able to work with law enforcement and to keep things safe.

I don't think there's going to be any instances on Election Day.

poll workers should feel safe working on Election Day.

And really, we're very fortunate.

When you look nationally at some of the challenges that you see, Idaho, where we have clerks that are all working together, we have so many people willing to serve at the polls.

this should be a very smooth election.

Davlin: We have about a minute left, but what are counties doing to prepare either themselves or poll workers for this massive turnout that we're anticipating?

McGrane: I will say the big thing is the counties right now are just working their tails off.

all this early voting means it's been really active at all of the county elections offices.

I know they're getting all the supplies out to the polling locations right now to be ready for it.

Having worked with all of them, this things are really working well together.

So hopefully voters will have the resources.

You know, I think the vote the vote idaho.gov website, that's a resource that has taken some pressure off many of the counties to say, okay, there's this One-Stop shop that people can find their polling place, get their sample ballot, that those tools are making it easier for people to vote, which allows the clerks to focus on getting their poll workers in place, getting the supplies ready.

And so far, I'm feeling really good heading into Election Day.

Davlin: I have to say, I have to give a plug for Voteidaho.gov because it is one of my favorite Idaho government sites.

If you did vote by mail and you're wondering if your county clerk got your ballot, you can check the status of it on vote idaho.gov.

If you haven't yet voted and you're not sure where your polling location is.

Once again, you can get all of that.

your polling location.

What your ballot will look like at voteidaho.gov.

Secretary of State Thelma Green, thank you so much for joining us.

Next week, our post-election show will be filming in Moscow.

It's home of one of those purple legislative districts.

we hope you join us for our statewide election wrap up show.

Thanks so much for watching.

We'll see you next week.

Narrator: Presentation of Idaho Reports on Idaho Public Television is made possible through the generous support of the Laura Moore Cunningham Foundation, committed to fulfilling the Moore and Bettis family legacy of building the great state of Idaho.

By the Friends of Idaho Public Television and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.