America’s Founding Fathers believed that direct democracy was a slower, more circuitous path to tyranny. To prevent this, they avoided establishing “electoral tyranny” and designed a system that filtered democracy through a representative legislature. National popular referendum initiatives did not exist until the Progressive Era in the early 20th century. Now progressives are trying to turn red states into blue states using national popular referendum initiatives, including a proposal to eliminate primaries altogether. What’s the Republican response?
As Democrats strive to establish a permanent majority at the national level, their extremism has repelled the public in nearly half of the states, making them more Republican. Republicans currently have a trifecta in 23 states, and de facto trifecta in 26 states, including Kansas, Kentucky, and North Carolina, where Republican supermajorities outnumber Democratic governors. In most of these states, Democrats have been relegated to a permanently irrelevant minority in statewide offices and control of the legislature, and in many states, Democrats have become barely noticeable within the state.
Many ballot propositions are filled with complex language and confusing double negatives, making the consequences of “yes” and “no” unclear.
A growing sea of dark red states threatens Marxist dominance because their policies depend on unanimity and cannot tolerate strong opposition. If the Republican Party were truly a conservative party, the contrasts between states would be so stark that it would be nearly impossible to maintain the Democratic Party’s culture of anarcho-tyranny and chaos outside of urban centers.
Democrats have long worked behind the scenes with pseudo-Republicans who subvert Republican states’ values and satisfy special interests to curb the rightward shift in Republican-leaning states. They have occasionally appeased conservatives on issues like life and guns to keep them at bay. But the rise of state Freedom Caucus and the grassroots takeover of many state Republican parties is eroding their ability to govern from the left of center while campaigning in red jerseys. The success of Governor Ron DeSantis in Florida, a once-purple state, has activists in more Republican states asking, “Why can’t Idaho do the same?”
Never fear, Democrats never give up and have plans for every contingency. Over the past decade, they have used sophisticated campaign tactics and big money to abolish Alaska’s primary and create a jungle primary system with ranked-choice voting. This system essentially fosters a “no label” dynamic, allowing closet Democrats, with the help of a subversive Republican establishment, to block conservatives from winning closed partisan primaries and then use a complex formula to defeat them in the ranked-choice general election.
So why are they limiting their successful model to Alaska and not trying it in the other 20+ Republican-leaning states? A left-wing front group called “Idahoans for Open Primaries,” led by former “Republican” Governor Butch Otter, succeeded in gathering enough signatures Earlier this month, a bill was passed that would put Alaska’s ranked-choice voting model on the November ballot. If the proposal passes, it would eliminate Republican primaries and allow a host of illegal immigrant candidates to run slick ads that trick voters into supporting Republicans like Otter as their only choice in the general election.
According to Ballotpedia, 10 states, including Idaho, have legally banned ranked-choice voting, but left-wing activists working with pseudo-Republicans have used the initiative process to change state constitutions.
Starting in the upcoming legislative session, all Republican-leaning states will have to make petitioning for citizen initiatives much tougher. One proposal is to require uniform signature collection across the state, or for ballot questions to meet a 50% or 60% threshold in each district. This would prevent liberals from scoring in urban areas and flipping the entire state.
If we don’t block ranked choice voting and limit initiative petitions, liberals will try to use convoluted ballot language to turn Republican states into Democrat states without winning an election, thus enacting pre-birth abortion rights in every state they try. They will use this tactic in every state, on every controversial issue.
Consider Missouri, where Donald Trump and Republicans are expected to win a statewide victory but could be saddled with ballot measures that include a $15 minimum wage and mandatory abortion until birth.
Many ballot propositions are full of complex language and confusing double negatives that make the consequences of “yes” and “no” unclear. This allows wealthy interests to manipulate the public. Our Founders understood that direct democracy means elites decide everything. John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the United States, aptly warned: “Pure democracy, like pure rum, easily intoxicates, and breeds with it a thousand mad pranks and follies.”
