By Rudi Keller
During testimony Monday to the state Senate Local Government, Elections and Pensions Committee, leaders of the state’s two largest political parties agreed that restoring the primary would increase participation and elevate the state’s national political profile.
“In 2024 we received just a ton of complaints from probably every legislative district in the state because we only got about 23,000 people participating” in the caucuses that replaced the primary, said Miles Ross, executive director of the Missouri Republican Party.
The Democratic Party held a private primary in 2024 with voting confined to a Saturday morning. Holding a state-run primary on the first day the two major parties will recognize as valid would attract candidates and money to the state, said Russ Carnahan, chairman of the Missouri Democratic Party.
“We’d like Missouri to be relevant again,” Carnahan said.
The committee did not vote on the bill. State Sen. Mike Henderson, a Republican from Desloge and chairman of the committee, said after the meeting that he was uncertain when, or if, he would bring the bill up for a vote.
The process of selecting the delegates who nominate presidential candidates traditionally kicks off in Iowa with local caucuses, followed by the first primary in New Hampshire. Republicans have held to that calendar while Democrats have tried to push other states ahead in the voting.
Both parties recognize March 1 as the earliest date that any state can begin its delegate selection process.
That is why so many states hold their primaries on “Super Tuesday,” which is March 7 in 2028. States that are scheduled for that date include California, Oklahoma, Texas and Tennessee. Rhode Island lawmakers are considering whether to move that state’s primary from April to Super Tuesday.
With President Donald Trump barred from seeking a third term, there will be no incumbent seeking re-election in 2028 for the first time since 2016. That will make the primaries competitive and Missouri can raise its profile, said state Rep. Brad Banderman, a Republican from St. Clair.
“I believe that we can do better as far as participation if we make the presidential preference primary matter, if we move it as far forward as we can,” Banderman said.
If both major parties would allow it, Banderman said, he would have set the primary earlier.
Each party allocates delegates under its own process and while Missouri had a primary from 2000 to 2020, the votes cast did not always determine which candidates received nominating delegates. Instead, the candidates who were best organized to turn out supporters to mass meetings in counties and townships were able to get delegates despite low overall voter support.
Banderman’s bill, which passed the House by a 116-23 vote earlier this month, would require the parties to allocate delegates based on the results of the primary. The people who would cast those votes would still be chosen in a caucus process, but they would have to reflect the results of the primary on the first convention ballot.
Democrats have not held more than one ballot at their convention since 1952. The last time Republicans needed more than one ballot to nominate a presidential candidate was 1948.
The primary would cost the state $9 million
“I think it’s honestly pretty extraordinary that we can host a statewide election for only about $9 million,” Banderman said.
While party leaders were in agreement, some Republicans are not happy with the idea of reinstating the primary.
Bev Ehlen, a member of the Republican State Committee, said taxpayers should not pay for elections to select partisan nominees and included the August primary in her objections. Caucuses build party organizations and teach important lessons about politics, she said.
A primary makes the caucuses irrelevant, she said.
“It really neuters the caucus and convention process,” Ehlen said. “It binds the delegates, so they don’t even have a reason to caucus.”
Missouri has only recently begun adding party affiliation to voter lists and adding a party is voluntary. Voters can choose to participate in either party’s primary by naming the ballot they want.
Republicans should use the presidential primary as leverage to move to a closed primary, Ehlen said.
Another opponent, Lisa Pannett of the political consulting firm Armorvine, said the bill allows Democrats to select Republican candidates.
“I want to applaud the Democrats and the left wing of the Republican Party who are working in unison together on this bill,” she said.
Banderman said he was surprised to learn he was in the “left wing” of the GOP and said a closed primary would not be possible.
“If we were waiting on closed primaries, none of us would be sitting here,” Banderman said. “The political parties within our state operate just fine.”
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