The Idaho Republican Party will gather for its 2026 state convention this weekend and among its business is consideration of a pair of resolutions that, taken together, would attempt to push the state entirely out of using state-run primary elections for party nominations.
And what is driving the effort to shift to nominations by caucuses? The "whereas" section of Resolution 19 spells it out...
WHEREAS: The goal of the Idaho Republican party is to select candidates who best represent the Idaho Republican Platform and who will vote to maintain a conservative Idaho way of life.WHEREAS: Republican candidates, elected to office, have failed to vote to uphold the Idaho Constitution, the Republican Platform, and conservative values they espoused when campaigning.WHEREAS: The ability to select the candidates who best represent Republican Party Values in primary elections has been jeopardized by candidates misrepresenting themselves as Republicans to be competitive.WHEREAS: The Idaho closed Republican primary has been irrevocably compromised by non-Republican voters’ ability to register as Republicans for the primary election and the state has no way of stopping this practice.WHEREAS: The state has no remedy for closed primary crossover votingWHEREAS: Unaffiliated and newly registered voters can choose to vote in the Republican primary on election dayWHEREAS: Caucusing diminishes the ability for non-Republicans to infiltrate the Republican Party vote for representation.WHEREAS: Caucusing allows more engaged discussion, debate, and informed voter participation to discern the candidates most representative of the Idaho Republican Platform, conservative values, and the Idaho Constitution.
There is a certain circularity to it all. Basically, non-Republicans have "infiltrated" the partially closed primary system in Idaho. Only, it has not been partially closed. The Republican primary has been closed, full stop, since the 2012 cycle, something current IDP Chair Dorothy Moon raised in a recent op-ed. Under Idaho state law, the state parties can choose whether unaffiliated voters and/or those affiliated with other parties can participate in their primaries. And the Idaho Republican Party has always confined participation to registered Republicans.
But voters are free to register and affiliate with a party of their choosing whether they are truly Republicans (or Democrats, etc.) or not. And that is where the infiltration has occurred. Non-Republicans, however defined, have registered as Republicans and elected Republicans who have not "best represent[ed] the Idaho Republican Platform."
"The state has no remedy for closed primary crossover voting." But what is not clear is whether the Idaho Republican Party has such a remedy. Sure, a party-run caucus is going to have a lower rate of participation than a state-run primary. However, that is only a partial remedy. It does not fully eliminate the potential for "infiltration."
Why?
For an answer, look to the 2024 Idaho Republican presidential caucuses. They, too, were a closed affair with no on-site registration. What did the Idaho Republican Party use to determine affiliation with the party for the purposes of participating in the 2024 caucus?
State voter rolls.
The same remediless option the state uses for the primary. The only difference was that the Idaho Republican Party required voters to have registered/affiliated with the party by January 1, 2024 (ahead of the March 2 caucuses). That tamps down on any last-minute registrations, but not those fully committed to voting Republican in a given cycle.
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Noteworthy: Mind you, all of this is based on a couple of non-binding resolution proposals the Idaho Republican Party is considering this weekend in Meridian. The delegates to the convention may reject either or both. But even if the convention votes in favor of one or both of Resolutions 18 and/or 19, there is nothing there to compel the (Republican-controlled) legislature in Boise to make the necessary changes to state law to change the nomination process.And while none of this directly affects the presidential nomination process in the Gem state for Republicans, the outcome will likely color any discussions around any resumed efforts to resurrect the state-run presidential primary. Prior attempts have already failed in both 2024 and 2026.
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