On March 3, 2020, Minnesotans will vote to nominate major political party presidential candidates in a primary election. This is the fifth time in state history – and the first time since 1992 – that Minnesota has held a presidential primary election; in previous years this was done through the caucus system.
The Minnesota legislature made this historic decision regarding the 2020 primary in 2016. Those of you who follow presidential primaries will recognize the date selected by the legislature as Super Tuesday, known as such because many states hold presidential primaries on the first Tuesday in March.
The primary election process in Minnesota will be similar to that of our other statewide elections: voters in the city of Grand Marais will go to their usual polling places at the courthouse and community center to cast their ballots between the hours of 7 a.m. and 8 p.m. All other voters will receive their ballots in the mail, and the registration process and absentee ballots process will be akin to other statewide elections.
There are some differences, however. While four parties qualify as major parties in Minnesota, only two decided to participate in the presidential primary: the Republican party and the Democratic-Farmer- Labor party. Additionally, there are separate ballots for each major political party and voters must select one party’s ballot for voting.
What does that mean? At the polling locations in Grand Marais, each voter will be required to indicate his/her party preference to the election judge, who will then give that individual the ballot for that party’s candidate(s). In mail ballot precincts, each voter will open the mailing from the auditor’s office and find two ballots: one with the Republican Party candidate and one with the Democratic Farmer Labor Party’s candidates. The voter will choose one ballot, vote on that ballot, and return that ballot to the auditor’s office. (The other ballot should be destroyed.) Please note that the signature envelope used to return the ballot has check boxes for all four major political parties. It is critical that the voter check the box of the party that matches the completed ballot in the envelope.
Absentee voters will indicate their major party preference on the absentee application. They will receive only the major party ballot that they requested. The information on each voter’s party choice must be provided to the chairs of each major party.
A complication for voters at the polling place is that they must be sure of their decision before receiving the ballot from the election judge. Once they’ve signed the roster and received the ballot lot, they are not allowed to request a different ballot. The process is slightly different for absentee and mail ballot voters, who have the option to request replacement ballots up until seven days before the primary (February 25).
So why do we have such a complicated process, and what about the privacy of the voter’s decision? The process was mandated by state legislation approved in 2016. County officials joined with the secretary of state to propose a statutory change to eliminate multiple ballots, but the legislature decided not to make that change.
The good news is that the voter’s choice of candidate remains private: candidate choice is made in the voting booth as usual. Also, there are procedural changes for this election to protect the privacy of the voter’s major party ballot choice from other voters in the polling place: all voters must sign the roster to receive a ballot, and they must mark their party choice on the roster. Election judges must cover the party choice made by each voter to prevent other voters from seeing it. Additionally, election judges will keep the blank ballots out of view so that, when they give a blank ballot to a voter, no other voter will be able to determine from which party’s stack it came.
For more information on the Presidential Nomination Primary and the upcoming state elections, contact the auditor’s office at 218-387-3640 or elections@co.cook.mn.us, or visit the Secretary of State at: www.mnvotes.org/.
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