How does One Change their Party Affiliation?

[RJ Connors]

I have been trying to find out how someone changes their party affiliation and not having much luck. I have been thinking about changing mine for some time but have just not gotten around to. Although I have been a registered Republican for some 30 + years now I quit being involved in local Republican politics in 1994 as it had just moved so far away from it’s political and philosophical moorings the it was became a party of something completely different than what it was founded as. While today’s Republicans call themselves conservatives that simply is not true. Today’s Republicans can be thought of as a lot of things however, conservative is not one of them.

So in short, since about 94 I have been voting Democrat but remained registered Republican. And for some good reasons. I suppose one of the main reasons initially is that I live in a state that is the very definition of a Red State and such being true I remained Republican because when it comes to the political spoils here for business purposes one has to be a Republican. And while I had cashed in on that in the past, and really did not anticipate doing so in the future, you just never can tell.

Then when the Bush regime came to power I remained Republican out of what I considered a very real possibility of being ostracized or worse if one was not. But I started voting pretty much straight Democrat. But that has changed these days. While in the 2004 election the polls closed at 7:00 p.m. sharp and at 7:01 p.m. NBC had called the state for Bush. That has changed this election as my state has now become a blue state even though my particular county went about 85% Republican.

At any rate I feel now is the time to make a change. Which the first thing that motivated me to address this issue now was listing to Rush talk on the day after election. I turned him on to see how he was going to backpedal and recast the reality of the election to his ditto heads as Rush is certainly the master in both those areas.

On of the things he mentioned when he stated telling his audience about how they need to start rebuilding the party, was that it was pretty obvious that some Republicans had crossed over and had helped with the Obama campaign. Rush then went on to firmly state that, "Weeee need to identify these people and make sure they stay out of the party and don't come back". I thought you know, Rush is Right, so I decided that now is the time to help Rush in achieving that goal.

So I went looking on the DNC website, along with the local state and county Democratic web site and the internet in general but I still am not finding anything about changing one’s party affiliation. Which I find pretty strange. So I sent an E-mail to the DNC asking how to do this but still have not received a response. Although I understand they are probably pretty tied up right now and I most likely will get an answer in the near future I thought I would go ahead and post the question here to see if people here could provide me with more information.

So, thoughts, suggestions?



Obama in 2012. :dem:

[Justitia]

1. Depends on the state. What state are you in? -eom

[RJ Connors]

5. I am in the Great Blue state of Indiana. n/t

[annabanana]

9. Congratulations on your Blue-itude!

Long may you wave :patriot:

[LiberalFighter]

12. Then you are NOT a registered Republican

Voters do not register as a Republican, Democrat or any other political affiliation in Indiana.

[RJ Connors]

13. We are for the Primary's

as I have worked those before.

[LiberalFighter]

16. You can only vote the Democratic OR Republican Primary. Not both.

The primary is the only time that a voter is asked whether they want the ballot for the Democratic or Republican Party. It is not automatic even if a voter has a history of voting for just one party.

By Indiana Code voters are suppose to take the primary ballot of the party a voter expects to vote mostly for in the General Election. BUT there is no way anyone would know or should know how a voter votes because it is a secret ballot. This was brought up a few times on tv and explained by a member of the Election Board.

I remember back in 2002 when Helmke ran against our current US Representative that many Democrats voted in the Republican Primary in an attempt to oust Souder. It didn't work. After that the voting history that I have seen of these 1 time Republicans showed them voting in the Democratic Primary after 2002.

I have worked with our county party's committee to appoint workers for the polls the last two elections. Our volunteers all gave pretty much the same response that voters don't register for a political party.

Filling those spots with workers for the election at the voting sites is suppose to be based on party affiliation. But it isn't followed 100%. We get workers that haven't voted in Primary and wouldn't know their affiliation.

Here in Allen County we have appointed some Republicans. Before I started helping out I don't believe there was a decent method used to determine a worker's affiliation. That has changed now that I incorporated data into the software application I developed. It includes their voting history. We are slowly eliminating anyone that votes just in Republican Primaries for at least the position for Democratic Judge. That is because in our county the Republicans get to be Inspectors and the Democratic Judge goes with the Inspector to pick up supplies before the election and to drop off the ballots and results after the election.

We had 521 positions to fill this election and ended up assigning 3 more workers with approval of the Election Board on election day.


By the way we have had a few show up at our monthly meetings and announced that they use to be a Republican.

[RJ Connors]

18. Ok, that makes sense and may have been where I got tripped

up at. As I was thinking about primaries and that we had one box for R's and one box for D's. To be truthful it has been so long ago since I have registered to vote that I don't even know when it was I did it and what was done.

Put thanks for putting in the IC reference so that I can look it up later if I need to for this or other items. Thanks for your help. :hi:

[LiberalFighter]

20. Depending on which county you are registered they may have the date you first registered.

The IC that pertains to Precinct Election Officers is IC 3-6-6.


Otherwise, all of IC 3 pertains to all facets of the election law.

[RJ Connors]

21. Great, thanks!!!!

:hi:

[LiberalFighter]

17. Also, there is no provision on voter registration forms in Indiana

to check off party affiliation. Or a separate form for such action.

[RJ Connors]

19. Yeah I have never run into that in any General Election. n/t

[Justitia]

14. Congrats! My in-laws are Hoosiers - Parke county. IN does not have party affiliation.

So you are already free of the "registered republican" label.

Indiana was my secret wish to turn blue and I nearly fell out of my chair when it actually happened.

My Hoosier-turned-Texan husband was beaming w/pride in his home state.

Indiana: Now Officially More Progressive Than Texas

We are very happy for you!

[annabanana]

2. I expect one could do that through the local Board of Elections office.

They're the ones with the books...

[RJ Connors]

6. You know I wondered if it could be that simple

but could not find anything saying yeah, that's all you have to do.

[PetrusMonsFormicarum]

3. Should be as easy

as filling out a new voter registration card.

And welcome.

[Jacobin]

4. In my state you just go to the registrar of voter's office and fill out

a form.

Call your registrar's office

[annabanana]

7. ps: That is a nice post. . . .Welcome to DU. . .

Let us know how you do.

[RJ Connors]

11. Thank you. Yes with Obama being elected it has renewed my faith

in the political process and now again makes sense to get involved in local politics. But I think most of the people have given me that answer in that I just have to fill out a new form. I have to go down to the courthouse on Wed so I think I will get that done then. :hi:

[Justitia]

15. Here is a link to the IN form for the Sec of State - no party affiliation.

http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/pdfs/VRG7_080108_revision.pdf

I really don't think you have to do anything.

If it is like TX, if you vote in a primary they mark you "R" or "D" - but only to keep you from voting in both, not to affiliate you with a party.

In TX we get new cards every year, so the new card comes with a blank primary section.

[SoCalNative]

8. Just re-register as whatever party you wish to be affiliated with

the Post Office has voter registration forms.

[The Wielding Truth]

10. Reregister. Check or write Democratic.

[davidinalameda]

22. you have to re-register to vote

not that hard

check out your state's secretary of state's website; you should be able to find registration info there

[tabbycat31]

23. I changed mine when I moved

I registered as an unaffiliated NY voter. When I moved, I changed my registration at the deadline day to vote in the Super Tuesday primary. I'm now a registered NJ democrat.