Rich Whitney: Voting Green in the Illinois Primary

As many of you may already know, there will be a Green Party primary election on March 18, 2014 (the same day as the primary for the other parties) in a few areas of the state where the Green Party is an “established” political party. However, there are a few very important things that you should know about the March 18 primary:

1. Although we are an established political party in the Metropolitan Water District of Greater Chicago, there will not be a primary ballot for the Green Party in that particular election. The reason is that it is an uncontested primary. We selected three excellent candidates—Karen Roothan, George Milkowski and Michael Smith—for the three positions up for election, through our own process. As a result, and in order to save on costs, the Cook County Elections Office has decided to use a provision in the Election Code that allows them to forgo conducting the primary election and just go ahead and certify our candidates for a place on the November 4 General Election ballot. In other words, our candidates have already “won” the primary (yea!) and can now begin focusing on the General Election! Not only that, because of our foresight, our candidates have already saved Cook County taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars even before taking office!

2. This will not affect the primary election with respect to any other race in which we have candidates for the primary. There will still be a primary election in the 5th and 12th Congressional District races (for Nancy Wade and Paula Bradshaw, respectively) even though these are also uncontested, and in those jurisdictions in which we have candidates running for township committee in suburban Cook County or precinct committee within the 12th Congressional District.

You can—and should—pick up a Green Party primary ballot in those areas and cast your votes for our chosen candidates. Among other things, we want to preclude even the slight possibility that a stealth write-in candidate may try to steal our ballot line.

3. To those who are considering running for office as a Green in the 2014 General Election—even if you only consider it a slim possibility that you might decide to run: DO NOT VOTE IN THE DEMOCRATIC OR REPUBLICAN PRIMARY. If you vote in the Democratic or Republican primary, you will be legally disqualified from running as a Green in 2014.

In most jurisdictions in the state, there will not be a Green Party primary. It is possible that, despite the lessons of history demonstrating the fallacy of so-called “lesser evil” voting, some of you may be tempted to pick up a primary ballot of one of the corporate parties, with a view toward helping a perceived “lesser evil” candidate or helping defeat a perceived “greater evil” one. While the desire to do this may be debatable or understandable in exceptional cases, we certainly hope that you will resist that temptation. But it is especially important for everyone who is considering running for any office as a Green in the 2014 General Election NOT to vote in the Democratic or Republican primary. The same rule will not bar someone deciding to run as a Green for local office in 2015 (but even persons in that category may have some explaining to do!)

4. Finally, in some localities there may be advisory referenda on the March 18 primary ballot that you may wish to cast a vote for or against. In those jurisdictions, the election authorities should make available a “non-partisan” primary ballot that would allow you to cast your vote without having to take a primary ballot of one of the two evil parties.

We will try to set up a hotline on primary election day to assist people who are denied a Green Party or nonpartisan primary ballot where these are supposed to be available. Watch for a future announcement on that.

Source