PAC formed to oppose Open Primaries initiative

A former congressional staffer for Raúl Labrador has created a group to oppose the Open Primaries initiative.

Jake Ball formed the political action committee Idaho Fair Elections on July 12, according to information from the Secretary of State’s Office. The Meridian resident, formerly a district director for Labrador while he was in Congress and campaign manager for U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo in 2008, created the group because he opposes the system and believes he was misled about the nature of the proposed initiative.

Ball said he signed the petition to get the initiative on the ballot because he thought it would restore the open primary system that Idaho had before 2012.

“I feel deceived,” he said. “I don’t feel good about the way this thing was carried out.”

The initiative’s supporters say volunteer signature gatherers were trained to explain all aspects of the proposed election mechanism.

If approved, the initiative would create a top-four primary, open to voters of any political party, that would send the top four vote-getters to the general election.

Voters could then choose the winner in a general election with instant runoff voting, also known as ranked choice voting, which allows voters to select a top candidate and rank additional candidates in order of preference. After the first choices of all ballots are counted, the candidate with the fewest votes will be eliminated. Votes for the eliminated candidate will be counted toward the voters’ next choice — this process repeats until two candidates remain and the one with the most votes will win.

Ball said he wasn’t informed about these details of the initiative; he signed a declaration outlining his experience in court filings to the state Supreme Court as part of Labrador’s lawsuit challenging the initiative.

He tried to get his name removed from the petition, he said, but it was too late. Ball now wants his PAC to be able to raise money toward opposing the ballot measure.

He’s opposed to the system because he believes an open, top-four primary would decrease voter choice, because he said it’s likely in many areas of the state only Republicans would make it through to the general. Similarly, some parts of Boise-area districts would likely only see Democrats in the general election under the system, he said.

Ball is a Republican, but said he believes the issue “crosses party lines.”

He also said he thought primaries could be flooded with candidates to make it easier to move along preferred candidates to the general election.

“It’s a system that lends itself to gamesmanship,” Ball said

Luke Mayville, spokesperson for Idahoans for Open Primaries, said the system would “not give power to one party or the other.”

“The reform gives power to the voters,” he said.

He said that after Alaska implemented ranked choice voting, there was no change in the number of Republicans and number of Democrats elected.

Mayville said the volunteer signature-gatherers were all trained to provide details about the top-four primary and ranked choice aspect of it, which is also called instant runoff voting. He said each volunteer was provided with an infographic to help inform people about how the system would work and the petition itself had an explanation of the proposal.

He argued that opponents like Ball tend to be “party insiders and political operatives.” The initiative has faced strong opposition from leaders of the Idaho GOP, especially Chairperson Dorothy Moon.

“Nearly every person we’ve come across who is energetically opposed to this initiative is a party insider or political operative who has benefited from the current system,” Mayville said. “The individual who filed this PAC has a long history as a party insider and a long history of bad decision-making during his career in politics.”

Mayville referenced reports that, in 2008, Ball invested $250,000 of campaign funds into an account of a real estate investor friend for a loan. A third-party venture “absconded with the money,” Crapo said in a statement at the time, and the money was never paid back. Crapo had been unaware of the bad loan until 2010, the Idaho Press reported.

When reports of the decision were published in 2013, Ball resigned from his position as a staffer for Labrador; Ball said at the time that the resignation was unrelated to the loan issue.

Ball said Thursday in an email to the Idaho Press, “It was a one time mistake that was self-reported.”

“Since that time, I have been involved in multiple campaigns and the treasurer for multiple PACs that have not run into any issues,” he wrote. “I am fastidious about reporting to the letter of the law and our PAC does not spend any funds without a unanimous vote of the committee. Every dime we receive or spend will be reported to the Secretary of State Elections Division. It would be nice if the OPI folks were willing to talk about the issue instead of going directly to personal attacks.”

The PAC doesn’t have reported contributions yet, but the organization has a website at idahofairelections.com, and Ball said he hopes to create material to hand out door-to-door to oppose ranked choice voting.

Mayville said supporters are undeterred by the lawsuit and the development of this PAC in opposition to the initiative; he said they continue to see support from across the state.

“Everywhere we go,” he said, “we’re seeing a large turnout of volunteers who are willing to knock on doors to discuss this initiative with their neighbors.”

Guido covers Idaho politics for the Lewiston Tribune, Moscow-Pullman Daily News and Idaho Press of Nampa. She may be contacted at lguido@idahopress.com and can be found on Twitter @EyeOnBoiseGuido.