this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2024
477 points (98.6% liked)
Political Memes
5083 readers
4055 users here now
Welcome to politcal memes!
These are our rules:
Be civil
Jokes are okay, but don’t intentionally harass or disturb any member of our community. Sexism, racism and bigotry are not allowed. Good faith argumentation only. No posts discouraging people to vote or shaming people for voting.
No misinformation
Don’t post any intentional misinformation. When asked by mods, provide sources for any claims you make.
Posts should be memes
Random pictures do not qualify as memes. Relevance to politics is required.
No bots, spam or self-promotion
Follow instance rules, ask for your bot to be allowed on this community.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Technical question: I don't get what that registration is. Was he a member of the party?
Is it just the registration to be eligble to vote and if yes, how the fluff does it contain info on the party? Doesn't the US have secrecy of the ballot?
The USA doesn’t really have party members in the sense you’re thinking. It’s not a club that you either belong to or don’t. Being a "party member" can have different meanings depending on context.
Political parties exist at both the state level and the national level, and the state parties mostly operate independently of the national parties. Each U.S. state has different rules governing political parties and how they work, and each state party has its own rules for how it administers itself.
You only need to care about that stuff if you want to be a party official or a candidate for political office. As an ordinary voter, all you really need to care about is whether your state has party registration or not, and to register with the party you intend to vote for, as many states only allow you to participate in the primary election for the party in which you are registered to vote for.
As for ballot secrecy, yes, how you actually vote is private information, but how you registered to vote, and what elections you voted in, are public information.
Thanks alot.
This is a confusing/interesting way of ballot secrecy. Basically it sounds like: You have to make a public statement for one political party, but you are allowed to lie. Thus it's secret
When the general election comes around, your ballot is still secret. So you can publicly declare a registration for the Republican party, but then vote secretly for the Democratic candidate. (Or vice versa)
In the UK, if you want to have some effect on which candidates are selected by a party, you usually have to join the party and go to meetings and stuff. In the US, parties mostly use public primary elections to select candidates, and the primary elections are run by the same government bodies that run the general election. That's why the voter registration cares about the party.