Robb: Will independents change Arizona politics?

Will the rising tide of independent voters changes Arizona’s political future?

Based upon a study by the Morrison Institute for the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, the sober answer is as follows: They could. But if they do, it’s likely to be a slow time coming.

I’m a Distinguished Fellow (insert your insult here) at the Institute and a member of its advisory board. And, a while back, I had suggested that the think tank conduct a study of the independent voter phenomenon in Arizona. But I didn’t have a hand in this particular study.

There is no doubting that the rise in independent voter registration is the biggest thing happening in Arizona politics.

The last time a Democrat won statewide office in Arizona was 2008. Since then, Democrats have lost nearly 90,000 registrants. Republicans have basically treaded water, leaking about 3,000 registrants. The number of independents, on the other hand, has increased nearly 400,000.

Today, there are more voters registered as independent than as Republican or Democrat. And the trend line shows no sign of abating.

There are a lot of theories about independent registrants. But, until the Morrison study, there was very little actually known about them.

One of the theories was that those registering independent aren’t really ideologically independent. They are closet Republicans or Democrats who just don’t want the label.

That may be true of independents who actually vote. But, according to the study, it’s not true of those who are registering independent. Although the questions asked weren’t well-honed to reveal political ideology, the large majority of independents do seem to fall between the parties. They identify themselves somewhere in the middle and their positions on the issues facing the state seem to fall somewhere in the middle.

That would suggest that independents have the potential to take the conservative edge off Arizona politics. But mostly at the margins. And only if they actually vote.

Independent turnout hasn’t kept pace with independent registration. Turnout in Arizona skews heavily Republican, even in presidential election years. In 2012, a presidential election year, Republicans were 40 percent of the general election vote. In 2014, an off-presidential year in which state officers were elected, Republicans were 43 percent of the vote.

Crossover voting by partisans has sharply diminished. So, if Republicans are over 40 percent of the turnout, a GOP candidate doesn’t have to do all that well with independents to get past the finish line.

While the independent turnout rate is still miserable, the huge increase in registration means that the independent share of the overall vote is going up incrementally, election by election. Independent registrants tend to be younger than either Republicans or even Democrats. So, there’s a chance their participation rate will creep up as they age.

Those who want to take the conservative edge off Arizona politics sooner rather than later will attempt to accelerate the process with the top-two primary initiative. Under the system, partisan primaries are eliminated. The top two vote-getters go on to the general irrespective of party affiliation.

This supposedly will increase turnout by independents, unleashing their moderating influence. The theory is that they don’t feel invited to participate in partisan primaries, even though legally they can, and partisan primaries produce unappetizing general election choices for them.

Given that a plurality of Arizona voters are now opting out of the two-party system, it would be hard to argue against a truly non-partisan election system, one that eliminated party labels entirely. But the hope that this would dramatically change the composition of either the primary or general election electorate is probably misplaced.

California adopted a top-two primary system in 2010, albeit one that still permits party labels for candidates. Turnout has actually gone down, in both the primary and general elections.

In politics, intensity matters. And while there are committed centrists, political interest and activism tend to cluster around the liberal and conservative nodes.

The safe bet continues to be against any significant change in Arizona’s political direction. But, after the Morrison study, the potential for such isn’t as easily dismissed.

Reach Robb at robert.robb@arizonarepublic.com.