By Zachary Gorchow
President of Michigan Operations
Posted: August 22, 2017 5:29 PM

For the last 25 years, at least, there’s been a dominant theme in the composition of the Michigan Legislature.

Democratic members have become more liberal. Republicans have become more conservative.

In this era of ever-increasing partisan polarization, the formula for winning election to the Legislature now largely consists of running to the right in a primary for Republicans and running to the left in a primary for the Democrats. Granted, this does not always hold. Name recognition, money and candidate effort can upend the formula.

Those who work in and around the Capitol, who represent varied interests, increasingly are chafing at this dynamic as making it difficult to build the coalitions necessary to pass legislation.

Backers of changing how legislative districts are drawn have said one benefit would be to force candidates to campaign toward the political middle because there would be more districts drawn with a more even split in political composition. That’s highly unlikely because the existing primary system would remain in place, benefitting those who best target their party’s core constituencies.

Look at the legislators who currently hold the currently competitive districts in the House. They are largely down-the-line Democrats or Republicans who vote the party-line. The one clear exception is Rep. Scott Dianda (D-Calumet), who frequently breaks with his caucus. Sen. Tory Rocca (R-Sterling Heights) also is in that mix.

Now, whether this is good or bad is up for debate. The candidates are running as representatives of their parties. Why should parties nominate people who don’t share a core set of views? And one could understand the laments of liberals and conservatives about what makes centrists so superior to them.

Under the current system, candidates can win their party’s nomination with a small plurality of the vote in the August primary and then in districts that lean so strongly to one party they are assured of victory in the November general election. A tiny plurality of the district in effect decides the next representative.

In the 2016 House elections, 22 primaries were won by candidates taking less than 50 percent of the vote (12 took 40-49 percent, eight took 30-39 percent and two took 20-29 percent). That was in a year where more than a third of the House had open seats with no incumbent running. Extrapolated over three cycles, when the entire House turns over under term limits, that means conservatively at least half of the 110 House members are arriving by winning less than a majority in their primary.

There is a remedy to this issue, used in other states, that would blow up Michigan’s long-time system. It would mean the certain end of straight-ticket voting in general elections. And its critics say it has its own flaws.

The jungle primary.

I’m not calling for its installation, but as a political junkie, it’s fun to think about its implications. And for reformers who dislike the results of the current system, it would address at least some of their complaints.

In the jungle primary, everyone would run together, Democrats, Republicans (and at least for now, Libertarians) in the August primary. Voters would no longer have to choose which party’s ballot to vote (and getting rid of that dynamic would greatly reduce the number of spoiled ballots). The top two candidates, regardless of party, would advance to the November general election.

In just 2016, there were 28 House seats where the top two vote-getters in primaries were of the same party.

What if Brian Banks and Pam Sossi faced off in the November general election for the 1st House District? Mr. Banks narrowly beat Ms. Sossi in the Democratic primary and then didn’t have to lift a finger to win the general election in the solidly Democratic district.

But what would have happened in the far higher turnout general election with those two going head to head? Surely the two would have had to appeal beyond the core Democratic base of the seat.

On the Republican side, what if now-Rep. Michele Hoitenga (R-Manton) and Morris Langworthy, both Republicans, faced off in the general election in the 102nd House District? They were the top-two vote-getters in the primary, regardless of party, in this safe GOP seat. In fact, all four Republicans took more votes than the lone Democrat. Yet the Democrat won a ticket to the general election and the larger electorate missed a chance to compare Ms. Hoitenga and Mr. Langworthy side-by-side.

The unpredictability would be wild. Some hard-fought general election seats, such as the 20th, 23rd, 50th, 57th, 66th and 106th House Districts would have seen two members of the same party advance to the general election, shutting the opposite party out of competition in the fall.

But, theoretically, a jungle primary would force those advancing to the general election, presuming they want to win, to build coalitions beyond their party’s core constituency.

That’s the kind of dynamic many of those working issues at the Capitol would like to see.