The Arizona Republican Party will not challenge a law that allows political independents to vote in and potentially decide the outcome of GOP primary elections.
The party’s executive committee this weekend rejected a proposal to restrict future primary voting to the 1.1 million registered Republicans.
Party spokesman Tim Sifert said the panel decided it made no sense to try to challenge the voter-approved measure which allows independents to vote in either major party primary. Sifert said the legal costs of such a move could be $75,000.
The decision is a setback for some conservative Republicans who believe allowing independents to vote in the primary helps elect more moderate candidates.
The 1998 law that allowed independents to vote in the primaries was actually drawn up by the Republican-controlled Legislature at the party’s direction. GOP leaders supported the idea because they were worried the alternative could be a wide-open primary where any registered voter could cast a primary ballot for any candidate.