In a lot of countries voting is by secret ballot so why in the US do people have their affiliation publicly registered? The point of secret ballots is to avoid harassment from political opponents, is this not a problem over there?
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It varies from state to state. Some states you can only vote in the primary election for your party, others it doesn’t matter.
I registered as a member of a party, but have never voted for a member of that party. (Except in the primaries.)
>The point of secret ballots is to avoid harassment from political opponents, is this not a problem over there?
The simple answer is: no, it isn’t. At least, I’ve never heard of anyone having such a problem.
Among other things, some people cross-register with no intent to actually vote for that party in the full election, as a way of gaining access to the party primary.
This is more common in states that are heavily dominated by one political party; a liberal in a conservative state might register with the conservatives in order to vote for a less-conservative primary candidate, and then abandon that candidate in the general election in favor of their preferred party.
I’ve considered doing this myself in the past, though never followed through, as my homestate is still relatively purple.
Ultimately, [this is a consequence of the first-past-the-post voting system](https://www.cgpgrey.com/blog/the-problems-with-first-past-the-post-voting-explained.html). The two-party system is a consequence of the way we count votes. I would love to abandon that system and move towards something like single transferable vote, but for that we would need consensus, and, well, America doesn’t have much of that these days.
It differs by state. One reason and many states have this, is you have to in order the pick the candidates. In others this does not matter.
I register for the opposite party. I don’t have a political party left enough for me, however I won’t vote for the right wing parties. So I register right wing and vote against their worst candidates.
The voter registration is often public and used for planning. Again my small shift messes with their numbers.
The problem with secret ballot voting is that only the counters (and each individual voter, regarding their personal vote) know who cast a vote for who. Therefore a corrupt counter say controlled by the political party that happens to be in power at the time can just say well our candidate won and there’s no no public record for anyone to say no they didn’t win because we know who cast what vote.
The ballots are secret. And not everybody has to register with a party. In the state of Alabama you don’t register with a party and the only time you state a party preference is when you vote in the primary to the poll worker to receive the correct primary ballot
I don’t in Indiana.
We have open primary elections. I show up at the polling place, they ask for my id, I tell them which party’s ballot I wish to vote on, I go to the machine and vote.
The general election in November is even easier, I show up, show id, get the ballot and vote.
I do because if you’re not registered with a party, you’ll generally get a lot of political junk mail from both parties.
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Political parties are private organizations and can limit who votes in primaries for that party’s candidate. There is no requirement to register with a political party if you just want to vote in the main election.
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