Since the 2024 presidential campaign began in earnest this year, Nikki Haley has been aided by Democrats who have crossed over to pick up Republican ballots, vote for the former South Carolina governor and thwart a comeback by ex-President Donald Trump.
In the Republican caucus in Iowa and primary elections in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Michigan — states that allow some form of crossover or unaffiliated voting — exit polls show upward of half of Haley’s support came from a combination of Democrats and independents. And they’re being urged by political action committees to keep it up next week in the seven Super Tuesday states with open primary elections.
Here in Illinois, which also permits adults to ask for either a Democratic or Republican ballot in a primary no matter how they’ve voted previously, non-Republicans have their chance to be party poopers, too, until the polls close on March 19. Our research shows that many are eager to play spoiler.
Asked by The Harris Poll whether they plan on casting a crossover ballot in the presidential primary, 36% of adults in Cook County say they’re likely to do so. That share, which holds steady in the city and suburbs, rises to 41% among moderates, as well as people of color and with high school diplomas or less and 49% among adults under 35.
The top reason for temporarily switching parties, cited by 37% of poll respondents, is to promote an opposing candidate more fit for the White House than the leading opposing candidate. A quarter also say they’re confident their preferred candidate will win their party’s primary election without their vote.
Illinois is one of 18 states that host open primaries, in which voters can ask for either major party’s ballot. (Others include Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.) Eight more states require would-be crossover voters to change their party registration first, though they’re allowed to flip back and forth as often as they like.
Crossover voting has been embraced by both major political parties over the years. In 2008, Rush Limbaugh used his radio platform to push Republicans to vote for Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama in his self-described “Operation Chaos” effort to prolong conflict among Democrats. Clinton won the Indiana primary partly thanks to Limbaugh’s intervention.
Back in the 2000 primary season, Democrats were the ones who changed their affiliation, to boost John McCain in his race against George W. Bush.
More frequently, voters switch parties to try to sway the outcome of the opposing party’s primary elections for congressional or state offices. In 2022, thousands of Democrats in Wyoming, where all statewide officeholders are Republicans, temporarily quit their party to back then-U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney in her reelection bid.
As Cheney’s big loss showed, however, party switchers seldom come out in big enough numbers to alter primary election results. A study by TargetSmart, a Democratic political data firm, found that crossover voting in 2018 and 2020 rarely topped 1% among Democrats and 1.5% among Republicans.
In our poll, respondents differ somewhat about why they may change their political stripes in March. Women are more likely than men — 41% to 34% — to say they’re hoping to advance a more qualified opposition candidate than the frontrunner. For women who would typically cast a Democratic ballot, this may be an indication of how alienating Trump’s policies on women’s rights — and Trump himself — have become. Half of all boomers and college-educated voters give that same rationale.
In Illinois, where political high jinks are a well-practiced art, party leaders have found they can sometimes influence the primary election outcomes of the other side without a battalion of crossover voters.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker spent $24 million on ads that boosted his preferred Republican opponent in the 2022 primary — one widely viewed as the most extreme of the GOP candidates and who would be more easily defeated in the general election. That opponent, state Sen. Darren Bailey, endorsed by Trump at the time, won the primary and, as Pritzker had banked on, was then trounced by the incumbent in the general election.
Despite consistently winning over big blocs of non-Republican voters, Haley is still losing the race to Trump. The former president has 122 delegates to Haley’s 24. (A candidate needs 1,215 to secure the GOP nomination.) Still, that’s more than all of Trump’s onetime rivals won altogether before they dropped out.
We’ll see in a couple of weeks how many more — if any — she’ll win in Illinois from erstwhile Democrats.
Will Johnson is the Chicago-based CEO of The Harris Poll, one of the world’s leading public-opinion research firms.