By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
The race for President of the United States has become a four-year affair. Voters in Iowa kicked off the official 2024 campaign season with their caucuses on Jan. 15. New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada, and Michigan will wrap up primaries by the end of February. Voters in Kansas will have their say in a rare Presidential Preference Primary scheduled for Tuesday, March 19. Barton County Clerk Bev Schmeidler said there are different rules for this election.
"It's a preference primary because it's an election where the vote totals are given to the political party to allocate delegates to candidates at the national convention," she said. "It's not where a party is selected by the voters."
According to the Kansas Secretary of State's website, a presidential preference primary requires an act by the Kansas legislature to be conducted. It removes responsibility from the state's two political parties from conducting individual caucuses. The deadline to register to vote or update voter registration for the primary is Feb. 20.
"If they want to change from Democrat to Republican, or Democrat to Republican, Feb. 20 is the last day to do that," Schmeidler said. "Unaffiliated voters can still affiliate through Election Day and vote if they're unaffiliated."
Unaffiliated voters can declare a party and vote at the county clerk's office or the poll sites on Election Day. The State of Kansas will reimburse counties for direct expenses at a later date. The 2024 primary will be only the third in Kansas history with the other two votes occurring in 1980 and 1992.
To get on the primary ballot, candidates must file their candidacy with the Secretary of State at least 60 days before the election and pay a $10,000 filing fee or present a petition with at least 5,000 signatures of eligible voters registered with the party. With the Jan. 19 deadline to register passed, there are four candidates each on the Republican and Democratic primary ballots.