Want to \u201cwin outright\u201d in Scottsdale?<\/p>\n
You better tap into \u201cthe indies.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Maricopa County\u2019s election website, Scottsdale has 168,455 registered voters.<\/p>\n
Of those, 69,459 are registered as Republicans.<\/p>\n
Another 40,718 are registered as Democrats \u2013 but that\u2019s not the second-largest group.<\/p>\n
Scottsdale\u2019s \u201cindependents\u201d total 55,581.<\/p>\n
That does not necessarily mean these people declare as members of the American Independent Party \u2013 just that they do not declare as Democrat or Republican.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t label me,\u201d this huge group collectively growls.<\/p>\n
According to Scottdale\u2019s primary pamphlet, \u201cVoters who are not affiliated with any political party \u2026 will not automatically receive a ballot for Scottsdale\u2019s July 21, 2026 Primary Election.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cVoters who are not affiliated with a political party have the<\/p>\n
option of requesting a political party ballot of their choice or a Scottsdale-only ballot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some of Scottsdale\u2019s eight candidates \u2013 Crystal Carroll, Barry Graham, Ethan Knowlden, Bob Littlefield, Eric Sloan, Michelle Ugenti-Rita, Solange Whitehead and Raoul Zubia \u2013 can boast of receiving endorsements from local Republican or Democratic groups.<\/p>\n
But none can brag, \u201cI\u2019m big with the no-label folks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those likely will be the key voters who help narrow down the field.<\/p>\n
Three scenarios exist.<\/p>\n
Three candidates can \u201cwin outright,\u201d leaving no Scottsdale seats to be decided in November.<\/p>\n
Two candidates can land enough votes to win outright this week, with the third and fourth-place finishers battling it out for the remaining seat in November.<\/p>\n
Or, if votes are dispersed and no candidate wins outright, the top six finishers will all be on the November ballot.<\/p>\n
How to score a seat outright?<\/p>\n
\u201cAny candidate who receives at the Primary Election a majority of the legal votes cast for that candidate\u2019s race is declared to be elected at the Primary to the office for which he or she is a candidate,\u201d according to Scottsdale\u2019s pamphlet.<\/p>\n
\u201cA \u2018majority\u2019 is calculated by dividing the total number of legal votes cast in each candidate\u2019s race by the number of seats to be filled, dividing that number in half, and rounding to the next highest whole number.\u201d<\/p>\n
In this case, dividing the total votes by six provides the \u201cmagic number.\u201d<\/p>\n
While voters can choose their three favorite candidates, some only pick one or two.<\/p>\n
So, as an easy example, if 50,000 Scottsdale residents vote and make a combined 120,000 selections, any of the three who top 20,000 votes would win a City Council seat.<\/p>\n
The 2022 Scottsdale primary had a voter turnout of just under 40%, with 64,017 voting.<\/p>\n
In 2024, 44% of registered voters participated in the Scottsdale primary.<\/p>\n
Back in 2014, voter turnout for the Scottsdale primary was under 30%.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Want to \u201cwin outright\u201d in Scottsdale? You better tap into \u201cthe indies.\u201d According to Maricopa County\u2019s election website,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":949170,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,382114,5643,1587,166900,166898,5310,304829,270104,270106,270103,1589,15855,241098,7600,152497,382115,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-949169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-phoenix","tag-america","tag-american-independent-party","tag-arizona","tag-az","tag-barry-graham","tag-bob-littlefield","tag-city-council","tag-crystal-carroll","tag-eric-sloan","tag-ethan-knowlden","tag-michelle-ugenti-rita","tag-phoenix","tag-primary-election","tag-raoul-zubia","tag-scottsdale","tag-solange-whitehead","tag-the-primary","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116956799662687535","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/949169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=949169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/949169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/949170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=949169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=949169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=949169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}