Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador has refiled a lawsuit against Idahoans for Open Primaries
BOISE, Idaho (KIFI) – Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador has refiled a lawsuit against Idahoans for open primaries.
This comes just days after the Idaho Supreme Court rejected his previous lawsuit.
The lawsuit was refiled in Idaho's fourth judicial district court on Friday.
Labrador claims voters are being mislead and didn't know they were signing a petition that also institutes ranked-choice voting.
Monday, Attorney General Labrador's office provided Local News 8 with the following statement.
“Friday, following the guidance from the Idaho Supreme Court’s opinion this week in Labrador v. Idahoans for Open Primaries, my office filed a lawsuit against Idahoans for Open Primaries, the coalition sponsoring Proposition 1, described by the sponsors as the Open Primaries Act," writes Labrador. 'This coalition obtained thousands of signatures for the initiative by telling Idahoans it would restore the open primary system Idaho had before 2011, even after the Idaho Supreme Court ruled that claim was false and that the initiative’s primary system is “significantly different” than an open primary. In reality, the initiative abolishes party primaries and institutes ranked-choice voting in the general election—an unpopular and complicated system that many petition signers did not know was included in the initiative and would not support on its own.”
Idahoans For Open Primaries' Luke Mayville says Raul Labrador is wasting taxpayer dollars to pursue the lawsuit.
"This lawsuit is nothing more than a political stunt, said Mayville. "It's an attempt to attack this initiative, that that nearly 100,000 Idahoans have signed and that the majority of Idahoans support. This is nothing other than an attempt by the attorney general to interfere with the election, because for some reason, he believes that he himself, and not the voters of Idaho, should be able to decide on this important issue."
Mayville says that with only 72 days until the November election he sees no way that the courts could take the open primaries vote off the ballot.
For the Idaho Supreme Court's full statement on the previous case, click HERE.
