May 27, 2026
Blaine County Is the Proof of Concept Idaho Republicans Can No Longer Ignore
By: Heather Lauer
For years, concerns about Democrat crossover voting in Idaho Republican primaries have been dismissed as overblown paranoia or the complaints of candidates who lost close races. Blaine County proves otherwise.
Anyone involved in politics in the Wood River Valley knows exactly what I am talking about. The idea that Democrats register as Republicans in order to influence Republican primary outcomes is not some closely guarded secret. It is openly discussed, appears in social media posts, comes up in political conversations, and is often treated as perfectly normal behavior. People joke about it. Some brag about it. This is not a matter of one or two isolated examples. It is a behavior pattern that many Republicans in Blaine County have observed for years.
A couple recent examples made me laugh. A Democrat precinct committeewoman in my own neighborhood, someone whose political views are hardly a mystery given the anti-Trump displays and upside-down American flags visible from the road, appeared on our Republican voter list. She is not alone. Indivisible organizers and regular attendees at No Kings rallies also appear on the list. These are not people who have undergone an ideological conversion. They are exactly the types of voters one would expect to find participating in Democratic political activity.
These examples are hardly surprising. Over the years, Republican volunteers have repeatedly encountered voters who appear in Republican voter files but immediately announce that they are Democrats the moment someone knocks on their door. Some are offended that anyone would mistake them for Republicans, yet they remain registered as Republicans. The obvious question is why. Most of us already know the answer.
The anecdotes are interesting, but anecdotes alone do not prove anything. That is why we turned to the data.
Our working Blaine County “Demcross” list was built from multiple sources, including individuals who have publicly acknowledged crossover voting or encouraged others to do so, voters identified through years of canvassing and voter contact, and Republicans with documented participation in one or more Democratic primaries during the last four election cycles.
Using that methodology, 792 of Blaine County’s 4,614 registered Republicans, roughly 17 percent of the Republican electorate, appear on our list.
Even if that figure is imperfect and some voters are misclassified, a number that large cannot simply be dismissed as statistical noise. The relevant question is whether enough crossover voters potentially exist to influence Republican primary elections. In 2022, Lyle Johnstone lost to Jack Nelsen by 559 votes districtwide. In 2024, he again lost to Nelsen, this time by just 169 votes.
Any election outcome is shaped by many factors, including candidate performance, campaign strategy, and voter turnout. The point is not that crossover voting explains the entire result. The point is that the identified crossover-voter universe is large enough that it cannot simply be ignored when evaluating close races. That is particularly true in a community where Democratic support for Nelsen over Johnstone was openly discussed and hardly a secret.
At the same time, 2024 introduced a competing incentive. Unlike 2022, Democratic voters had a highly contested sheriff’s primary of their own. Many of the voters most likely to have an interest in the Republican primary suddenly had a meaningful Democratic contest competing for their attention. Whether that dynamic affected the outcome is impossible to know with certainty, but it is difficult to ignore.
Nobody has to prove how every crossover voter cast a ballot. The relevant question is whether a population of crossover voters exists that is large enough to influence the outcome of close Republican primaries. In Blaine County, the answer appears to be yes.
The significance of this issue extends far beyond the Wood River Valley. In much of Idaho, Republican primaries effectively determine who will hold office. As those primaries become more consequential, voters who are not Republicans have every incentive to influence them.
For years, many Republicans have comforted themselves with the belief that crossover voting is either rare or insignificant. The evidence suggests otherwise. Organized crossover participation can exist, can become normalized, and can reach levels that are potentially large enough to affect close elections. What makes Blaine County noteworthy is not that it is uniquely susceptible to the practice, but that people here are unusually open about it.
For Idaho Republicans, the question is no longer whether crossover voting exists. The question is whether Republicans are comfortable allowing Republican nominees to be selected by an electorate that includes voters with a demonstrated history of participating in Democratic political contests.
The evidence from Blaine County should serve as a warning. The rest of Idaho should pay attention, because what is openly discussed here today may become commonplace elsewhere tomorrow.
Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared on HonorIdaho.com, and is republished here with permission.
