party nominations for presidential primaries?

Question

Im an Iranian guy interested in American politics... Q. Who votes in party primaries? To phrase my question better: are only registered party members allowed to vote for a particular candidate in the party they signed up for? My other question is that if a current president decides to run for office again will he have to re-seek his party's nomination, or could he be challenged by a fellow peer?

Answer 1

In the U.S., election laws are written at the state level. As such, the answer to the first set of questions is that it depends on the state.

In many states, when you register to vote, you have the option of registering as a member of a party or as an independent. You also have the option to change that party registration at any time up until the deadline set by statute for a particular election. Assuming that a state has party registration, those states tend to fall into one of three categories.

First, there are "closed" primary states. In closed primary states, only those voters who have registered as members of the party can vote in the primary. Second, there are "semi-open" primary states. In these states, those registered as independents can choose to vote in a party's primary (all of the primaries of the established parties are held on the same day), but voters registered to a particular party can only vote in their own party's primaries. Finally, there are "open" primary states. In open primary states, party registration merely gives a clue to the candidates as to which party's primary a voter is likely to vote in as any voter is allowed to vote in any party's primary.

A substantial minority of states do not have party registration at all and, as such, are effectively open primary states.

For all offices but the President, two states (Louisiana -- though Louisiana has reinstated party primaries for other federal offices starting in 2008 -- and Washington) have essentially done away with party primaries and have a unified primary with the two top finishers advancing to the general election regardless of party.

In addition, in some states, parties have the option of choosing a candidate by a party convention instead of a primary.

Finally, all of the above rules only apply to the "established parties" -- those that polled above a certain percentage in the last election. All other parties file petitions to get on the ballot and designate their candidates as part of the ballot process.

As to the last question, no person is guaranteed their party's nomination by operation of law or custom. Whether for county commissioner or President, someone wishing to run for another term (and President's are limited to two terms) must file to get their party's nomination. Sometimes someone with national stature will file to challenge the incumbent (as happened in 1968, 1976, 1980, and 1992). Sometimes there will not be a significant challenger (though in each state's primaries there is almost always someone who has filed even if it is just the dogcatcher from the neighboring state). In 1984, 1996, and 2004, the incumbent President had no significant challenger in the primary.

Whether or not there is a significant primary challenge is based mostly on the popularity of a President within his party. Over the last forty years, the best predictor of the result fo the general election has been whether an incumbent has faced a real challenge in the primary. When there is a real challenge that tends to indicate that his party is concerned about his ability to be re-elected. Not to surprisingly, when such signs are on the wall, the incumbent tends to fail in his re-election bid.

Answer 2

have been given to furnish speech's that no-one listens to and have been given to social gathering. heavily there is different employer that they preserve at those conventions. it fairly is not virtually the nominee for president.