Could absence of party line lead to primary election surprises?

[RandySF]

n the first year where neither major political party is using the “party line” on election ballots, some changes are already evident, says Julia Sass Rubin, the Rutgers University professor whose research helped fuel the court challenge to the line.

Both Democrats and Republicans in almost every county in the state used the party line to group their preferred candidates in one column on the ballot.

“I would say the two most notable impacts so far are that so many Democrats and Republican candidates, including pretty legitimate candidates with a shot at winning, [are] choosing not to go for an endorsement. That would have been unheard of before,” said Rubin, an associate dean at Rutgers University’s Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy.

“And the other impact is just the number of people running for the Legislature, so we have twice the number of people running as we did two years ago.”



https://www.njspotlightnews.org/video/could-absence-of-party-line-lead-to-primary-election-surprises/

[no_hypocrisy]

1. It depends.

Will voters actually look for and vote for their chosen candidate or will they continue to arbitrarily vote for the first name on the ballot, notwithstanding that name isn't the "choice of the Party"?