Choosing a political party

When you sign up to vote (register), you can join a political party. A political party is a group of people who share the same ideas about how the government should be run and what it should do. They work together to win elections. You may also register "Delince to State" (explained below).

• You can read about the parties in California here on this website. Political parties are listed in alphabetical order. The number of party members listed for each political party is from the Secretary of State's January 22, 2008 totals and has been rounded to the nearest thousand.

• You can change your party at any time before the voter registration deadline, which is May 19 for the June 3 State Primary election. Just fill out a new registration form and check the box for the party you want.

What Is Decline to State?

If you do not want to register with a political party in California (you want to be “independent” of any political party), mark “Decline to State” on the registration form. If you register “Decline to State,” your June ballot will not have any candidates for U.S. Representative, State Assembly or State Senate on it. However, these three political parties will let you vote with their ballot for their candidates.
    American Independent Party
    Democratic Party
    Republican Party

If you are registered “Decline to State” and want to vote for candidates from one of these parties, you must ask for that ballot when you go to your polling place on election day. If you plan to vote by mail, you must write on the application the name of the political party whose ballot you want to use.

If you want to be able to vote for a candidate for one of the other three political parties not listed above, you will need to fill our a new registration form and choose to join that party. Send it to your County Elections office to arrive by registration deadline.

It is helpful to understand that Decline to State ballots are only confusing like this when it’s a Primary Election. That’s because of the reason for a Primary Election, which is to help narrow the number of candidates for each political party to just one. The winners for each political party in the primary election run against each other in the General Election.

 

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