All political power inherent in the people

In his letter of Aug. 24, Michael Perez makes some serious allegations regarding Reclaim Idaho.

To paraphrase a line from the movie, Jerry Maguire, "Show me the proof!"

Show me the proof, Mr. Perez.

I did some checking. My first stop was the Idaho Secretary of State’s campaign finance website. The record shows that the majority of donations come from Idahoans who reside in every county in this great state. Not a single donation can be linked to "out-of-state Democratic Party interests."

A recent article in the Idaho Capital Sun reveals that open primaries and instant runoff elections are opposed by political parties that dominate. In fact, the D.C. Democratic Party filed a lawsuit to block a ballot initiative that would adopt ranked choice voting and allow voters without a party affiliation to cast ballots in primaries. (Source: bit.ly/44MJyYx)

Opposition by political parties holding power is revealing because George Washington warned us about that in his farewell address. When political parties tell "we the people" who to vote for by providing a slate of "preferred candidates" and when political party bosses call elected officials before the party tribunal, that’s evidence that our first president was prescient. When the party dictates to the voters and to those elected, we no longer have a republic.

That is why there is a groundswell of support for the open primary initiative among Idahoans of all political persuasions. We take to heart the words in Article I, Section 2, of Idaho’s Constitution: "All political power is inherent in the people."

MARY OLLIE

Bonners Ferry