So, what are we voting for?

Today is the last day to register to vote in California for its primary next month. Have you registered yet? Because in front of Tommy Trojan here on the campus of USC there are people from CALPIRG who are willing to help you submit your registration form by hand before midnight tonight. There’s almost no excuse not to register to vote anymore; it’s one of the basic rights we as Americans are fortunate enough to have—in Hong Kong they’re still pushing for a democratic election for its chief executive by 2017.

So you’ve registered to vote, now what? Call me ignorant but as an average American, I’m still a little hazy on the whole concept of primaries and caucuses. Who decides the order of the primaries? Why are caucuses so important? Who are the delegates? Do our votes matter in the primaries? Why do some states have an open primary and some states have a closed primary? Sure, most Americans studied American history or government in high school, but if I were to ask a random person on the streets to explain the whole idea of how primaries or caucuses work, they probably wouldn’t know why their vote is important in the primary next month.

So this is how it works. Before the general election, each party must elect a representative for the presidential election. Ten states hold caucuses; seven others host a combination of primaries and caucuses, while the remaining thirty-three states hold primaries. Each party must request state legislatures to pass laws whether the hold primaries and caucuses.

Caucuses are when registered voters attend a meeting to select delegates who demonstrate support for their presidential candidate. There are different types of delegates for each party. The Democratic Party has pledged delegates and superdelegates. The former are elected to the position and he or she will show support for a particular presidential candidate, but are not bound to vote for the candidate. The latter are Democratic National Committee members and Democratic members of Congress, former presidents, vice presidents, governors, congressional leaders etc. who are not required to indicate a preference for a candidate and do not compete for privilege like pledged delegates. The Republicans have pledged and unpledged delegates. The latter are not required to show a preference for a candidate and are elected just like pledged delegates on a state and local level.

Primaries are elections when registered voters directly vote for their candidates through a secret ballot. For the Democratic Party, the popular vote percentage is directly proportional to the number of pledged delegates given to each candidate. But a candidate has to have at least 15% of a popular vote to get any pledged delegates. The Republicans do not require a 15% threshold like the Democrats do, but individual states have their own rules. Some states use a “winner takes all” system where the candidate with the most popular vote gets all the delegates, and some states use the same proportional system as the Democrats do.

The Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary were the most important because they were the earliest contests—the votes there would determine the race for the rest of the presidential elections.

Confusing? I thought so. Don’t get me started on the Electoral College. But this means that our vote as the general population does matter. Every vote counts.