Primary Power For Independent Voters

You can care about principles and still care about strategy, because the rules of the system decide whether your voice gets heard. We start with a listener stuck in a closed-primary state as an independent and walk through the hard tradeoff: stay unaffiliated and lose primary access, or register with a party so you get two meaningful chances to influence the outcome. Along the way, we explain open primaries vs closed primaries, why crossover voting happens, and how to think about party registration without turning your conscience over to a party label. 

From there, we zoom out to a values-first approach to voting, including Benjamin Rush’s blunt line that he’s neither an aristocrat nor a democrat but a “Christocrat.” That idea frames the whole conversation: judge candidates by the values they defend and the policies they will implement, not by team identity. If you’ve felt politically homeless, this gives you a clear way to stay grounded while still being effective. 

We also tackle two rapid-fire but important civics issues. First, the constitutional question about whether President Trump could ever serve as vice president, using the 12th Amendment and the 22nd Amendment to show why eligibility rules matter. Second, we respond to concerns about DEI in schools by correcting common “Founders” misinformation, including what really happened on July 4 versus August 2 with the Declaration of Independence, then lay out practical steps to challenge questionable curriculum and classroom materials at the local level. 

Wrap it up with a thoughtful look at gerrymandering reform and why simple fixes like “rectangular districts” run into geography, population, and politics. If you want more constitutional literacy, better history, and actionable ways to engage, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave us a review.

Transcript

Rick Green [00:00:07] Welcome to the intersection of faith and culture. Thanks for joining us on the WallBuilders Show on a Thursday, of course, around here at WallBuilders that means it's Foundations of Freedom Thursday. That means we're taking questions from our audience on foundational principles, and that can be broad. It can be something about the Constitution might be an issue going through Congress right now, or even in your state legislature or in your community, send those into us at radio@wallbilders.com, radio@wallbuilders.com for an answer that will be a biblical, historical and constitutional response. That's how we approach everything here at WallBuilders. I'm Rick Green here with David Barton and Tim Barton. And guys, we'll just jump right in. Jeffrey Gardner's got the first question. He said, listening to your show and you say, go out and vote in your primary. I live in Pennsylvania and I'm registered as an independent and independents are not allowed to vote in the primary. My question is, how would I be able to vote when I'm not allowed? Oh, great question guys. So not all states have a closed primary. I'm kind of becoming a fan of that with the way I've seen so many crossovers, especially in local races. But I guess, yeah, that what do we, how do we advise people on this?  

Tim Barton [00:01:10] Well, if you're from Pennsylvania, I think the easiest option is just go to New York and pick up a ballot. They're not checking IDs, so you get to vote in the primary. 

Rick Green [00:01:18] Unless you're shoveling snow, yeah. 

Tim Barton [00:01:20] Well, yeah, then you need two IDs and social security number. But to vote, I mean, there's a lot of states and you just show up, it's fine. They can't ask you; they can't look at it.

Rick Green [00:01:30] Just take a road trip. What you're saying is go on vacation and then vote in whatever state you happen to be in. Okay, people were being.... We're joking here. 

Tim Barton [00:01:37] Yeah, as long as you're vacationing in a blue state, that would work, but then the options in your primary might not be great either, so it's a challenge. 

Rick Green [00:01:45] I guess you just need to pick right and go ahead and register in one of the two parties or do it. I really don't know how it works in these other states. 

David Barton [00:01:52] Well, here's what I would recommend because I am very active as a Republican because that's where my voice is heard, but I am not a Republican. I am an independent. I'm going to vote not for the party. I'm gonna vote for the principals and the people. And there are times when I have voted for Democrats because they were better than Republicans. So, I'm not going to just carry the water of whatever party it is, although I am a very active Republican right now. I'm still an independent. 

Tim Barton [00:02:19] I would like to ask a clarifying question. How recently did you vote for a Democrat? Was this like Kamala Harris recent or was this like Bill Clinton recent? 

David Barton [00:02:31] It has to go back earlier. I think we've talked about the last Democrat in Congress that I could have voted for was Mike McIntyre out of North Carolina. And what's he been going 10 years now, he still had a brain and was willing to vote for moral things and biblical things in Congress. And I've even contributed Democrat candidates who are better than Republican candidates because they were better on religion and morality and Constitution. So, it has to go back Tim,10 years, at least probably. 

Tim Barton [00:02:58] But that's the one you can identify but that's not one in Texas. You would have voted for, right? I'm asking clarifying question because I don't want people to hear and be like he's voting for Democrats So it's been quite a hot minute like you gotta certainly you can go back to like your blue dog Democrats. 

Rick Green [00:03:17] Okay, wait! I finally get to be the oldest. I'm going to, I'm gonna have the longer time. Let's see. What would this would have been 30. We do my math here. Thirty-five years ago, 35 years ago, as a 19-year-old. I voted for a Democrat in West Texas, who was a Democrat state Senator who was ultra conservative and like one of us. So, there you go. That's been 35 years. He's the last one. That I know of.

David Barton [00:03:42] There are guys like that that we had in Texas. You remember Warren Chisholm? He was a Democrat, and he was better than a whole lot of the Republicans. 

Rick Green [00:03:49] And then became a Republican. 

David Barton [00:03:50] And he became a Republican because he was no longer welcome in that party. So, what I do, I am not a hack for either party, although I am very actively involved as a Republican. Go to national conventions because I'm sent there. I'm going to go somewhere where I can have an influence and have my voice heard. I don't want to just wait until the general election and get one shot at this. I want two shots at it. I want a shot in the primaries, and I want to shot at the general. And the general, I only get to see who made the final run, but if I can get involved in primaries I can help choose those who are gonna be in the final run and so I wanna exert as much influence as I can. And so, my thing is I am an independent in mindset because I'm going to judge every candidate, not by their R or the D, but by the values they hold and positions they hold and what they're gonna do policy-wise. So, from that standpoint, I don't know. 

Tim Barton [00:04:41] Well, let me just ask one more clarifying question. Is this position similar to any Founding Fathers that you can think of? It seems like a place for a good Founding Father quote right here. 

David Barton [00:04:55] Hey, you got my text just in time to answer. So yeah, that wasn't quite a set of questions, but Benjamin Rush, one of my favorite Founding Fathers, signer of the Declaration. John Adams said he's one of the top three most notable founding fathers. Benjamin Rush served in three different presidential administrations and all three presidents came from different political parties. And when he was one time asked about his party affiliation, he said, well, I've been alternately called an aristocrat and a Democrat. He said, I'm neither. I'm a Christocrat. And that Christocrat Party is where you have to be biblically. So, I would say if you want to have influence in your state, like a blue state of Pennsylvania, just go get registered and vote in the party that you can have the most influence on. Now I would go vote as a Democrat if I thought I could have any influence, but now they're so woke in so many directions, I can't even have an influence in their primary. If I thought that I could get a good Democrat out of the primary and into the general, I might do something. But right now, all the Republicans, all the Republicans are better than all of the Democrats that I've seen in Texas in the last several years. So I'm going to keep acting as a Republican. And that's the way you can do it in those states that are blue. You just have to go vote in a primary so that you can have two choices, or actually two influences, have two votes before the general. And that is the best thing I can recommend. 

Tim Barton [00:06:10] Well, and Dad, this is too, something that you're indicating. There is a strategy politically in this. We see Democrats employ this often. There are states where there are closed primaries, like apparently in Pennsylvania, where you can only vote in the primary if you are a member of that political party, persuasion. But there are other states that have open primaries which means anybody, as long as you're registered to vote, you can come and vote in that primary. And we have seen in many states where they were Democrats that came and voted in a Republican primary to try to remove the more conservative of those individuals that were in the primary. And we've seen at times them even be successful in that, replacing some of the stronger conservatives by joining with some of what have become known to be like the Rhino Republicans. All of that to say is it's different in different states. But I think, Dad, your point is really great, that If we are registered as independent because we are frustrated with Republicans and I don't disagree with any of that, or you don't want to be a Democrat and I don't disagree with that either, but if you are an independent and you're in a place where there's a closed primary and then you don't ever get to have a say primary and now you're just stuck having to choose between a Democrat and a Republican in a general election. Cause that's probably who's going to win unless you're voting for Bernie Sanders somewhere you're probably not having an independent win. Then it does make sense that you look at the two parties, say, okay, which party does my values most align with? And this is why Dad, to your point with Benjamin Rush, being able to identify that he's a Christocrat, it's because his values lined up the most with the Bible, with Christ, and he was going to support those values above everything else. Find out what are your values you believe in, support, promote. And we can go over a list of what some of our key values are we look for, whether it's life or marriage or religious liberty, et cetera. Some, some very basic things that we should care about. Look at which party does a better job of promoting, defending your values. And then consider if it makes more sense to register in that party. So, you can at least have a say in the primary thereby helping choose the person who has a chance to get elected come election time. So, I think Dad, to your point, it does make a lot of sense to consider and join one of the political affiliations that actually has a primary and is most likely to have a candidate win in a general election. 

Rick Green [00:08:41] Yeah, I think that strategy question is critical to ask and sometimes it goes against our natural inclination that we wouldn't want to vote in a party that represents so many bad things. But if in your area, that's the only place to have influence. You can actually be a positive influence on a party like the Democrats that have gone so communist and woke and everything. So good, good, answers guys. Okay, let's see. We've got John up next. He said can or asked can President Trump be the vice president of any future president? So, this is one of those president Trump trolling the nation. Where he loves to drop these little hints, you know, or, or say these things. And then it's like the cat, you know, with the mirror and everybody talks about this. Cause they're distracted while he's over here solving all kinds of big problems, I think. That's the way I see this question. John, thanks for sending it in though, guys. What do you think? 

David Barton [00:09:32] It's a fun question, but it's a short one to answer. The constitution says the vice president has to meet all the same requirements as the president because he might be the president and the requirement is you can only serve two terms as President. So, if your vice president had to become president, you'd have a third term and that's unconstitutional. So, he cannot be the vice-president because in case he were to have to secede someone, he would, he wouldn't be able to serve. So that disqualifies him from vice president constitutionally. The answer is no. 

Tim Barton [00:10:01] But he could be speaker of the house, which would put him third in line for the press hit scene. So, there's still a chance. 

Rick Green [00:10:09] Now Tim's trolling all of those. Yeah, it's true though. And everybody loves to, loves to mention that one. Hey, I do want to read that clause just for constitutional education for everybody, it says no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president shall be eligible to that a vice president of the United States. And of course, if you serve two terms, you're constitutionally ineligible to the office of President because of the 22nd amendment. That's the last line there in, in that clause in the, uh, in the 14th amendment, so our 12th amendment, sorry, very, very good stuff. Okay guys, let's take a quick break. We'll come back. We've got more questions. And again, if you haven't sent one in, you should send one. Something's on your mind. Maybe one of our other programs has spurred some idea in your mind that you want to ask about radio@wallbuilders.com. We'll be right back. You're listening to the WallBuilders Show. 

[00:11:58] Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show. Thanks for staying with us on this Thursday. Foundations of Freedom Thursday today. So we're getting to as many of your questions as we can. Next question comes from Ruth. She says, hi y'all. So, Ruth, where are you from? Cause you speak the exactly right grammar. I love it when someone addresses us correctly. 

David Barton [00:12:16] That's New York. That's clearly New York or Maine. That is clearly New York or Maine with y' all in there. 

Rick Green [00:12:20] She says yeah, hi, y’all. I love your podcast and it's so educational on history. So obviously she's a good, you know, judge of character as well. Thank you. Sorry. All right... Thank you so much for helping me learn real history. I used to work in the Louisville independent school district. Yep. Texan. Okay. There you go. I get it now. And went into middle school history classrooms for eighth grade where they are learning American history. I was shocked when the teacher put the famous slide before the students of the Founders deliberating over signing the Declaration of Independence. We all know the slide. The teacher said to the students, what's wrong with this picture? Please write me a whole page about it. The entire 40 minutes of class was taken up with this. Shocking. I saw this a few times. The teacher is the one at fault, not the textbook. Our teachers need re-educated on true history without DEI. How can I influence my district to quit teaching DEI and garbage inserted into history? Often the teachers are given materials that are not in the textbook to teach from, from slides, handouts, etc. I notice that these materials are the problem. Sorry for the long question. Thank you for your amazing podcast. No, Ruth don't apologize great question! And guys, and I'm assuming of course where the teacher took it was what's wrong with this picture? You know, they're all white nationalists or whatever they probably claimed at that point. 

Tim Barton [00:13:33] Well, I would like a chance to answer the essay cause I do have a problem with the picture. John Trumbull's famous painting. Fifty-six guys signed the Declaration. 

Rick Green [00:13:43] Where is Waldo? 

Tim Barton [00:13:45] There's not 56 guys in the picture. We're missing some people. So, like we're gonna have a problem with anything of like a John Dickinson. There are a few guys in there who also. We're part of the Continental Congress, Second Continental Congress, but they didn't sign it. So, like, if we had a problem, I could history-nerd -out on this problem, but if you history-nerd- out the problem you would not land on is what that teacher was trying to have the students identify, Rick, which is what I totally agree with you. It probably was some DEI wokeness that these were only white males. And there were no minorities, there were no women and blah, blah, blah, right? That's where it would have gone is to criticize instead of recognizing the incredible thing the Founding Fathers did, the document they put together, the fundamental truths they were built on, those principles that made America the most successful governing nation in the history of the world, and the fact that they paid with their lives, their fortunes and sacred honors. All of that was going to be left out by embracing the wokeness. So instead of just identifying the fact that John Trumbull didn't include all of the signers. Dad, what is your answer to that question? 

Rick Green [00:14:53] Wait, wait, wait. I have a question for you, Tim, because I don't know. I just heard this just the other day. Our mutual friend, Krish Dunham, and brought it up. Did Trumbull is Trumbull in the painting of the signing of the declaration? Did he paint himself in? 

David Barton [00:15:05] He did not. 

Rick Green [00:15:05] OK, so let's just rumor then? 

David Barton [00:15:06] Yeah, that's rumor. Yeah. All there is a key to all the people in that painting and they're all identified. And just so that everybody gets really, they're mind blown on this. The Declaration of Independence was not signed on July the 4th, 1776. That's when they approved the wording of it. They didn't sign it until August the 2nd. And so between July the fourth, now what you have with that famous painting is their presentation. 

Rick Green [00:15:32] Wait, I say that means extra fireworks and we get hot dogs on two different days. We don't have to only do July 4th. We need to throw a party on August 2nd. 

David Barton [00:15:41] That works for me for sure. So, what happens on July? Let's go back on June the 7th, Richard Henry Lee says, hey, let's separate from Great Britain. He makes a motion in Congress to separate. And they tabled emotion because if we vote yes, we don't have any document prepared to explain why we're doing so. So, let's just table that let's create a committee, a committee of five, let them go out and work on this, see if there's reasons and what those reasons might be. And so that's the committee of five that wrote the Declaration of Independence. And Jefferson did 75% of the final document. He wrote a hundred percent of the draft. Well, 99.9% and then he did most of, by the time they get done editing the 75% is what actually stays. So, the committee has worked committee at five is working on it. And so, they get it ready. They bring it back to Congress. And on June the 28th, they say, okay, we now have a document. So, let's go back to that motion we had on June, the seventh. And pick up from June the 7th and see if we want to separate from Great Britain. So that happens on June the 28th, July the 1st. They start talking about whether we want to separate From Great Britain, they had kind of a test vote on July the first. And not everybody was unanimous. Pennsylvania actually wasn't ready to separate based on that vote. So, they work on it. And then on the second with some changes and other things, They are able to strengthen it and on the July the 2nd, they said, yes, we want to separate from Great Britain, all 13 states said yes. Then they said okay, what's the document we're going to give Great Britain when we separate? And so, on July the 2nd, they start debating the declaration and that painting is of July the 2nd, where they're laying the declaration, the four pages of the draft on the table, and they're going start debating what Thomas Jefferson has written. And that's what happens on July the 2nd. And that's why nobody signs it then. There's nothing going on at the time that they lay that on the table. And so, on the fourth, they pass the wording of the declaration, but at that point it had not yet occurred to anybody, why don't we all sign this document of separation? So, they passed it, they've announced our separation. This is the document we're gonna send to Great Britain. And on about the 19th of July, they come up with this idea that, hey, why don't we all put our names on this? And that's where they say, hey, let's do a big and gross copy, all the handwriting, make it look really pretty, and we'll all sign the bottom. And that what they do on August the 2nd. So, the signing of the declaration is on August 2nd, people see that painting and think that that's signing the, that's not, that's when they laid the Declaration before Congress to start working on whether they want to approve it and then sign it. So back to the question from the teacher, I would analyze the answer to what she can do in two parts. And one part is with staff and the second part is with curriculum. So with the staff, the first thing I would do is since Texas has passed laws banning DEI, and it's certain that she didn't say exactly what they were talking about, but it certainly appeared that it was DEI that the teacher was headed toward. 

Tim Barton [00:18:48] And based on the way the teacher would have graded this too, you'd be able to indicate because the teacher comes back and grades it and says, well, you didn't identify that it was lacking women and lacking minorities, et cetera. Well, at that point, if they're grading for DEI, then it's super easy to go back and say, hey, this is not something we're supposed to be doing. This wasn't part of the historic account of what happened at this event, what this painting was from, depicting, et Cetera. And so not only, Dad, could we look and see, certainly maybe there was a suggestion from the teacher in this direction, but if there was confusion or if we're saying, Hey, there's nothing in writing, well, where would there be something in writing based on what the teacher put on that grade and even giving an explanation for that grade. But to your point, if we see moments or can identify moments where there is DEI, and this is not just for Texas, there are several states that have passed laws saying we're not doing DEI here. And if it happens in those states then people need to pay attention and say, hey, wait a second, you can't penalize somebody for not embracing your DEI woke ideology. 

David Barton [00:19:52] So, and by the way, there's a lot of other laws in Texas that say you have to teach patriotism, Founding Fathers and patriots. And if you're attacking and tearing them down, then you're not teaching patriotism. So, first thing that can be done is we have state law on our side. Go to, go to your school administrator, school principal, say, hey, did you know this teacher is doing this kind of stuff? Were you aware of that? They might not know at all. The administrator says, well, that's okay. Then you go to elected school board members and say, hey, you do understand that Texas has passed laws on this. And if the school board refuses to follow the law, then it opens itself up for litigation from the state attorney general. And you've opened yourself up to all sorts. And so, what you do is you start following the structure of making them aware, making them aware here's what the law is, here's, what the teacher was doing, here's the stuff going on. Were you aware of this? Are you supporting this? Are you? Are you deliberately violating state law or did you just not know what was going on? So, I would follow that tact because sunshine is still the best disinfectant. When you start putting light on something, that really creates pressure on people who don't wanna have to deal with things. And so, they'll solve it just to keep from coming to light. The second thing is I would start getting into curriculum and I would start investigating, hey, where did those teaching materials come from? Is that a lesson she came up with on her own? Because if that is in a lesson book, now you've got something you can really go to the school board with, because DEI is banned in Texas, and if you're, and by the way, patriotism required in Texas with the Founding Fathers. So, if you are attacking Founding Fathers, you're trying to tear them down, or doing DEI, we've got laws in Texas. And wherever, what states, as Tim pointed out, there's a lot of states that have, you know, Oklahoma, other states, a lot other red states, Tennessee, they've banned this kind of nonsense. So, if you’re in the classroom, or if you're a parent, those are your two options. Start pointing this out to school officials, say, Were you guys aware? Go to the elected school official's school board, say, were you guys are aware? And if need be, make other parents aware and get some noise going. The second thing is check on the curriculum because that curriculum may be violating state law if it's teaching the DEI kind of stuff as that teacher portrayed it. So those are the two avenues that I would follow given that situation. 

Rick Green [00:22:11] All right guys, we've got time for at least one more. Let's see how fast this one goes. This one is Walter. Walter said, what do you think of a constitutional amendment mandating that all congressional districts be rectangular? Now I started to chuckle, but I think I know where the guy's going with this simple and it would defeat all the creative line drawing and make it much harder to politicize redistricting. So, he's basically saying, can we get rid of gerrymandering with the rectangle? 

David Barton [00:22:38] The gerrymandering part is a lot of fun. I was thinking about the rectangle thing. Okay, how many states, only maybe two, have completely square lines in the states, like Wyoming, Colorado, almost Utah. Everybody else has got rivers for borders, and there's no way of making the square edge when you got rivers for borders. So, you're number one, limited geographically. I understand the concept, get rid of the gerrymandering. But then I was thinkin', all right. But if you made square districts, you would have to have all different sizes of squares. So, I took Wyoming, just as one example. Wyoming, by its population, the Constitution of course requires a certain number that there be an enumeration made and you divide the nation into districts. So, there's 435 districts. Every one of them has essentially the same number of people inside it. So, Wyoming gets one congressperson out of Wyoming. If you take New York City, Just New York city, which is not very big. New York city’s only 27 square miles. Now 27 squares. Miles Wyoming is 3,600 times larger than New York City. So, if you were to take New York, actually New York city gets 11 times more congressman than Wyoming does. So, Wyoming is 3600 times larger, but New York city would have 11 times. More squares, if that makes sense. So. It would be a really mathematical problem to get this all broken into squares that might be somewhat equitable in their size. 

Tim Barton [00:24:12] Well, and Dad, to this point, even when you look at state assemblies, when you have like New Hampshire that has hundreds of people in their state assembly, and then you look at other places like Texas, where it's a little over a hundred in Texas, or I guess 150 in Texas. And then is it 31, I guess, in the Senate? You're making a very valid point from a congressional side, but even from a state side, because different states, have different apportionment for assembly members or state legislators based on population. And because there are population strongholds, it is an inevitability that there is going to be some level of manipulation of the districting. Because even if you made rectangles, a rectangle is just a box with four sides. And you would have some rectangles that would be really tall or some that'd be really wide, right? Some that would. Be compressed and expanded. And so, there's still going to be a level of, for example, in New York City, Dad, as you're mentioning where there's essentially 11 congressmen that are there. There would be a incredible debate over where those 11 rectangles would fall within the city to favor which district and what population or demographic, et cetera. So even, even though I completely appreciate. The honesty of the question and would be so supportive to say, you know, I, but I kind of agree. Like I agree with the premise of the question. It should be so simple as, as, hey, if you live on this side of the line or that side of line, but because the population of states continues to change and because representation is based on population, both in state assemblies and in Congress, it's an inevitability that lines will continue to change and no matter what shape you make them. There will be some degree of gerrymandering. 

Rick Green [00:26:04] Well, great questions today, folks. Thanks for sending those in, for the rest of you be thinking about some good ones, send them to us at radio@wallbuilders.com, that's radio@wallbuilders.com. And then of course, share the program with your friends and family, be a force multiplier, help us get the word out there. There's so much crazy fake news out there and literally crazy podcasters, putting out ridiculous things. So, it's important to give people a good diet of information. Make sure you're sharing the WallBuilders program on a daily basis with your friends and family. You can do that at our radio website, wallbuilders.show. Wallbuilders.show, easy place to share the link. And then for more information about the entire organization, go to wallbuilders.com. Thanks so much for listening to the WallBuilders Show.