Back on top: Republicans again the largest registered voting group in Arizona
Aug 22, 2016, 12:21 PM
PHOENIX — The Republican Party is once again the largest group of registered voters in Arizona, it was announced Monday.
The last time the Republican Party had the largest number of registered voters in the state was January 2014.
Arizona Secretary of State Michele Reagan’s office said the Republican Party has 1,185,023 registered members in the state. There are 1,164,373 registered independents and 1,019,050 are Democrats.
“These numbers seem to indicate voters are reengaging with the political parties for this election cycle,” Reagan said in a press release.
Reagan theorized that the spike in registered Republicans had something to do with this year’s presidential preference election. Independent voters were not allowed to vote and the state had encouraged those who wished to support one party’s candidate to register as either a Republican or Democrat.
“While many independents chose to register with the parties for the closed presidential preference election, they apparently decided to stay,” Reagan said in the release.
Both the Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump, and the Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, claimed a victory in the state’s presidential preference election.
In the same release, Reagan’s office announced that voter registration statewide had increased by about 47,000 people.
“It’s great to see the total number of registered voters grow during this election cycle regardless of their political affiliation,” Reagan said. “I’m optimistic it will also translate into higher turnout at the polls.”