As of February 17, 2020, here is the number of registered voters in Kansas: Republican 803,475; Democratic 456,098; Libertarian 18,221; independent and other 557,573.
The percentages are: Republican 43.78%; Democratic 24.85%; Libertarian .99%; independent and other 30.38%.
The percentages in October 2018 were: Republican 44.40%; Democratic 25.14%; Libertarian .96%; independent and other 29.50%. Thanks to Clayton Barker for the new data.
Funny, I checked the Kansas SOS site two days ago to see if there was any new data. The most recent numbers I still see as of this morning are from October 2018.
As a Libertarian, was hoping to see the party’s percentage cross over 1% – so close. Anyway, add one new registered libertarian (my nephew) who filled out his voter registration form over the weekend and is handing it in today.
States are all over the board with how frequently they update their voter registration data, and reporting partisan registration. Some are weekly (NC and Utah), some are monthly (Alaska, Colorado, DC, Delaware, Kentucky, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oregon, South Dakota, West Virginia, and Wyoming, and, until recently, Idaho), and others are sporadic and irregular. Iowa and Maryland are also monthly reporters, but they no longer separately report LP registration.
There are also variations among the states as to whether they report all partisan registration statistics, or just major party and independent. As I recall, Kansas is one of the states where the isn’t a whole lot of transparency in the reporting.
By my calculations, Libertarians in Kansas fell 135 voters short of being at exactly 1.0%. The actual percentage, to four decimal places is .9928%. Very close. Currently, there are five states where LP registration is above 1% — Alaska, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada, and Utah. Kansas will probably be next, followed by Idaho then New Mexico.
Kansas seems to only make public updates of voter registration numbers by county and by party every two years or if there is a state-wide special election. However, per the SOS’s website, the voter reg info is updated every quarter and available for purchase at any time of the year. (I suspect that is where this current info came from.) I do note the SOS’s following disclaimer: ‘The statewide voter registration data base is compiled from registration records provided by county election officers on a quarterly basis. The accuracy and timeliness of the records vary according to county. No guarantee as to the accuracy and timeliness of the data is made by the Office of the Secretary of State.’ Lovely.
Also, Kansas only has four choices on the voter registration form for Party Affiliations: Democrat, Republican, Libertarian and ‘Not affiliated with a party”. There is no place to mark ‘other’ and write in your own choice.
For comparison the voter reg numbers as of October 2018 were as follows: Republican 817,713; Democratic 463,114; Libertarian 17,618; Not affiliated with a party 543,403. So, the absolute numbers went down for both the Republicans and Democrats and up for the Libertarians and Not affiliated.