Top CT lawmakers question whether to change August primary due to low turnout

Hartford Courant – Friday, August 14, 2026
By Christopher Keating

Citing low voter low turnout in the middle of the summer, top state officials are considering whether to change the August primary to another month.

House Speaker Matt Ritter, a key player at the state Capitol, says he is open to the idea that would be studied by the legislature during the next session that starts in January 2027.

A Hartford resident, Ritter has seen low turnout in the city and beyond during his years in the General Assembly.

“I don’t think August works,” Ritter told The Courant in an interview. “So I would go to June or go to September. So I think that’s a bill we need to discuss in 2027.”

Ritter added, “I think you’ve got to try something else at some point. I know the reason June wasn’t picked a long time ago was that legislators thought they wouldn’t have enough time. Well, you know what? It’s six weeks. It’s plenty of time. Maybe it’s time to think about a change. … June or September. You’ve got to pick one of the two.”

Since legislators hold the sole power to change the law, they are the decisive players in setting the primary date.

One of the key issues is that the legislature operates in election years under a “short” session at the state Capitol that lasts from early February to early May. Lawmakers had complained in the past that they would need to scramble on the campaign trail in the final weeks before a primary in June after the hectic end to the session in which they routinely work long hours. Their opponents, lawmakers said, would have an advantage because they would not need to be at the Capitol working in those weeks to pass legislation.

When Connecticut primaries were held in September in the past, legislators complained that they did not have enough time from that date to recover for an early November general election. As a result, the primary was switched to August.

“I do think we have to look at changing the date. I really do,” Ritter said. “November is ingrained in people. They know that we vote in November. That’s almost like a national understanding. These primaries are not. I came home from my vacation to get back for the primary. Not many people are leaving their vacation to get home for the primary. July and August – everyone goes away. That’s the time families get to go away.”

As a resident of the First Congressional District, Ritter said he was inundated by constant mailings that were sent to his Hartford home as part of the four-way Democratic primary that was won by former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin against U.S. Rep. John B. Larson of East Hartford, state Rep. Jillian Gilchrest of West Hartford and Hartford school board member Ruth Fortune. In addition, Gov. Ned Lamont was locked in a primary battle against state Rep. Josh Elliott of Hamden. In the Second Senate district in parts of Hartford, Windsor, and Bloomfield, three Democratic candidates battled in another competitive primary.

With those races, Ritter said there was relatively little chance that an adult would be completely unaware that there was a primary on August 11.

“I must have gotten 50 mailers,” Ritter said. “I must have gotten 100 text messages. I can’t imagine how someone could not have known. … There was not much more you could have done to inform people there was a primary. I don’t think it’s that people don’t care. I think it’s just that time of year when people go away.”

Republican view

House Republican leader Vincent Candelora of North Branford said he is willing to discuss changing the date, but he added the issue leads to a broader conversation about voting.

One issue, he said, is that voter turnout was still low in some towns despite having seven days of “early voting” when residents could head to their local town hall and cast a ballot before the main primary day of August 11.

“We’re going in the wrong direction for voter turnout,” Candelora told The Courant. “I think we need to look at reducing the days of early voting.”

If the primaries were moved to September, he said, there would be relatively little time before early voting would begin in late October for a general election in early November under a compressed timetable.

Another possible answer to increasing turnout, he said, is to call for “open primaries” in which unaffiliated voters could cast ballots in either the Democratic or Republican primaries. In the days of liberal Republican Lowell P. Weicker, Jr., the state Republican Party allowed the practice by changing the rules in 1984 in a move that was eventually upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1986 in a 5-4 decision following a lawsuit. But after Weicker left the party to run as an independent, Republicans then changed the rule back again in September 1991 to allow only closed primaries.

“Let the unaffiliates vote,” Candelora said.

Primary history

The mid-August primaries have a long history of lackluster turnout – with one major exception.

The biggest turnout since the August primaries began was 43% in 2006 when Lamont burst onto the political stage with a stunning primary upset against then-U.S. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman. The 43% was huge — far beyond the 25% Democratic turnout in 2010 for a statewide governor’s race. Lieberman later won the general election and served for six more years in the U.S. Senate.

Long before he was governor, Lamont said after he had lost the August 2010 gubernatorial primary that he was not a fan of the mid-summer contest.

“You have to give them a compelling reason to vote in an August primary,” Lamont said at the time. “If you don’t want a smallish group of insiders to decide the party’s nominee, it shouldn’t be on the hottest day in August. It certainly favors party-endorsed, insider candidates, but I don’t think it’s in the best interest of our democracy.”

Lamont has as much experience in August primaries as anyone in the state — running major, high-profile races in 2006, 2010, and 2026. Lamont was hurt by the low turnout in 2010 as party activists and union members came out strongly for Democrat Dannel P. Malloy, who defeated Lamont. With a well-planned strategy, Malloy did a better job than Lamont at targeting his voters and getting them to the polls on that summer day.

Today, Lamont is a two-term governor who won this year’s August Democratic primary and will face Republican Ryan Fazio in the November general election.

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