Like 49% of my fellow Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, I am an independent voter. Like all veterans, when I deployed overseas, I wasn’t fighting for the Republican Party or the Democratic Party — I was fighting for the whole country.

That’s why I’m dismayed at Maine’s outdated election laws. As an independent, I’m not allowed to exercise the most fundamental of American rights — the right to vote — in the primaries when it really matters. While each major party makes use of taxpayer-funded elections to conduct their primaries, the largest block of voters in the state is not allowed to participate in those elections.

I don’t think that just because a person is not affiliated with one party or another means that their voice shouldn’t count when it comes to determining who their elected officials are going to be. That’s not what democracy is about, and that is not what the thousands of veterans in Maine who served in foreign wars risked their lives to protect.

I urge all readers to contact their state representatives and urge them to pass L.D. 211, An Act To Open Maine’s Primaries and Permit Unenrolled Voters To Cast Ballots in Primary Elections.

Ross Cunningham
Lisbon Falls