America's Electoral System (5): Primaries and Nominations: How Candidates Are Chosen

[Key points]

The names on the November ballot are not self-appointed: they first survive a primary season earlier in the year

Primaries come in two forms - government-run primary elections and party-run caucuses - with open, closed and hybrid rules on who may vote

California uses a 'top-two' primary for most offices: all candidates on one ballot, the top two finishers advance

1. Why primaries come first

In November, each party can field only one candidate per office. Who that is gets decided in the primaries, held state by state from March to September. California's 2026 primary took place on June 2; the names Californians see on the November 3 ballot are the people who came through it.

Primaries make American elections a two-step process: parties pick their champions first, then the whole electorate decides. Incumbents can lose at this stage to challengers from their own party - and in one-sided districts, the primary is often the real contest.

2. Two formats: primary elections and caucuses

Most states use primary elections: run by government election officials, with secret ballots at regular voting locations, just like November.

A few states, for some contests, use caucuses: meetings run by the parties themselves, where supporters gather in school gyms and community centers on a set evening, stand in groups for their candidates, debate, and are counted publicly. The most famous is Iowa's, traditionally the first contest of the presidential cycle. Caucuses demand hours of in-person attendance and draw far fewer people than polling-place voting; several states have moved to primaries or to party-run hybrids with early voting.

3. Who may vote: open, closed, and in between

States answer the question 'who can vote in a party's primary' differently. In closed primaries, only voters registered with that party may vote in it; unaffiliated voters - registered as 'no party preference' - generally sit it out. In open primaries, any voter may pick any one party's ballot at the polling place, regardless of registration, but only one. Semi-open and semi-closed systems fall between: unaffiliated voters may join one party's primary, while registered partisans may not cross over. Details vary by state.

Candidates face thresholds of their own: to appear on the ballot they must file paperwork with state or county officials by a deadline and pay a filing fee or collect a required number of voter signatures.

4. California's twist: the top-two primary

Since 2012, under Proposition 14, California has used a top-two primary for congressional and state offices: every candidate, whatever the party, appears on a single primary ballot open to all registered voters, and the two highest vote-getters advance to November - even if both belong to the same party. Same-party general elections are therefore common in California, and a voter's choice is not pre-sorted by party columns.

The presidential primary is the exception: it remains party-by-party. Registered partisans vote their own party's ballot; no-party-preference voters who want to join a party's presidential primary must request that party's ballot, and parties set their own rules on whether to accept them. Most city and county offices in California are nonpartisan by law - no party label appears next to the candidate's name at all.

5. Choosing a president: a six-month relay

Presidential nominations are the primary system's biggest stage. Primaries and caucuses award each candidate a share of convention delegates; at the national conventions in the summer, a majority of delegates makes the nomination. The traditional calendar opens in the new year with the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, continues through states such as Nevada and South Carolina, and reaches 'Super Tuesday' in early March, when more than a dozen states vote at once and the races usually settle. Each party controls its own calendar and tweaks it every cycle - but the logic is constant: half a year of escalating state contests to assemble a majority of delegates.

(Previous: what the 2026 midterms will decide. Next: how voters actually cast ballots - California, 2026.)

Related: America's Electoral System (4): The Midterms: What Is on the Ballot on November 3, 2026

Related: America's Electoral System (6): How Voters Cast Ballots: California in 2026 as an Example

Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)

Photo: 图：爱荷华州党团会议季期间一场竞选集会上的选民，身后为爱荷华州旗。Evan Guest 摄／Wikimedia Commons（CC BY 2.0）

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