Okay.

For a deeper look at last night's primary election, I'm joined by our senior writer, Colleen O'Dea.

Colleen, good to see you.

What gives with the turnout?

I mean, talk about a lackluster election.

Yeah.

So far, from what we're seeing, it looks like little more than half a million people turned out.

That's maybe about 13% of the registered Democrats and Republicans, not counting unaffiliated voters who tend to not show up because they don't want to become Democrat or Republican.

That's about what it was ten, 12 years ago when we last had a Senate, state Senate at the top.

And that's despite having more options to vote.

Yeah.

And, you know, this should have been a year when when people came out because it was redistricting year.

Right.

The districts changed.

This is a time for more people to come out and that we just didn't see.

And yet they didn't.

So how does this set us up for the general election in November?

So, you know, we're going to be looking at typically a lot of different districts.

I mean, the fourth district is going to be one that we will continue to look at because that's one where the Republicans think they might be able to steal again from the Democrats.

It's down in South Jersey, which has been trending red.

But then our attention is going to go to the 11th in Monmouth County and to the 16th in Somerset, Hunterdon County.

Those ones have very close Democrat, Republican registrations.

And so those are two places where, again, the Republicans think they can pick up seats.

So those are really kind of going to be the focus, I think, of the races to watch.

Well, how does this sort of change the makeup of the legislature?

Because it's been tough to keep up with all of the turnover and certainly the face of it still seems the same.

Yeah.

You know, unfortunately, we're going to be losing Senator Nia Gill, a black woman in the 34th district.

She was put in the district with Richard Codey.

She lost.

You're going to be losing a woman down in the third district because Beth Sawyer decided to run against Ed Durr.

I mean, I think you know, from the last time we took a look at it, it looks like we will probably have fewer women in the legislature than we did at the start of this year.

And we may have, you know, a less diverse legislature as well.

You're losing people like Sadaf Jaffer, who is, you know, a Muslim woman.

So you know.

Who was leaving because of what she said were really hate attacks on her on her character.

Quickly, Colleen, in a little bit of time, we have left.

What's a fix for this?

I know you've been talking to policy makers and others about the situation that we're in with just general malaise about the elections.

You know, there are a couple of things that some people point to.

One is an open primary.

Several states have that.

In that case, then unaffiliated voters could come out and vote for whoever they wanted, a Democrat or Republican they would have to become a member of that party.

You know, right now we've got two and a half million unaffiliated voters who just don't want to show up at primaries.

So that could help.

Another thing that people talk about is ranked choice voting, which, you know, is come to New York.

It's used in a couple of other states.

And that might give people maybe more of a thought that they have an actual say in the process.

So those are two things that, you know, might be considered.

All right, lawmakers, listen up.

Colleen O'Dea, senior writer, Thank you so much.

Thank you Bri.