Unaffiliated voters are the fastest-growing large voting block in Oklahoma, according to the latest statistics released by the Oklahoma State Election Board.

Nearly one of every five Oklahoma voters registered as an independent. Four years ago, independents made up just 15% of voters — now it’s just shy of 19%.

Since the last presidential election, the number of people who refused to pick a party has risen 31% with the addition of more than 100,000 independent registrations.

How do Oklahoma voters compare to national trends?

It’s a trend seen across the United States, particularly with young voters. National polling and Oklahoma-specific data indicate they are more politically disengaged than older generations, but also might be less polarized. A survey of more than 4,000 young adults showed 61% don’t align with either major political party.

Independents aren’t the only voting block seeing record numbers, though. The third-largest party in the state, the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma, has nearly doubled in size to 21,910 registered voters since 2020.

“It’s an indication that even in Oklahoma, as Republican-dominated a state as we are, there’s a growing dissatisfaction with both parties,” said political scientist James Davenport.

Republican stronghold remains in Oklahoma

Despite that, he said, there’s no indication that Republican dominance over state government is under threat. The GOP saw smaller but still impressive growth since 2020, and now makes up over 50% of voters.

Democrats continued to see plummeting registration numbers over the past four years, losing more than 85,000 voters. The once-powerful Oklahoma Democratic Party now has just 28.4% of the voter share, down from 35.3% in 2020.

Democrats enjoyed decades of local political dominance; between statehood and 1973, four out of five state legislators in Oklahoma were Democrats. The party was the major political force largely because of its appeal to rural voters, especially in the southeast, a region dubbed “Little Dixie” because of political and cultural ties to the Southern United States.

Those conservative rural strongholds now register with the Republican Party. Today, it’s hard for a Democrat to win outside of an urban area.

“It’s an amazing reversal from decades long gone, in which those numbers were completely flipped for Republicans and Democrats,” said Davenport, an associate dean and professor at Rose State College. “Democrats, I think, have a challenge, and there’s obviously going to be some kind of threshold where they will fall below. And the question is, what are they going to do to start increasing that?”

Can independents vote in primaries in Oklahoma?

Seven years ago, the Oklahoma Democratic Party agreed to let independents vote in Democratic primaries. So far, they are the only party to schedule open primary elections and recently announced that the practice will continue through 2025.

There is a growing movement in Oklahoma to mandate open primaries as a way to counter partisan extremism in government. A group of influential local and state officials recently met to discuss how Oklahoma could restructure the way politicians are elected and hope to present voters with an initiative petition within a few years.

The number of registered voters of any affiliation grew over 10% since 2020, according to the state Election Board. As of Jan. 15, there were 2.3 million registered voters, up from 2.1 million in 2020.

If you’d like to vote or change your voter registration, you can now complete forms at the state Election Board’s website. Oklahoma became the 41st state to adopt online voter registration last year, allowing eligible U.S. citizens with a state driver’s license or state-issued ID card to complete the entire process online.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma voter registration: Independents fastest growing voter block