BATON ROUGE - The term "other party" is getting a little more popular in Louisiana, specifically in East Baton Rouge Parish.

Since 2016, the amount of registered voters in the state who identify as a third party has increased almost 10%. In East Baton Rouge Parish, that number has increased by 15%. According to political analyst James Hartman, those numbers are representative of younger voters stepping up to their ability to vote and is also indicative of single-issue voters registering independent of a party.

From Feb. 1 to March 1 of this year, the amount of increased registered voters in East Baton Rouge Parish grew at three times the rate as registered Republican voters. 

"Certainly the Republican Party in Louisiana is the strongest it's ever been," Hartman said, confident in the numbers. "But to see voters registering with 'no party' at the rate of three times of registering as Republicans is certainly very interesting. My suspicion is that most of those, or a large plurality, of those are going to be younger voters who tend to be typically less partisan and tend to be more disgusted with extreme politics on both sides."

The concept of an increased third party isn't strictly confined to Baton Rouge. Hartman said the trend in a third — or other — party is a decades-long concept. However, he refers to it as the 40-40-20 rule, where prior to the 2000s, it was predicted that 40% of the electorate would vote democrat, 40% would vote republican and 20% would vote as a third party. Now, Hartman said the philosophy has shifted to 30-30-40, where 30% of the electorate votes with one of the two main parties and the 40% comes from elsewhere — independents, no party or the Green Party.

Hartman believes voter registration party affiliations may shift in the coming months as each party holds its convention this summer. The political analyst also believes as universities open up in the fall, there will be a push for voter registration at universities which could alter the numbers even more, especially among a younger voting population.

It's not uncommon for there to be an uptick in voter registration before presidential elections, specifically around the Republican and Democratic primaries. However, Hartman believes an increase in 2.1% voter registration in the state over the years may indicate increased voter participation. Yet, that doesn't entirely mean increased voter turnout.

"An uptick in voter registration does not necessarily correlate to an uptick in voter participation," Hartman said.

Political analysts like Hartman will await October's voter rates and November's presidential election voter turnouts to see if those registering with a third or other party — while voter registration "other party" status rates are increasing — will actually vote.