Election reform advocates had hoped for a big year at the ballot box. That's because a historic number of states were considering initiatives for ranked choice voting or to end partisan primaries.

Summary

Voters across eight states, including Arizona, Colorado, and Nevada, rejected ballot measures for election reforms such as ranked choice voting (RCV) and open primaries, despite a $110 million push from advocates.

The movement, inspired by Alaska’s 2020 adoption of these reforms, failed to gain traction, with critics citing confusion and doubts over RCV’s benefits.

Some reforms succeeded locally, including in Portland, Oregon, but opposition remains strong.

  • AtHeartEngineerEnglish
    0•1 month ago

    I’m only saying this because the vote failed everywhere, clearly it’s a strategy problem.

    If you ask anyone on the street if they would want more moderates and parties in office, a large majority would agree, so if that’s the goal, the question is, how do we get there. Ranked choice is great, but it’s not optimal in either how the tallying determines a winner, or in convincing people this is better. Approval voting is clearly easier to explain and probably convince people it’s better. So now that the vote has failed, we should reassess our strategy from ranked choice to approval voting.