Yeah, I agree with them. Ranked Choice voting is extremely confusing. First you have to rank the candidates in the order you prefer to win, then…oh wait, no. It’s really not confusing at all.
But these poor black people can’t count to five!
How fucking patronizing.
As a citizen of a country with ranked choice voting the hardest thing is choosing which of the loonies you want to put last!
Is it patronizong if it’s backed by data? The article discusses how they’re not just claiming it’s confusing for these districts out of nothing, they’re pointing to existing voting data that shows when there are multiple seats to fill for the same position, such as City Council seats, voters in these districts neglect to cast votes for the additional seats at a higher rate than other districts. “Undervoting” it’s apparently called.
This is a horrifically self-serving bullshit “solution” to this problem, but there does appear to be a real problem that ought to be addressed as part of a ranked-choice rollout.
Sounds like there just needs to be a little bit of voter education rather than scrapping the whole thing.
I would need to see the ballot to say for sure, but the article lists this example:
“The lawsuit notes that in elections for at-large seats on the DC city council — where voters can currently choose two candidates — voters in Wards 7 and 8 are less likely to cast a second vote, a phenomenon known as “undervoting.””
So, when presented with a relatively simple “Vote For Two” choice, Ward 7 and 8 are less likely to vote for a second person.
If that’s a problem, then the idea of not only voting for multiple people, but ranking them 1-2-3, may be a big issue.
Remember, back in 2000 Florida voters struggled with the butterfly ballot.
But in the end, this could be solved by a combination of education, clear instructions, and an easy to understand ballot design.
But undervoting isn’t really a problem. No one is being disenfranchised by not casting a second vote (or ranking all options), they just aren’t availing themselves of the full range of options. Even just voting for one person could be an intentional choice if you don’t really care about the other options or want your first choice to have a better chance of winning an expected head-to-head.
This is at worst an indicator the government should run some informational campaigns, not a reason not to use multi-voting systems.
If it’s intentional by the voter it’s not a problem.
If it’s because the ballots are confusing, or the process is, it isn’t fine. They’re being partially disenfranchised- their ballot will have less power than someone who understood the process.
We have RCV in NY for primaries. Understanding the implications of how the order matters and gets counted isn’t super easy. There are definitely going to be unintended consequences for RCV.
Depends on the system. In Australia undervoting can invalidate your vote.
I get this in theory but it gave me the hilarious mental image of someone gathering their phone, keys, wallet, going to their local polling station, showing their ID, walking to the voting machine, then thinking, “Oh no, I’m allowed to vote for TWO people?” and immediately bolting out the door.
It’s a design and execution problem, not a voter problem. The Florida ballots had a stupid design that met the needs of a counting machine, not the needs of voters
Maybe the second candidate was s*** and nobody wanted to vote for them? Or maybe voters really only wanted the one person.
Or, and I think this is more likely, people are used to the idea of marking more than one name invalidating the ballot.
No, it’s only confusing for people in predominantly black areas! Wait… this statement seems problematic…
Undervoting is a real issue.
they always have, if we’re honest. Corpo Dems think the working class needs shepherding. they like to pretend they’re benevolent while their benefactors fuck us slowly. They’re benevolence is only incomparison to the party of “Saying the Quiet Part out Loud”.
No, this isn’t a both-sides argument. This is a “just because one side is objectively worse doesn’t mean the Corpo Dems don’t also really suck.” argument.
Liberals have always and will always be the natural enemy of the Left and the working class. That’s been true for almost 400 years and it isn’t changing now.
They didn’t even mention anyone not being able to vote because of race. They mentioned in court that certain areas that happen to have older voters, poorer voters, and black voters could be potentially undermined by ranked choice. And it’s proven to be true. As shown in previous elections time and time again. It is called undervoting.
See:
None of these commenters read the fucking article. You read the headlines and then jump straight to the hot takes, to spew about unrelated agendas.
The Democratic Party officials in DC are like 90% black.
Here are literally the actual people who made the argument in court. You. can see their pictures:
https://www.leadersofcolor.net/team/victor-horton
Just to be clear: I’m for ranked choice. Their concern is not racist. And saying it is in this case means you didn’t read the article.
Here’s Charles Wilson - The leader of the DC democrats, who personally argued in court, as mentioned in the article you all didn’t read:
All I had to do was read the article to not come to the same conclusion as half the people in this thread. Community fail. This thread proves some people can’t be bothered to read. And that’s what the argument made in court was about - confusion.
You didn’t read the article. I did. You also apparently didn’t read the TLDR bullet points. I did. Let me get the excerpts for you:
They argued in a lawsuit that low-income and Black voters would be confused by the system.
In a lawsuit filed earlier this month seeking to block ranked choice voting in Washington, DC, the local Democratic Party argued that implementing the system would be particularly confusing for voters in predominantly Black areas.
The lawsuit notes that in elections for at-large seats on the DC city council — where voters can currently choose two candidates — voters in Wards 7 and 8 are less likely to cast a second vote, a phenomenon known as “undervoting.” “Many of those voters report their confusion about selecting more than one candidate for what appears to be the same office,” said Wilson in the lawsuit, arguing that implementing ranked-choice voting “would introduce an additional layer of confusion to the electorate.” // “I have a similar concern for seniors and persons with disabilities,” Wilson added.
They’re explicitly saying these minorities are more likely to be confused.
About your point about “they can’t be racist because they’re black”… yes they absolutely fucking can. There is zero need to call on race here. “Our constituents report confusion leading to under voting” is all that needed to be said. Tying it to race is…. Racist. Tying it to age is ageist.
Doubt they care. They do anything to uphold a two party system where they can raise campaign contributions from the same corporate interests that also contribute to radical regressives, while at the same time being able to hold some offices solely by being the marginally less shitty party (at least publicly). Ranked choice makes a third party a viable option and the Democrats as a political party with no real stances doesn’t make sense in the world where they aren’t the sole alternative.
That’s the argument they’re trying for in court, which is not the same as what they think. The reality is much more mundane. Probably more frustrating too.
Ranked choice voting makes it easier for incumbents to lose. It makes it harder (but still… not actually difficult) for retiring office holder to coronate their hand-picked successor. That’s all this comes down to. Especially in a place like DC that votes for a single party by such wide margins. Places that lopsided, in a FPTP primary system, once elected a politician is all but incapable of losing. Even to horrible, horrible scandal.
Ranked choice threatens that. If DC switched to it overnight, >90% of the incumbents would win reelection trivially. In fact I’d be surprised if any of them that ran again lost. But they don’t like that it goes from just short of a guarantee, to still really highly certain.
This is about protecting establishment career politicians, not about what voters want and not about what they are capable of understanding.
Estblishment corporate dems 🤝 All elected republicans:
Disenfranchising the American people in the name of job security.
Surely centrist neolibs and the far right would never collaborate to prevent leftist candidates from being able to have a chance at getting elected… That never has happened before /s
Damnit democrats all I want from you is voting reform and then we can move onto better parties.
Although I guess this is them realizing that and not wanting to let go.
Neoliberals only want business-as-usual. The Reich want to enslave everyone not mega-rich. Neither party want positive change.
.jpeg){kind=link}