Ranked choice voting is awesome.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

Read the article at the link. I am so pleased that Ranked Choice Voting passed (again) in Maine this past Tuesday. I think this will make our government much more effective. Maine has a really great referendum process where the people can essentially make and veto laws. This is how we legalized gay marriage and recreational marijuana. We voted for those things via referendum questions on the ballot. Our referendum process has enabled us to elect this new voting system for ourselves. This will eventually help prevent extremists like LePage from getting elected into office by a minority of the population. There is still some work to be done so we can use this style of voting in the general election for governor, state house, and state senate races, but I think we are going to get there eventually. We will be using RCV for primaries and US house and US senate races in the general election. I am very pleased that we are actually making progress towards solving these sorts of problems over here. Maine is awesome. Now this needs to happen in other states too.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/06/maine-lepage-ranked-choice-voting/562871/

[msongs]

1. yeah who cares if the candidate who gets the most votes is kept out of office nt

[Ms. Toad]

4. If there had been ranked choice voting in the Republican Primary

Trump would not be president. One of the reasons he won the Republican nomination was becasue he was running against other mostly no-descript candidates. Voters for most of those other candidates would have favored someone more similar to the candidate they chose - than Trump.

Beyond the primary, it also permits people to vote for who they truly want as president, without worrying about accidentally electing a Republican. The Nader votes in 2000 would almost certainly have gone to Al Gore (as the second choice for those Nader voters).

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

10. That wouldn't happen

This system ensures the most popular candidate wins. Technically, who ever wins still has the most votes, but no one can win with just 30% of the vote anymore. If no one has 50% among the first choice votes, then an instant runoff happens. The last place person is kicked out. Second choice votes of the people who voted for last place person would be applied to the remaining candidates. Whoever has the most first and second choice votes would then win.

[docgee]

2. So if all the Dems vote for the Democratic candidate as top

choice and the repuke as last, and the repukes do the opposite, how likely is a 3rd party libertarian win?

[Ms. Toad]

5. Nearly impossible.

That candidate would probably garner the fewest votes, and be elminate in the first round, with the votes designated with the libertarian split between the remaining candidates.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

9. Right. An instant run off between the Dem and Repub would happen

Anyone who voted for the two front runners as first choice, their votes are still locked in for the runoff. Last place guy is kicked out of the race. The people that voted for him as their first choice will then have their second choice votes applied to figure out which of the front runners is truly more popular. That is how it works. It is basically an instant runoff is no one gets 50% of the votes.

[PoliticAverse]

3. I wonder if some people will change their minds, when...

it starts getting third party/independent candidates elected.

[shanny]

7. Why is that a problem?

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

8. I don't see why that is a problem either

If they have the most support, than that is the will of the people. There is nothing wrong with that. Maine elects independents sometimes. Senator Angus King is an independent and he does a pretty good job. I prefer him over the the dem running.

[NurseJackie]

6. Nope. The "third-runner-up" should be allowed to explicitly endorse someone else...

Nope. The "third-runner-up" should be allowed to explicitly endorse someone else, and to encourage his/her voters to return to the polls and support the endorsed candidate.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

11. They can do that prior to the election

Read the article. Eves and Sweet endorsed each other, for example.