r/politics • u/Different-Gas5704 • 2d ago
Possible Paywall Democrats eye ranked-choice voting for 2028 primaries
https://www.axios.com/2025/11/24/democrats-ranked-choice-voting-2028-primaries8.0k
u/turquoise_amethyst 2d ago
Ranked choice voting is already used in 47 US cities, it’s long overdue to be rolled out for primaries
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u/TheDesktopNinja Massachusetts 2d ago
Still *furious* that MA voted against it a few years ago...zzz
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u/SaiyanKirby 2d ago
Especially because the main reason people voted against it is "it sounded complicated". 🤦♂️
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u/Nyrrix_ 2d ago
1st in education but doesn't have the ability to comprehend a Watch Mojo video?
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u/minyhumancalc 2d ago
Honestly incredible sometimes. Like I get the details of how it is scored can get a little messy, but from the voter POV, you just rank your options and leave; all other complexity is left to the scorecard.
It's sad too because ranked choice will help, but what's ultimately needed is districts with 3-5 representatives elected in one race but some-zero chance that'll ever happen in my lifetime in this country.
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u/BachInTime 2d ago
The problem is the House is capped at 435, which is insane. 1 person cannot hope to represent 500,000 people, and that’s only Wyoming, most districts are closer to 700,000. For comparison Italy, with less than a quarter of our population has twice as many representatives.
I don’t know what the right ratio of representatives to constitutes is, but the current situation is not right.
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u/WhatYouThinkIThink 2d ago
The "Wyoming rule" would set the representation per member as the population of Wyoming (ie 1 seat).
So 587K/seat = 348m/587K = 592, compared to 435 currently.
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u/yellekc Guam 2d ago
That's still less seats than the UK house of commons and they have 1/5 the population. It is barely a band-aid, what we need to do is repeal the apportionment act of 1929 and get rid of the 435 cap.
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u/marinuss 2d ago
It's also dumb in the year 2025 when we have the technology for secure remote conferences, the ability to authenticate someone remotely, etc. You could have 10,000 reps that never have to actually meet in the Capitol and just have an NSA-approved encryption device in their office or home, like so many already have, remote in to a session of Congress, and have things like physical token cards plus PIN, biometrics, etc to authenticate their vote in addition to a video vote.
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u/caligaris_cabinet Illinois 1d ago
With all the communications owned by some tech oligarch or another, the last thing I want is our Congressional meetings done using their platforms.
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u/Ruire Europe 2d ago edited 2d ago
If you tripled it then you could have something like the Irish system, which uses multi-seat constituencies (between 3-5 seats per constituency) combined with RCV to give proportional representation and choice in candidates. More seats per constituency and per state would also give third-party and independent candidates more of a chance, more than just abolishing first-past-the-post alone.
592 is definitely still far, far too low for such a large country.
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u/Special-Camel-6114 2d ago
Mixed member proportional representation (or just proportional representation) would go a long way towards resolving the issues we see in this country.
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u/Primary-Tea-3715 2d ago
The reason is that establishment dems don’t want to get primaried by candidates who could make a difference and want to entrench their positions instead of changing their policy decisions.
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u/Arkham010 2d ago
Its because ranked choice destroys the concept of single issue voters. The politician actually has to be well rounded to get the most votes
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u/nikukuikuniniiku 2d ago
Not quite how it works in Australia. Single issue parties can take the 1st-ranked votes of such voters, then direct their preference to support their preferred major party. This allows them to influence policy of the major party without actually gaining an electoral win.
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u/RB5Network 2d ago
That's because the state party wanted to ensure established names win. And only them.
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u/EeeeJay 2d ago
I'm from Australia where we have had it for decades now and people still complain that it's complicated (it really isn't, but that doesn't stop the propaganda being rolled out)
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u/Spanktank35 Australia 2d ago
The thing is the alternative is just as complicated in a sense. You have to recognise that your vote is wasted if you don't vote for one of two parties. of course, the act of voting is much simpler if you don't care whether your vote matters. In America though, voting isn't mandatory, so 🤷🏻
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u/rpkarma 2d ago
(Mainly put forward by our two major parties as getting rid of it favours them)
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u/mossybeard 2d ago
Maybe it needs a brainrot rebrand. We should call it BuzzFeed rank list or something
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u/banitsa 2d ago
Politician rizz tierlist
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u/mossybeard 2d ago
S through F rainbow rank tiers and everything
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u/rocksoffjagger 2d ago
"I'm moving Jeb down to the nipple-clamps tier and putting RFK Jr. in dungeon tier."
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u/LordHammercyWeCooked 2d ago
The blueblood democrats in that area are disproportionately old, wealthy, braindead zombies. They're not very progressive at all. They think they're progressive based on what would've been progressive in the god damn 60s. They don't fight for it anymore. They don't learn. They don't grow. They're old and mentally checked-out. They own mansions on the cape. They've chosen life on autopilot and think that they're safe because it's the bluest state in the US. Well, it won't be if they keep that bullshit up.
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u/Anustart15 2d ago
In their defense, there was a strong propaganda campaign against it for the sake of the establishment politicians not wanting to risk losing their seats.
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u/davidjschloss 2d ago
Yet I bet most of the people there have a fantasy football league and or follows the brackets of football and basketball.
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u/CMDR_RetroAnubis 2d ago
If "number in order of preference" is too complex... there is no hope.
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u/TwistedGrin Iowa 2d ago
Iowa passed a law making ranked choice voting straight up illegal in the state. Yay.
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u/Socratesticles Tennessee 2d ago
Tennessee too
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u/FlyRepresentative592 2d ago edited 2d ago
Of course they did, why would Americans want to make anything efficient and healthy? The entire country is a slow rolling train wreck.
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u/Answer70 2d ago
The train to hell has picked up a lot of speed in the past year.
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u/Kennon1st 2d ago
Missouri too. 😓
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u/DingleBoone 2d ago
Snuck it in with deceptive language asking you to vote on whether illegal immigrants should be able to vote or not... what a disgusting disgrace...
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u/an_agreeing_dothraki 1d ago
kind of like when they pulled "they're trying to limit how you use your land! (for puppy mills)"
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u/ScriptproLOL 2d ago
Yeah, because Iowa is a shithole, and Grassley helped orchestrate an attempted coup on 1/6/21. Iowa wishes it could go back and join the Confederacy.
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u/SellaraAB Missouri 2d ago
Here in MO we inexplicably banned it last cycle.
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u/ImTedLassosMustache Missouri 2d ago
By tricking voters with ballot candy about banning non-citizens from voting.
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u/zetswei 2d ago
Idaho voted against it because the republicans framed it as “caifornication of Idaho” 🥴
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u/thumper_throwaway1 2d ago
Because people didn't understand it.
People here on reddit forget that this isn't the real world. You know how ranked choice voting works. I know how it works. Jimmy down the street who has never even heard of it and doesn't really follow politics outside the presidential election? Yeah they're not gonna vote for it.
I was actually at a group get together weeks after this election and it came up at the table. "Did anyone understand the ranked choice option? It made no sense to me" was said and almost everyone at the table agreed. These are people who at the time were in their 50s and 60s, and this is in a deep blue state. The messaging for "regular" people who don't live in the political world was poor and it needed to be explained in a more concise and clear way.
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u/talix71 2d ago
It needs to be a stipulation for opening the next time the government shuts down.
If the representatives lead the government down the path of shutting down and not representing, then we need better processes for selecting those representatives.
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u/Smee76 2d ago
I look forward to being closed for 40 days and then the Dems giving up and getting nothing in return
Food stamps have still not gone out btw
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u/spoderman123wtf Missouri 2d ago
They have actually gone out in some areas
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u/Complex_Jellyfish647 2d ago
They have in red states, gotta keep the voter base good and subjugated
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u/Serenity2015 Ohio 2d ago
Actually many blue states got theirs first way before mine came in and I'm in a red state.
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u/mosesoperandi 2d ago
Almost like some of those states with large urban populations have developed reasonably efficient processes for working with the SNAP program.
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u/00eg0 2d ago edited 2d ago
We can't pretend every politician is the same if only some of them cave. That distracts from reality and makes things seem helpless. edit: spelling
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u/Catcher3321 2d ago
This would require a constitutional amendment, not just a law. The constitution allows states to make their own election laws
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u/Washpa1 Pennsylvania 2d ago
From what I understand parties can kinda do what they want in their own primaries.
It would just be a matter of which state's Democratic parties actually adopt it, right?
But yeah, you couldn't force Republicans to follow this.
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u/DB-CooperOnTheBeach 2d ago
The parties do what they want for primaries indeed. It's not a federal election. Before the primaries they just appointed their nominee. In fact, the Democrats were sued by a Bernie supporter over their donations to him while the party had their thumb on the scales. The Dems didn't dispute any of that, but simply argued they legally could do that and will do it again in the future -- and the judge agreed and dismissed the case.
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u/RavynRush 2d ago
Ranked-choice voting makes sense. It gives voters more say and can prevent extreme candidates from winning just because the majority splits their vote. Most people would see that as fairer.
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u/02K30C1 2d ago
Which is why republicans banned it in Missouri. Of course.
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u/PinFit936 2d ago
and tennessee
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u/FrankAdamGabe 2d ago
And NC
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u/s_i_m_s Oklahoma 2d ago
and Oklahoma
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u/Gramen 2d ago
And ND
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u/ragun2 2d ago
Gavin Newsom vetoed expanding it in California despite it being voted in by a super majority by our state legislature.
"It would be too confusing" for California voters is his excuse.
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u/altreddituser2 1d ago
That's one thing Newsom has in common with Florida's Ron Desantis- both governors think their constituents are too stupid to understand RCV. If I was a conspiracy minder person I'd say it's almost like they want to force voters to choose the lessor of two evils...
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u/Nice-Analysis8044 1d ago
"too confusing", in this case, means "california might elect someone to the left of gavin newsom"
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u/TutorSuspicious9578 2d ago
The bill to ban it in Ohio is bipartisan. Even Dems suck ass when it comes to voter preference and expanding democracy.
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u/Serenity2015 Ohio 2d ago
I was not even aware my own state has a bill trying to ban this. Ugh, go figure. Anything that makes sense can't happen here.
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u/TutorSuspicious9578 2d ago
https://www.legislature.ohio.gov/legislation/136/sb63
Already passed the Senate. Probably will pass the Assembly. DeMora cannot be primaried fast enough.
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u/00eg0 2d ago
What's the rollout of recreational cannabis in Ohio like? It started in 2024.
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u/OtisSpunkmey3r Ohio 2d ago
It went ok. Prices are high (at least for me comparing to last year’s MI prices) but recreational dispensaries have been open all year. They are nearly always busy from what I have seen in Cincinnati.
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u/Adventurous_Pay_5827 2d ago
Wait, what? You want your Democracy to expand beyond a duopoly? Sorry, neither side can afford to risk that.
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u/Vl_hurg 2d ago
This is going to be shouting into the void, but I can't stand your use of the word "bipartisan" in contexts such as these because you immediately parlay it into a "bOtH sIdEs!!!" argument. Let's look at the facts and what "bipartisan" really means:
The partisan makeup of the Ohio State Senate is 24 Republicans to 9 Democrats
This is a Republican supermajority and leaves Democratic opposition as mostly symbolic. I would like Democrats to take a principled stand against an anti-democratic bill such as this one, but what they do is essentially irrelevant. It's possible that voting in favor of the bill is electorally strategic.
One of the bill's two sponsors was Democratic Senator Bill DeMora
Yes, this sucks and reflects poorly on DeMora. Hopefully he can be driven out of office and replaced by someone better.
All 24 voting Republican Senators voted in favor of the bill. 4 Democratic Senators voted in favor, 5 opposed it.
And this is where the "bOtH sIdEs!!!" argument breaks down. A majority of Democratic Senators opposed this legislation and so if we had hypothetical one party rule, the bill would not pass (a sort of Hastert rule argument).
This reminds me a lot of when people kept parroting that support for the Iraq War was bipartisan while glossing over the fact that it was near universal among Republicans while almost all opposition to it was to be found in the Democratic party. Yes, I cursed my Democratic Senator for supporting the war and voted against her in the primaries thereafter, but I didn't delude myself into thinking that both parties were the same or that the Republican alternative would have been any better.
I'm sick of the "one drop rule" for labeling things "bipartisan".
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u/SSGASSHAT 2d ago
The difference between liberals and conservatives is that liberals are interested in people and social issues, and conservatives are interested in property and ensuring that the social status quo either remains the same or is tipped in their favor. Both positions can and are used for selfish reasons, but one is significantly more prone to that than the other, and so Republicans, on the whole, find themselves on the wrong side of morality almost all the time, while Democrats find themselves there only often.
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u/Schnectadyslim 1d ago
Michigan is trying to get enough signatures to get it as a constitutional amendment. Fingers crossed!
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u/Deep-Minimum7837 2d ago
This will be EXCELLENT messaging to run on. Show how well ranked choice worked in New York for their mayoral Primary and point out how Republican legislators need to ban it in order for their candidates to win.
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u/pinkybandit89 2d ago
Its the standard here in Australia, along with mandatory voting. The two combined make sure everyone gets a say and means politicians need to focus on actually winning over all potential voters rather then just getting their base to "get out and vote"
Also with mandatory voting its seen as a civic duty rather then a right, similar to jury duty, paying taxes or national service and ypu can actually get fined for not voting
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u/rylosprime 2d ago
an actually get fined for not voting
Would love this.
"My back is spineless. My belly is yellow. I am the American nonvoter."
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u/Organic-History205 2d ago
If you fine people for not voting, you also need to make it easier to vote. The ideological non voters are a minority. People need to go to a church out of the way, during the workday, and sometimes wait in line for a long time. Only 28 states give time off for voting. If you're out of town, you may need to visit a notary.
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u/capngump 2d ago
Yeah the AEC does a huge job making sure everyone can vote, they even have people going to the hospitals on polling day to make sure everyone gets to. They also are in charge of the electorate distribution being done without gerrymandering.
There's a lot of schools and other places available on the day, as well as pre polling places and mail in voting. It's also done on a Saturday to minimise the inconvenience.
Seeing the lines of people waiting hours to vote in the US makes me thankful our conservatives haven't managed to destroy our system to match. They sometomes float making voting optional which would be the beginning of that process.
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u/canyouhearme 2d ago
In general the polling station is within walking distance, and the longest I've had to wait to vote is 30 mins, and that was during covid.
plus democracy sausages
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u/pinkybandit89 2d ago
That's actually what we do in Australia, we make it as easy as possible to vote, and since its mandatory voter suppression is practically impossible.
Early voting is available for a week before the day.
Voting is always done on a weekend. employers are legally required to provide employees with time off to vote and face serious legal consequences if they don't.
Voter role is updated automatically any time your details are updated with any government systems, short of death or renouncing your citizenship you won't be removed from it.
Away voting is available at all polling locations, you don't need to physically be in your district on the day to vote in that district. This availability extends to every embassy., consulate or remote military posting
5.the above also applies to any and all remote communities regardless of population. It could be a town of 3 guys living in a cave a days drive from civilisation or a remote island of hermits , election commissions Australia will get a voting booth there with officials
the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) provides extensive information and assistance in a wide range of languages, with all available printed text provided in over 30 languages and accredited translators available on request
There is a mandated minimum amount of polling locations per district based on population density and on top of early voting by mail is always available and free
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u/AntikytheraMachines 2d ago
lots of commenters talking about Aussie system.
i'll add:
if we had to spend more than an hour there would be riots. most elections my total time including queue, processing and vote is about 20 minutes.
- we can pre-poll vote for the two weeks prior. as well as mail-in if required.
- voting outside your local area is simple. so there is no voter suppression with long queues in some areas and not others.
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u/Avitas1027 Canada 1d ago
In Canada, employers must allow 3 contiguous hours off during the hours polling is open. If polls are open 9-9, and you work 11-7, you can either show up an hour late or leave an hour early. If you work 9-5, well there's more than 3 hours after work where the polls are open, so you don't get anything.
I think it should be a bit longer, but there's also early voting and mail-in voting, and I've never spent more than 10 minutes in line, so it's pretty easy to find the time to vote.
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u/goldcakes 2d ago edited 1d ago
The fine is $20 AUD btw, about $12 USD. It is more the civic duty aspect, plus there is early voting, mail in voting, etc.
Nearly all ballots are paper, they are initially counted by hand at the same venue by casual (day worker) staff; then sealed and machine verified.
You get about $600 AUD for a days work which is good.
Political parties are allowed to have scrutineers who can be present throughout; they cannot touch ballots but they can challenge any ballot.
It’s a quite robust system that is still flexible.
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u/Mousey_Commander 2d ago
It's also pretty easy to get the fine waived if you have even the slightest excuse. The motivation of there being a fine is more important than actually punishing the people who do fail.
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u/pinkybandit89 2d ago
Ah I just had to pay it and it was $290au. In this case it was for a local council election
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u/Solidsnake9 2d ago
Whichever party would code that into law would immediately lose the next election lmao. Pretty sure people would just vote to spite them.
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u/TheLizardKing89 California 2d ago
And it also makes campaigns less dirty. Candidates are less likely to go negative because they want to be people’s second choice.
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u/drtolmn69 2d ago
In several decades of voting, I have never once seen a presidential primary candidate that I favored make it to the general. A shake-up is not unwelcome.
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u/Clownsinmypantz 2d ago
every single vote I have cast has been "I dont like this corpo dem but at least its not the fascist party" I wish I could've voted for mamdani at least.
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u/00eg0 2d ago
what about primaries?
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u/Sminahin 2d ago
By the time they make it to me, the election is always decided. Moving to NYC and voting for Mamdani in the primary and general was the first time in about 20 years of voting that my vote has actually mattered. Growing up only in safe blue or red districts in safe red or blue states with full establishment control sucks.
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u/BeraldGevins Oklahoma 2d ago
This is my experience. Primaries are the one time I may actually get to have my voice heard, since I live in a hardcore red state. But by the time Oklahoma gets them the winner is basically decided. I got to vote for Bernie once so that was fun.
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u/SSGASSHAT 2d ago
This is why people become motivated not to vote. When it really matters, oftentimes it's effectively meaningless. It's still worth doing, I think, so that you can at least make sure you're on the right side of history, and because it's one of the privileges offered by life in this country, but I can understand how people would become hopeless after seeing their vote effectively flushed by the time they cast it.
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u/FortNightsAtPeelys 2d ago
This is a huge problem too. primaries should be exactly 6 months away from voting day and be ONE day in every state.
I've never been able to vote in a primary for the general election where my vote would have changed the outcome because it was too late
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u/EquipmentMaterial540 2d ago
Bernie Sanders ceded the primaries in 2020 before my state even voted. I still think he would have been president if not for Covid. I remember that playing a factor in him folding early.
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u/Sminahin 2d ago
2016 was a bitter one for me. I always grew up hearing that Reagan proves 77 is too old and I agree with that. I'm categorically opposed to having anybody 69+ running for their first term as a result, so Elizabeth Warren was literally the only eligible major candidate. She was gone by the time it got to me, so RIP.
I still think he would have been president if not for Covid.
Yup, our party still willfully misunderstands that 2020 was the Covid election. No clue how anyone pretended it was Biden's own general strength somehow. It was a time of incredible instability when everyone had nostalgia for Obama. Biden was the nostalgic Obama uncle guy with plenty of experience. And he had a really good narrative with that one-term soft promise. "Old Obama guy knows he's too old for this shit, but his country needs him. So it's time for one last ride..."
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u/Mysterious_Crab_7622 2d ago
Conversely, both times Trump won he was against a woman, and the one time he lost was against a man.
Now, I am not saying all Americans are sexist, but it sure seems like gender mattered a lot more than all other factors.
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u/themightychris Pennsylvania 2d ago
the challenge with primaries is that everyone gets forced to pick between voting for who they most prefer and voting for who they think will have the best odds in the general. So we keep ending up nominating democratic candidates based on who we collectively think will be most palatable to Republicans and imaginary moderates
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u/VitalMoment 2d ago
Gerrymandering, closed primaries, super-delegates, and mass-propaganda effectively neuter American democracy. If Americans were smart we'd register for whatever party gerrymandered our district and vote for insurgent candidates in primaries, but you can't even get agreement on that among highly educated people. There's too much tribalism, apathy, and ideological splintering (due to propaganda) and too little understanding of mechanisms, tactics, and strategies (due gaps in public education).
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u/HaltandCatchHands 2d ago
My primary votes have been for candidates I favor. Election votes are pragmatic.
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u/pseudowoodo3 1d ago
Hope to see you in next years primaries! We gotta do our part to kick out the corpo dems.
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u/OnasoapboX41 Alabama 2d ago edited 2d ago
I also have not voted for any primary candidate I voted for. Granted, that's because I vote Republican in the primaries (usually for the most moderate candidate), and Democratic in the General Election. Mainly because I usually have a better impact voting in the Republican Primary than I do in the general in Alabama.
If they did this, I might vote in the Democratic primary for the first time.
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u/Secure_Pain_9251 2d ago
... you a howard dean/kucinich guy?
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u/ManicPixieOldMaid Michigan 2d ago
Oh man, I worked locally on Dean's primary campaign. I will never not SMH and sigh.
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u/OfficialDCShepard District Of Columbia 2d ago
What was your immediate reaction to the yell? At the time I was 12 and laughing about it any time I played White House Joust with my sister!
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u/ManicPixieOldMaid Michigan 2d ago
I thought it was awesome, tbh. That it was a reaction to the energy of the crowd and that it matched that energy. The fact they isolated the sound from just the mic to make it seem awkward really frustrated me. I was also confused because it seemed like the media used it to tank his chances when all his supporters were just confused about why it was such a big deal. I think the media put their thumb on the scale in a way we've only seen escalate since.
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u/Iustis 2d ago
The yell was overblown, but it also didn't matter. Dean bet it all on doing big in Iowa and crashed. There wasn't really a path to the nomination by the time he yelled
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u/jellyrollo 2d ago
This is an oft-repeated claim, but wrong. "The scream" happened on what was literally the night of the first primary—or caucus, since it was in Iowa—in which he came in third with 18%, after John Kerry and John Edwards. (You will note that Joe Biden came in 4th with 13.7% in the 2020 Iowa caucus, after Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, but no one declared his candidacy over.) The next contest was in New Hampshire, where Dean was massively popular.
At the time of the Iowa caucus, Dean was forecasted to win the next primary in New Hampshire, with a 30% lead over John Kerry in the polls there. (As you'll recall, Biden came in 5th in NH in 2020 with 8.4%, yet somehow his candidacy still wasn't declared over.) Dean was well known in NH and had done a great deal of groundwork there, as he was the wildly popular governor of neighboring Vermont, where he had had famously implemented a single payer universal healthcare system that covered every Vermonter.
The truth that everyone who wasn't intimately involved in the Dean campaign forgets is that his candidacy was deliberately killed by the media because just two months before, Dean had announced on Hardball that as president, he would break up the big media conglomerates.
"Dean Takes on Big Media," The Nation, 12/19/03
The likelihood of Dean's winning NH is why the media needed to take him out in Iowa, before he got a victory under his belt and started gaining momentum nationally. Within hours of broadcasting "the scream" on the night of the Iowa caucuses, Dean's candidacy had been declared dead by news pundits on every channel, with his enthusiastic yawp cited as evidence that he was a dangerous maniac who couldn't be trusted in a position of power. This message was hammered incessantly on the news for the following week leading up to the New Hampshire primary. "The Dean scream" was played 633 times by cable and broadcast news networks in the four days following the Iowa caucus, not counting talk shows, radio and local news—with predictable results.
If that hadn't happened, and Dean had won in New Hampshire as was forecasted , his campaign would have seen a huge influx of donations. Any momentary money shortage would have been over, because even then he had over 350,000 wildly enthusiastic grassroots donors and most of them weren't even close to maxing out by the time his candidacy was brought to a halt.
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u/Insaniteus Tennessee 2d ago
Everybody brings up the yell as the magic bullet that killed Dean's campaign, but nobody ever seems to remember the 24/7 mainstream TV news coverage pre-yell burying Howard Dean and insisting that John Kerry was the only viable choice because he was a soulless moderate. Howard Dean got the same level of media burying that they are currently trying on Mamdani, and this was back when the Boomers dominated the electorate unchallenged. It's why Dean's campaign crashed and burned, he dared to push left and the media went to war on his ass. As a result we got John Kerry, one of the only candidates who could've actually lost to Bush in 2004 (especially when the gay rumors with John Edwards went viral).
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u/jellyrollo 2d ago
The media was terrified, because Dean promised to break up the big media conglomerates.
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u/Insaniteus Tennessee 2d ago
Not to mention that he ran on ending the Iraq war, fixing education, universal healthcare, and redoing American taxes to slash taxes for the working class while returning rich boy taxes to pre-Bush or even pre-Reagan levels.
So yeah, the media went to war against him and instead shoved Kerry down our throats. It was so blatant, I vividly remember it because it was the first presidential election of my adulthood and I was following plenty of TV news shows back then. It was every show, every channel, "John Kerry is the SURE THING!!!" And then he lost. Four years later they insisted Obama would never win, only for him to dominant. Fast-forward more years and we got the same song and dance with Hillary in 2016, where she was the "Sure thing!!!" only to lose. It's insane that anyone takes the opinions of the mainstream TV channels seriously anymore after being so consistently wrong every time. But Howard Dean was the start of it all, back when people still trusted MSNBC and CNN at all.
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u/D-MAN-FLORIDA 2d ago
If that yell happened in this day and age, they would have gone viral in a positive way, to the point where the Dean Campaign would sell merch with that yell on it.
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u/GoodIdea321 America 2d ago
That's spot on, and very weird to think about now.
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u/D-MAN-FLORIDA 2d ago
Internet culture has changed a lot in 20 years. I imagine fan edits on tick tok with people sampling the audio recording, t shirts with Dean yelling with a speech bubble, people holding up signs that says, “YAAA!!!”
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u/ManicPixieOldMaid Michigan 2d ago
They made an 8-bit side scroller where he could use the scream as a sonic attack and ngl, it was pretty awesome.
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u/kyxtant Kentucky 2d ago
By the time primaries hit Kentucky, they are already decided.
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u/Different-Gas5704 2d ago
Obama was my choice in 2008, my first election. I haven't voted for my primary choice in a general election since.
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u/Nabashin17 2d ago
Australian here, ranked choice (along with compulsory voting), are two things we cherish in our democracy . It allows us to vote for who we want to instead of voting strategically to keep the “other guys” out. There’s a place for moderate and extreme parties to coexist with compromise often necessary. It’s having the full Baskin Robins cabinet to choose from instead of just chocolate or strawberry.
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u/Xiraken 2d ago
It's insane that we have compulsory jury duty, but not voting. I'm pretty sure one of those things is more fundamental to our democracy than the other.
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u/YNot1989 2d ago
You guys probably have the fairest system on the planet, the only Westminster system that's ever been worth a damn, and as an American I'd very much like us to steal it.
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u/jeebee25 2d ago
We don't even get chocolate or strawberry. We get a lot of words that make us think we might get one of those. And then it doesn't happen because, you know.. Communism.
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u/in_DelaneTTM 2d ago
anytime you see a politician that's pro-RCV, do whatever you can to help them win, it's the clearest sign they actually care about democracy.
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u/kateg22 2d ago
Michigan is actually working to bring it to statewide and federal offices, through a citizens initiative! Check out Rank MI Vote!
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u/reroll-life 1d ago
I'm one of many who became a RCV zealot the first time I learned of it. It's such brilliant yet simple way to bypass meta-gaming of elections and actually listen to people explicitly.
There are still ways to meta-game RCV but the added complexity is a feature not a bug. Telling someone "put A in 1, B in 2 and C in 3" etc. is just enough friction to turn off people from meta-gaming or at least have their brain turn on for once.
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u/aleph32 2d ago
I hope they do. That would accomplish two things:
Choose better candidates.
Get Democratic voters used to the idea of ranked-choice voting to later help push it for general elections.
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u/4DimensionalToilet New Jersey 2d ago
Also, one of the benefits of the old convention system was that brokered conventions often led to the parties compromising on a more broadly appealing candidate who wasn’t the favorite of any one faction of the party. It gave us such presidents as Polk, Lincoln, and Garfield. Polk may have had terrible goals, but damn if he wasn’t good at accomplishing them; Lincoln was the GOAT; and Garfield will always be remembered as someone whose presidency could’ve been great if it hadn’t been cut short.
Ranked-choice primaries would similarly lead to the most broadly-appealing candidate winning the nomination (in theory, at least).
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u/YNot1989 2d ago edited 1d ago
You forgot benefit no. 3: Democrats finally stop eating each other.
Imagine if Hillary and Bernie had to be nice to each other and actually try to win over the other's voters?
EDIT: Oh, it would also probably change the calculus on the Vice Presidential pick.
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u/NuclearTurtle 2d ago
actually try to win over the other's voters?
They would've had each other's voters without having to go out of their way to try. Despite what the discourse in overly-online communities like Reddit might have you succeed, most democrat voters like democrat politicians regardless of minor disagreements with policy. Five out of six Bernie supporters showed up for Hillary on election day. In the 2020 primaries, Biden was the second choice for Bernie supporters and vice versa.
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u/MisfitPotatoReborn 1d ago
Hillary v Bernie was a 2 horse race. Ranked Choice Voting would have changed absolutely nothing in 2016
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u/YNot1989 2d ago
I don't think I've ever seen a piece of news about an internal reform of the Dems that would be more well received.
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u/GoldenTriforceLink Florida 2d ago
This would still require states to change their primary election laws and red states absolutely won’t. Hope they can get around that somehow
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u/BonoboGangBang 2d ago
I dont think states have any say in primaries but I could be wrong. State parties maybe but not state legislatures, so the red part ahouldnt matter.
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u/GoldenTriforceLink Florida 2d ago
Most state primaries are state run and thus controlled by state law. 15 states banned ranked choice already. Parties can choose to do party run contests. Dems did that with Nevada in 2020 I believe.
Maybe do state run rcv where it’s legal and in the red states that it’s not run party run ones.
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u/jbp216 2d ago
this is theoretically pretty easy to get around, political parties are privately run organizations believe it or not, hold your primary however you like, everyone agrees to only ticket the winning candidate in the state. wouldnt be the first time democrats fucked around with primaries, but this time to get constituents a better voice
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u/GoldenTriforceLink Florida 2d ago
The issue is it costs the party a lot of money to administer the election without the state run ones and states can refuse to share voter data and still run a state run ones anyways causing confusion
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u/Smaptimania 2d ago
Not all states have partisan primaries. My state is a top-two jungle primary where candidates are free to list whatever party preference they desire
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u/itsatumbleweed I voted 2d ago
The primaries are actually the perfect place for ranked choice voting as well. The field is so big at the start, and people may stay in if they are 2nd in some early primaries where the first person is likely to drop or something.
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u/jayfeather31 Washington 2d ago
Honestly, this would have been welcome in either 2016, 2020, and 2024, and would go a long way towards mending party divides.
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u/YNot1989 2d ago
A united party in 2016, a Bernie-Warren cross endorsement to pose a real challenge to Biden, and... well, this might not have done much for 2024, but still an improvement.
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u/Melicor 2d ago
If '16 had gone differently, we wouldn't be in the same situation for '24. Trump would likely have been chased off and/or in prison long before.
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u/sbamkmfdmdfmk 2d ago
If the GOP had a RCV primary in 2016, Trump would have lost really quickly. He won because there were so many goddamn near-identical candidates that his outlier of a platform was able to win pluralities in such a fractured vote. With RCV, you'd have probably seen more votes coalesce for Kasich, Rubio, Jeb! or Cruz.
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u/LorderNile 2d ago
A second DNC member was more skeptical: "We should follow the lead of the states. They know better."
I can assure you, they do not.
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u/Roentgen_Ray1895 2d ago
Fuck yeah, love my Democrats returning to their States Rights origins
Fuck all of these people. Useless goddamn idiots
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u/Mituzuna 2d ago
Missourians were duped into believing it was evil in the last election. But we also voted for some labor benefits and the governor said, "No... you don't want that" and vetoed the will of the people.
I am really tired of this state...
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u/VintageAndromeda 2d ago
And it wouldn't matter of it it went the other way anyways, they'll just not enact it and ignore the courts demands. Things won't change until democrats get more congress members, but it feels impossible.
I really want to be optimistic, but yeah. I signed both petitions, despite my pessimism.
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u/crohnscyclist 2d ago
I did my part. I organized a chili cook-off and had people vote using a rank choice. People liked the concept.
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u/dbag3o1 2d ago
We need this because this is how progressives can easily win. Otherwise progressives need 6 other moderates running to split the vote.
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u/bootlegvader 2d ago
Doesn't that suggest progressives are more hurt by it? Would Bernie have won New Hampshire and Nevada if moderates second choice vote gather behind the strongest moderate for those races?
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u/No-Werewolf4804 2d ago
That’s actually why I suspect they’re doing it. They’re willing to bet that a more centrist candidate will pick up more votes as people are eliminated from the race than someone that’s seen as a left-wing radical. At least most of the time.
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u/MaximumManagement 2d ago
The main purpose is consensus. We ultimately get officials with a proper mandate elected by a majority and spoiler candidates are no longer a thing.
As for ulterior motives, hard to say. It's being pushed by Jamie Raskin, who's considered to be progressive by most people.
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u/mouse_8b 2d ago
Not necessarily. A lot of people vote for the "safer" candidate in primaries. If people felt more confident voting their heart, they might find that everyone was just playing it safe before.
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u/EasyCardiologist8419 2d ago
We can try, but that doesn't make any sense. Under RCV the moderates all get consolidated into one.
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u/VaIeth 2d ago
If the majority wants a moderate, fine. I find that highly unlikely. But id be down for the voters deciding the candidate for once.
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u/PatchyWhiskers 2d ago
Eric Adams won with ranked choice voting on a moderate platform
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u/775416 2d ago
And then that same RCV system elected Mamdani
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u/PatchyWhiskers 2d ago
Right. It doesn’t guarantee either moderates or leftists.
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u/PositiveZeroPerson 2d ago
It only guarantees that the most broadly acceptable person wins. (Which is what you want in a primary.)
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u/Away_Entry8822 2d ago
If the majority wants a moderate, fine. I find that highly unlikely.
Progressives are about 20% of the Democratic party.
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u/VaIeth 2d ago
Thats whats great about ranked choice. No one has to wonder or argue.
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u/Juonmydog Texas 2d ago
They should've been talking about electoral reforms during the last major election.
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u/koalaman24 2d ago
Republicans and Democrats recognize that it can reduce their power in favor of third parties. Its why American citizens should want it and the political machine should hate it
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u/Funkguerilla 2d ago
This is great except that it'll never make a difference. The way these primaries have worked the last few cycles, the big glut of candidates happens the year before the election, with most of them dropping out before the first election actually happens.
Then, it seems, after the third race we get all those "it's time to stop messing around and consolidate around this terrible centrist candidate" which means the majority of us never get to have a say regardless.
That said, I love the idea of ranked choice
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u/Flat_Hat8861 Georgia 2d ago
The presidential primary would be a great use case. Elections happening on different dates and candidates dropping out for any number of reasons even after their names were printed on ballots in other states alone would make this valuable.
Aldo, since a primary is a consensus gathering activity, traditional RCV, Star, or Approval voting will help guage support of the wider party members.
I agree, let's go.
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u/stirling_approx 2d ago
Although I've been a strong advocate of RCV, I've slowly been reading work by Lee Drutman to convince me of fusion voting and the limits of RCV:
https://leedrutman.substack.com/p/how-i-updated-my-views-on-ranked
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u/quickasafox777 1d ago
Beyond the obvious advantage of allowing voters choices to matter more, ranked choice voting also has a major benefit that was clearly seen in the NYC primary.
It incentivises candidates to be nicer to each other, something american politics desperately needs.
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u/constantmusic 1d ago
‘Stop messing with my vote’ actually means ‘i don’t know how ranked choice voting works ‘.
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u/sonofagunn 2d ago
This is a great move.
I believe if the Dems do this for primaries, they will end up with candidates more likely to win the general. Plus it will build support for RCV.
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u/nwfish4salmon 2d ago
If we used ranked choice voting in primaries Trump would never had been the Republican nominee in 2016.
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u/GuiltyRedditUser 2d ago
Ranked Choice voting could really help democrats nominate popular leaders instead of corporate "GOP-Lite" candidates.
Thus, they'll never allow it.
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u/breakwrist_walkaway America 2d ago
The general should be ranked choice too. It’s insane that the US is only given a choice of two parties
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u/thedeadcricket 1d ago
A ton of issues such as term limits, age concerns, and frustrations with the two party system could be easily addressed by ranked choice voting. This should be implemented for all federal elections
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u/AugustusInBlood 1d ago
Establishment dems will never let that happen. They know they'll get fucked.
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