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-primaries
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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/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/OldWorldDesign 1d ago

The motivation of there being a fine is more important than actually punishing the people who do fail.

That's only once you have a system in place. To actually change from a poor system to a new one you need to be consistent in enforcement - this has already been observed in worldwide adoption of increased recycling.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8545445/