Voters in several states last week delivered a stinging rebuke to ranked choice voting, clouding the future of an idea that had seen strong momentum in recent years.
In this case, the ranked choice voting is supposed to serve as an instant primary.
I guess you could run a 16 candidate primary and narrow it down to the top 6 for a rank 6 general election, but you’d still have the same problem, you’d just be adding a 2nd election.
That’s too many positions to research for just one race. Five to six would probably be about the right amount of candidates for a single seat RCV.
I think [open] primaries still have a place to help weed out the field and narrow in on specific candidates.
Not every party has the money or resources to run a primary
These are all non-partisan races.
OK so then who should be running primaries?
In this case, the ranked choice voting is supposed to serve as an instant primary.
I guess you could run a 16 candidate primary and narrow it down to the top 6 for a rank 6 general election, but you’d still have the same problem, you’d just be adding a 2nd election.
Fortunately, the research wasn’t that hard because it’s super easy to eliminate the looney tunes candidates.
Ex. this guy:
Still, stunning how many first round votes he got…
p.s. “Michael Necula”? Mike Neck? Spot the vampire running for office!