While this specific example is a bit of an outlier, it’s another demonstration of why ranked choice voting can avoid a possible travesty of an election.
Correia, a 27-year-old Democrat who was arrested last fall on federal fraud charges, survived a recall election Tuesday in somewhat unconventional fashion.
Fall River voters were given a two-part ballot in which they were asked if Correia should be removed from office and then to choose from five candidates to replace him. Due to the city’s rules, Correia was allowed to run for re-election on the second part of the ballot. And even though more than 60 percent of voters voted to recall the mayor, he won re-election with a 35-percent plurality in the five-way race.
That is to say, 60% voted him out of office, and 65% wanted someone else — but he remains in office.
Ranked Choice voting is one of a variety of voting schemes that have become increasingly popular recently as a way to eliminate these kind of small plurality wins, spoiler candidates splitting a voting pool, the significant costs (and binary starkness) of run-off elections, etc. Voters don’t just pick a candidate but their 1st choice, 2nd choice, 3rd choice — however many of the candidates are acceptable to them, and in what order.
If no candidate gets a majority, then the lowest vote-getter is eliminated has their votes given to the 2nd choice their voters had indicated. This continues until someone has a majority; someone always get a majority of the vote.
This sort of thing is particularly useful in primary voting scenarios, or where there are multiple popular candidates. It also empowers people to vote for the long-shot candidate of their choice without fear that doing so will tilt the field to someone whom they really don’t want to see in office.
It seems like a good idea to me.
Do you want to know more? Fall River recall election result elicits calls for ranked choice voting | Boston.com