Can Ranked Choice Voting Strengthen Democracy?

In 2022, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski was the only Republican Senator up for election who had voted to convict Donald Trump at his impeachment trial for inciting the Capitol insurrection. Trump and Alaska’s Republican Party endorsed her Republican opponent. Far-right primary challengers were defeating many GOP incumbents who refused to support bogus claims that election fraud altered 2020 election results.

Murkowski seemed likely to be purged from the Republican Party like other moderates, but Alaska’s election was following a new structure, enacted via ballot initiative in 2020, for statewide offices and U.S. Congressional seats.

First, party primaries were replaced by open, nonpartisan primaries in which all registered voters can participate, with the top four vote-getters advancing to the general election.

In the general election, ranked choice voting enabled citizens to rank the four candidates in order of their preference, rather than just selecting one candidate. When votes are tallied under ranked choice voting (previously called instant runoffs), a candidate who gains over 50 percent of the vote wins. If no one earns an initial majority, the candidate who won the fewest votes is eliminated and the second-choice votes of people who favored the eliminated candidate are apportioned. This process is repeated until one candidate surpasses 50 percent of the vote.

In the Senate race, no candidate won a majority of first-place votes initially, but Murkowski was popular with enough voters to give her an outright majority once second-choice votes were counted.

Murkowski, who has emphasized a willingness to work across party lines, won an overwhelming majority of second-place votes from people who ranked the Democratic candidate first.

It’s unknowable whether Alaska’s election yielded a different outcome than the plurality election system used in most U.S. elections would have, but it clearly impacted the nature of the race.

Ranked Choice Voting: Is Idaho Next?

Proponents of ranked choice voting argue the system encourages Murkowski’s approach and discourages the negative campaigning that often dominates U.S. elections. One such proponent is Rev. Dr. Elizabeth Stevens, who has served the UU Church of the Palouse in Moscow, Idaho, since 2012. Stevens, along with others in her congregation and UUs in other Idaho communities, have teamed up with Reclaim Idaho to champion Initiative 1 on the 2024 ballot.

If voters approve it, the initiative will take Idaho down the same path as Alaska, opening primaries that state legislators closed in 2011 and implementing ranked choice voting in general elections.

Out of Idaho’s one million registered voters, over 265,000 are unaffiliated and thus excluded from voting in closed Republican primary elections. So, while Stevens considers Initiative 1 a tool to thwart regressive legislation, it also is a means of advancing a core UU principle of the right to democratic participation.

Idaho’s closed primaries and non-competitive general elections have empowered zealots who push bills like anti-trans laws and book bans.

“In Idaho, most people are kind. Most of them are compassionate, but this extremist agenda is just cruel,” says Stevens. “We’ve lost our moderates.”

The success of progressive citizen initiatives supports Stevens’ belief. For example, after Idaho lawmakers refused to expand Medicaid coverage, a 2018 initiative to overrule the legislature won by a 22-point margin.

The Moscow UU church invited Reclaim Idaho’s director to talk to the congregation, and UUs from multiple congregations supported the signature-gathering phase of the ranked choice voting initiative.

Stevens says UUs were inspired by UU the Vote donating to support the campaign and meeting with a key campaign leader.

“It meant a lot to our congregation that the [Unitarian Universalist Association] cared enough about our state to chip in,” says Stevens.

Initiative 1 was finally confirmed for the ballot in September after surviving a legal challenge from Idaho GOP officials who baselessly claimed that signature gatherers had deceived petition signers. The state GOP previously tried to stifle citizen lawmaking (a disturbingly common tactic) via enacting onerous signature gathering requirements before the state supreme court struck down that law.

Ranked Choice Voting: Pros and Cons

Another benefit promoted by ranked choice voting advocates is eliminating the potential of “throwing away your vote” because you can vote for your preferred candidate—even if they seem unlikely to win—without the risk of helping elect a candidate you strongly disfavor.

In plurality voting systems (the one most common in the United States), the candidate who received the most votes wins, even if a large majority of voters chose other candidates. This system is sometimes referred to as winner-take-all.

Under the typical plurality voting system, a candidate who motivates a committed base of supporters can win even if most voters strongly oppose that candidate. As in Idaho, a person winning an election with a minority of voters’ support is incentivized to continue catering to their base rather than seeking to serve a broader spectrum of the electorate.

Under ranked choice voting, the competition to be seen favorably by most voters should encourage more civility and more positive, substantive campaigns. But since Maine is the only state having used ranked choice voting for more than one election cycle, there is limited evidence to assess that argument for statewide and federal races.

Ranked choice voting also helps minimize the voter fatigue and expense involved in run-off elections that often resolve races where a majority of votes is required, but no candidate reaches the threshold. It may also build more faith in elections because all winners have gained majority support, either through initial counts or secondary choices.

In Alaska’s first race for its sole U.S. House seat using ranked choice voting, Democrat Mary Peltola became the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress, flipping the seat. The Alaska Federation of Natives endorsed open primaries and ranked choice voting. This year, a group opposed to open primaries and ranked choice voting qualified a ballot initiative that proposes reverting to the old structures.

Along with the Alaska and Idaho ballot questions and an initiative in Washington, D.C., Nevada, Colorado, and Oregon voters will decide whether to use ranked choice voting for statewide and federal elections.

Opponents of ranked choice voting typically argue that ranking choices confuses some voters and adds costs to implement. Indeed, some voter education is needed to ensure people understand their choices. Some ranked choice voting opponents say it undermines the two-party system by reducing one barrier (among many) to “third party” and independent candidates. While that point is accurate, many people disillusioned with the U.S. political duopoly may view that impact as a feature, not a drawback.

Initiative 1 advocates believe ranked choice voting can encourage democratic engagement while strengthening the perceived legitimacy of elected officials and institutions. As Stevens told me, “Disenfranchisement is part of the reason extremists keep winning and [ranked choice voting] empowers voters . . . the point is to hold our elected officials accountable to constituents.”

On deck for Idahoans in 2026: a ballot initiative to revoke the state’s draconian abortion ban.

For more about UU pro-democracy work and opportunities to engage, see UUtheVote.org.