Ranked Choice Voting and Open Primaries are on the ballot in fives states and Washington, D.C. this fall. In Idaho, Proposition 1 gives all voters the opportunity to vote in the single primary election, and to rank their choices in the general election, giving them more opportunity to have their vote count.
In the proposed open primary, all registered would voters cast one vote in each partisan race. Currently, over 270,000 unaffiliated registered voters in Idaho are left out of this process. The top four candidates from the primary appear on the November general election ballot. If a candidate receives more than 50-percent of the vote, they win. Currently that is not the case in Idaho.
Many states have a runoff election to avoid a situation where a candidate represents a minority of voters. Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) is an instant runoff that saves time and money. It has been used across the U.S. for over a century. In 2022, it was used in 62 jurisdictions, using a variety of ballot-counting systems, including hand counting. In RCV races across the country, higher turnouts have been reported, especially among younger voters.
In RCV, if no candidate receives over 50-percent of the vote, the last-place candidate is eliminated, and voters who selected this candidate will now have their votes transferred to their second choice. If needed, the process is repeated until the winning candidate has a majority. This is still a one-person, one-vote system, and federal courts have ruled that it is constitutional, unlike our previous open primary system.
Kathleen Painter
Bonners Ferry