A Grassroots Analysis of Runoff Voting Systems

By Andrew Hayes

I am a strong proponent of majority vote to win systems, and 100% against plurality voting.

First a couple of definitions:

Plurality Voting: In a race with 3 or more candidates the candidate who gets the most votes wins, even if he doesn’t have a majority of the vote. Example : George 35 Thomas 33 John 31.   In plurality voting, George would be declared the winner.

Majority Voting: A candidate must receive 50%+1 of the votes in order to win. So the above example would require some sort of runoff system between George and Thomas.

At one time Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) and Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) were synonymous, But what Alaska did is a completely different thing than anything I ever imagined IRV turning into. Therefore I refer to the Alaska system as RCV and the simple Instant runoff voting as the same, or IRV . But let’s begin first with some history. 

In 2002 the Democratic nominee for governor got 43.3% of the vote and Became governor, beating out Steve Largent, the Republican Nominee, who got 42.6 percent of the vote. For those doing the math, that’s a difference of 0.7% and 14.1% is missing. Well it isn’t missing. That 14.1% went to another conservative candidate, Gary Richardson, who ran as an independent. I am not okay with this. I do not believe a governor, or anyone else should be able to take office with less than 50% of the vote! If you disagree, please contact me and let me know how getting less than 50% of the vote should qualify someone as a winner.

This is all by design. The uniparty does not want you to be able to vote 3rd party. If you do, you’ll get stuck with the Democrat! I do believe that the Republican party is the best vehicle for advancing liberty. But the only accountability we can have on our elected republicans in office, besides primarying them, is to be able to vote 3rd party. Which isn’t an option at this point, because of the scenario that played out in 2002!

The simple solution to a simple problem is to have a runoff election. This is about as straight forward as it gets. But Oklahoma only has runoff elections in its primaries, not in any general elections! This has been proposed and rejected on the grounds that having an actual runoff election is too expensive. So Another solution is Instant Runoff voting. 

The chief difference between RCV and IRV is that the Alaska RCV is a complete remodel of our election system. I looked at the 2022 Senate Race in Alaska, they had 1 primary, with a total of 19 candidates on the ballot,  every candidate from every party all on the same ballot, Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians and Independents,  and voters ranked their choices, with the top 4 advancing to the general. Instead of fixing the problem that we started with,  they made sure that the two party system would be more ensconced than ever! In that senate race, 3 republicans and 1 democrat advanced. Alaska also lengthened the time allowed to vote allowing early in person voting to begin 2 weeks prior to election day! But I suppose that is a whole ‘nother issue.  The way Alaska set it up, it doesn’t allow a 3rd option to be presented to hold republican and democrats accountable, rather, it ensures that it will only ever be Republicans and Democrats in the general election! (though one could hope that of the three republicans one would be anti establishment patriot!)

IRV isn’t remaking the wheel. We keep our primaries, our primaries are closed. And everything stays as it is. IRV is a solution to a problem that occurs very rarely. I looked over the Oklahoma state races for the last 3 cycles and only found 2 cases of the vote being split and state legislators being elected with less than 50% of the vote, both in 2018 State house District 25 with the Republican Ronnie Johns winning with 49.3 percent. And the other case also being in 2018 with Democrat Kelly Albright winning with an even 49% of the vote, she lost her seat in 2020 with 48.77 percent of the vote in a heads up race. It’s pretty clear that Mrs. Albright shouldn’t have won in 2018, and had there been a run off. Or IRV she would not have won!

So RCV (the Alaska system is, a complete overhaul, dismantling and combining the party primaries into a mess, only to have the front runners of the two major parties emerge in the first place. And IRV is contingency runoff voting that wouldn’t be used very often anyway. As I have it figured, there would probably only ever be 4 or at worst, 5 candidates. Republican, Libertarian, Democrat, and an Independent or 2. So I don’t see how that is complicated. And I have heard that In Alaska, you must rank each candidate, but this shouldnt be required. If neither the libertarian or republican candidates win, then I’m on the losing side and that’s that.

If you reject the idea of being represented by someone who wasn’t even able to get the majority of votes, and if the idea of IRV is rejected because bubbling in a backup is too complicated, and runoffs are just too expensive. Then what other alternative is there?

To again emphasize my position, I am merely against plurality voting. I am for having runoffs where no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote. To the objection that this is too expensive, I submit IRV which I think is better than a candidate taking office with less than 50% of the vote, For the record, no more often than it would be necessary to do, I do not accept that having runoff elections are too costly, after all we already do them for our primaries, why can’t they be done for our general elections?

If Tom Cole does win the primary, then think about this scenario when you’re in the voting booth in November. Do you vote for the RINO Tom Cole? OR, do you vote for the Independent and risk handing the election to the Democrat? That’s why having some sort of a runoff is important!

DEO VINDICE
Andrew Hayes 580-458-7860
Lawton, OK