Background:
On June 24, 2025, New York State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani overcame frontrunner former Governor Andrew Cuomo to win the Democratic nomination for mayor of New York City. While Mamdani secured a clear plurality from the outset, New York City’s application of ranked choice voting (RCV), also known as an instant-runoff system, saw vote tabulations continue onto second-choice candidates until his vote total has surpassed 50%. In the US today, RCV has been implemented scarcely across an isolated and unlikely variety of terrains, such as Maine, Alaska, Minneapolis and the NYC Democratic primary. While rarely an issue passionately discussed in national discourse, the system remains hotly contested and often misunderstood. This column debates a hypothetical implementation of the system nationwide.
In favor:
In American politics, the two-party system of Democrats and Republicans is ubiquitous. Third-party voting in the U.S. is generally seen as, at best, a joke, and at worst, an act of political subversion against a potentially-winning candidate. This is, more than anything else, a result of the spoiler effect. In practice, the spoiler effect is seen when voters opt to vote for a third-party candidate rather than their preferred major-party candidate, thereby drawing potential votes away from that major candidate. With large-scale third-party campaigns, this can be the swing that determines the results of an election.
Arguably the most infamous instance of the spoiler effect was the highly contentious 2000 presidential election. Contested between Republican candidate George W. Bush and Democratic candidate Al Gore, the electoral votes of Florida determined the result of the entire election. While the state’s vote counts were heavily scrutinized due to electoral irregularities, a recount ultimately determined that Bush won the state by 537 votes. However, it is exceedingly likely that Green candidate Ralph Nader acted as a spoiler in favor of Bush, winning over 97,000 votes on a platform to the left of Gore’s. If Nader were absent from the ballot, enough voters almost certainly would have swung towards Gore to deliver him to victory. The same would also be true if ranked choice voting was in place during this election, allowing Nader voters to rank a second choice candidate.
Herein lies the utility of RCV: it allows voters to choose a “backup” candidate, so that they can vote their conscience and choose a candidate who best represents their views, but also support their preferred candidate among those with the best chances of winning. With RCV in place, there is no risk of vote spoiling attached to supporting a third-party candidate or a primary longshot. Too often, voters must speak of choosing to only vote for who they describe as the “lesser evil” in elections. This phenomenon is unhealthy for the democratic process, as it makes voters less enthusiastic about political participation and has the potential to drive down voter turnout. RCV would alleviate this issue, giving voters the chance to find the best candidates to represent them while leaving the “lesser evil” as only a last resort. Additionally, RCV would encourage voters to research all potential candidates. Rather than being drawn into supporting one of the few frontrunners based on curated information from social and legacy media, voters would instead be motivated to look into the individual platforms and experience of each candidate who could potentially earn their vote.
Another upshot of RCV could be seen even if a major-party candidate were to win an election. Since winning an election using RCV requires a candidate to win at least the partial support of the greatest number of voters, candidates would be incentivized to espouse positions that are broadly popular among many Americans across party lines. Under the current majoritarian voting system, elections are won by those who win a plurality of votes by inflaming their base to turn out and vote, often just out of opposition to another candidate. In this sense, political candidates are almost better off under the current system riling up their bases by stoking fear and resentment of the other side. In an RCV system, it is more politically moderate candidates who succeed instead. This can be seen in two of the few winners of RCV elections: Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME), who was the fifteenth-most bipartisan Democrat in the House last congressional session; and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), who was the third-most bipartisan Republican in the Senate.
Finally, I must note that my position may well be contrary to my personal biases. My politics tend to line up with one of the two major American political parties, and I choose to affiliate with the party that I view as a bigger tent, representing a more broad collection of ideologies espoused by the American people. It is entirely possible, if not incredibly likely, that the large-scale introduction of RCV would empower third parties at the expense of my own. However, I also recognize that third parties are a fundamentally good force in American politics. They bring attention to often overlooked issues that large swathes of voters care about, and create political pressure on incumbents to pay attention to these voters. Perhaps the best example of this was the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. After the substantial turnouts for Ross Perot’s independent and Reform presidential campaigns in 1992 and 1996, which were driven by voters concerned about deficit spending, the Clinton administration and congressional Republicans finally reckoned with the national debt, running the first budget surplus in decades.
Moreover, in the new age of politics, divided and dominated by cults of personality, we cannot count on the two major parties to be the big tents that they once were. One major party is already effectively dictated by the whims of a single person. If the other were to fall into a monolith, it would be up to third parties to represent Americans of different ideologies that fell through the cracks. Whether we agree with them or not, it is in our national interest for third parties to be competitive and influential in this country. But as long as our current electoral system remains dominant, third parties will forever be plagued by the spoiler effect, while our country becomes even more divided along partisan lines.
Against:
In the year 2000, a quarter century ago, Americans watched one of the closest, most complicated elections in US history unfold. In the end, significant questions over who meant to vote for whom, and which ballots belonged to which candidates were set aside by the US Supreme Court in an unprecedented move. Deciding 5-4 to prematurely halt the count in Florida, Governor George W. Bush (R-TX) was declared the winner over Democratic Vice President Al Gore, winning Florida, and with it, the White House, by a mere 537 votes.
In 2000, RCV was on no one’s mind, and no historian or political scientist would use the words ranked choice or instant runoff if asked to say a few about that flashpoint in electoral history. But the connection is strong and pressing. In Palm Beach County, for the first time in a presidential election, voters were handed ballots so confusingly organized, thousands “spoiled” them (accidentally voting for two candidates). Thousands of Democratic voters who likely meant to vote for Gore, meanwhile, instead cast ballots for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan, who himself acknowledged that those votes had been a mistake. Without the confusion arising from such a strange ballot, according to a 2001 study by the American Political Science Review, Florida, and the presidency, would have gone to Gore.
Democracy is messy, and voting is always a complicated endeavor. But the role of the electoral process should be to make this crucial execution of civic duty as smooth and secure as possible, rather than obliging wonky reorganizations of formatting or policy likely to make it more difficult. It should come as no surprise that the more complicated voting is, the less people are likely to do it. This is the practical impact of RCV. To intense ideologues, policy experts and campaign workers, voting in an RCV election is second-nature: if you don’t know how it works, everyone around you will drill it into your head. But even to the intelligent average voter, the process is anything but intuitive. For voters of uneducated or marginalized backgrounds, studies have shown that the process can be even more confusing, and as such, its guiding principles are hard to justify.
The essence of democracy is risk and compromise. For 250 years, American political history has been defined by a neverending, always evolving conflict between those in search of greater freedom, and those who would keep it from them. Very often, it’s not that black and white, of course, and either side can view the other through a reverse lens. But this challenge, this inherent struggle to optimize the constitutional system for all its people, demands as much pragmatism as it does vision.
Casting a ballot is a sacred patriotic act, honoring all those who have sacrificed to free this country unto its better angels from Nathan Hale to John Lewis. It is an act that demands thought, courage and conviction. These factors should govern how the voter arrives at their decision, and for whom they fill in the bubble. It should be required as little as possible in understanding how the ballot will be tabulated. Instead, that thought routinely goes into who the best candidate would be; who best represents the voter’s values. For an exceptional majority of voters, that means major compromises: understanding that democracy is inherently imperfect, because democracy means of the people, by the people, and for the people. Even in RCV, pragmatic voters are willing to set aside differences and endorse the candidate both aligned with their vision, and likely to win. Unfortunately, the rest of the process is then left to be decided by those more interested in playing games.
When voters complete their presidential ballots, they know that third party candidates are fundamentally unserious. RCV does not change this in the slightest. No reasonable understanding would assume that fringe candidates would be more likely to win. Instead, it devalues the votes of those who have set aside their differences and sacrificed policies important to them to embrace a big-tent candidate. While their votes are locked in, those who cast virtue-signalling votes for pretend candidates get to come back into play, with their second or third ranked choice now deciding the election. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that nearly every state in which a possible implementation of RCV was on the ballot in 2024 (Arizona, Colorado, Idaho and Nevada) voted against it, and even Alaska, where the system has been in place since 2020, voted to keep it by only 743 votes. Only Washington, D.C. voted to authorize a new RCV system. Across the country, people have spoken. Enthusiastic policy students zealous for RCV must understand that the popular will is not behind them.
Ironically, both progressives and moderates claim RCV acts as a secret tool that will bolster their candidates when given a fair shot. Recent history makes that claim oddly puzzling. While moderates Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME) have both prevailed in RCV contests, now-Mayor-elect Mamdani only increased his margin of victory after RCV tabulations were complete, in a city where moderates tend to fare well (such as with the previous campaigns of Michael Bloomberg and Eric Adams). In short, the only thing RCV actually serves to accomplish is further empowering those disinclined to take significant, unfortunately often binary choices, seriously, while making the process only more convoluted and difficult to understand for everyone else.
Qualifier:
On the Other Hand is a recurring column in The Hoot, which seeks to promote critical approaches to the issues of our time and respectful dialogue. The arguments made here should not be taken as the views of The Hoot and its staff, or even as those of the writers, unless explicitly stated. In this edition, Jack wrote in favor of Ranked Choice Voting (RCV), while Stephen wrote against. They decline to state their personal views.
