6 states have adopted RCV for their 2020 Democratic primaries

[PDittie]

Six states plan to use ranked choice voting (RCV) for their 2020 Democratic primaries or caucuses, including for all early voters in Iowa and Nevada, and all voters in Alaska, Hawaii, Kansas and Wyoming. These states will adapt RCV to Democratic Party rules -- last-place candidates will be eliminated and backers of those candidates will have their vote count toward their next choice until all remaining candidates are above the 15 percent vote threshold to win delegates.

State parties made this change because they realize allowing voters to rank their choices -- especially in a crowded field that includes many experienced and well-funded candidates -- makes everyone’s vote more powerful. RCV has the additional advantage of putting an end to vote splitting, the problem of “spoilers” and even the possibility of a nominee who lacks majority support inside the party.

http://inthesetimes.com/article/21959/ranked-choice-voting-2020-democratic-primary-maine-kansas/

[Princetonian]

1. Good idea.

I hope more states do this

[thesquanderer]

2. This is the best political news I've heard in a long time! (n/t)

[bluewater]

3. Very interesting

Definitely sounds like a fairer way to dispense delegates from candidates who did not make the 15% threshold.

And it allows people to cast a ballot for their preferred candidate without having to worry about wasting their vote.

It will be interesting to watch the results from those states adopting RCV.

[Uncle Joe]

4. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread PDittie.

[mitch96]

5. I really like this idea.. it makes way too much sense... nt

[oasis]

6. Iowa, Nevada, Hawaii, Kansas, Alaska and Wyoming.

Hope everything works out well.

[not_the_one]

7. this makes so much sense, except for one thing....

It requires computers to make all those calculations.

What could possibly go wrong?

Still, let's try it and see what happens.

[dsc]

8. not necessarily

If we were willing to wait for the results it could be done by hand. In Iowa, in point of fact, it mostly will be done by hand.

[dsc]

9. A couple of things

First, this won't necessarily lead to someone having majority support since they will be stopping when all remaining candidates have at least 15%. Thus we could see leader 40%, 2nd place 28%, 3rd place 17%, 4th place 15% when all is said and done. Second having majority support isn't necessarily what we should be after in a primary. What we want is a candidate everyone can vote for even if he or she isn't the favorite of a majority. For that we should consider the Borda method. For that method if a race has 5 candidates all the voters rank the candidates from 1st to 5th. A candidate gets 5 points for 1st, 4 for 2nd, 3 for 3rd, 2 for 4th, and 1 for 5th. The candidate with the most points wins. This rewards consistently ranking high across the population and punishes divisiveness which is exactly the dynamic we want for a primary.