Alaskans will vote on a ranked-choice voting system this November

[One Term Floridian]

Should be an easy pass in AK. I have yet to see someone who isn't a total partisan hack seriously object to RCV

[7,052,770]

Why can't they just use IRV for the first round to get a winner right away?

IRV with many candidates is extremely messy and still causes spoiler effects, better to winnow the field first (though better yet would be to use a method that passes independence of irrelevant alternatives and thus doesn't require winnowing).

I kinda like how you can't just be basically everyone's second choice and slip up to the top. You have to at least be in the top 4 in first preferences to even get going.

Having said that, they could still just do that in 1 round and have first step be to eliminate everyone who isn't in the top 4 of first preferences.

[Figueira]

Should be an easy pass in AK. I have yet to see someone who isn't a total partisan hack seriously object to RCV

I have some issues with RCV, but I'm still voting for it in MA because it's better than FPTP.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

As absentee ballots trickle in, the "No" lead is being reduced (currently at 53 No-47 Yes with only  75% of the vote in). I expect this to pass.

[StateBoiler]

Should be an easy pass in AK. I have yet to see someone who isn't a total partisan hack seriously object to RCV

Richard Winger of Ballot Access News:

http://ballot-access.org/2020/10/27/alaska-newspaper-story-on-spending-for-top-four-initiative/

Alaska voters will see Measure Two on their November 2020 ballot. It is a measure that would make it more difficult for parties to obtain or keep qualified status. It ends the ability of parties to have nominees for any office other than president. Therefore, there would no longer be any method for parties to obtain or keep qualified status based on their votes. Instead, the only way would be to have registration equal to 3% of the last vote cast.

This newspaper story says the initiative has received 99.5% of its funding from outside Alaska. The main contributors are John and Laura Arnold, and Kathryn Murdoch. The campaign for the initiative is outspending the opposition by fifteen to one.

3% registration test is only met by the Republicans, Democrats, and Alaska Independence Party.

Comment to the story from "Manaanwasgreat":

I actually had a back and forth with the official campaign on Reddit, and whoever running the account either had no idea what was actually in the initiative it would seem. They kept claiming that you shouldn’t worry if any parties can’t make it into the top 4 because they can still just petition their way onto the ballot. Turns out, from reading both the local newspaper coverage and the actual initiative, that isn’t true. When I responded with sources that it seemingly will remove the ability to petition to get onto the ballot they never responded. Huh.

Some thoughts :

I think the anti campaign campaign “Defend Alaska elections” has been a pretty bad campaign. They’ve spent around 95% of the time attacking ranked choice voting and very little time talking about the Top 4 “primary”. Pretty stupid if you ask me, with RCV on the ascendancy in America. If they had otherwise focused on the jungle primary and how it will take away your choices and basically locked in the two party system in Alaska, it probably would have been a much more effective opposition. No idea if it will pass, but if it does, it’s because of how stupid the anti campaign conducted itself.

Overall though this initiative is a mixed bag. On one hand, it’s obviously an attempt to mess around with the state Republican primary there. In fact the website for the campaign directly mentions the Republican primary, and them only. I believe they’re the only one who doesn’t participate in Alaska’s blanket primary process. The RCV stuff was likely tacked on to bring out RCV activists like FairVote who don’t really seem to care about how bad a proposal is, as long as there’s some ranked choice in it somewhere. I wish FairVote would develop some standards beyond “it has ranked choice voting so therefore good”. I imagine the likely result of this will be on big ticket races, you’ll just end up often getting 2 Democrats and 2 Republicans, and the general election will basically function as a ranked choice primary for each group of partisans with the greater block winning. I doubt they’ll be much crossover rankings like the proponents expect. On the other hand, at least it allows a write in without a “sore loser” clause which is better than Washington and California’s jungle primaries and every other failed jungle primary proposal. I suspect despite the Alaska Libertarian parties support for this initiative, they’ll be forced to run write in campaigns for the big races in the general if this passes. It also has RCV without a jungle primary for the presidential race, which is kinda a big deal. So it’s kinda a wash. If I was in Alaska, I’d probably end up voting no, especially after the campaign possibly lied to me but at least compared to the Top Two initiative in Florida, there’s at least some good stuff in it. And since it isn’t a constitutional amendment (you can’t do that with an initiative in Alaska), it will be easier for the legislature to amend or repeal it. Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll junk the Top 4 part and keep the RCV.

[Canis]

Yes it looks like its gonna pass! also I sent an email to FairVote and they want me to apply for an internship for them Im definitely gonna do it! get ready for Murkowski vs Palin vs a Democrat and an Independent or Libertarian in 2022 I wonder how this hybrid Jungle primary rcv system will work out it will make Alaskan elections more fun to watch then they already normally are haha.

[brucejoel99]

As absentee ballots trickle in, the "No" lead is being reduced (currently at 53 No-47 Yes with only  75% of the vote in). I expect this to pass.

Lisa Murkowski's probably jumping for joy right about now.

[Please delete this account. :)]

This should be interesting to watch, as well as the inevitable court challenges that will result.

[Canis]

This should be interesting to watch, as well as the inevitable court challenges that will result.

Theirs legal precedent to protect RCV now Maine Republicans tried to strike down RCV a bunch of times and got turned down by the courts and then took it to the ballot again in 2018 and voters voted for RCV again People generally like RCV when its implemented because it makes elections a lot less nasty as people arent just campaigning for your first pref but your second and third

[Left Wing]

This should be interesting to watch, as well as the inevitable court challenges that will result.

Theirs legal precedent to protect RCV now Maine Republicans tried to strike down RCV a bunch of times and got turned down by the courts and then took it to the ballot again in 2018 and voters voted for RCV again People generally like RCV when its implemented because it makes elections a lot less nasty as people arent just campaigning for your first pref but your second and third

Why did it have to fail in MA though ughhhhh

[Canis]

This should be interesting to watch, as well as the inevitable court challenges that will result.

Theirs legal precedent to protect RCV now Maine Republicans tried to strike down RCV a bunch of times and got turned down by the courts and then took it to the ballot again in 2018 and voters voted for RCV again People generally like RCV when its implemented because it makes elections a lot less nasty as people arent just campaigning for your first pref but your second and third

Why did it have to fail in MA though ughhhhh

Yeah that was a real bummer surprised me I figured it would pass in MA and fail in AK looks like it went the other way around.  It did pass in 5 cities though and St Louis will be the first are in the country to try Approval voting which imo is even more representative than RCV! in 6/7 elections (Assuming it passes in AK) where RCV is on the ballot it passed this year which is good!
https://www.fairvote.org/election_results_hq#election_results_hq_ballot_measures

[jimrtex]

Passage/failure is going to be really close (within 1%).

Alaska rarely has 4 candidates running for legislative seats. The exceptions are open Republican seats, where multiple candidates will run knowing that if they are successful, they will almost certainly win the general election. But in seats like that, there may not be even one Democrat candidate. The Democrats have even got an interpretation of the state constitution that they can nominate independents. There has been some back and forth as to how they appear on the ballot.

Alyse Galvin wanted to be listed as

(    )  Alyse Galvin   Non-Partisan

or at least:

(    ) Alyse Galvin   (N)     Democratic nominee

but courts ruled that

(    ) Alyse Galvin          Democratic nominee

accurately represented the basis for her appearance on the ballot. In 2018, the second style had been used, though Galvin was Undeclared or (U) at the time

Non-partisan and Undeclared are a majority in Alaska at 56.8%, with Republicans 24.6%, and Democrats 13.6%.

Alaska had used a blanket primary since territorial days, having borrowed it from Washington which had used it since the 1930s. In a blanket primary, a voter may choose which primary to vote in for each office, helping choose the Republican nominee for Governor, and the Democratic nominee for Senator, etc.

After California adopted the blanket primary in the late 1990s, the SCOTUS ruled it unconstitutional claiming it permitted Republicans to interfere in Democratic nominations etc. California and Washington switched to conventional partisan nominations (though in Washington affiliation was secret).

Before this was going to happen, parties in Alaska got a ruling from the Alaska Supreme Court that the Alaska Constitution affords greater protection to freedom of association than the 1st Amendment of the US Constitution does. A party may invite voters to participate in its nomination contests, while the State may not compel them to do so.

All parties but the Republicans permitted all voters to participate in their primaries. So a Republican voter could take a composite ballot and vote for the Democratic nominee for governor, Alaskan Independence nominee for lieutenant governor, Libertarian for senator, etc.

Washington and California have since adopted Top 2, and if Alaska adopts Top 4, all three blanket primary states will have adopted some form of non-partisan nomination.

Alaska all but encourages write-in campaigns, including by losers of primaries. When Lisa Murkowski lost the Republican primary, a casual reading of the statute on write-ins could be interpreted as
"Run Lisa Run!"

Under Top 4 this could mean that most legislative races have write-in candidates qualifying for the general election. In Washington and California, write-in candidates can qualify but finishing in the Top 2 is much harder than finishing in the Top 4. It usually only happens when there is an unopposed major candidate. If it is hopeless for a Republican to run, it is even more hopeless for a Libertarian or Green to run.

Alaska legislative districts are small (in terms of voters) so it is feasible to campaign door-to-door in at least in cities, and they appear to have elected two real independents.

While it will retain partisan nominations, the presidential general election will be by RCV. There were 7 presidential on-ballot candidates, and the Alaskan Independence Party did not have a candidate.

[cinyc]

Passage/failure is going to be really close (within 1%).

My models say it should pass by 1.5 to 2 points. We'll see.

Yes closed to within 2,000 votes after tonight's early count dump, but a lot of them were from D-leaning HDs.

There's a fairly strong correllation - r^2 of 0.89 or so - between the D-R registration advantage and the absentees reported by HD so far. So I have a number of ways to calculate this. As I said, all ways point to a RCV win here.

[jimrtex]

Passage/failure is going to be really close (within 1%).

My models say it should pass by 1.5 to 2 points. We'll see.

Yes closed to within 2,000 votes after tonight's early count dump, but a lot of them were from D-leaning HDs.

There's a fairly strong correllation - r^2 of 0.89 or so - between the D-R registration advantage and the absentees reported by HD so far. So I have a number of ways to calculate this. As I said, all ways point to a RCV win here.

Today's dump was the strongest yet for Yes, but it included HD-17 and HD-18 in central Anchorage, HD-32 Miscellaneous, Et Cetera, and Other in Southern Alaska (that is a really weird district - what are the population splits?)

Are the only districts still out HD-13, HD-22, HD-36, HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39, or are there some incomplete?

I'm guessing that HD-13, HD-22, and HD-36 will have about 3000 votes each with 60% Yes which will about close the gap. How many mail ballots in HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39. If the 633 from HD-40 is complete, then not too many. In all the tiny villages it is a lot easier to vote in person than to mail a ballot in - the polling place may have longer hours than the post office does, and they may not have residential delivery.

I'm still inclined to think it will be under 1%.

[2016]

What a nonsense! Ranked-Choice Voting only benefits Democrats!

[Left Wing]

What a nonsense! Ranked-Choice Voting only benefits Democrats!

Lisa Murkowski is now 50% more likely to win re-election but okay.

[cinyc]

Passage/failure is going to be really close (within 1%).

My models say it should pass by 1.5 to 2 points. We'll see.

Yes closed to within 2,000 votes after tonight's early count dump, but a lot of them were from D-leaning HDs.

There's a fairly strong correllation - r^2 of 0.89 or so - between the D-R registration advantage and the absentees reported by HD so far. So I have a number of ways to calculate this. As I said, all ways point to a RCV win here.

Today's dump was the strongest yet for Yes, but it included HD-17 and HD-18 in central Anchorage, HD-32 Miscellaneous, Et Cetera, and Other in Southern Alaska (that is a really weird district - what are the population splits?)

Are the only districts still out HD-13, HD-22, HD-36, HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39, or are there some incomplete?

I'm guessing that HD-13, HD-22, and HD-36 will have about 3000 votes each with 60% Yes which will about close the gap. How many mail ballots in HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39. If the 633 from HD-40 is complete, then not too many. In all the tiny villages it is a lot easier to vote in person than to mail a ballot in - the polling place may have longer hours than the post office does, and they may not have residential delivery.

I'm still inclined to think it will be under 1%.

Here's my estimate of what ABSENTEES are out as of right now:



40 is not complete. Some of it is counted by the Nome office; some of it is counted by Fairbanks. Aleutians 37 has 1,519; Bethel 38 has 1,135; Nome 39 has 592 and Barrow/Kotzebue 40 has 400 (probably in parts closer to Fairbanks than Nome).

The big district yet to report is 31 on the Southern Kenai Peninsula. Its absentees are poised to go 57% yes according to my model - which was off on 32. 13's absentees are expected to go 55% Yes.

So far, the absentees have only gone No in uber-Republican HDs 8 and 30.

There also are some early and Questioned/provisional votes to be counted, but those have been more or less been breaking even so far.

[cinyc]

No sooner do I post that then another 11.5K or so votes dropped, and BM 2 took the lead.

Here's the revised estimated what's left charts. The numbers are rough, so put a little bit of a range on it.

[Canis]

RCV ahead by 400 votes now!

[brucejoel99]

What a nonsense! Ranked-Choice Voting only benefits Democrats!

Lisa Murkowski is now 50% more likely to win re-election but okay.

You realize you're talking to a person who probably feels that Lisa Murkowski is more Democrat than Republican, right?

[jimrtex]

Passage/failure is going to be really close (within 1%).

My models say it should pass by 1.5 to 2 points. We'll see.

Yes closed to within 2,000 votes after tonight's early count dump, but a lot of them were from D-leaning HDs.

There's a fairly strong correllation - r^2 of 0.89 or so - between the D-R registration advantage and the absentees reported by HD so far. So I have a number of ways to calculate this. As I said, all ways point to a RCV win here.

Today's dump was the strongest yet for Yes, but it included HD-17 and HD-18 in central Anchorage, HD-32 Miscellaneous, Et Cetera, and Other in Southern Alaska (that is a really weird district - what are the population splits?)

Are the only districts still out HD-13, HD-22, HD-36, HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39, or are there some incomplete?

I'm guessing that HD-13, HD-22, and HD-36 will have about 3000 votes each with 60% Yes which will about close the gap. How many mail ballots in HD-37, HD-38, and HD-39. If the 633 from HD-40 is complete, then not too many. In all the tiny villages it is a lot easier to vote in person than to mail a ballot in - the polling place may have longer hours than the post office does, and they may not have residential delivery.

I'm still inclined to think it will be under 1%.

Here's my estimate of what ABSENTEES are out as of right now:



40 is not complete. Some of it is counted by the Nome office; some of it is counted by Fairbanks. Aleutians 37 has 1,519; Bethel 38 has 1,135; Nome 39 has 592 and Barrow/Kotzebue 40 has 400 (probably in parts closer to Fairbanks than Nome).

The big district yet to report is 31 on the Southern Kenai Peninsula. Its absentees are poised to go 57% yes according to my model - which was off on 32. 13's absentees are expected to go 55% Yes.

So far, the absentees have only gone No in uber-Republican HDs 8 and 30.

There also are some early and Questioned/provisional votes to be counted, but those have been more or less been breaking even so far.

Was there a release of number of absentee ballots?

After the second dump on Thursday included HD-13, 22, 31; that left HD-36, 37, 38, and 39 as the only districts with no absentee ballots reported,

So were the remaining ballots the last-arriving or why weren't they counted?

For example, HD-24 had 2435 votes counted in one big batch, but you show 504 more ballots to be counted.

[cinyc]

Was there a release of number of absentee ballots?

After the second dump on Thursday included HD-13, 22, 31; that left HD-36, 37, 38, and 39 as the only districts with no absentee ballots reported,

So were the remaining ballots the last-arriving or why weren't they counted?

For example, HD-24 had 2435 votes counted in one big batch, but you show 504 more ballots to be counted.

They're counting in batches, up to a certain date received. The remaining absentee ballots outside of 36-39 and maybe 29 are probably late arrivals.

[7,052,770]

What a nonsense! Ranked-Choice Voting only benefits Democrats!

Why would you even think that? It "helps" whichever ideology has more 3rd party voters, which can vary a lot from state to state and year to year.

With RCV, a 40-35-25 victory for a Democrat over Murkowski (I) and Palin (R) is likely off the table now unless Palin voters are really spiteful.

[jimrtex]

No sooner do I post that then another 11.5K or so votes dropped, and BM 2 took the lead.

Here's the revised estimated what's left charts. The numbers are rough, so put a little bit of a range on it.

Why are the numbers different for districts like HD-29 (+200), HD-37 (+51), HD-14 (+54), HD-38 (+13).

I was looking at the roll-off to determine if there was any difference based on mode of voting. Based on a small sample (HD-15), it appears not. (4.8% vs 4.9%). Once upon a time, it was conventional wisdom to vote against any proposition you didn't understand. But I think over time that may have changed. Those more susceptible to persuasion might vote Yes to go along with the crowd ("If I vote Yes, others will like me").

There was likely XX% of voters who had no idea that there would be any referendums on the ballot, let alone what they were about, this is true of everything but President ("What is this "Senator" about. I wonder if this Don Young is new. I've never heard of him.").

I thought it possible that those who voted in-person might have a different response than those who voted by mail. If you were filling out a ballot at home, you might be more likely to research questions. It would be like a take-home or open-book test.

But this does not seemed to be the case.

But what I noticed is the roll off for questioned ballots was extreme. Swarms were not getting past President, and most weren't voting for the legislature let alone the questions.

CUCUKLILLRUUNGA!

(This is Yup'k for "I voted")

[jimrtex]

Was there a release of number of absentee ballots?

After the second dump on Thursday included HD-13, 22, 31; that left HD-36, 37, 38, and 39 as the only districts with no absentee ballots reported,

So were the remaining ballots the last-arriving or why weren't they counted?

For example, HD-24 had 2435 votes counted in one big batch, but you show 504 more ballots to be counted.

They're counting in batches, up to a certain date received. The remaining absentee ballots outside of 36-39 and maybe 29 are probably late arrivals.

There was only one Friday dump, which was the weakest Yes vote yes. But that is likely because if was mostly from the Fairbanks and Mat-Su districts. In every district, the Yes percentage increased, 0.1% - 0.3%. But the new votes were just a little. Perhaps they were just bumping the certain date.

The regional offices are behaving differently. Fairbanks already had the least remaining ballots, but did s few more. Mat-Su districts had relatively few remaining but did some more.

It appears Anchorage mostly took the day off. HD-18 may just have been finishing off what they had started on Thursday. Otherwise they only added 146 votes in HD-22.

Juneau did the first dump in HD-36, and a lot more in HD-31, which simply has bunches of mail ballots.

Nome appears to be holding out. Will they be done by Christmas?