Advocates for changes to the voting system agree that plurality balloting needs to be replaced with something better. But there’s disagreement on which of the “better” systems is best.
And usually the backers of different proposals, whether intentionally or not, stay out of each other’s way, working in different cities and states. But there’s an odd situation developing in Seattle, where supporters of ranked-choice voting are hoping to compete with a ballot measure to institute approval voting in America’s 18th most populous city.
In June, Seattle Approves, a nonprofit organization pushing for approval voting, secured enough petition signatures to put the proposal on the ballot in November.
"Seattle’s leaders must represent everyone," said Sarah Ward, co-chair of Seattle Approves. "Initiative 134 will make Seattle’s elections as representative as possible, so that its leaders represent the entire electorate. This initiative puts voters first.”
But Washington for Equitable Representation, a coalition of organizations pushing for RCV across the state, including for federal elections, wants the Seattle City Council to offer a “parallel” option in November. A member of the city council has taken the first step to making that happen by introducing a bill to put RCV on the November ballot.
“As proposed in Seattle, approval voting could be a voting rights disaster. Affluent voters already wield disproportionate power in our politics, and under approval voting, those affluent voters would have the power to pick the two candidates for the general election, presenting a false choice to the more diverse, representative voters that show up in November. That’s not democracy,” said Kamau Chege, executive director of the Washington Community Alliance and a member of WER. “Seattle voters deserve ranked-choice voting, which would level the playing field and guarantee everyone the freedom to pick their first-choice and backup-choices.”
Logan Bowers, another co-chair of Seattle Approves, is concerned that the decision-making process is being hidden from the public.
“The whole process is secret because the ethics laws prevent them from having public deliberations. For example, if the deliberations were public, they could consult voting experts on the construction of the alternative,” Bowers said. “But we know the council is deep underwater with the general public and if history is any guide, it’s pretty common for elected officials to help themselves rather than help the voters when drawing districts or writing voter law.”
Under the approval voting system, voters may mark as many names as they wish on a ballot with the person who receives the most support winning the election. In Seattle’s case, approval voting would be used for primaries and the two candidates with the most votes would advance to the general election regardless of party.
The system’s backers say approval voting is superior to RCV because the ballot is simpler to use and to implement.
In an RCV system (also known as instant runoff voting), voters rank candidates by order of preference. If no one receives a majority, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and that person’s support is redistributed to voters’ second choice. The process continues until someone has a majority of support. RCV’s supporters say it guarantees the winner has received backing from the majority of voters, results in more representative elections and encourages less divisive campaigning because candidates need to appeal beyond their base.
In traditional plurality or “first past the post” voting, the candidate with the most votes wins even if they do not get a majority of support.
Approval voting is currently used for municipal elections in Fargo, N.D., and St. Louis. Ranked-choice voting is used statewide in Maine and Alaska, in New York City and San Francisco, and about 50 other cities.
FairVote, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for ranked-choice voting and is allied with (but independent from) the Washington coalition, is focused on an “affirmative case” for RCV.
"Just this year, RCV legislation has been debated in nearly half the states, while RCV is being used by Democrats and Republicans in important contests in states like Alaska, Maine, and Virginia. There will also be at least sevenRCV measures on the ballot in cities and counties across the country in November,” said Will Mantell, press secretary for FairVote. “There's no shift in strategy towards approval voting or effort to undo its implementation in St. Louis and Fargo, though it may face challenges in winning and sustaining its wins.”
According to Mantell, the push for RCV in the Emerald City isn’t a reaction to the approval voting initiative.
“In the case of Seattle, there is a deep, long-standing, and diverse coalition supporting RCV, and we aren't surprised that they have city council allies who want to see RCV presented as an option to voters," he said.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.