UPDATE: This story was updated Thursday morning with new developments
The recent run of success for advocates of ranked-choice voting surged forward Wednesday, then unexpectedly stalled.
The Democratic-controlled legislature in Maine, already the only place where the system is used for congressional contests, cleared legislation that would make the state the first where ranked-choice voting is used in presidential contests.
But the lawmakers ended their regular session late Wednesday night without completing the final, procedural and almost always pro forma steps necessary to deliver the bill to Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, whose signature seems assured. As a result, the bill will remain in limbo until legislators return to Augusta, giving its Republican opponents time to mount a last-ditch effort to derail the measure .
A special session later this summer seems likely but is not guaranteed. So it's not clear whether the system will be in place in time to govern how Democratic convention delegates are allocated in March, when Maine is switching to primaries after a long run of presidential caucuses. If the bill becomes law, it would also apply to the awarding the state's four electoral votes in November.
"It represents an historic first," Rob Richie of FairVote, a prominent advocacy group for ranked-choice voting, said in anticipation of the measure's completion. "This is a tremendous victory for our democracy."
One reason the move would be so consequential is that Maine could then test the notion that RCV generally works against Republicans, a principal reason the idea is opposed by almost everyone in the GOP establishment.
To be sure, the system caused the defeat last year of a Republican congressman, Bruce Poliquin, who failed to secure an outright majority of No. 1 votes in the midterm election and then saw a lopsided share of the minor-party candidates' first-choice ballots redistributed to Democrat Jared Golden as the second choice.
But two years earlier, the reallocation of third-party votes could have had the opposite effect. Hillary Clinton carried the state with a 48 percent plurality, meaning the RCV rules would have been put in place. And her 22,000-vote margin over Donald Trump was less than the 38,100 votes won by the Libertarian nominee, Gary Johnson, who polling showed took the bulk of his support away from Trump. So there is a reasonable shot that Trump could have carried the state if voters had been allowed to list him as their second choice after Johnson.
From now on, a similar result statewide or in either of the state's two House districts would trigger this sort of instant runoff. (Maine and Nebraska are the only states where one elector goes to the winner of each congressional district.)
Final action in Maine would be the biggest win so far for RCV advocates. Last week, a panel in New York City voted to create a referendum this fall in which the city will decide whether to use the system in primaries and special elections. At least five cities will use RCV for the first time this fall in Michigan, Minnesota, Utah and New Mexico – although the city council in Albuquerque, the state's largest city, rejected this concept this week.
Maine would become the sixth state where Democrats use RCV for all or part of their caucuses or primaries. None of them used the system for picking presidential nominees four years ago.
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner speaks to voters at a town hall at the Elks Lodge 188 on June 7, 2026, in Portland, Maine.
McConnell and Platner both feel entitled
The two men could not be more different. One, a Republican, octogenarian, seven-term Southern senator, the other a progressive, millennial Maine oysterman who’s never spent a day in elected office.
But Mitch McConnell, the senior senator from Kentucky who’s been MIA for the past few weeks and Graham Platner, the Maine Senate candidate who’s facing calls to drop out of his race against Sen. Susan Collins, apparently do have something in common: an outsized sense of entitlement.
McConnell, who is 84 and not running for reelection, has been hospitalized for three weeks, and yet we still don’t fully know what he was admitted for or what his condition is. Per CNN, “his office has not disclosed a medical reason for the hospitalization or provided specifics on his health status beyond saying last week that he ‘continues to improve’ and ‘is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters.’ ”
While several legislators have said they’ve talked to him and insist he sounds strong, others have said they are completely in the dark. One MAGA influencer, Laura Loomer, posted ”High level source close to the White House tells me ‘Mitch McConnell is officially brain dead. He’s not coming back.’ ”
Meanwhile, up in Maine, Platner has been artfully dodging calls from his own party to drop out of his race after several allegations of misconduct from women, including a sexual assault allegation from a former girlfriend, came to light. While Platner, who has managed to survive a Nazi-tattoo scandal, a sexting scandal, and several old tweets scandals, denies the allegations, he has not quit.
High-profile Democrats including Sens. Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer, the latter of whom had unsuccessfully hand-selected Maine Gov. Janet Mills to face Collins instead of Platner, have urged Platner to drop out, while other Dems have accused him of trying to influence the picking of his replacement.
Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson released a statement Tuesday, which said in part:
“Unfortunately, Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like. We have repeatedly reiterated to Graham Platner’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate nor in determining what this process looks like.”
Both incidents show a deep lack of accountability to voters, who in one case deserve to know whether their senator is capable of performing his duties, and in another deserve a candidate who isn’t being accused of crimes, bigotry and deception.
The offensive and odious entitlement of both McConnell and Platner stands out not because it is particularly unique among today’s political class. Tom Kean, the New Jersey GOP congressman, missed more than 100 votes, only sharing after a three-month mystery absence that he was dealing with depression.
Former President Joe Biden’s Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin failed to disclose a hospitalization for prostate cancer surgery, flouting the established rules for Cabinet members and senior U.S. officials.
From Biden’s insistence on running for reelection despite his obvious cognitive and political weaknesses to Trump’s brazen flouting of laws and norms, few politicians seem to appreciate that their public service job comes with responsibilities to constituents, including transparency and honesty.
But both parties increasingly justify the chicanery, because the stakes of winning elections and keeping power are simply too high. But that’s no excuse. If we’ve learned anything over the past decade, it’s that character and accountability do, in fact, matter. And when we, the voters, stop caring about it, well, so do they.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.