Proponents of ranked-choice voting have failed in their attempts to bring the alternative election system to Massachusetts and are confronting a potential defeat in Alaska as well.
The twin setbacks would amount to a big reversal of fortune for one of the darling ideas of democracy reform: Allowing voters to list candidates in order of preference, then reallocating the secondary choices of the poorer performers until one person emerges with majority support. Maine is now the only state using ranked elections almost exclusively
But a switch to so-called RCV for municipal elections was approved in two cities in California, two in Minnesota and one in Colorado. And voters in St. Louis voted to embrace another alternative election format for local primaries called approval voting.
Advocates say that conducting RCV elections will eliminate the harshest partisanship and spur more consensus-driven politics, tamp down on negative campaigning, weaken the major party duopoly and promote the election prospects of women and people of color. Opponents label the system as unnecessarily confusing and prone to manipulation (if not fraud) by smart and well-funded candidates.
In Massachusetts, voters rejected the idea with a solid 55 percent opting against it — a margin of 308,000 votes with all but a handful of votes yet to be counted Thursday.
Cara Brown McCormick, campaign manager for the effort, conceded that proponents "came up short" but praised all those who worked on the ballot initiative. Paul Diego Craney, spokesman for the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance, said his side defeated the proposal "because its costs far outweigh its very limited benefits."
In the end, most of the state's high-profile Democrats were behind he measure and most Republicans, including Gov. Charlie Baker, opposed it.
The proposal in Alaska would combine ranked-choice voting for some federal and state offices in general elections with open primaries for state executive, state legislative and congressional offices where the top four finishers would have faced off under an RCV system in the fall.
With votes cast in person early and on Election Day tallied — almost three-fifths the expected total -- the proposal was being rejected by a lopsided 65 percent of Alaskans. The 55,000 vote gap could shift and potentially be reversed when 152,000 mailed ballots are opened and counted starting Tuesday, however, and proponents of the package said they had reason for optimism that would happen.
Under RCV, voters are allowed to support more than one candidate, ranking them in order of preference. If no one wins outright with a majority of first-choice votes, the person with the fewest No. 1 votes is dropped and those ballots get redistributed based on their No. 2 choices — the process repeating in an instant, computerized runoff until one candidate has a majority of support.
Backers of ranked-choice voting found success with ballot measures approved in Eureka and Albany, Calif., as well as Bloomington and Minnetonka, Minn., and in Boulder, Colo. — continuing a string of wins at the local level, capped last year by a switch to ranked elections in New York in time for next year's mayoral race.
The mayor and city council will be chosen using RCV in Eureka, Bloomington and Minnetonka. In Albany, the new system will be used to select members of the city council and school board; Boulder will use it to choose the mayor.
Voters in St. Louis, meanwhile, voted 2-1 to switch next year to an election system sometimes viewed as a rival of RCV for the attention of those who say American democracy isn't benefiting from the traditional system: Voters select one candidate, and the one with the most votes win.
The approval voting system will allow voters to check as many as they can live with in all-candidate primaries, and the two endorsed on the most ballots will square off in the general election. Proponents say this will improve the prospects of Black candidates for mayor and council in one of the nation's biggest minority-majority cities.
Ranked-choice voting almost played a role for the first time in a Senate race, but incumbent Republican Susan Collins of Maine emerged as the winner Wednesday as returns neared completion and she barely crested 50 percent of the vote.
U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on August 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Long Island to tour law enforcement facilities in Nassau County and rally support for local Republican candidates ahead of the upcoming midterm elections
Travel Far Enough, You Meet Yourself
Is it possible that our President has simply not traveled enough?
Born and raised in Queens and attending Fordham University in the Bronx, Donald Trump has no record of traveling outside New York until he was over 20, when he transferred to a college in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania. Were his formative years amiss, then, in his learning about other places and other people?
Is his view akin to the famous New Yorker cover by Saul Steinberg, an illustration of the United States with New York City as the epicenter of the country and the Hudson River the border of the known world? We can now at least add Washington, D.C., and Mar-a-Lago to the map of “the realm.”
Our President has now traveled some, but what we recommend is another kind of travel. Not a state-sponsored trip or a venture to scout locations for future Trump Towers. This would be a genuine travel experience, enriching and eye-opening, showcasing other cultures and ways of living.
It will extend far beyond viewing military parades, hobnobbing with such “understanding” world leaders as Kim Jong Un, or taking tea with the King.
WHERE, then, should the President go? As Elon Musk’s Starship spacecraft is not yet ready to take passengers to Mars, perhaps he could explore our own vast country?
Maybe he could travel to “flyover country,” the farming states, where his ying-yanging tariffs and trade restrictions have played havoc with rural economies. Or possibly to California, number one in homeless U. S. citizens, and while there, regale homeless veterans (approximately 32,500 nationwide) with tales of his brave exploits invading and bombing foreign countries.
Or he might tour the Great Lakes, and rename the other four?
WHEN should he go? This will be tough, as he is very busy building his ballroom and renaming bodies of water.
How about a trip in early November, around the midterm elections? Despite the long-discredited accusation of widespread voter fraud, it would be reassuring to know he might be so caught up divvying out ladles of soup in a soup kitchen somewhere that he wouldn’t remember to deploy the military for “election security.”
HOW will he travel? He should definitely not take his Qatari-donated, newly renovated 747, especially after last time, when he had to be smuggled off clandestinely in a catering truck. It’s unlikely any traveling companions, like the Secretary of State or of the Treasury, are going to fall for the ruse a second time. Besides, we may need those people. No more decoys!
Perhaps the President could fly commercially, although this likely would expose him to undue suffering. Without gold bathroom fixtures and maple wood floors, the trip will be no “Luxury Experience.” If only he still had his “Trump Shuttle,” bought with a massive loan he later defaulted on, saying then, “I’m smart. I got out at a good time.”
Considering the potential pitfalls, maybe it’s best the President travel incognito, disguised perhaps as an elderly woman wearing a lot of bronzer.
Wherever, whenever, however: our President needs a vacation.
Moreover, we need a vacation from him.
If the President refuses our travel suggestions, here’s another idea:
Let’s get him a pet! He has never owned a pet. As we know with our children, pets teach essential life lessons: compassion and empathy; they instill a sense of responsibility. There is a well-established connection between those who can care for a pet and those who can care for people.
So, which pet should we choose? A puppy? A kitten? A boa constrictor?
Imagine, the President may even decide he likes having a pet. After all, what is more obedient than a well-trained dog, besides possibly the Cabinet? And what is more docile than a sweet kitten, other than plausibly the Supreme Court?
The President may even become more mellow with a pet afoot and less likely to slap tariffs on our allies, or attempt to annex our neighbors, or bully our Congress. (Realizing, of course, a bully requires active participation from the bullied to maintain his status.)
Maybe we should do both: get the President a pet and devise a travel plan for him. (Do you think we could possibly convince him to leave his phone at home?)
Let’s go for it! After all:
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. (David Mitchell)
And for our President, that would likely be the most profound discovery of all.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."