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GOP Secretary of State Frank LaRose has been scouring the state's registration rolls in search of people who are not qualified to vote
Ohio’s elections chief in aggressive effort to find voters who shouldn’t
Ohio's chief election official has taken another high-profile step in his campaign against perceived vote fraud, referring to the state's attorney general the names of 10 people he says appear to have cast ballots in Ohio and another state in the 2018 election.
Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose caused a stir just a few weeks earlier when he said he found 354 people who are not U.S. citizens but were registered in the state. Of those, 77 voted in the midterm, he said.
Voting rights advocates had criticized LaRose about the earlier report, saying what he found may have been simple mistakes, people confused about the system or people who got naturalized later than the records he was looking at.
A voter in Florida's closed primary in August 2018. A measure on next November's ballot would create an open, top-two primary system for state elections.
Proposal for an open, top-two primary in Florida secures spot on 2020 ballot
Floridians look increasingly likely to vote next year on a proposal to dramatically alter the way primaries for state offices are conducted.
Officials this week decided the proposed amendment to the state Constitution had garnered enough petition signatures to earn a place on the November 2020 ballot. But the two major parties are still fighting the idea.
If the state embraces the citizen-led ballot measure, which is far from certain, it would grant the ardent wishes of many democracy reformers. They say participation in the process and faith in the system would improve if more people were able to participate more often — and if more candidates on the ballot had realistic chances of winning.
The proposal would do this by creating an open, top-two system for nominating candidates for elections to state offices, including governor and all members of the Legislature, in the nation's third most populous state.
"Elections are at the core of democracy, and voting rules are hugely important in explaining variations in political outcomes and representation," argues Lee Drutman.
Why RCV beats approval voting
Drutman is a senior fellow at the think tank New America and author of the forthcoming "Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America."
Electoral reform is hot these days. Ranked-choice voting is getting most of the attention. But approval voting advocates are generating some buzz, too.
So what's the difference between the two, and which deserves your vote? The answer is easy: ranked-choice voting.
Both improve on our existing system of first-past-the-post plurality elections. But ranked-choice voting, or RCV, is superior for simple reasons: It makes more realistic assumptions about how voters and candidates behave. It assumes voters have meaningful preferences among their candidates, and that campaigns are strategic.
Fledgling fix-the-system crusaders handed a free online toolkit
DemocracyU provides information, policy best-practices, and resources for citizens and policymakers who want to be a part of the reform movement in their community. It was launched Monday by the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for tighter campaign finance rules and easier access to the polls.
"CLC seeks a future in which every American has a fair and equitable opportunity to participate in and affect the U.S. democratic process," said Catie Kelley, the group's senior policy director. "However, many people feel excluded. Voters are frustrated by an election system, and ultimately office holders, they feel do not represent them."
