“Every Vote Must Count” is a favorite slogan from both sides of the isle. With Rank Choice Voting, you are guaranteeing that only certain votes will count. With each cycle of counting more and more votes are eliminated from the final vote tally. This means many of the voters do not have a voice in the final round because their ballot has been eliminated. An example of this is when Mayor Jacob Frey won in the 6th round of voting. 22,835 ballots were eliminated and not included in the number that made up the new majority. That’s 22,835 voters who did not have a voice in the final choice for their mayor.

A recent set of bills were proposed in Minnesota to provide for state wide Ranked Choice Voting.  The Carver County Republicans took a survey of voters online to share with our represenatives.

Below are the survey findings from March -April 2023 (104 people responded).

Some real life experience

In a time when there are significant concerns with election integrity, the implementation of such a convoluted process will further break down the confidence of the electorate thus reducing the actual participation of the public in the voting process. As an example, since Minneapolis and St, Paul have run RCV in local elections for more than a decade, both lag behind other major metropolitan cities in municipal turn out. We should encourage greater civic engagement, not discourage it.

Your opinion - would you recommend RCV?

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Ranked choice voting leads to disenfranchisement, the system inherently discourages new and infrequent voters from participating. Voter confusion, high rates of ballot exhaustion, and the difficulty of tabulating the results, RCV increases costs, reduces turn out and undermines the transparency of the voting experience.

Minority communities, seniors and many others who do not have the resources to learn how to use ranked-choice voting and research multiple candidates on a ballot have simply stopped voting. Councilman Daneek Miller (D-Queens) co-chair of the Black, Latino & Asian Caucus of NYC Council, during a discussion on the merits of ranked choice voting stated, “Under ranked-choice voting, the city of San Francisco has seen a depressed voter turn-out in communities of color.”

Why should only some of the people have an opportunity to vote on the final candidates? Carver County Republicans believe every citizen should have the opportunity to vote on the final candidates, which is how our long-established fair voting system has worked in Minnesota throughout our statehood. This is how we truly protect democracy.

Changing to Rank-Choice Voting adds no benefit to our state, would cost money, time, and voter trust. This effort does not merit any of our precious resources to form a task force to study it – especially a task force that has any representation from Fairvote or others, who have financial interests in the passage of this bill.

To learn more about RCV- see  https://rcvscam.com/