Six Maine Representatives and one Maine State Senator have introduced LD 114. It proves for a top-two system. Ranked choice voting would still be used in the primary, but not in the general election. Write-in space would be eliminated in the general election. Here is the text.
The Maine Constitution requires that state offices be filled by plurality, not majority. The Maine Supreme Court has already ruled that this means that ranked choice voting can’t be used for state office. Therefore, it would seem the same decision would also prohibit LD 114 from taking effect, if it were passed.
The authors did not provide for any ballot language explaining to voters that the party label on the ballot does not mean the candidate is a party nominee.
The authors are six Democrats and one independent, Kent Ackley. The six Democrats are Senator Geoffrey Gratwick, and Representatives Deanne Rykerson, Anne-Marie Mastraccio, Michael Sylvester, Diane Denk, and Michele Meyer.
Ok, this now accidentally sounded they are hating RCV as (superbly for former) corrupted Democrats and Republicans in the state by shoving this very more flawed style method without modifications via ‘Unified Primary’ idea for supposedly designed only for PRIMARY elections for all parties but it shouldn’t mean but unfortunately resulted in a technically abolished statewide elections for while which that forcing people to unintentionally make a State’s into semi-permanent dominantly party system for while as party membership are bigger than other state parties in their state make this problem worse, and also give a reason why Open primary (but not outside all political parties’ elections) as big election as a bad idea.
And also advanced RCV bill in the State legislature is also working on it days ago to getting in Statewide elections are already betting them do it, Make me think Maine Republicans and corrupted ‘Democratic’ bastards are going their way to make this RCV blocked off from statewide for while.
ME is one of the now few *somewhat* marginal Stares —
likely dying off — due to younger folks moving OUT to survive cold winters.
NO primaries.
—
PR and AppV
https://www.maine.gov/legis/const/
ME const
plurality – stupidity —
4-1-5 state reps
4-2-4, 4-2-5 state sens
5-1-3 Gov
6-6 co judges
9-9 co sheriffs
One more DARK AGE regime –
formed in 1820-1821 from Mass. due to MO slavery CRISIS
— one more gerrymander band-aid to 1861.
Will require liberation via USA Const 4-4 RFG = MAJORITY RULE regimes.
The Maine Constitution requires that votes in general elections be counted in towns and the results forwarded to the the SOS who totals the results. It was that procedural requirement that RCV tried to circumvent. Since RCV is a result of a citizen’s initiative, there might not be the support for a legislative repeal, and there is likely not support for amending the constitution.
There is nothing in the constitution about primaries or party nominations. There is no restriction on their conduct. They can be exclusionary partisan primaries or Top 2 Open Primaries.
The language in LD 114 is clumsy because Maine continues to use partisan primaries for county offices, and they were not modified to use RCV in either the primary or general election. It would be simpler to apply Top 2 to all elections. Local offices are more likely to be decided in the primary following the retirement of a longtime commissioner. In 79 partisan county races, there were 51 Democrats, 63 Republicans, 12 independenrs, and one Libertarian.
Of the 79 races, 41 had only one candidate, 30 had two, 7 had three, and one had five. So only one of 79 races would have required any tabulation. In 7 others, the third place candidate would have been eliminated.
Candidates will continue to qualify by partisan primary. This will make it difficult for Libertarians to qualify if the party is qualified, but relatively easy if the party is not. Maine permits anyone to sign an “independent” petition, but permits the candidate to self designate.
New section 21A-441 violates equal protection because it maintains the differential between party candidates and unenrolled candidates. 21A-335 should be modified to apply to all primary candidates.
It is possible that Maine’s party qualification standard is invalid if it restricts access to offices for which there are no partisan nominations. Also the qualification standard is based on success in the general election, not the primary.
Maine should reduce the candidate access requirement to 0.1% of the previous gubernatorial vote. This would be 631 for governor and US senator, around 316 for US representative, 21 for state senator, and 5 for state representative.
Section 21A-301 should be modified by eliminating the requirement to hold municipal caucuses, and by reducing the number of enrollees to 100, and eliminating the requirement that they have voted. That is just busywork for election clerks.
Section 21A-302 should be repealed. 21A-303 should be amended to require 100 enrollees, and the refernce to 21A-302 eliminated. 21A-303-A should be modified to be consisten with a lower standard.
The elimination of write-ins in the general election may be accidental. The RCV initiative explicitly provided for write-ins. Since RCV is being eliminated for general elections, the drafter may have thought they should remove it. There is language elsewhere that requires provision for a write-in space.