New York Assemblymember Robert Carroll (D-Brooklyn) has introduced A90. It establishes a top-two system for all partisan office except president. Oddly, it provides for ranked choice voting in the primary, but not the general. Of course, with only two candidates on the general election ballot, there is no need for RCV in the general election.
One wonders, if parties are no longer allowed to have nominees, and if the mechanism for using ranked choice voting is in place, what is the purpose of the primary? Why not just have a general election with ranked choice voting?
Although top-two bills have been introduced in many states in the last decade, this is the first bill in any state to combine top-two with ranked choice voting.
“One wonders, if parties are no longer allowed to have nominees, and if the mechanism for using ranked choice voting is in place, what is the purpose of the primary? Why not just have a general election with ranked choice voting?”
One possible answer to this question is based on the notion that RCV is difficult for voters because it asks them to form comparative judgments about a lot of candidates. Ranking the candidates within your own party is — according to this notion — and easier task than ranking all of the candidates. I’m not sure I buy this myself, but it’s there. See https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5099845.
RCV should be banned nationwide.
There’s a few spicy bills in NY right now. One bill that advanced through the state senate’s Elections Committee last Monday would expel all members registered with the Independence Party.
Fred makes a good point.
Would this kill fusion for most elections?
Kill it! Kill it now!