In a move to fulfill a 2022 campaign promise for securing an endorsement, Gov. Ned Lamont established a 14-member working group in June to explore ranked-choice voting (RCV) in Connecticut. Over six meetings, the working group primarily heard from experts supportive of RCV, leaving opposing viewpoints out of the conversation. The group is set to conclude its work with a final public meeting on Friday, Dec. 6.
RCV completely changes traditional elections, where the candidate with the most votes wins. In RCV, voters rank candidates by preference, with supporters saying this approach increases participation and ensures the winner has majority support. Notably, this is also the method used by the Academy Awards to determine the Best Picture winner.
The process begins by tallying all first-choice votes. If no candidate wins a majority, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and their votes are reassigned to the next preference listed by those voters. This process repeats until a candidate secures more than half of the total votes.
For instance, if this was applied to a hypothetical presidential race in 2024 it could have played out as follows. Round 1 – Trump receives 40% of first place votes, Harris receives 40%, Kennedy receives 5%, Stein receives 4%, Oliver receives 3%, and West receives 2%.
Since nobody received 50%, Mr. West would be removed and everyone who picked him as their first candidate would have their second option counted as their preferred winner. To make it easy, we’ll say Harris wins all of those ballots, now she would be at 42%.
This process would continue until a candidate breaks the 50% threshold.
Formed to draft a legislative proposal for the General Assembly, the working group is charged with creating a system that allows municipalities and political parties the option to implement RCV in caucuses, conventions, primaries, and certain municipal elections. They are to report recommendations by the end of 2024 so that the findings can be considered during the 2025 legislative session. Current state law does not allow RCV in any primaries or elections.
The organization whose presence dominated the working group’s meetings — presenting at four out of six sessions — is FairVote, a Maryland-based nonprofit heavily funded by far-left groups like George Soros’ Open Society Foundation and the Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros Foundation. FairVote’s mission is to educate the public and push for the nationwide adoption of RCV.
FairVote’s director of research, Deb Otis, made her case for ranked-choice voting (RCV) at the working group’s June 14 meeting, claiming it “promotes more voter choice” by letting voters rank candidates based on preference. Otis argued that voters often have clear opinions about candidates — some they support, others they oppose, and some they feel neutral about — and RCV supposedly captures these preferences more accurately. According to her, this system reduces vote-splitting and limits the need for strategic voting.
Otis argued that RCV leads to more civil campaigns, claiming it discourages candidates from going negative and instead pushes them to focus on issues and voter outreach. She suggested that, under RCV, independent and third-party candidates get a better shot, as voters aren’t as hesitant to support them. Otis also claimed that in places using RCV, campaigns reach out to more voters, driven by the need to appeal to a broader base.
She noted that “half the time you got a winner just on first choices,” while in other cases, an instant runoff is necessary to determine a majority winner. While Otis admitted the data is “mixed” on RCV’s impact on turnout, she pointed to a “1.5 to 2 point” boost in voter participation in odd-year municipal elections, calling it a modest but positive effect.
Another group, with left-wing backing, the Ranked Choice Voting Resource Center, made three appearances at the meetings, promoting RCV. While the organization focuses on research and best practices for RCV, it offered little substance beyond ballot design. When pressed on specifics like costs and minority participation rates in RCV, the group came up empty-handed, unable to provide any concrete answers.
Other invited “experts” included local elected officials from New York City and Maine, all of whom had won their elections through RCV and, unsurprisingly, praised the system. To the working group’s credit, both Democrats and Republicans were represented — but all speakers supported RCV, giving a one-sided, biased view of the outcomes.
It’s unclear why the group chose to only hear from RCV supporters, ignoring experts with opposing views. The Foundation for Government Accountability, for example, has called RCV a “disaster in disguise,” highlighting issues like delayed election results and, in some cases, lower voter turnout.
The costs of RCV aren’t cheap, either. Research from the MIT Election Data Science Lab reveals that implementing RCV can saddle municipalities with expenses “exceeding five standard deviations greater than would have otherwise been expected.”
These concerns raise questions about why the group hasn’t included a broader range of perspectives in its discussions.
Furthermore, the Reason Foundation reported Wednesday that RCV ballot initiatives “massively failed,” with voters in nine states rejecting the system. Only Washington, D.C., opted to adopt RCV, suggesting that most Americans aren’t eager to embrace it.
In addition to the lack of balanced discussion, public involvement has been minimal. Only 25 people registered to testify at Friday’s public hearing, with just 19 actually speaking — and even then, some organizations had multiple speakers, meaning only 17 unique voices were heard. Among these, only seven were registered voters who went on record in support.
Speakers were limited to a strict 3-minute window, with no opportunity for questions or back-and-forth dialogue with the working group.
Yankee Institute’s president Carol Platt Liebau provide testimony against adopting RCV saying, “Connecticut’s people deserve elections that are reliable, trustworthy and transparent.” Liebau added, “Ranked choice voting makes it harder for people to vote, harder for them to verify the process, and easier for them to be disenfranchised. It’s the wrong choice for the Constitution State.”
A more troubling moment came from Rep. Joshua Elliott (D-Hamden), a Progressive Caucus member, whose remarks in favor of RCV seemed more focused on using it as a tool to secure progressive wins than its actual impact on voters. Elliott’s support appeared rooted in advancing a political agenda rather than genuinely considering how RCV would affect the public, raising questions about whose interests this push for RCV really serves.
Rep. Elliott not only backs RCV but believes coupling it with fusion voting is the best path forward. Fusion voting allows candidates to run under multiple party banners, a feature that already complicates voter decision-making. In his testimony, Rep. Elliott stated, “I want to be out the gate. And just saying that, I think fusion voting is incredibly important for the state,” emphasizing that fusion voting could bolster third parties and “ensure as little polarization as possible.”
However, layering fusion voting with RCV would likely produce more confusion than clarity.
Together, these two systems will overwhelm the election processes, leading to delayed results, higher administrative costs, and a chaotic voting experience that could ultimately frustrate voters more than it empowers them. This combination could end up serving political agendas at the expense of clear and accessible elections.
The push for RCV, especially when paired with fusion voting, raises questions about its real intent and impact. For all the talk of reducing polarization and boosting participation, it seems more like a partisan experiment—one that Connecticut’s taxpayers and voters would pay for, both financially and logistically. With minimal public input and one-sided expert panels, this “solution” might solve problems no one asked to be fixed, only adding layers of confusion and expense. At best, it’s an untested gamble; at worst, it’s another costly initiative that ultimately serves those who pushed for it, not those who would bear its consequences.
