Let’s make all votes count in DC!
We can change the game and make politicians work for everyone.
We’re a group of neighbors starting the process of letting DC residents vote on whether to make all votes count in DC. This initiative, if we get on the ballot and neighbors vote to approve it, would implement ranked choice voting and end voter disenfranchisement for over 80,000 independent voters in DC.
Want to get involved in our movement to make all votes count and build community power in DC?
Read below for more on what our Ballot Initiative would do if passed, and more about Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) and Open Primaries (OP).
WHY RANKED CHOICE VOTING?
When the ballots are counted, if a candidate receives more than half of the first choices, that candidate wins.
However, if no candidate gets more than half the first-choice votes, the candidate with the fewest votes is removed. If you picked that candidate first, then your vote goes to your next choice. You only have to rank your choices once – this counting process continues automatically until a candidate wins with more than 50% of the vote.
Ranked Choice Voting is already used for statewide elections in Alaska and Maine, and local elections in more than 50 cities and counties including New York City; San Francisco; Takoma Park, Maryland; Arlington, Virginia; and Oakland, California.
Ranked Choice Voting Has Proven Results:
- Elects more women and people of color
- It reduces strategic voting and pressure to vote for the ‘devil you know’.
- Ranking is natural and easy to understand.
- Helps reduce toxic or negative campaigning
- Makes city-wide politicians have to campaign beyond their base and across the city, forcing them to go East of the River to build broad coalitions.
- Ranking preserves Native Washingtonian voting power and combats political displacement by letting communities vote for backup choices without harming their first choice. When they implemented ranked voting in Oakland, CA, Black representation was maintained despite severe gentrification and population loss.
- Candidates have to build a coalition that includes 1st and 2nd choices (you can’t win with only 2nd choice votes).
WHY OPEN UP DC’S PRIMARY ELECTIONS?
The District of Columbia has what are called Closed Primary Elections. Only voters registered with a political party can vote in the Primary Election.
Currently over 86,000 (16%) registered voters in the District of Columbia do not belong from to a political party. This excludes these voters from being able to participate in DC’s most contested election: the Primary Election.
This amounts to voter suppression and we can change this by opening up DC’s primary elections to ALL registered voters.
Open Primaries permit voters not registered with a political party to choose to participate in primary elections of that voter’s choice for all offices other than party offices.
Here’s how it would work: Prior to a Primary Election, unaffiliated voters would contact the DC Board of Elections and choose a party to vote in for that election. When the voter receives their ballot in the mail or show up to vote, their ballot will be for whichever party they have choosen for that election cycle.