February 27, 2020
By introducing the Voter Choice Act (VCA), US Senator Bennet is standing up for Ranked Choice Voting (RCV), a proven election reform that is used across America. VCA is an excellent opportunity for Americans to build an election process that brings us together by supporting community efforts to implement RCV.
RCV frees Americans to cast ballots for candidates they love the most, without fear of helping to elect candidates they like the least. To many Americans, vote-splitting between similar candidates erodes public faith in the fairness of election outcomes. In every election cycle, there are representatives taking office in the unenviable position winning without earning a majority of support. However, in small pockets of our country for over 100 years, RCV has been quietly solving the problem of vote-splitting between similar candidates.
Most of us are stuck with an outdated voting system where a majority is not required to win. Instead of building a win based on the issues, candidates resort to mud-slinging to be the ‘lesser of two evils’. For the voters, partisanship has taken over the decision-making process. Our scorched-earth politics have caused many American to turn away from voting all together. While in office, our representatives participate in undermining the ‘other’ party and the resulting policy lurch harms businesses and families.
In the places that have transitioned to RCV, we are seeing better results: voter satisfaction increases dramatically, campaigns become more issue-focused, and more voters turn out. In a few small Colorado towns, RCV has been used successfully since 2011. Now that most counties have RCV-capable software, the time is right to expand the use of RCV to the rest of us. The VCA will offset half of the cost of implementing RCV, which is a barrier for many Colorado communities
RCV for Colorado is extremely pleased that US Senator Michael Bennet is sponsoring legislation to bring greater freedom to our citizens. Our politically diverse grassroots organization is made up of Democrats, Republicans, Greens, Libertarians and unaffiliated voters. We are all grateful to US Senator Bennet for supporting this political freedom that every American deserves.
RCV for Colorado has been working since 2014 to get more voice for the Colorado voters. We want every voter to be heard.
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