Election Polls Survey a Great Success: Missourians like Ranked Choice Voting

[Rachel MacNair]

Friends --

We at Better Ballot KC (the bi-state metro group) and Missourians for Ranked Choice Voting (the state-wide group) covered 7 polling places in Independence on November 3, plus a large number around St. Louis County and one in Rolla, for a total of 629 respondents. (Kansas doesn't allow people close enough to the polls to allow us to do it there). 

This was similar to our highly successful exit survey last March 10, with 944 respondents, during the presidential primary. 

Except the March 10 survey was practically designed for highest positive response: having several viable candidates is ideal for showing the value of RCV, and we had them practice on a paper with the exact same candidates they had just voted on. For November 3, we had what most people understood as only two viable candidates, and we had to social-distance, so we showed them how RCV works with a sign that had movie stars for ranking verbally. People who don't generally show up to vote will show up for the general election, meaning we have less of a concentration of highly engaged voters. And this year, we had 28% of Missourians voting early - meaning the ones who showed up on election day were skewed toward the tradition-minded people who  may dislike voting innovation. So this last survey was practically designed to be the other end of the spectrum, the lowest ratings.

Yet we still got a solid majority of people who liked or strongly liked it! And, as before, and even stronger super-majority that thought it was easy or very easy. 

I attach the full report for the Independence polls. Please think of who you can share this with, and send it to them. 

 

In the elections nationwide, ALL of the cities voting on RCV passed it. Yet both of the states (Alaska and Massachusetts) did not. Because of the Covid crisis, one-on-one voter education was severely hampered in those states. Ballot language for RCV must necessarily be confusing, especially since it includes how the rankings will be counted. If that's all the voter saw, when people don't understand something, they tend to vote no. 

Yet they voted yes in the cities. Our own results show that RCV is quite popular when it's explained and shown in just a minute or two. This tells us something important about strategy: that one-on-one demonstration is valuable. 

-- Rachel MacNair

for Better Ballot KC