California Senate passes bill allowing Ranked Choice Voting in Santa Clara County Sep 5, 2023 Ongoing effort by Cal RCV and partners pays off as AB 1227 passes 31-7 Cal RCV and its coalition partners FairVote and CfER have been working together to complete a project CfER started in November 1997 to bring Ranked Choice Voting to the 2 million people of Santa Clara County. The people of Santa Clara voted for RCV, however, there have been questions raised by the county's counsel about whether the county can choose to move to RCV, even though Santa Clara County is a charter county. Assembly Bill 1227 clarifies that Santa Clara County can indeed adopt RCV as a charter county, and on September 5, 2023, the bill passed the California Senate, 31-7. The bill passed the Assembly earlier in the year with bipartisan support: 57 Democrats and 10 Republicans in favor, 0 against, 13 no vote recorded. From the AB 1227 fact sheet: PROBLEM In November 1998, Santa Clara County voters passed Measure F, with 53.9% voting in favor, to allow the use of instant runoff voting in the county when the technology became available. Instant runoff voting is another name for RCV. Although the County’s voting machines now have the capability to conduct RCV elections, the County’s Board of Supervisors would like clarity in state law that gives Santa Clara County, a charter county, control over the method of electing their county officers. SOLUTION AB 1227 allows the people’s vote to be implemented in Santa Clara County by giving authority to the County Board of Supervisors to adopt a proposal to elect county officers by RCV. All News & Updates

New National Deliberative Poll Shows Bipartisan Support for Polarizing Issues Affecting American Democracy Aug 10, 2023 Stanford Professor Larry Diamond: One of the biggest takeaways was the consistent majority support for Ranked Choice Voting in all of its different potential applications. After deliberating, majorities of our sample consistently supported the use of RCV for all kinds of elections — local, state, and national, and in both primaries and in general elections. ""America in One Room: Democratic Reform" polled participants before and after deliberation to gauge their opinions on democratic reform initiatives, including voter access and voting protections, non-partisan election administration, protecting against election interference, Supreme Court reform, and more. The results show many significant changes toward bipartisan agreement, even on the most contentious issues." Read the News Release and pages 5-6 of the Executive Summary for specifics on the 600 participants' views on RCV. Read the full Deliberative Poll results All News & Updates

64 percent of voters in Santa Clara County support ranked choice voting in poll Feb 5, 2024 A new EMC Research poll finds that 64% of likely 2024 voters in Santa Clara County support using ranked choice voting (RCV) in countywide and local elections. This represents significant growth in support since 54% of county voters voted for RCV in county elections by approving Measure F in 1998. A new EMC Research poll finds that 64% of likely 2024 voters in Santa Clara County support using Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) in countywide and local elections. This represents significant growth in support since 54% of county voters voted for RCV in county elections by approving Measure F in 1998 . Read the poll memo Even before hearing any explanation of Ranked Choice Voting, 56% of poll respondents supported using RCV to elect countywide officials like the Board of Supervisors. After hearing a brief explanation of how RCV works, that support increased to 64%. Large majorities of voters in Mountain View (70%), San Jose (63%), and Sunnyvale (70%) also want to use RCV to elect their cities’ officials. “Voters from across Santa Clara County want ranked choice voting because they know it will give them better representation, less toxic politics, and more choices on the ballot,” said California RCV Institute Executive Director Marcela Miranda-Caballero. “This poll proves that support for ranked choice voting has only grown in Santa Clara County since residents here first voted to adopt it 25 years ago. Ranked choice voting is already making elections better in several cities across California. The Board of Supervisors should listen to the people and bring RCV to Santa Clara County.” One of the most notable benefits of RCV is increased representation of historically underrepresented communities. Notably, 68% of poll respondents who request a Spanish-language ballot when they vote said they support the use of RCV in countywide elections before hearing an explanation. That support jumps to 73% after respondents hear the explanation. Ranked choice voting (RCV) is a simple reform that can lead to significant benefits for our cities, state, and country. RCV lets you rank candidates 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and so on instead of being forced to choose just one candidate. If your first choice can’t win, your vote automatically counts for your second choice. It's a commonsense upgrade from the broken single-choice voting approach that favors entrenched interests and underlies so much political dysfunction. Read EMC Research's poll memo for more details. The poll was conducted online and by phone from Dec 7-17, 2023 and included 400 likely voters countywide. The overall margin of error is 4.9 percentage points. All News & Updates

How Better Ballot Design and Voter Education Improved Oakland’s Ranked-Choice Voting Elections Oct 1, 2025 Due to improvements in ballot design and voter guidance, the special election ran smoothly “Oakland held a special election with RCV in April 2025, just five months after its November 2024 election with the higher-than-usual error rate. Due to improvements in ballot design and voter guidance, the special election ran smoothly and the overvote rate dropped to less than a quarter of the rate in 2024 with 99.6 percent of voters casting valid ballots.” Article begins on page 29 of the PDF report at https://electioncenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/JEARP-Volume-04-Issue-02.pdf . All News & Updates

Politicians Are Polarized. American Voters, Not So Much. Aug 29, 2025 RCV enables ideologically complex voters to express their nuanced views An op-ed by Kristen Soltis Anderson, a Republican pollster, reveals that while elected officials have become increasingly polarized along partisan lines, three-quarters of American voters defy ideological extremes and instead hold "heterodox" views—complex combinations of positions that don't fit neatly on a traditional left-right spectrum, with 22% identifying as socially conservative but fiscally liberal, and most voters weaving together beliefs from across the political spectrum rather than adhering to a single ideological framework. The op-ed's finding that the political center is better understood as a "mind-set of openness" rather than a fixed point directly supports the case for ranked choice voting, which incentivizes candidates to build broader coalitions by seeking second-choice rankings from voters with diverse perspectives rather than appealing only to partisan bases. By eliminating the spoiler effect and allowing voters to rank candidates in order of preference, RCV enables these ideologically complex voters to express their nuanced views without strategic calculations, while encouraging candidates to campaign more positively and adopt positions that appeal across traditional partisan divides to earn rankings from supporters of other candidates. This alignment between how most voters actually think—rejecting rigid ideological sorting in favor of issue-by-issue heterodoxy—and how RCV structures electoral incentives makes ranked choice voting particularly well-suited to represent the true complexity of the American electorate and reduce the disconnect between polarized politicians and the more ideologically fluid voters they claim to represent. Read the article at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/29/opinion/american-politics-center.html All News & Updates

Charron: It’s time for Santa Clara County to adopt ranked choice voting Nov 19, 2025 If we can spend $13 million on an extra election, we can certainly invest a fraction of that to make our voting system fairer. Cal RCV's co-founder and board president, Tom Charron, penned an op-ed about the need for Santa Clara County to adopt Ranked Choice Voting. Read the op-ed at https://sanjosespotlight.com/charron-its-time-for-santa-clara-county-to-adopt-ranked-choice-voting/ All News & Updates

Why Mathematicians Love Ranked Choice Voting Dec 11, 2025 The Institute for Mathematics and Democracy (IMD) has released what may be the most comprehensive empirical study of ranked choice voting ever conducted. The Institute for Mathematics and Democracy (IMD) has released what may be the most comprehensive empirical study of ranked choice voting ever conducted. The 66-page report analyzes nearly 4,000 real-world ranked ballot elections, including some 2,000 political elections, and more than 60 million simulated ones to test how different voting methods perform. The study’s conclusion is clear. Ranked choice voting methods outperform traditional first-past-the-post elections on nearly every measure of democratic fairness. Read IVN's coverage and download the 66-page report . All News & Updates

The best thing California could do is cancel the election Nov 5, 2022 "We also could implement structural changes. Instead of running two redundant sets of elections under the state’s top two system, we could use ranked choice voting with instant runoffs in June, and determine winners in just one round." -- Joe Mathews Joe Mathews is a journalist, an Irvine senior fellow at the New America Foundation, and a contributing writer at the Los Angeles Times. He is the author of The People's Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy and coauthor of the book California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix it . Read the full article at: https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/11/05/mathews-the-best-thing-california-could-do-is-cancel-the-election/ All News & Updates

Ranked Choice Voting Leads to Diverse Representation for our LGBTQ+ Community Apr 16, 2024 Santa Clara LGBTQ+ leaders speak out As we have talked to voters in Santa Clara County, some have asked whether Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) leads to more elected representation for the LGBTQ+ Community. The data shows that RCV does lead to more LGBTQ+ candidates being elected into office. How does changing our elections help elect more LGBTQ+ candidates? It’s simple: RCV makes it easier for nontraditional candidates to run and win. LGBTQ+ candidates face no penalty when running against others of the same sexual orientation or gender identity – no more “splitting the vote” within the LGBTQ+ community. RCV also lets us get rid of the primary, with its older, more conservative, and less diverse electorate, and elect majority winners in the high-turnout election in November. RCV has led to more LGBTQ+ people being elected into office across the country, regardless of that region’s political ideology. Salt Lake City, in the heart of conservative Utah, used RCV for the first time for their City Council elections in 2021. RCV enabled Salt Lake City’s voters to elect a history-making Council with a super-majority of minority representation. 4 of 7 Councilmembers are openly LGBTQ+ and another 4 of 7 are people of color. In 2021, progressive New York City elected its first 3 lesbian women of color to its City Council. Locally, BAYMEC’s Board of Directors has enthusiastically endorsed Ranked Choice Voting for Santa Clara County. As Executive Board Secretary Allie Hughes notes, “BAYMEC endorsed Ranked Choice Voting because it removes barriers to entry for candidates from underrepresented communities. By leveling the playing field, RCV has led to more LGBTQ+ folks being elected, increasing the queer community’s representation.” We hope that you will stand with BAYMEC and the California RCV Coalition and support Ranked Choice Voting for Santa Clara County! All News & Updates

Bay Area should embrace ranked-choice voting movement Nov 16, 2022 System strengthens the principle of majority rule and discourages negative campaigning The San Jose Mercury News Editorial Board writes: "Ranked-choice voting carries multiple advantages, especially in primary elections that yield low voter turnout and consistently hurt minority candidates running for office. It also gives voters greater say in who is elected. The current system works fine when only two candidates are on the ballot. But in an election with multiple candidates, which often occurs in a primary election, a candidate can win with only 20%-30 % of the vote. That means a majority of voters did not choose the winner. Too often that favors extremist candidates and/or candidates who engage in negative campaigning." Read the full article at: https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/11/16/editorial-ranked-choice-voting-santa-clara-county/ All News & Updates

Cal RCV Strategy Meeting - June 2024 Jun 5, 2024 Guest speakers shared insights and updates on RCV progress in California and our neighbor to the north, Oregon This past Wednesday, we hosted a statewide strategy meeting with phenomenal guest speakers from Portland, OR, Richmond, Santa Clara, and Los Angeles. In case you missed it, the recording is now up on YouTube: https://youtu.be/sVAFR9FcO7g 2:30 - How Portland Oregon got Proportional Ranked Choice Voting (Sol Mora) 20:01 - Oregon's statewide ballot measure for RCV (Sol Mora) 28:32 - Richmond, CA's effort to get RCV on the ballot for Nov 2024 (Sue Wilson & Ken White) 36:27 - An update on our progress in Santa Clara County (Allie Hughes) 40:10 - The opportunity to get Proportional RCV on the ballot for 2026 in Los Angeles We were joined by Sol Mora, Advocacy Director at Portland (OR) Communities of Color. Sol was instrumental in bringing Proportional RCV to Portland and is now working on statewide RCV adoption in our neighbor to the north! California RCV activists can learn a lot from her experience building awareness and diverse coalitions to build deep community support for this important reform. Supporters also get the latest updates on Cal RCV's progress, including updates on RCV efforts in Santa Clara County, Richmond, and Los Angeles! All News & Updates

Ranked Choice Voting Gaining Steam Dec 1, 2022 The League of Women Voters of Alameda (LWVA) and their supporters want the option to institute RCV in Alameda to appear on the ballot in 2024. "Ranked Choice Voting has become the fastest-growing electoral reform in the nation because it ensures elected officials have the broadest range of support , and reduces political polarization and negative campaigning . Candidates are motivated to expand their base of support by asking voters whose first choice is another candidate to consider them as their second choice. It also encourages more women and racial minorities to run for office. And it saves the expense and delay of a separate runoff election when a majority mandate is required." Read the full article at: https://alamedapost.com/op-ed/ranked-choice-voting-gaining-steam/ All News & Updates