Early Voting Has Started. In One Maryland Race for Congress, That’s Plain Undemocratic

This article by Rick Hutzell, published in The Baltimore Banner, mentions RepresentWomen. Read an excerpt below.

“Voters have more power with ranked choice voting, and it is more likely to have a consensus candidate,” said Cynthia Richie Terrell, executive director of Ranked Choice Voting Maryland, a group created to advance this idea.

Maryland is one of 30 states with closed primary elections, where only registered Democrats and Republicans can vote in their respective party primaries. Nonpartisan school board races are an exception. Other than that, it’s winner-take-all, with no need to get more than 50% of the vote.

Theoretically, each party picks the candidate with the best chance of winning. In reality, these prelims give the decision to a small number of highly partisan voters.

In a district where registration favors one party as much as it does in the 3rd — 248,402 Democrats, 150,277 Republicans and 84,246 independents — older, white Democrats in Howard and Anne Arundel counties will pick the next member of Congress.

Read the complete article here.

‍