Ranked-choice voting returns for 2023 Council primary elections

This article, published in Gothamist, discusses the return of ranked-choice voting in NYC and quotes RepresentWomen's research. Read an except below:

Leaning into the current system

Although ranked-choice voting faced legal pushback before its initial implementation in 2021 — with opponents arguing it would harm voters in minority communities — its proponents cite the Council results from elections that same year, when voters elected a majority of women councilmembers and more people of color than ever before in the body’s history.

“Ranked-choice voting is a tremendous contributor to the ability to achieve authentic gender parity,” said Jessica Haller, executive director of the New Majority NYC. She cited research conducted by RepresentWomen, a nonpartisan nonprofit that studies strategies that help women get elected at all levels of government.

In a report released last fall, RepresentWomen found a combination of factors helped women succeed in the city’s 2021 elections with ranked-choice voting lead among them. Haller said her organization is so committed to fostering more awareness of ranked-choice voting that it uses it to make its own board decisions.

“We actually did a ranked-choice vote on our new name internally,” Haller told Gothamist, noting that the organization was formerly known as 21 in ‘21. The group was founded to elect a minimum of 21 women to the City Council in the 2021 elections. At the time, only 14 women served in the Council; now, there are 31.

The organization endorsed 74 candidates in 35 districts that year. Of the current women councilmembers, 21 of first-ranked candidates by 21 in '21 won.

Read the full article here.