Did the state's first ranked choice voting election deliver on its promises?

Mary Peltola is going to the US House. The former state House member will become the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress after winning the state’s first ranked choice election on Wednesday. Peltola will serve out the remainder of the term of former Representative Don Young, who passed away in March.

Peltola maintained her lead in Round 1 to beat out Republicans Sarah Palin and Nick Begich with a final total of 91,206 votes, or a little over 51 percent. After Begich was eliminated in the first round of ranked-choice tabulations, the second-place votes on his voters’ ballots were redistributed. But they weren’t enough to grant victory to Palin, a former Alaska governor, vice presidential nominee, and far-right political celebrity. She captured 49 percent of the final vote. Alaska Division of Elections director Gail Fenumiai announced the results on a Facebook livestream.

Did Alaska’s new election system work as predicted?

Before the election reforms passed in November 2020, I wrote, “No voting system is absolutely perfect, but . ranked choice voting is better than the more prevalent winner-takes-all system at strengthening democracy.” After they passed, I called it a “cure for US elections.”

In ranked choice voting, voters rank candidates from most- to least-favorite. In Round 1, any candidate who wins a majority of first-place votes wins. If no one secures a majority, the last-place candidate leaves the race and a new round begins. In Round 2, the second-place votes from the ballots of the candidate defeated in Round 1 get redistributed among the remaining candidates. The process continues until a candidate secures a majority of the voted ballots.

I wrote that Alaska’s new system would likely have the following benefits: making campaigns less polarized and, possibly, more civil than the status quo; being easy for voters to understand; checking the power of political parties and hyperpartisan primary voters; leveling the playing field for candidates from underrepresented groups; improving voter turnout; and ensuring no candidate can win without a majority in the final round.

Alaskan voters adopted ranked choice general elections, along with open primary elections, in November 2020. Many supported the reforms based on these anticipated benefits. And while the US House special election only gives us a single Alaska data point when it comes to ranked choice voting, it’s worth examining whether the new system delivered.

Campaigns may become more civil and less polarized

The apocalyptic tropes of left vs. right that so often characterize US elections didn’t dominate this one. Peltola radiated warmth throughout the campaign. She snapped selfies with her Republican opponents, spoke of her support for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and shared laughs with Palin over their time as pregnant politico moms working in Juneau. (Peltola served in the state House while Palin was governor.) Palin even called her a “sweetheart.”

But civility did not exactly rule the day. With only one Republican expected to survive Round 1, the two conservatives turned on each other. Begich ran ads calling out Palin for leaving the governorship before her term ended to chase fame and fortune outside Alaska. Palin questioned Begich’s credentials as an Alaskan, threw shade on his relative lack of political experience, and cast doubt on his fealty to the Republican cause. (Begich did say he’d rank Palin second, but the ads spoke for themselves.) It didn’t have to go that way. A different set of Republican candidates may well have worked together to drum up votes for each other.

Peltola’s victory meant the least polarizing candidate actually won. Peltola is a moderate Democrat. Like Sen. Lisa Murkowski, she supports abortion rights and cares deeply about the welfare of indigenous people and the health of the salmon runs across the state. She will also defend the oil ...