Contact: Steve Abramson, Director

NYSIRV

631-287-3700

stevea@nysirv.org

"……(Instant Runoff Voting) makes possible a more representative result than under a rule that a plurality shall elect." "……this type of preferential ballot is preferable to an election by plurality……"

"Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised," Chapter XIII §§45. 10th edition, 2000

Relevant Election Information

General Elections - National

2002 - 2% of Congressional races were decided by plurality (All races in New York State were won by majority.): 3 of 34 Senate seats; 5 of 434 House seats; 9 of 36 Governor races.

2000 - 2% of Congressional races were decided by plurality: 2 of 34 Senate seats; 9 of 441 House seats. In New York's District 2, Democratic Congressman Steve Israel defeated David Bishop in the primary, 43.4% to 41.2%; his win against his Republican opponent, Joan Johnson, in the general election was an overwhelming plurality (47.9% to 34.9%).

2002 New York State Primary Races

In the recent primary elections in New York State, two dozen races for Congress, Senate, and Assembly had multi-candidate fields. In four districts for the Assembly, Democratic primaries had four candidates in each race. Queens' District 31 had six candidates, and Manhattan's District 69 had eight candidates. The winner of the primary in District 69 garnered only 34% of the votes. But it could have been worse...with eight candidates in the contest it was possible to win with as little as 13% of the vote.

2001 Democrat Primary Runoff for Mayor of New York City

For months prior to the primary, pundits had predicted that the Democratic nomination for Mayor would most certainly belong to Mark Green, the Public Advocate. But, the primary ballot contained some formidable competition. Freddie Ferrer, the Bronx Borough President, had been coming on strong in the pre-election polling. There was also Peter Vallone, City Council Speaker; Alan Hevesi, City Comptroller. Finishing off the field was George Spitz, former New York State Auditor.

The primary election was cancelled during the chaos of 9/11, and ultimately held on September 25. To win this nomination a candidate needed to garner a plurality with at least 40%. Under the current election code (applicable only to New York City's offices of mayor, comptroller, public advocate), if no candidate were to receive 40% of the vote, a separate runoff election is mandated between the top two vote-getters. The primary result had Freddie Ferrer, somewhat surprisingly, in first place with 35.6% of the vote; Green was in second place with 31.0%; Vallone in third with 19.8%; Hevesi in fourth place with 12.1%; Spitz in fifth place with 1.1%, and write-in candidates fielding 0.4% among them.

After 9/11, the fundamental issues which divided the candidates were no longer hot button issues. The debate turned, instead, to a new and distracting issue as to whether to extend Rudy Giuliani's term in this moment of crisis. As it turned out, Mark Green experienced a pyrrhic victory in the runoff election against Freddie Ferrer on October 11. Many of Ferrer's supporters took umbrage at the heat of the contest and did not rally behind Green in his race against the Bloomberg money machine. Green, who was significantly outspent (Bloomberg spent $69 million to Green's $15 million), had to divert some of his resources to the runoff against Ferrer. And, of course, he also lost valuable competitive focus and time in the runoff campaign, which would leave less than four weeks until the general election on November 6. The city was a loser, too, as it cost $10 million to administer the runoff election.

1977 Democrat Primary Runoff for Mayor of New York City

In 2000, the first two places in the Democratic Mayoral runoff were never in doubt...not like it was in 1977. In that year, Ed Koch won the Democratic primary for Mayor in 1977 with a plurality of just 20% in a field of six political stars and five close contenders: New York State Secretary of State Mario Cuomo, 19%; Mayor Abe Beame, 18%; Bella Abzug, 17%; Manhattan Borough President Percy Sutton, 14%; and Herman Badillo, Deputy Mayor, at 11%.

With such close margins between the candidates, a runoff between the top two seemed almost unfair. After all, the votes for Beame, Abzug, Sutton and Badillo comprised the majority - 60% of the total. If the second choices of the eliminated candidates' voters were also one of the four eliminated candidates, their preferences would not be counted in the top-two runoff. These voters must have felt they "wasted" their votes since their second choice was also eliminated from the runoff.

Koch defeated Cuomo, 55% to 45% in the restricted run-off election, and once again in the general election, 50% to 42% percent, with Cuomo heading the Liberal Party ticket.

2000 U.S. Senate Races

In 2000, 34 U.S. Senate seats were contested: 32 were settled by majority wins, two by plurality. In Michigan, the incumbent Republican, Spence Abraham, narrowly lost the general election to Debbie Stabenow, 49.4% to 47.8%. In the Minnesota primary, the DFL candidate, Mark Dayton, won with 41.3% of the vote in a field of eight, and was elected to the Senate with a plurality of 48.8%. In Maryland, the Republican candidate, Paul Rappoport, won the primary with only 22.7% of the vote in a field of eight. In the New Jersey Republican primary, Bob Franks received the nomination with 35.7% of the vote in a field of four. In Ohio, Ted Celeste, the Democratic candidate, won the primary with 43.9%. In Texas, the Democratic candidate, Gene Kelly, won the primary with 35.7% in a field of five. In the Vermont Democratic primary, Ed Flanagan won the primary with 49.2%.

2000 U.S. House of Representatives Races

In 2000, 441 seats were voted upon in 2000. All but nine seats were won by majority. In the primaries, however, 31 seats were won with less than a majority: 10 Democrats and 21 Republicans. In Arkansas the Democratic primary did not produce a majority winner, and a subsequent runoff election was mandated. In New Jersey's District 12, Democrat Rush Holt edged Republican Dick Zimmer in the general election, 48.73% to 48.51%, a 631 vote differential of 299,942 total votes cast; each of the candidates from the Green Party, New Jersey Conservatives, and Libertarian Party garnered more than enough votes than the margin of difference between the Democrat and the Republican; in total, 8,269 voters gave one of the minor party candidates their (first choice) vote. In New York's District 2, Democratic Congressman Steve Israel defeated David Bishop in the primary, 43.4% to 41.2%; his win against his Republican opponent, Joan Johnson, in the general election was an overwhelming plurality (47.9% to 34.9%).

2000 Local Election Example in East Hampton

It is noteworthy that in 2000 no runoff would have been needed in any one of the general election races for the New York State Legislature. All 61 Senate seats and all 150 State Assembly seats were won outright by majority. However, a good example of how IRV would have applied at the local level is in the 2001 election for Town Supervisor of East Hampton, where there were three candidates: Jay Schneiderman, David Gruber, and William McGinty, who respectively received 37%, 35%, and 28% of the vote. Schneiderman was thinly elected by plurality, having received only 187 more votes than did Gruber of 8,210 votes cast, but more than 3 of 5 voters preferred one of the other two candidates as their first choice. Under IRV, the second-ranked preferences of the 2,228 voters whose first choice was McGinty would have been transferred to the two remaining candidates. The winner may still have been Schneiderman, but also could have been Gruber, if the latter had been the second choice of 3of 5 McGinty supporters.

2002 Utah Republican Primaries for U.S. House of Representatives

In May 2002, Utah Republicans used IRV to decide their congressional candidates. In Congressional District 3, the first round was decisive with a majority. In Congressional District 1 there were 10 candidates, and the first round leader received a majority in the 9^th round. In Congressional District 2 there were 12 candidates, and the victor, who was in second place in the 1^st through the 8^th round, took over 1^st place in the 9^th round and became the majority winner in the 11^th round. (See presskit Utah exhibit.)

1992 Presidential Election

In the Presidential Election of 1992 enough voters chose a third party candidate to affect the outcome of the election. The election looked decisive in the electoral college, but the winner-take-all electoral votes were awarded in the absence of majorities in 49 states. The margins for majority existed with the second choices of the Perot voters. Governor Clinton won only one state by majority, Arkansas, plus the District of Columbia; he won another 31 states by plurality. Clinton won six states and 44 electoral votes with 40% or fewer voters (Ohio, Colorado, New Hampshire, Maine, Montana, Nevada). In these states, three of five voters' first choice was someone else. President George Bush (the 41^st) won 18 states by plurality and came closest to winning a state by majority in Mississippi with 49.7%.

President Bush won seven states with less than 41%. In all, Governor Clinton won 19 states (with 237 electoral votes) with 47% or less. Consider that in those 19 states, a transfer of 3/4 of Ross Perot's and other voters to Bush would have shifted 214 electoral votes to Bush and retained him in office with an electoral college landslide of 382 to 153. On the flip side, had Clinton won only half of Perot's and other voters in those 19 states, Clinton would have won them all by majority.

1996 Presidential Election

In 1996, President Bill Clinton was re-elected in an electoral college landslide, 376 to 159 for Senator Bob Dole. Again, however, less than half the states (24) were decided by majority. Dole won 5 states by majority, accounting for 32 electoral votes. Clinton won 19 states by majority accounting for 230 electoral votes plus three from the District of Columbia for 233 of the 268 needed. Clinton won the balance of his 146 electoral votes by plurality in 13 states. In 9 of those 13 states, comprising 90 electoral votes, Clinton would have needed less than 1/4 of Perot's voters to reach a majority.

In addition to the 5 states he won by majority, Dole won 13 states and 122 electoral votes by plurality. In 6 of those states with 72 electoral votes Dole needed less than 1/4 of Perot voters to reach a majority. Dole would have needed 2/3 of Perot's voters to shift 3 more states and 20 electoral votes from Clinton to his column - not enough to avert a landslide.

2000 Presidential Election

In the 2000 presidential election, 40 states were decided by majority and 10 were won by plurality. Governor George Bush received a full majority in 26 states, averaging 57.2% in those states. Bush won another 4 states by plurality with an average in those states of 49.1%. Vice President Al Gore won 14 states by majority and 6 states by plurality. While Gore reached a national popular vote majority, 30 states and the electoral college count went to Bush.

The Supreme Court decided the method of the Florida vote count and the physically countable votes, but in the final analysis, Bush had 48.85% of Florida's vote to Gore's 48.84%. Bush needed 1.16% for the majority, and Gore needed 1.17%. Ralph Nader had 1.63%, Buchanan 0.29%, and others 0.39%. IRV would have delivered a majority winner in Florida, however the election would not have come down to Florida's count alone. Razor-thin margins remained between the candidates in four other states, where IRV would have decided the outcome: Iowa (Gore by 48.54% to 48.22% for Bush); New Mexico (Gore by 47.91% to 47.85% for Bush); Wisconsin (Gore by 47.83% to 47.61% for Bush); Oregon (Gore by 46.96% to 46.52% for Bush). Again, the voters whose first choices were Nader or Buchanan would collectively have decided the majority.