During the 2023 legislative session, the DFLers in control of the legislature passed sweeping changes to Minnesota’s election law.
As far back as the Ventura administration, Minnesota governors have insisted upon bipartisan agreement before any major changes were enacted in how we vote. Not so with this regime; Walz signed into law some of the most dramatic and highly partisan changes in election law – without so much as one Republican vote in favor of these draconian changes.
One of the most egregious bills that became law is a provision that allows local communities to adopt Ranked Choice Voting – a confusing, non-transparent and complicated system that eliminates primary elections. While progressives around the state have the ultimate goal to enact statewide RCV, the DFL votes weren’t in place this spring to do so. Instead, RCV activists are going to “study” how to best enact statewide RCV and report back to the 2024 legislature.
Instead of rubber stamping whatever the DFL RCV commission recommends, voters would be well-served if legislators looked around the country at what is happening with RCV: communities are backing away from RCV once they realize the mess it creates for voters and for election transparency.
Arlington, Va. is the most recent large metropolitan area that learned that RCV isn’t all that it’s purported to be. “The northern Virginia board adopted ranked choice voting in December [2022], deployed it during the Democratic primary in June [2023] and decided to scrap it a month later.” Oops.
Nationwide, the forces behind RCV have a lot of staff and even more money to continue to lobby elected officials to enact this election law boondoggle. These lobbyists have been highly effective in convincing some progressive local communities to enact RCV in recent years including Bloomington and Minnetonka. This fall, voters in Minnetonka have the opportunity to repeal this terrible system. You can read more HERE about that effort here and also why many Democrats don’t support this confusing system of elections.
