Opinion

Opinion: Our primaries make the case for ranked choice voting

Montgomery County’s at-large race featured 17 candidates with no one earning a earning a fair share

July 13, 2026 10:21 a.m.

The dust has settled on Maryland’s primary elections. Voters have picked the nominees for statewide and local offices to move on to the general election. The results up and down the ballot reveal that many of the candidates advancing to the general election did not win with a majority or broad voter support.

Elections produce more than winners. They are the basis for our representative democracy and a government that reflects the will of the people. As we celebrate the 250th birthday of America, we must recognize that while the founders shed the binds of tyranny, they carried forward a system that impacts our politics to this day: winner-take-all elections.

When you hear “winner-take-all” or “first-past-the-post”, they seem like straightforward and practical approaches to determining winners. If you imagine elections as a horse race, it doesn’t matter how close the finish is, it just matters who gets to the finish line first. A political horse race can make winning everything and representation an afterthought (at best). Plurality outcomes tell us who has the most votes. Majority and proportional outcomes tell us who most voters actually want. The question we must ask then is: Does the way we vote now reflect what we want?

Our organization, Ranked Choice Voting Maryland, conducted an analysis of the primary election results in Montgomery County and the state. We compared outcomes to thresholds for majority rule and fair representation. For single-seat races (e.g. governor or executive) the threshold is a majority (50% +1) vote share to win. For multi-seat races, we use the Droop Quota for proportional representation. This threshold is used in democracies around the world, and sets the vote share needed to win a seat based on the number of seats being elected (1 / number of seats being elected + 1). In a three-seat election (like most House of Delegates seats), a candidate would need 25%+1 vote to win. Proportional thresholds ensure that a cohesive community of voters can elect candidates of their choice while leaving room for other communities to have representation. It ensures majority rule while including minority voices.

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For ranked choice voting, voters rank candidates by preference — first, second, third and so on. Once all the votes are in, every voter’s first choice is counted. In single-seat elections, if a candidate has more than 50%, they win. If not, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and voters who ranked the eliminated candidate as their first choice now have their next choice counted. This continues round-by-round until someone reaches a majority. In multi-seat elections, a candidate needs to reach the Droop Quota. If no candidate reaches the threshold, you eliminate the candidate with the fewest votes and voters have their next choice counted. If a candidate is over the threshold, votes above the threshold are redistributed to voters’ next choice. This continues in rounds until the specific number of candidates are elected.

The majority rule and fair representation thresholds set a finish line and address the shortcomings of plurality. In any election, plurality outcomes may indicate that more voters preferred a different candidate to the person with the most votes. It’s not a flaw in our candidates – but in our system of voting that does not give voters a full expression of their preferred choices.

We saw plurality outcomes in numerous contests in our primary.

The Republican nominee for governor won with 43% of the vote. The representative for Maryland’s 6th congressional district won with 48%. And the Democratic nominee for county executive in Montgomery County won with 40% – a continuing trend since 2014. Across the Free State we saw plurality winners in 25% of the single-seat races and 64% of the seats in multi-winner elections (where winners were below the threshold for proportionality). These contested races featured multiple viable candidates, crowded fields and split votes.

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While we often give more scrutiny and examination to single-seat races, our plurality problem is most evident in our elections for at-large and multi-seat races, such as the at-large council contest. Seventeen candidates competed for four at-large seats in Montgomery County, and the winners will all advance with well below the proportional threshold of 20%.

Our system is failing us.

It’s an open secret that our primaries determine the winners. In Democratic-heavy jurisdictions, Democratic nominees are all but guaranteed to win; in Republican-heavy jurisdictions, GOP nominees win. Local and state legislators will spend the next four years representing constituents based on primaries where, in many contests, a majority of voters backed someone else. This is a structural failure of plurality voting and a key reason we need ranked choice voting.

Ranked choice voting lets voters fully express their preferences instead of picking one candidate and hoping for the best. Even if a field splinters, the outcome is a candidate (or candidates) with the broadest support, rather than a fragmented plurality. It’s worked successfully in Takoma Park for two decades. Washington, D.C., used ranked choice voting for the first time in its June primary – delivering majority winners in crowded fields. Voters in the Prince George’s County cities of Greenbelt and Berwyn Heights have approved ranked choice voting for upcoming elections.

Critics often warn about complexity, but numerous studies and exit polls show voters intuitively understand how to rank and like the system. RCV would also give candidates a stronger mandate coming out of an election and ensure fair representation in at-large contests.

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For any county in Maryland to use ranked choice voting, we need enabling legislation at the state level. For the last seven years, the Montgomery County delegation has put forth a local bill with full support from the council and county executive. Legislation has stalled at the state while plurality outcomes in key races keep recurring as more candidates run for office.

Voters will continue to have plenty of choice in our elections. What they don’t have is a way to make their voices heard with clarity. We need a system that ensures those who are elected not only cross the finish line but meet our shared goal for a representative democracy.

It’s time for the General Assembly to allow ranked choice voting.

— Michelle Whittaker is Executive Director of Ranked Choice Voting Maryland and a Montgomery County resident.

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Originally published at Bethesdamagazine