We are only a month away from a presidential election that Americans seem eager to have in the rearview mirror. We are exhausted by politics, tired of polarization, and increasingly skeptical of either party’s ability to solve our problems or move the nation forward.
The stakes are high.
I helped found a third party, but I will support Kamala Harris this fall. My Forward party decided not to field a candidate this year, fearing that it would spoil the party and unwittingly help the wrong candidate return to power.
But the majority of Americans feel real anxiety about the future. They fear that the nation is going astray. They worry about the state of the economy and their children’s future prospects. They voted for Democrats and Republicans and have plenty of reasons to feel used by both.
In short, they want more choice. They want new choices. But there’s only one way to give voters more choice: modernize our outdated system and bring our elections into the 21st century with ranked-choice voting. Maine and Alaska have already figured this out. They will use RCV for the presidency this fall.
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Here’s the problem with our “choice” elections: the math doesn’t work.
This year, despite telling pollsters for years that they feared a rematch between President Biden and former President Trump, that’s exactly what voters got. Before Biden’s surprise exit in August, more than 50% of voters hoped another candidate would enter the race.
Yet several big names like Senator Joe Manchin and Governor Larry Hogan took a look and succeeded; like us, they were afraid of ending up playing the role of “spoiler”. And they were right: our two-party system turns any independent into a troublemaker.
While most voters will hold their noses and choose Trump or Harris in November, the desire for options and choices outside of the duopoly hasn’t gone away anyway – not this cycle, and certainly not for a future where more and more voters will identify as independent.
Americans are too smart and too tired to support a lesser evil every four years. In one of these elections, the pent-up demand for greater choice and a real voice will burst forth. The threat of spoilers will seem less serious than four more years of status quo.
With ranked-choice voting, serious independents could actually run, without fear of irresponsibly electing a bad candidate with less than 50 percent of the vote.
Instead of choosing a single candidate, voters in a ranked-choice election have the power to rank candidates: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and so on. Think of it as an insurance policy to protect your vote and guarantee majority results. The vote count works like an instant runoff: If no one has 50 percent of voters’ first choices, the candidates with the lowest totals are eliminated and the second choices come into play.
Without RCV, we will not get the independent candidates or the multifaceted debate we deserve. Voters want more choice, but the political market has no incentive to meet this need. Instead, voters’ very real concerns about our two-party system and its failure to meet the expectations of the American people are being transformed into a specific political game they hate: the major parties strong-arming third-party and independent candidates, viewing them as nothing more than a tool. to try to steal votes from the other side.
Earlier this year, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s independent candidacy appeared to be different. The thirst for a fresh face was so intense that Kennedy registered double-digit support in national polls, numbers no independent has reached since Ross Perot’s 1992 candidacy.
Third parties often disappear as elections draw closer, and as Kennedy’s campaign dwindled into the single digits, he seemed to fall into the same reasoning as his critics: he came to view his own campaign as a mere “spoiler “, and according to reports, tried to leverage it to get jobs with Trump and Harris. Ultimately, he suspended his campaign and supported Trump.
None of this makes sense, not to voters, not to political parties, not to independents, not even to Kennedy supporters. Kennedy explained that he was suspending his campaign to avoid spoilsport in swing states; Yet just weeks later, the margins in those states remain so narrow that the presidency could be decided by 0.5 percent more voters choosing, say, the Green Party’s Jill Stein in Michigan, or the Green Party’s Chase Oliver. Libertarian in Pennsylvania.
The solution should not be to limit voters’ choices. It’s a voting system that leaves room for everyone but still produces a result that the majority of Americans like. We should also work to overcome divisions through open primaries that include independents in the conversation.
It’s too late to solve the problem of spoilers for 2024, but we don’t need to follow the same path in 2028. Amid all the rancor and negative polarization in our national politics, it’s exciting to see four States and Washington, DC vote. on adopting a combination of ranked-choice voting and open primaries this fall. Voters in these states should say yes to much-needed reform, and more states should follow suit.
If they don’t? Let’s not find out the hard way.
Americans won’t hold their noses forever.
With the growing and evident demand for more choices, there may well be a stronger, more experienced candidate next time who solves the spoiler problem and still shows up. There is market demand. Someone will meet him soon.
We can hope that this probability is ruled out. We can continue to do nothing about spoilers and hope for different results. Or we can make room for more serious candidates, protect majority winners, and give Americans real choices through ranked-choice voting.
Andrew Yang is a businessman, lawyer, philanthropist, and former candidate for President of the United States. In July 2022, Yang, alongside Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, launched the new Forward Party to give Americans more choices in our democracy.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author.
