Ranked Choice Voting Community Forum
Recorded Wednesday, October 16, 2024, 7:00 – 9:00 p.m., in Blacksburg, VA Town Council Chambers. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Montgomery County, Virginia Tech’s Lifelong Learning Institute (LLI) and the Montgomery County-Radford-Floyd County NAACP, ranked choice voting was presented as an option to better reflect voters’ choice for their elected leaders.
In ranked choice voting (RCV), voters rank their preferences among the candidates rather than choosing just one. If no candidate receives a majority on the first round, votes for candidates who got the fewest votes are redistributed to the top-ranking candidates until someone receives a majority. Your vote will count by going to your second choice even if your first-choice candidate does not win.
Proponents claim that this system gives voters more voice and that campaigns become less polarizing as candidates compete for second-choice votes as well as first choices.
Guest Speakers: Liz White, executive director of the democracy reform organization UpVote Virginia, and Virginia Tech Associate Professor Caitlin Jewitt, who studies elections.
Follow the League of Women Voters of Montgomery County, VA at http://lwvmcva.org/ and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/LWVofMCVA.