A record number of abortion measures are on the ballot in 2022
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23191816/abortion-ballot-measures-california-vermont-kentucky-kansas-montana
Tag: voting
Ranked choice is good, but we can do better: STAR, range, and approval voting.
There are at least dozens, probably hundreds, of proposed and discussed systems for determining who wins a single winner election. Unfortunately, the most commonly used system appears to be one of the worst. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mh7L9yJgVcU
Ranked choice is good, but we can do better: STAR, range, and approval voting. Video Sources
RCV vs STAR Voting FairVote. https://www.fairvote.org/electoral_systems_rcv_vs_star_voting Independent Party of Oregon STAR Voting Primary Spotlight on the Data: STAR Voting. 9 28 2020. https://medium.com/@5starvoting/independent-party-of-oregon-star-voting-primary-spotlight-on-the-data-1ab98d6fa8f4 The Limits of Ranked-Choice Voting Aaron Hamlin. 2019 2 7. Election Science. https://electionscience.org/voting-methods/runoff-election-the-limits-of-ranked-choice-voting/ Overvoting and the Equality of Voice
With Cheney’s Loss, Just 2 House Republicans Who Voted To Impeach Trump Are On The Ballot In November
“But while Cheney’s loss is particularly high-profile, it is not surprising. Of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, only two advanced to the general election, four lost their primaries and four didn’t even try to seek reelection, retiring instead.”
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“That said, it’s probably not a coincidence that both Valadao and Newhouse won in states that use a top-two primary system. In that format, all voters can cast a ballot that includes every candidate, regardless of party, whereas party primaries mostly involve voters who are either registered with that party or generally back it and who are voting only for candidates from one party. Still, Valadao, the only pro-impeachment Republican running who didn’t face a Trump-endorsed challenger, barely edged out fellow Republican Chris Mathys, an ardent Trump supporter, 26 percent to 23 percent for second place in his top-two primary.1 Newhouse didn’t do much better, essentially tying with the lone Democrat in the race with 25 percent.
In fact, not a single pro-impeachment Republican captured a majority of the GOP primary vote. This amounts to an especially weak set of performances for incumbents, who in most cases easily win their primaries.”
The Wisconsin Supreme Court Just Made Ballot Drop Boxes Illegal
“the Wisconsin Supreme Court..rendered most ballot drop boxes illegal in the state. The Court found that state law, which requires that mail-in ballots be delivered to a “mailbox,” does not allow “delivery to an unattended ballot drop box.””
What Are Our Options? Step 2 in the “It’s Fatally Flawed” Series
What Are Our Options? Step 2 in the “It’s Fatally Flawed” Series
The Forgotten Constitutional Weapon Against Voter Restrictions
“perhaps a largely forgotten provision of the Constitution offers a solution to safeguard American democracy. Created amid some of the country’s most violent clashes over voting rights, Section 2 of the 14th Amendment provides a harsh penalty for any state where the right to vote is denied “or in any way abridged.”
A state that crosses the line would lose a percentage of its seats in the House of Representatives in proportion to how many voters it disenfranchises. If a state abridges voting rights for, say, 10 percent of its eligible voters, that state would lose 10 percent of its representatives — and with fewer House seats, it would get fewer votes in the Electoral College, too.”
The challenge of turning pro-choice Americans into pro-choice voters
“Pollsters say there are arguments in favor of abortion rights that can resonate across the ideological spectrum. The most popular messages, researchers find again and again, are those that emphasize freedom from government control, and those that stress that abortion should be a decision between a woman and her doctor.
For the past decade, these concepts haven’t always been prominent in abortion access debates. As the procedure came under increasing attack nationwide, reproductive rights supporters mobilized Democrats and allies to stand up more forcefully for abortion access, and challenged the idea that some abortions — like in the event of rape or incest — are more worthy than others.
Rather than accept the “safe, legal, and rare” messaging popularized by Bill Clinton in the 1990s, celebrities, lawmakers, and activists have encouraged amplifying abortion stories, even, or especially, less sympathetic ones. Activists have also emphasized that messages about a “woman and her doctor” could diminish the reproductive agency of the pregnant woman herself. As feminist writer Rebecca Traister put it earlier this week, “It’s at the heart of the attitude that a person who can be pregnant… cannot simply get access to that procedure by their own damn self, without consultation or permission from anyone.”
The issue now is that, although a majority of American voters have repeatedly said they believe Roe should be upheld, roughly one-third of that majority personally opposes abortion. Those who believe abortion should be legal only in some cases primarily cite rape, incest, or a threat to a woman’s life.
Navigator Research, a group that works to provide messaging guidance to progressives, including Planned Parenthood, has conducted a few surveys on reproductive rights over the last few months: one in April before the leak of the draft Dobbs decision, one in May after it, and one following the Supreme Court’s final ruling. They found that respondents found a few consequences of the ruling especially concerning and believable: that women would have to seek unsafe abortions and that victims of rape and incest would be forced to give birth.
These ideological tensions between reproductive activists and other self-identified pro-choice people were not of huge concern when Roe was the law and defending the decision was a collective rallying point. But it makes building a coalition in a post-Roe world a more delicate balance.”