While ranked choice voting aims to expand voter choice, Nolan McCarty’s research reveals potential drawbacks for minority communities.
In recent years, ranked choice voting (RCV) has emerged as a popular reform aimed at addressing some of the shortcomings of traditional electoral processes. By allowing voters to rank candidates in order of their preference, RCV is designed to foster more representative outcomes, drive voter engagement, and expand voter choice. However, such reforms often come with unintended consequences and complexities, and little attention has been paid to how RCV affects minority representation and influence. As RCV gains traction across the country, Nolan McCarty, Susan Dod Brown Professor of Politics and Public Affairs at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, sat down with the Ash Center to discuss its implications.
On January 31, 2025, McCarty spoke as part of the American Politics Speaker Series, hosted jointly by the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation and the Center for American Political Studies. The series aims to foster meaningful connections despite political differences, highlighting scholars whose research is at the forefront of American politics.
McCarty’s presentation drew on his research into racial and ethnic patterns of ballot exhaustion in recent elections. He found that while RCV expands the field of candidates, it also increases the likelihood of non-majority winners and votes going uncounted in the final tally. This effect is particularly pronounced in districts with higher concentrations of minority voters, where ballots are more likely to become “exhausted”—meaning all the voter’s candidates have been eliminated, so their vote does not contribute to the final round.
To illustrate this issue, McCarty focused on two key case studies: the 2021 New York City Democratic primary and the 2022 elections in Alaska. By analyzing voting data from both elections, he explored how RCV operates in diverse electorates and whether it fulfills its promise of greater equity and wider voter choice while still ensuring majority-backed winners.
In 2019, after years of study, New Yorkers approved the adoption of RCV with 75% of the vote. The 2021 primary elections marked the system’s first use in citywide races, including for mayor, comptroller, and city council, among others. McCarty focused on the Democratic primary and found that ballot exhaustion was widespread, with especially high rates in elections featuring many candidates. He also found disparities in exhaustion rates across racial and ethnic groups. Districts with high concentrations of Asian, Hispanic, and other racial groups had consistently high exhaustion rates, while Black-majority districts showed more variation, experiencing lower exhaustion rates when Black candidates reached the final round but higher rates otherwise. Given prior research indicating that RCV’s impact on candidate diversity tends to be limited and short-lived, McCarty suggested that these disparities could pose ongoing challenges for the system.
A similar pattern emerged in the analysis of the 2022 elections in Alaska, which featured a Top Four Primary system followed by an RCV general election. McCarty found that even with fewer candidates, there were still noticeable racial and ethnic differences in ballot exhaustion rates. While the Top Four system led to a more manageable number of candidates compared to New York, minority voters in Alaska still exhibited higher rates of ballot exhaustion, particularly in races without candidates from their own ethnic backgrounds. Here, ballot exhaustion was especially pronounced in areas with high populations of Alaska Natives.
Based on these findings, McCarty closed by emphasizing both the promises and challenges of RCV. Whether high ballot exhaustion rates among minority voters stem from limited voter education, the complexity of ranking candidates, or broader patterns of racial and ethnic polarization, its impact on minority voters raises concerns. Going forward, without targeted efforts to educate voters and encourage ballot completion, RCV may disadvantage the very communities it aims to empower.
