Duell: Proposition 140 is confusing, complicated and could disenfranchise voters

The last thing Arizona needs is a confusing, complicated, California-style election scheme that could disenfranchise voters. Proposition 140 would import to Arizona some of the worst components of California’s election system like jungle primaries and Ranked-Choice Voting.

Jungle primaries and ranked-choice voting create an incredibly confusing and opaque process that is prone to errors. Two months after a 2022 California school board election using ranked-choice voting, it was finally discovered that votes had been incorrectly tabulated and the wrong candidate had been certified as the winner.

Ranked-choice voting also disenfranchises voters. It forces voters to rank and cast a ballot for candidates they don’t support in order to ensure that their ballot is not discarded in the numerous rounds of vote tabulation.

New York City used ranked-choice voting for their 2021 mayor’s race, and it took eight rounds of tabulation to declare a winner. More than 140,000 voters were effectively disenfranchised due to “ballot exhaustion,” since they didn’t rank all the candidates. It’s as if those voters didn’t even cast a ballot, since their votes were not counted in the final vote total.

Arizonans want an election system where it is easy to vote and hard to cheat. California-style jungle primaries and ranked-choice voting only increase distrust, confusion and chaos in our election system. Heritage Action urges voters to vote NO on Prop 140.

Editor’s note: Nathan Duell is Arizona state director of Heritage Action for America, Glendale. Reader reactions, pro or con, are welcomed at AzOpinions@iniusa.org.