[EM] A rant about IRV and it's recent history in Alaska.

[John T Whelan]

That, like RB-J's original statement, is something of an oversimplification.  Yes, Peltola was the Condorcet winner in the 2022 general (when she had the advantage of incumbency) and Begich was the Condorcet winner in 2024 (when the electorate in general shifted to the right compared to 2020 and 2022).  Ultimately, the fundamental fact remains that FairVote claims IRV eliminates the spoiler effect, when it's been demonstrated twice now that this is only true until the "spoiler" has enough support to eliminate the Condorcet winner before the final round.

This assessment is independent of the fact that I personally would rather see Peltola in that seat than Begich.

JTW

________________________________________
From: Election-Methods <election-methods-bounces at lists.electorama.com> on behalf of Michael Garman <michael.garman at rankthevote.us>
Sent: Thursday, December 5, 2024 12:38 AM
To: Greg Dennis
Cc: election-methods at lists.electorama.com
Subject: Re: [EM] A rant about IRV and it's recent history in Alaska.

Because rb-j is an intellectually dishonest crank who doesn’t want to be confused by facts after he’s made up his mind

On Thu, Dec 5, 2024 at 12:35 AM Greg Dennis <greg.dennis at voterchoicema.org<mailto:greg.dennis at voterchoicema.org>> wrote:
Why leave out the November 2022 election where Peltola was the Condorcet winner against Begich?

On Wed, Dec 4, 2024 at 4:46 PM robert bristow-johnson <rbj at audioimagination.com<mailto:rbj at audioimagination.com>> wrote:
This is what we've learned from the 2-year history of Ranked-Choice Voting in Alaska.

The Instant-Runoff Voting method of RCV failed in Alaska August 2022 at everything that RCV is supposed to do for us (as it also did in [Burlington Vermont 2009](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jIhFQfEoxSdyRz5SqEjZotbVDx4xshwM/view)).

Essentially, it was a spoiled election with all the bad things that come with a spoiled election.  In August 2022, Sarah Palin was a loser whose presence in the race materially changed who the winner was.  Had Palin not run, Begich would meet Peltola in the final round and defeat Peltola.  (We know this from the [tallies](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y32bPVmq6vb6SwnMn6vwQxzoJfvrv6ID/view) from the Cast Vote Record.)

The definition of a Spoiler is a loser whose presence in the race materially changes who the winner is.

So then these voters for the spoiler, Palin, they find out that their second-choice vote was never counted.  Their favorite candidate was defeated and their second-choice vote was never counted.  If just 1 out of 13 of the Palin voters that marked Begich as their lesser evil (there were 34089 of them); if about 2600 of these voters voted tactically (the tactic is called "compromising") and marked their lesser-evil (Begich) as their first-choice vote, then Begich would have met Peltola in the final round and beaten Peltola.

They were promised that it was safe to vote for their favorite, Sarah Palin, but by doing so they caused the election of Mary Peltola.  But they prevented Begich from having a head-to-head with Peltola because Palin did instead and lost.

There were about 112000 voting GOP and 75000 Dem.  The GOP vote was split and RCV promised that it would resolve the split vote correctly, but it didn't.  IRV propped up the *weaker* of the two GOP candidates against Peltola and that candidate lost.  If, instead, RCV had put Begich up against Peltola, Begich would have won.

They were promised that RCV would let them vote their hopes, not their fears.  But they would have been better off voting their fears.  They were promised their second-choice vote would count if their favorite candidate couldn't get elected but that second-choice vote was never counted for these Palin voters.

More Alaskans, 87899 to 79461 (an 8438 voter margin), preferred Begich to Peltola and marked their ballots saying so.  But Mary Peltola was elected instead.

This November, again, more Alaskan voters marked their ballots that Begich is preferred to Peltola by nearly the same margin, 8354 (164117 to 155763).

Both times about 8000 more Alaskans said they would prefer Begich over Peltola to go to Washington and represent the state.  And, both times, Alaskan voters marked their ballots saying so.  Both times, Instant-Runoff Voting was used.

What was different?

Sarah Palin was in the race in 2022 and not in the race in 2024.  And different winners resulted.


--

r b-j . _ . _ . _ . _ rbj at audioimagination.com<mailto:rbj at audioimagination.com>

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

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