Mainers in the 2nd Congressional District were “voting blind” on Election Day when they cast their ballots using ranked-choice voting, an expert in voting systems testified Wednesday at a hearing on U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin’s federal lawsuit to have the results from the Nov. 6 election he lost to Democrat Jared Golden set aside. …
“The fundamental defect is that voters are forced to make a guess about who will be left after the first round,” University of Maryland Political Science Professor James Gimpel said of the voting method, in which voters rank their choices numerically, setting up a series of instant runoffs if no candidate wins a majority of first-choice votes. …
Under cross-examination by James Kilbreth, representing Golden, Gimpel admitted he has not spoken with any Maine voters to determine whether they found the process confusing. A Bangor Daily News exit poll on Election Day found that 75 percent of voters supported the voting method’s continuation. CONT.
Judy Harrison, Bangor Daily News