Last week, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio marked the state’s voter registration deadline by calling for several changes to increase voter registration and turnout, including some promoted by FairVote.

Lawmakers that want more open and efficient elections in New York should go beyond trying to fix one issue at a time and instead give voters a system that is fair to everyone.

Without expanded use of ranked choice voting, third parties have little chance of gaining traction among the electorate. Even if they do, they run the risk of splitting the vote with ideologically similar parties, and allowing the party they agree with least to win. Reich is correct to point out that there are more than just two viewpoints in American politics and each deserves a seat at the table. But to ensure that every group has a real chance of winning representation, we need a level playing field for all perspectives.

In addition to forcing different groups of voters to compete for the scarce representation they are afforded by this system, the way we elect Congress is also plagued by issues such as plurality winners, turnout gaps, vote-splitting, single-party dominance, and incumbency advantages. All of these were on display in the District 13 primary, and all of these contribute to making Congress so dysfunctional.

The 2016 primary marked the third election cycle of statewide races when California employed the “Top Two” method, in which candidates from all parties for State Assembly, State Senate, US House, and this year, Barbara Boxer’s open US Senate seat, appeared on the same ballot. FairVote will be providing more extensive analysis of this unique system’s outcomes in the coming weeks, but we wanted to share a few key findings now.

While some states have pursued policies that make ballot access more difficult and suppress turnout, others are expanding the voter rolls with automatic voter registration - a piece of FairVote’s reform vision.

Yesterday, the California State Senate voted in favor of SB 1288, which enables all of the state’s general law jurisdictions to use majority-winner voting methods, including ranked choice voting.

Last week, the Arlington County Democratic Committee held a caucus to nominate two candidates for the November general election for School Board. As FairVote has highlighted in the past, Arlington Democrats have used ranked choice voting on several occasions to nominate candidates for local office.

In the first election held using multi-winner ranked choice voting to elect the Senate, a great leap forward for campus democracy at UCSB. In addition to an increase in voter turnout from last year, the election sees three new parties winning seats.

More than 12,500 of Berkeley’s roughly 38,000 students (32%) participated in this year’s election for the Associated Students of the University of California Senate and executive branch. This level of turnout is impressive in student elections and can be, at least in part, attributed to the dynamic climate around campus politics at Berkeley.