Board approves Ranked Choice Voting summary that residents will see on petitions
The Brief
A new form of voting for elected officials may be presented as a ballot proposal in Michigan in 2026.
On Friday, the state canvassing board gave its blessing to the petition language that citizens can sign if they want to see it on the ballot next year.
Instead of a single election where the candidate with the most votes wins, ranked choice voting allows people to rank their favorite candidates.
(FOX 2) - The Michigan Board of State Canvassers approved the language that petitioners pushing to change the state's voting processes would show to residents as they gather signatures for a potential future proposal.
Ranked Choice Voting is not how Michigan currently elects its officials. But residents may get the opportunity to approve implementing it in the 2026 midterms.
Big picture view
The board that approves language that campaigns can use when gathering signatures for ballot proposals gave the green light to the group that wants to change how Michigan elects candidates for office.
On Friday, the Michigan Board of State Canvassers approved the summary that Rank MI Vote can show residents when it gathers signatures in hopes of putting the issue before voters.
The effort is still in its early planning stages. But if the group gets enough people to sign onto their petitions, it would appear as a ballot proposal during the 2026 midterms.
If a majority of voters approve the proposal, it would change Michigan's constitution. Instead of the candidate with the most votes winning an election during one round of voting, voters would rank their favorite candidates.
The backstory
Voters have the opportunity to rewrite the Michigan constitution using ballot proposals. But the journey a proposed constitutional amendment takes before appearing on a ballot is a lengthy one.
It starts with a citizen-led petition drive. When a group wants to change something about the state constitution, they bring it to the canvassing board, which works to summarize the proposed change in 100 words or less.
After approving the summary, the group must obtain enough signatures from voters before they can get it to appear on the official election ballot. Only then can citizens vote for or against the constitutional change.
Dig deeper
On Friday, the canvassing board approved summary language that Rank MI Vote will take to voters as it seeks to obtain enough signatures.
The election method allows voters to rank their favorite candidates in a race. If a candidate receives more than half of the first choices, they win the race.
If no candidate wins the most first-choice votes, then the lowest-ranked candidates will be eliminated, and their voter's choices will be reallocated to their second choice.
The proposal would also move up the summer primary earlier in the year to allow for enough time.
Below is the summary language approved by the canvassing board:
Require Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) for federal offices, governor/lieutenant governor, attorney general, and secretary of state, allowing voters to numerically rank candidates by voter preference starting in 2029, count votes in rounds, eliminating lowest-ranked candidate, and reallocating their votes to remaining ranked candidates until candidate with most final round votes is declared the winner, allow voters to rank at least four more candidates than positions to be nominated/elected, unless insufficient number of candidates, authorize local jurisdiction to adopt use of RCV in local elections, move August primary to June or earlier in even-year elections. Require legislative funding and implementing legislation.
The Source
The Michigan Board of State Canvassers meeting on Friday was used while reporting this story.
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Enable two-step verification: If someone logs into your WhatsApp account on their phone, they'll be able to see your messages. That's why you should set up two-step verification for your account. This will require a PIN that you set to be entered whenever an attempt is made to log into your WhatsApp account on a new device. If the PIN isn't entered correctly, the new device won't have access to your account. To enable two-step verification, go to WhatsApp's Settings>Account>Two-Step Verification and toggle the feature on. Apps the CAO suggests using instead When reached for comment on the CAO's decision to ban WhatsApp, the organization's chief administrative officer, Catherine Szpindor, told Fast Company, 'Protecting the People's House is our topmost priority, and we are always monitoring and analyzing for potential cybersecurity risks that could endanger the data of House Members and staff. We routinely review the list of House-authorized apps and will amend the list as deemed appropriate.' In the past, the CAO has banned or imposed partial bans on various foreign apps, including those from ByteDance, such as TikTok. But the CAO has also previously announced bans or restrictions on apps made by American companies, including Microsoft Copilot and the free versions of ChatGPT. As for Meta, a company spokesperson told Fast Company that it disagrees with the CAO's characterization of WhatsApp 'in the strongest possible terms.' The spokesperson also asserted that, when it comes to end-to-end encryption, WhatsApp offers 'a higher level of security than most of the apps on the CAO's approved list that do not offer that protection.' In the Office of Cybersecurity's memo, the agency provided guidance on alternative secure messaging apps that House staffers could use now that WhatsApp had been banned. According to Axios, those apps include Apple's iMessage and FaceTime, Microsoft Teams, Wickr, and Signal.
