Aldermen Poised to Make Elections Less Meaningful
Members of the Board of Aldermen have decided that voters should go back to voting twice in their local elections, even when both ballots will feature identical candidates. This would reverse a change that the aldermen previously passed, which eliminated primaries in municipal races with only two candidates. While other parts of the proposed changes may have merit, such as lowering the filing fee to run for local office to below what’s required to run for most federal offices, I don’t know a single person who has mentioned a desire to revert to a system that requires identical primary and general elections in local races.
These changes stem from city voters’ decision to abandon partisan elections and adopt a nonpartisan system featuring open primaries. In these contests, numerous candidates from all political persuasions are included in a single primary. The top two candidates then move on to a general election the following month. The system was pitched as a “fix” to elections in a city where almost everyone running identifies as a Democrat, leaving the general elections little purpose. Supporters envisioned a system where, after the initial election, the candidates that didn’t make the runoff would then begin “horse trading” with those that advanced. They would then push their supporters toward the candidate most aligned with their failed campaign’s goals. This was intended to result in winning candidates that truly represented the majority of voters and ensure that both primary and general elections were meaningful.
Of course, things don’t always work out the way intended. The reality is that the envisioned coalition-building between losing candidates and primary winners seldom seems to happen. Even if it does, it doesn’t seem to have much of an impact on the outcome of the second round. The winner of the primary almost always carries the day in the general election, which is how the old, partisan system used to function. On this particular goal, it seems that reformers missed their mark.
In fact, the system has brought its own set of headaches. Given the reality that the winner of the primary almost always wins the general election, one of the main products of the new system is a month where the second-place candidate and their most enthusiastic supporters know that they have nothing to lose. The result is often pettiness and anger that builds through the campaign’s final weeks. In this way, the new system is actually a downgrade from the old, partisan system. While the second election in both systems seems mostly ceremonial, the new system creates a situation where sour grapes become the main event for the final month of campaigning. It is very unpleasant to sit through.
Given the fact that the primary winner is almost always victorious, and the final month of campaigning is largely dedicated to pettiness, one can’t help but wonder why the aldermen have decided to force multiple, duplicative rounds of voting. This is a problem that the Board of Aldermen was right in remedying with prior legislation, and the decision to reverse it makes little sense. Ald. Browning is leading the latest effort on election tweaks, and his main argument for requiring multiple rounds of ballots seems to hinge on it not really costing the city much more money. The odds that there wouldn’t be a single citywide race with a primary in any given cycle are fairly low. These citywide votes mean polling places are open across the city on the primary election day, even if they are located in a ward without the need for an election.
Even considering that this change wouldn’t have major costs, the question remains: who wants to switch back to a system of essentially rerunning races a few weeks apart? Certainly, nobody in my social circle has expressed a desire to revert to a system that makes them go to the polls twice for the same decision. Given that there’s been no popular movement asking to bring back the superfluous primaries, the question then shifts to asking who would benefit from the switch. There are two groups who would likely benefit from the reversion: incumbents and political consultants.
Incumbents would benefit from this change by forcing their challengers to begin spending their money earlier than the current system. Incumbents usually outraise their competitors in elections. This is not true in every case, but one of the perks of incumbency is greater ease in raising campaign donations. Conversely, challengers don’t often have deep connections to the lobbyists and wealthy donors whose cash fuels much of our political spending. As such, challengers are usually required to be more frugal in their campaign spending. A common way of doing this is backloading spending on mailers and advertising. Many voters don’t really tune into these contests until the final weeks, and concentrating spending down the stretch helps challengers concentrate their limited financial resources into the most impactful portion of the race. Forcing challengers to begin spending earlier, due to having to face the incumbent twice, reinforces this incumbency advantage. Instead of being able to “keep their powder dry”, challengers must begin spending money earlier to ensure that they appear competitive in the first round of voting. Not spending early risks putting the challenger in a position where their voters don’t show up for the first round, diminishing both their primary vote total and perceived competitiveness in the general election.
That then leads directly to the second group of people who stand to benefit from asking voters to cast multiple ballots: political consultants. Earlier spending on mailers and other campaign materials means more money flowing to the consultants who design mailers, internet advertising, and other forms of publicity. It especially stands to benefit consultants who specialize in fundraising. They use their connections to the area’s political donors to fill their clients’ campaign coffers. This is usually made much easier by having an incumbent as a client, reinforcing the incumbent’s electoral advantage. As there would now be two election days to fund, rather than the single general election ballot, these consultants would be going back to donors and pushing them to give more. In turn, their commissions would increase.
As mentioned earlier, the public isn’t demanding to vote multiple times in contests with identical candidates. I would hope that the other members of the Board of Aldermen decline to move forward with this portion of Ald. Browning’s election overhaul proposal. As previously mentioned, there are portions of the legislation that have merit, but this particular idea is simply a bad one.
