Gavarone Introduces Bill to Prohibit Ranked Choice Voting

COLUMBUS—State Senator Theresa Gavarone (R-Bowling Green) and State Senator Bill DeMora (D-Columbus) have introduced bipartisan legislation that would effectively prohibit the use of ranked choice voting in Ohio.

Ranked choice voting is a voting method that continuously eliminates candidates in a series of rounds until a winner materializes. Under this election method, voters rank candidates in order of their personal preference instead of choosing just one.

“Ranked choice voting distorts election outcomes, which inherently leads to uncertainty in our results,” said Gavarone. “If this idea came to Ohio, it could, as it has in other states, delay election results, decrease voter turnout, and create confusion among voters, diluting their voices at the ballot box. If implemented, it would undo more than two centuries of voters having the ability to cast their vote with one vote and one voice, and alter our elections to look similar to the way it's done in New York City and San Francisco."

"Ohio is a national leader in the way we run our elections, and the surest way to undermine that would be to implement ranked choice voting," said the senator.

Recently, the Ohio General Assembly passed legislation Senator Gavarone wrote that gave Ohioans earlier access to election results in order to improve election integrity and voter confidence. Ranked choice voting is infamous for causing greater uncertainty and delayed election results that can take days or weeks to settle.

“I believe ranked choice voting is cumbersome, confusing, and unnecessary,” said DeMora. “It’s something Ohio has stayed away from to date, and any implementation now would only serve to confuse voters and election workers.”

Senate Bill 63 would prohibit ranked choice voting in all elections in Ohio except, as the Ohio Supreme Court decided in 1923, for those conducted in municipalities or chartered counties. The bill would deem any municipality or chartered county ineligible to receive Local Government Fund distributions if they choose to implement ranked choice voting.

The legislation will next be referred to a committee for further consideration.