For years many, election experts have pushed ranked choice as a way to fix the problems in America's elections. In their view, this new system would create more excitement and give more people a voice by offering marginalized candidates a fighting chance. Over the last few years, three major jurisdictions have held ranked choice voting elections, and they have consistently created issues that could lead to more problems in elections.

Maine first held an election using ranked choice voting in 2018. That cycle had a competitive congressional race where the Republican incumbent, Bruce Poliquin, initially finished ahead, but over a week later, the Democratic challenger ultimately won the election. The race led to costly litigation and heated rhetoric.

Two years later, Maine had a competitive senate race and the media did call the election by the morning after. But this speed only came because Republican incumbent Susan Collins won in a landslide with over 50% of the vote, and by close to double digits. If Maine had had a closer race that cycle, it might have taken weeks to get the results and led to the same controversial rhetoric the rest of the nation saw. The only way to avoid a long convoluted count with ranked choice voting is for someone to win by a large margin. So in close elections, ranked choice voting will undermine confidence in the results.