State Senator-elect Colton Moore (R) issued a statement on Friday opposing what is known as “ranked-choice” voting.  Ranked-choice voting allows voters to select more than one candidate in an election and to “rank” their preferences for candidates when they vote.

Moore said, “If ranked-choice voting was implemented, a candidate who received less than 20% of the initial count could potentially assume office following the instant run-off tabulations. Any candidate who fails to reach over 50% of the vote should not automatically assume elected office before first receiving a majority of support from Georgia’s voters.”

Moore made the statement after Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger made statements about doing away with runoffs in General Elections on Wednesday of this week.  Raffensperger did not advocate for rank-choice voting, but did say, “No one wants to be dealing with politics in the middle of their family holiday. It’s even tougher on the counties who had a difficult time completing all of their deadlines, an election audit and executing a runoff in a four-week time period”.

Georgia has not always had runoff elections.  The move to runoff elections came during the 1960’s when a segregationist politician Georgia politician named Denmark Groover  pushed through legislation to establish General Election runoffs.  Groover later admitted to the motives behind the runoff election legislation saying, “I was a segregationist. I was a county unit man. But if you want to establish if I was racially prejudiced, I was. If you want to establish that some of my political activity was racially motivated, it was.”  Groover later tried to reverse some of his segregationist policies, but the runoff in the General Election remains to this day.

You can read Moore’s full statement below:

“Our electoral process is far from perfect, but the establishment’s latest push for rank-choice voting will only further complicate elections and disenfranchise voters.

As elected officials, our number one top priority should be to restore faith in our election process and make sure that every voter in Georgia has their voice heard at the ballot box.

If ranked-choice voting was implemented, a candidate who received less than 20% of the initial count could potentially assume office following the instant run-off tabulations. Any candidate who fails to reach over 50% of the vote should not automatically assume elected office before first receiving a majority of support from Georgia’s voters.

Democrats recommending unnecessary changes to how our leaders are elected is a major red flag because, historically, Democrats have only advocated for changes to election laws when they can use disenfranchisement to their advantage.

States that have implemented rank-choice voting have seen a larger number of ballots thrown out and lower voter turnouts. Our lawmakers should not be seeking to disenfranchise voters through changes to our electoral system. We should be doing everything in our power to amplify the voices of the people.”