jonetta rose barras: Will ranked choice voting disenfranchise DC’s vulnerable voters?

The longer my interview went on with Robert “Bob” King about ranked choice voting, the more animated he seemed to become. He raised concerns about the potential negative effect of that system, which allows voters to choose multiple candidates for each office on the ballot and to prioritize those choices. The results of those rankings help determine the final winners.

Supporters of ranked choice voting have likened it to instant runoffs. They say it will end the history in DC of individuals being elected to office with far less than 50% of the votes cast in their race.

However, King and other members of the Ward 5 Leadership Council — Hazel Thomas, James Butler, Anita Shelton and Courtney Williams — recently shared a report in which they assert that the DC Board of Elections lacks the time and staff to conduct the comprehensive education and outreach required by law. They said DC officials run the risk of triggering inequity and indisputable disenfranchisement. 

“This will go down as the greatest voter suppression in history,” predicted King, who has worked in local politics for nearly a half century, serving under every elected DC mayor while helping to organize seniors into a robust political force. They remain one of the most reliable voter bases in the city and, in the past, they have not been shy about using their clout. 

I’ve been around long enough to remember that moment during the financial control board era when then-Chief Financial Officer Anthony Williams recommended cutting the budget for the DC Office on Aging. Senior citizens came out in droves to protest the proposal. He eventually withdrew that plan, publicly promising not to offer any similar solution in the future. 

Are King and his team hoping to trigger a comparable reaction?

In 2023, in a controversial move, the DC Board of Elections ruled the citizen proposal known as Make All Votes Count DC — an effort to install ranked choice voting and authorize semi-open primaries in the District — was a proper subject for the ballot as Initiative 83. That ruling resulted in a lawsuit being filed by the DC Democratic State Committee; it is still being litigated in DC Superior Court, after being remanded there by the DC Court of Appeals.

However, during the subsequent general election in 2024, Initiative 83 passed with the support of a majority of voters (212,332 or 72.89%); 78,961 or 27.11% voted against it, while 34,676 did not mark their ballots at all. 

This year, long after the results had been certified, DC elected officials and voters learned that proponents of the initiative had blatantly violated the portion of the District municipal code that governs the collection of voter signatures needed for qualifying petitions. The Elections Board knew about the violations but chose to ignore them.

Instead of pushing for an internal investigation of the Elections Board’s handling of the process, two lawmakers — at-large DC Councilmember Christina Henderson and Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau — urged their colleagues to allocate $421,000 for the implementation of Initiative 83’s provisions related to ranked choice voting. Those funds came even as they decried a lack of money for various critical social programs, including health care. The Henderson-Nadeau proposal prevailed on an 8-4 vote.

None of that history seemed to rile King. I admit, however, that I am hard-pressed to dismiss that kind of government-endorsed recklessness and corruption.

This is not about me, however. This is about King, the Leadership Council and hundreds of thousands of residents and voters they have asserted will be greatly injured by what will almost certainly be a half-baked implementation of ranked choice voting. 

King said it wasn’t until late last month that the Elections Board hired four new workers to conduct the required outreach and education. There is speculation that the agency may bring on a contractor as well. However, that could take between 30 and 60 days to complete. 

The task is huge, King said, reviewing the elections calendar and the vast landscape to traverse in order to reach the populations he and his team want to ensure are not casualties in the race to ranked choice voting: “There are 62 public housing buildings, 40 assisted-living buildings. 

“We haven’t gotten to nursing homes; we haven’t gotten to Walter Reed or the DC jail,” said King. “They can’t do it in 90 days.”

In New York City, a mayoral Charter Revision Commission started considering ranked choice voting in the early aughts. It was introduced by a city council representative in 2010. The general view was that more time was needed before consideration. 

In 2018, the commission was still cautious, but by 2019 the members recommended its adoption and the same year New York City voters approved ranked choice voting. It wasn’t implemented until 2021. 

Common Cause New York City, a nonprofit pro-democracy organization that is part of a national network of like-minded groups, reported on its website that it conducted “500 RCV training” sessions for voters, candidates and others. It distributed over “one million pieces of informational literature” and worked with 750 other organizations during that two-year implementation period.

Following the DC Council’s actions, the Elections Board is planning to put ranked choice voting into effect in time for the June 2026 primary. It would involve all local elections — for mayor, the attorney general and council seats, including the chair, two at-large positions and those for wards 1, 3, 5 and 6. That means the entire city would need to be ready.

Thus far, there have been no official training sessions. No printed information has been mailed to registered voters. 

“They must think this is Gideon’s army that’s in the Bible,” said King. “That translates to mean they really need a miracle, and only God can deliver that.”

It’s questionable that the District government is up to managing the task. At-large Councilmember Anita Bonds chairs the Committee on Executive Administration and Labor, which has oversight of the Elections Board. There is no indication whether she is concerned about the issues being raised by King and other members of the Ward 5 Leadership Council. She did not reply to my email.

However, she has scheduled a roundtable on Monday, Nov. 24, at 11 a.m., to discuss the Elections Board’s preparations for the 2026 primary and general election. Testimony will be accepted from the two-member panel, its staff and invited guests, according to the notice in the council calendar.

Nadeau, who has decided to retire at the end of her term in 2027, also did not respond to my email. 

In Henderson’s email reply to my request for comment, she asked why I had included Council Chair Phil Mendelson on the chain before offering, “We will take a look at your request and if there is time to meet your deadline, we will share a written statement.”

Nothing yet.

I sent several questions to the Elections Board through its staff spokesperson, Sarah Graham: Does the board have a written outreach and education plan that it is implementing? Does that plan incorporate the special needs of seniors and vulnerable voters, including those with physical and intellectual challenges? How many staffers are conducting the outreach and what are their salaries? Is there enough time to implement ranked choice voting for the 2026 primary?

“We are working on responses to your questions, and I will send them as soon as they are available,” Graham wrote me via email, after I left her a voice message on her cellphone, hours after my deadline had passed.

Why don’t they have answers months after the council made the political decision to spend more than a quarter million dollars on an education, outreach and registration campaign? 

The “Leave No Vote Behind” report “prepared for the DC Board of Elections” by the Ward 5 Leadership Council relies on several federal laws and local studies, including a 2020 analysis by the DC Council’s budget office that determined 83,600 people in DC were 65 and older at the time; that represented nearly 12% of the population.

Ward 3 has the largest portion of seniors at 16.2%, followed by Ward 5 with 15.5% and Ward 4 with 15.4%. Ward 7 has 12.5%, according to King’s report.

The number of senior citizens is expected to increase to more than 100,000 by 2030, according to DC government documents.

The King report estimates that at least 4,962 seniors in DC have difficulties with their vision. That could affect their ability to navigate a complicated ballot where multiple choices are required for multiple races.

Literacy challenges are acute east of the Anacostia River, noted King: “13.4% of adults in Ward 7 and 20% of those in Ward 8 lack a high school diploma.”

None of this may mean anything, however. The Elections Board will simply bypass those voters. In 2024 when it came time to determine whether Initiative 83 proponents had met the threshold set by law for the number of signatures of valid voters that must be gathered, wards 5 and 8 were excluded from the calculation.

Legally, the Elections Board needed to include only five wards. Since those two areas did not reach the 5% quota, they were left out. Back then, citing ongoing litigation, Graham refused to explain what was done and why..

A year earlier, in 2023, during a public hearing to determine whether Initiative 83 was a proper subject for the ballot, Elections Board Chair Gary Thompson dismissed concerns similar to those being articulated now by King and the Ward 5 Leadership Council.

“We cannot interfere with the right of initiative based on such speculative concerns, particularly given the lack of evidence of an incurable discriminatory impact and the fact that the Measure is neutral on its face,” Thompson wrote in his administrative order.  

And so, who cares about old people, vulnerable people, people of color? District officials have said they do. But their actions and those of the Elections Board seem to tell a different story — one colored by signs of discrimination.

Although he has argued in the past against adoption of ranked choice voting, King and the Ward 5 Leadership Council are not trying now to prevent implementation permanently. They have recommended a pause.

“The council should pass emergency legislation without hesitation or reservation that would delay implementation until 2028,” said King. 

The Ward 5 Leadership Council has also asked that “$6 million be allocated” for “education, outreach and registration” in advance of the 2028 elections, with a deliberate effort to engage seniors and other special populations.

“Without targeted investments in education and inclusion, RCV risks upending our traditional democracy in favor of a system that few understand, and none can explain,” said King.

Maybe he should say that a little louder for the folks inside the John A. Wilson Building.

jonetta rose barras is an author and DC-based freelance journalist, covering national and local issues. She can be reached at thebarrasreport@gmail.com.