Land: Michigan should reject ranked choice voting
by Terri Lynn Land
The Detroit News, August 20, 2025
In Michigan, we believe in a simple, fair principle: one person, one vote. Period. Every eligible voter gets a single vote, which is counted equally. The highest vote-getter is declared the winner. This process is straightforward, trusted and it is the backbone of our democracy.
Ranked-choice voting (RCV) threatens to unravel that clarity.
Under RCV, voters rank candidates in order of preference. If no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote in the first round, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. Ballots that ranked that eliminated candidate as their first choice are then redistributed to whichever candidate is marked as the voter’s next choice. The process repeats until a candidate crosses the 50% threshold. Legally, this means that your vote may shift from candidate to candidate depending on how you filled out the ranking — even if you never intended to support the candidate who ultimately benefits.
This confusing system often forces voters to rank candidates they know nothing about, simply to make sure their ballot isn’t tossed out. In fact, if a voter only ranks one or two candidates and those candidates are eliminated, their ballot is “exhausted” — meaning it is discarded before the final round of counting. That’s why some experts and legal scholars have raised concerns that RCV could violate the principle of equal treatment of every vote.
Right now, petition circulators are trying to amend our state constitution to force ranked-choice voting into Michigan’s elections. I urge you not to sign this petition. If passed, this amendment would permanently change how we choose our leaders while adding confusion and expense to the process. Once in the constitution, it will be nearly impossible to fix or repeal.
We don’t have to speculate about what happens under RCV — we can look at real-world results. In 2022, an Alaska congressional candidate who earned the most votes in the first round ended up losing after multiple rounds of redistribution. In Maine, more than 14,000 ballots were thrown out in a single congressional race because they did not rank every candidate. In New York City’s 2021 mayoral race, it took more than two weeks to certify the results because of the complexity of tabulating and retabulating the votes.
That’s another major problem: speed. Michigan voters are accustomed to getting clear results on election night or soon after. Under RCV, tabulation requires running multiple rounds, reconciling exhausted ballots and auditing shifting totals. That can drag out the process for days or even weeks. The longer it takes to declare a winner, the less trust voters have in the process — and trust is already fragile.
Michigan elections work because they are straightforward, accurate and fair. Voters know the rules and can be confident their ballot counts once and equally. RCV would undermine that trust, dilute the power of each vote and make our elections less transparent and more expensive.
This is not about partisan advantage. It’s about protecting the voice of every Michigan voter — regardless of party — and preserving the democratic principles we all share.
One person. One vote. Period. Let’s keep it that way.
Terri Lynn Land is a former Michigan Secretary of State
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"We have sued jurisdictions such as North Carolina for not registering voters properly by first verifying their eligibility."
"We have notified Texas of grave concerns about congressional districts drawn with racial motivations, and we are suing other jurisdictions where there is evidence of ineligible voters on their voter rolls."
"Our job is to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat."
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The proposed amendments to the International Health Regulations open the door to the kind of narrative management, propaganda, and censorship that we saw during the COVID pandemic. The United States can cooperate with other nations without jeopardizing our civil liberties, without undermining our Constitution, and without ceding away America’s treasured sovereignty.
Episode 6 of the Lantern Podcast.
Rachel Atwood is a stay at home mom from Grand Rapids, MI who works on the side for Premier Jewelry.
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