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Dear John,

It’s a big day in the Big Apple: Today, the New York City Board of Elections released results in its ranked choice primaries, and we also have a new SurveyUSA exit poll on NYC voters’ attitudes toward RCV.

Key takeaways include:

  • 96% of voters found their RCV ballot simple to complete.
  • New York voters continue to support RCV: 76% want to keep it or expand it to more elections.
  • 81% of voters say they understand RCV very or extremely well.
  • Turnout in the city’s Democratic mayoral primary exceeded 1 million voters for the first time since 1989.
  • The city is also poised to keep its majority-women City Council – first elected under RCV.
  • 95% of voters weighed in between the two finalists for mayor. That includes 152,883 voters who ranked another candidate first but also expressed their preference between Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo on their ballot – RCV gave them more choice and more voice.

Voting is becoming ranking in the nation’s largest city. Voters get more choice, more competition, and better campaigns. New York City is showing how cities and states across the country can make their elections better with RCV.

The exit poll is available here:

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FairVote’s full analysis of the initial RCV results is here:

NYC exit poll.png

New York City voters are done for now – because of RCV, they get majority winners without having to vote again in a costly July runoff.

Here at FairVote, we're looking forward to sharing another update on New York City's elections in the coming weeks, when the city releases its cast vote record – an anonymized record of all ballots cast that will give us a treasure trove of data on how voters interacted with RCV.

Sincerely
Deb Otis
Director of Research and Policy

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