The Untold Story of U.S. Elections

As the world focuses on the Presidential election result and which party will control the Senate or the House, there is an alarming number which no media paid attention to. 75%.

75% of the elections in the United States are uncontested!

According to Ballotpedia, “Through October 2024, Ballotpedia has covered 36,068

elections in 55 states and territories. Of that total, 27,164 (75%) were uncontested

and 8,904 (25%) were contested.”

In all these uncontested races, voters can only vote YES or not vote at all. That’s not democracy.

In all these elections, plus all those with just two contestants for one seat,

electoral reform proposals such as Ranked Choice Voting, or Approval Voting, or

Proportional Representation,  or Score Voting would all be irrelevant.

This is one of the reasons why we need the choice to vote NO and why it should be implemented as a basic right. Each person still has only one vote, each NO vote will be counted as minus one.

This will increase participation for sure, especially from the independent voters. Increased participation is good for democracy. Extra votes can change the result of a tight race. Since the extra votes will mainly come from independent voters, that will reduce the influence of extremists and contribute to world peace.