Victory in Paradise: Honolulu voters reject RCV

The Stop RCV Coalition works hard to educate leaders and voters about ranked-choice voting (RCV), explaining how it works … and doesn’t work. We had that opportunity as Honolulu residents asked us for information to help them understand Charter Amendment 5, which would have imposed RCV there. At first, it looked like the measure was likely to pass. After all, Hawaii is a very “blue” state.

Yet RCV lost in 2024 even in blue states like Colorado and Oregon. The reason, I believe, is that most voters—other than some ideologues and elitists—really don’t want more complicated elections. When the debate focuses on RCV itself, it tends to lose. In fact, that is always our advice to people facing an RCV measure: Talk about RCV—the details and the process. As voters understand it, they tend to oppose it.

In Honolulu, voters soundly defeated RCV. Current results show just 40% of voters in favor of RCV, with a majority opposed and nearly 9% leaving the question blank.