The New Mexico Justice Project

07/21/2023

ELECTION INTEGRITY ALERT — July 21, 2023

New Mexico law—adopted this past March—now requires county clerks to VERIFY the VOTER's SIGNATURE on the ABSENTEE ballot's Official Mailing Envelope. This is a significant positive step in Elections Integrity.

HOWEVER, the Secretary of State is proposing a RULE that COMPLETELY IGNORES THE NEW STATUTORY REQUIREMENT.

This New Proposed Rule would continue to allow county clerks to merely note that there is "something" in the signature box on the mailing envelope — be it a signature, mark, or any kind of cursive writing. Such a rule would NOT comply with the bill passed this past session and signed into law by the Governor.

Today, Friday, July 21st, the The New Mexico Justice Project submitted the following comments to the Office of the NM Secretary of State:

The New Mexico Justice Project
Public Comments on the Secretary of State’s Proposed Rule Changes—specifically the Proposed Amendments to 1.10.12 of the New Mexico Administrative Code (NMAC)
Regarding ABSENTEE BALLOT ENVELOPES

Summary: Section 1-6-10 NMSA 1978 now requires each county clerk to “verify that the voter signed the official mailing envelope.” However, the Proposed Rule overlooks that new requirement, adopted by the legislature this past March, and fails to establish the now-mandated signature verification process as required by Section 1-6-10 NMSA 1978 of the Election Code.

This Comment addresses the Amendment to NMAC 1.10.12.16: MAILED BALLOT CURING PROCESS, addressing the amended section of 1-6-10 NMSA 1978:

VERIFICATION of the VOTER’S SIGNATURE

In Senate Bill 180, introduced in January 2023 and signed into law this past spring, Section 1-6-10, NMSA 1978, was amended to provide that the county clerk is now required to verify the voter’s signature. This newly adopted, very specific, statutory requirement is not currently included in the proposed rule change. As of today, here is what the New Mexico statute provides in § 1-6-10:

B. … Within one business day of receiving a
returned official mailing envelope, the county clerk
shall remove the privacy flap to verify that the
voter signed the official mailing envelope and to
confirm that the last four digits of the social
security number provided by the voter match the
information available to the county clerk...

C. If the voter's signature is present and the last
four digits of the voter's social security number
match, the county clerk shall note in the absentee
ballot register that the information required to be
provided by the voter under the privacy flap has
been verified and shall safely keep the official
mailing envelope unopened in a locked and
number-sealed ballot box until it is delivered to the
absent voter election board.

In both Sections B and C of the statute, the new requirement is not to merely note the existence of “any” signature, (which would include any random mark or scribble) but for the presence of the voter’s signature. (This is because of the new language that includes the verb “verify,” the relevance of which is further explained below in reference to this same requirement found in 27 states, for which New Mexico now joins as the 28th.)

This new statutory provision requires the county clerk to compare the signature of the voter on the outer envelope with the voter registration certificate at the same time that the county clerk confirms that the last four digits of the social security number match the voter’s registration record, which is found on the very same certificate as the signature.

According to the National Council of State Legislatures (NCSL):

“the most common method to verify that absentee
/mail ballots come from the intended voter is to
conduct signature verification. When voters return
an absentee/mail ballot, they must sign an
affidavit on the ballot envelope. When the ballot is
returned to the election office, election officials
have a process for examining each and every
signature and comparing it to other documents in
their files that contain the voter signature—usually
the voter registration record.”

NCSL further notes:

“If a ballot is missing a signature or the signature
does not match the one on file, some states offer
voters the opportunity to ‘cure’ their ballots. The
election official will contact the voter explaining
the problem and asking them to verify their
information and that they did in fact cast the ballot.

Some states have other methods for verifying
absentee/mail ballots, such as requiring voters to
provide a copy of an identification document or to
have the absentee/mail ballot witnessed or
notarized.

“Twenty-seven states conduct signature
verification on returned absentee/mail ballots:
Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii,
Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine,
Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New
Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota,
Ohio, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas,
Utah, Washington and West Virginia.”

The NCSL notes that, for this process, nine (9) states, along with the US Virgin Islands and Washington, D.C., merely determine that an absentee/mail ballot envelope contains a signature of some kind, but do not conduct actual signature verification.

New Mexico has been included in that list (of non-verification states) because of its omission of the requirement to verify a signature, as opposed to merely note the presence of any signature or mark in the space.

However, the changes to Section 1-6-10 and the inclusion of the provision that county clerks will “verify that the voter signed the official mailing envelope” statutorily removes New Mexico from the group of nine states that do not verify signatures and adds New Mexico as the twenty-eighth state to require signature verification.

▪️THE PROPOSED RULE DIVERGES FROM THE
LEGISLATIVE ACT

The Proposed Rule would continue having New Mexico in the current grouping of states that merely note the presence of cursive writing or other random marks in a space. It fails to adopt a uniform and nondiscriminatory standard for the new statutory requirement for actual signature verification.

It does not establish the process, which is now required, to verify that the actual registered voter, himself or herself, signed the official mailing envelope. And again, the mere presence of any signature or mark, however random it may be, in the signature box of the outer envelope, does not meet the requirement of the newly adopted statute.

In published public comments, the Chaves County clerk requested clarification on the process to “verify” the voter’s signature.

As the Chaves County clerk is alluding, it is incumbent on the Secretary of State to propose and adopt administrative rules which actually apply the requirements of the now-current statute.

According to newly adopted New Mexico law, the County Clerks must review the signature of that voter on the electronic voter registration certificate to verify that the signature that appears on the envelope is the registered voter’s signature on file.

Clearly, the current Proposed Rule fails in this regard. It has been written in a way that does not require any verification of the voter’s signature.

Under the Proposed Rule, the county clerks are instructed to continue treating the signatures on the mailed ballot outer envelopes in the same way that they have been handled in the past by the absent voter election board.

Under that old process, the board merely checked to see if there existed the presence of any signature, or cursive script, or mark. This is because the previous statutory provisions for qualifying mailed ballots did not include the requirement to verify.

With regard to the only other component of voter identification—the “last four” of the voter’s social security number—the Proposed Rule is both adequate and proper in that it sets out a detailed process for the County Clerk to “confirm” the accuracy of the last four digits of the voter’s social security number.

It is vitally important to note that this does not mean “any” set of four numbers—which would be the equivalent of the proposed standard for verifying the signature.

Clearly, both of these voter identification elements require the same degree of verification. However, in moving on to the signature verification requirement, the proposed rule completely ignores the statute.

Accordingly, the Proposed Rule must be amended to provide a process for verifying the voter’s signature, and for the voter to be able to cure the ballot in the event of a signature mismatch.

Republican Party of New Mexico, Taos County Republican Party, Republican Party of Bernalillo County, Republican Party of Santa Fe County, The Republican Party of Torrance County, Republican Party of Rio Arriba County, Republican Party of Los Alamos; Republican Party of Sandoval County, Republicans of San Juan County NM Group; Republican Party of Valencia County; Doña Ana Republican Party; New Mexico Young Republicans; The Republican Party of Chaves County; Republican Party of Lea County; Republican Party of Curry County; Republican Party in Roosevelt County New Mexico; Republican Party of Eddy County; Republican Party of New Mexico; Lincoln County Republican, Lincoln County Republican Party; Grant County Republican Party

01/18/2022

VOTING RIGHTS? Or ELECTION MANIPULATION?**

As we celebrate the birthday of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., New Mexico’s Governor and the Secretary of State are announcing their proposed election “reforms.” They, like Democratic Party officials all over America, are selling their proposals as:

• “Voting Rights”
• “Just making it easier for everyone to vote”
• “Universal Registration and Voting”

Our findings however, indicate that none of the proposals would do anything to help Americans believe their election systems are in any way “better.” That is to say, they do nothing to provide integrity or security to election systems, and appear to do a great deal to work against providing confidence in elections.

As best we can tell, all of their proposed measures are aimed at removing as many election integrity safeguards as possible. Their goals appear to be to have everyone in every state automatically registered, regardless of citizenship status, and regardless of verifiable address.

With that achieved, the next proposed step appears to be to order the mailing of actual ballots to every single address they can get into the system—regardless of whether the named addressee actually requests a ballot or even wants to vote. And they do not propose verifications/matches of voters to the addresses on file.

Additionally, Democratic officeholders continue to vehemently object to any form of ID as a condition for voting. Even though > 65% of Democrats and more than 80% of all voters support Voter ID.

The average citizen has to understand that in a representative democracy, elections are everything. And for elections to be valid and legitimate their counts and results have to be trusted.

People have to believe their elections are administered in a manner that ensures that only eligible voters are voting, and they are voting only ONCE.

Without safeguards, it is impossible to develop a level of trust among the electorate. Democracy is diminished. Even destroyed.

NEW MEXICO SPECIFIC

But before we get to ANY of that in New Mexico, we must first acknowledge that New Mexico has enormous problems with the statewide voter file. So, voters need to understand that the Democrats’ current efforts in this state are to build a system with no integrity ON TOP OF one that already lacks integrity.

This should make everyone who cares about our system of government very concerned—if not afraid—for the system itself.

NEW MEXICO's VOTER FILE

In the recent December special session dedicated to redistricting, Research & Polling, Inc. provided all the data used by legislators. Research and Polling provided all the maps of all the counties and voting precincts in New Mexico. This included the 2020 populations and demographic data, together with election returns and voter registration statistics.

The staff for The New Mexico Justice Project has examined the data provided by Research and Polling (R&P data) and finds the following information:

Analysis of the R&P data finds the disturbing fact that the number of registered voters in many many precincts in New Mexico exceeds the number of voting-age people who actually live in those precincts.

In other words, let’s say: the 2020 Census shows that there are 300 people aged 18 and over living in a particular Precinct X. But then you find that New Mexico’s official voter file shows that 375 people are registered to vote in that same Precinct X.

Well, that is not a hypothetical. New Mexico has many precincts like that. This is a fact of great concern—a concern that should be addressed long before anyone starts trying to take away any and all elections integrity provisions.

If only 300 people over the age of 18 live in a precinct, common sense should tell you that there should not be more than 300 registered voters. (And frankly, even that would be most unusual. Typically, 20-30% of adults are not registered to vote. So in a precinct with 300 adults, the number of registered voters would usually be somewhere between 210 and, perhaps, 250, maybe 260 at the most.

WHO IS HURT BY ALL OF THIS?

Analysis of the R&P data reveals trends in the voter registration file that indicate that minority voting strength—both Hispanic and Native American voting strength—is being diluted by packing more voters into certain precincts than the entire Voting Age Population (VAP) for those precincts.

WHERE IS THIS HAPPENING?

Bernalillo County

According to the R&P data, Bernalillo County has 157 precincts in which the total number of registered voters is higher than the entire Census-counted Voting Age Population (VAP). The total number of voters in excess of the VAP for those 157 precincts totals 5,328 people.

Demographically, 98 of those 157 precincts have a Non-Hispanic White (Anglo) majority. Those 98 precincts contain 3,308 more voters than the VAP. The remaining precincts have a Hispanic majority with 2,020 more voters than the VAP in those precincts.

Bernalillo County, House District 22 (HD 22)

In 2020, Stephanie Lord narrowly won House District 22 by a vote of 10,300 to 9,808—a margin of 492 votes. Under the newly redistricted State House maps as adopted in House Bill 8, eleven of the 157 precincts identified above are located in HD 22.

Those Precincts are: 556, 557, 558, 559, 566, 572, 574, 575, 576, 577 and 603. For these 11 precincts, the voter registration reported in the R&P data exceeds the VAP by 527 voters—this is a margin greater than Representative Lord’s margin of victory.
Interestingly, Representative Lord lost the absentee vote in the 9 precincts which were part of HD22 in 2020 but won the early and election day voting.

Sandoval County

Sandoval County has 49 precincts where the total number of registered voters is higher than the number of adults living in the precincts. Again, more than half of those precincts—29 of them—have a population that is majority Anglo. Only 7 of the precincts have a majority Native American population.

Santa Fe County

In Santa Fe County, there are 60 precincts in which the total number of registered voters is higher than the entire adult population in those same precincts. This means the total number of registered voters exceeds the actual number of adults by a whopping total of 2,269—2,269 more registered voters than there are adults living there! The VAP in those precincts is 70% Anglo.

SUMMARY

In summary, we urge the Legislature to examine the data that they already have in their possession.

They should examine every county, every precinct, and every newly created senate and house district, as well as the congressional districts.

These problems of inflated voter rolls exist statewide. However, there are a number of counties where this phenomenon does not exist. Their voter registration numbers—in relation to the Voting Age Population—are commensurate with what is normally expected.

The consequence is that the voting power of the citizens in those counties that have clean voter rolls is being diluted by the counties that have packed extra voters into their precincts.

** Permission was given to New Mexico Political Journal to use the data we collected and the summary we have written.

10/23/2020

The following is an inquiry we frequently receive:

"People are criticizing the all-mail balloting that a number of states have suddenly adopted. They're claiming it will be a mess, and that it raises serious issues involving election integrity and honesty."

HOW CONFIDENT ARE YOU THAT THIS WILL BE A FAIR ELECTION?

ANSWER:

Very concerned. Let us explain.

Elections are conducted by states. There are major differences in the ways each state administers elections. Yes, there has been great controversy about "mail" ballots and whether or not "voting by mail" is okay. In that talk, there has been a lot of obfuscation, and (in our view) deliberate misrepresentation. For example, the media have said about a hundred times that "Trump votes by mail."

What they are implying is that an "all-mail election" is the same as the way Trump, and many thousands of other Americans as well, have been voting since the Civil War. But that is not true. Trump has voted by absentee ballot: requesting his ballot, providing his verifiable personal information—the same as all absentee voters.

That process—the absentee ballot—is NOT the same as an "all-mail-ballot-election." Not even close. And we have seen many, many talking heads, reporters, and politicians who have appeared (to us at least) to be deliberately trying to deceive the public about the system. More on that below, but first things first:

1) What is most important is whether or not a state has done a good job of maintaining its voter list. Most states do not do this well. Among the 160 million or so registered voters in the country, there are millions of addresses that are incorrect, with people having moved or died, and their addresses never being updated or corrected.

2) Another big consideration is whether a state is conducting a regular, normal election, or is conducting an "all-mail-election"—which is a shotgun mail-out to everyone on its statewide list. In the all-mail-ballot election, every single listed voter is mailed a general election ballot, ready to be voted. This is done without a request from the voter, and without any verification that the address where the ballot is being sent is accurate.

3) Important facts to consider are that: A) 31 million Americans move each year; B) 20 million students are away from home in college; C) 1½ million adults are in nursing homes; D) a million are in assisted living facilities; E) 55 million live in apartment buildings (that frequently incorrectly show the same address for each resident). That's a total of 108 million Americans whose addresses and locations present huge opportunities for missing the actual, intended voter.

The reality is that states that simply send out ballots to every listed address in their file are INEVITABLY (there is no debate or question about this) going to end up with lots of ballots arriving at homes, dormitories, apartments, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and in post office boxes where the voter in question does not live, or does not currently get his or her mail.

Blanket mailings of ballots, sent without being requested, have the same error rate as tons of junk mail sent out every day that often say “to the current resident” or “household.” This leaves a tremendous opportunity for unclaimed ballots lying around all these venues.

We live in very divisive times, with the American people facing an election that so many are beyond passionate about. It seems highly likely that any number of misdirected ballots will fall into the wrong hands and be voted by someone else.

Bottom Line: There is actual cause for concern. And this is without even beginning to address the logistical problems involved in many states who are, for the very first time, receiving millions of "all-mail" ballots, struggling to have the time to verify that they are from the intended voter, and processing them in any reasonably timely manner.

01/20/2020

2020 KEY ELECTION DATES: If you are thinking about running for office.

One week from tomorrow, Monday, 27 January, is a key date for any New Mexican wanting to be a candidate for office in 2020. It is the date of the Secretary of State's Proclamation.

For someone to run in a Democrat, Republican, or Libertarian Party primary, he or she must be registered in one of those parties AS OF Monday, January 27.

Additionally, for all those seeking election to an office with a specific geographical district, candidates' voter registration must show a residential address within the boundaries of that district.*

We have seen candidates who wanted to run for judge, or the legislature, or a county office as a Democrat, or as a Republican, only to realize that when they had registered several years before, they had indicated DTS (Decline to State), or independent, or had registered in the major party with which they no longer identify.

Some have not realized this until the filing date, which this year is February 4, for statewide and congressional offices; or March 10 for all other offices. At that point, they realized they were anywhere from one week to five weeks too late to change or update their registration. So they lost their chance to run for office.

Similarly, we have seen people realize that they had not checked maps and did not know that they did not actually reside in the district for which they wanted to be a candidate. Or, they had moved into the district sometime earlier but had never updated their registration, so when they attempted to file, they found that their existing registration form disqualified them.

Either one of those errors disqualifies the wannabe candidate. So all interested parties should pay close attention to the upcoming date, and carefully read the candidate guide.
_____________________________
* US House of Representatives excepted

10/31/2019

LEGAL USES of CAMPAIGN FUNDS

(Article #15 of our series on Election Law)

In New Mexico law, there is a section of the Campaign Reporting Act that spells out how candidates can legally use campaign funds. It is Section 1-19-29.1 NMSA 1978 (page 217 of the 2019 Election Handbook, found here: https://www.sos.state.nm.us/legislation-and-lobbying/how-to-become-a-lobbyist/nm-election-handbook/.

(We have no idea why the Secretary of State has moved the Election Handbook out of the “Legal Resources” tab and into the “How to Become a Lobbyist Tab,” but it has made the Handbook much harder to find and, frankly, does little for transparency.)

Section 1-19-29.1 says that it is unlawful for candidate to make expenditures of contributions received except for:

1. Expenditures of the campaign;
2. Expenditures of legislators that are reasonably related to performing the duties of the office held, including mail, telephone and travel expenditures to serve constituents, but excluding personal and legislative living expenses;
3. Donations to the state general fund;
4. Donations to an organization to which a federal income tax deduction would be permitted under Subparagraph (A) of Paragraph (1) of Subsection (b) of Section 170 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended;
5. Expenditures made to eliminate the campaign debt of the candidate for the office sought or expenditures incurred by the candidate when seeking election to another public office covered by the Campaign Reporting Act;
6. Donations to a political committee or to another candidate seeking election to public office; or
7. Disbursements to return unused funds pro rata to the contributors if no campaign debt exists.

DIFFERENCES in the SPENDING HABITS—Between Off Years and Election Years—of NEW MEXICO CANDIDATES

If you look at campaign reports, you generally see that in election years candidates—especially candidates in opposed races—do spend their funds on what appear to be legitimate “expenditures of the campaign.”

This makes sense on several counts: 1) a candidate is fighting to win or hold on to an office, so his or her funds need to be spent efficiently so as to persuade voters; 2) funds are not that easy to raise, putting a further premium on their efficient use; and 3) in an election year a candidate is more likely to come under scrutiny, and he or she knows that.

However, in off years, like 2019, the reports become much more interesting, and we wonder if everyone is playing by the same rules. We would encourage interested voters to peruse the Secretary of State's database and check up on the spending habits of candidates in your area. You can access that database here: https://www.cfis.state.nm.us/media/CFIS_Data_Download.aspx

COMMENTS on VARIOUS LEGITIMATE USES

Looking at the allowed uses outlines above, we can tell you that there is one subsection which we have never seen listed as an expenditure. That is SUBSECTION (3) — Donations to the General Fund. No one seems to make these kinds of donations.

With regard to SUBSECTION 4, above, the Administrative Rules (NMAC) make it clear that the subsection (4) refers only to entities that are tax-exempt under federal law:

Here is the applicable section of the Administrative Rules:

1.10.13.26 CHARITABLE DONATIONS: 1.10.13 NMAC 13

A. Donations to charity from campaign funds permitted under Paragraph 4 of Subsection A of Section 1-19-29.1 NMSA 1978 may be paid only to organizations recognized as tax exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986.
B. The candidate or committee making a charitable donation is responsible for determining whether the charity has the permissible tax status prior to making the donation.

SUBSECTION 6—Donations to a political committee or to another candidate seeking election to public office—is a fairly common expenditure.

Some questions have arisen as to whether this section of the law is being applied uniformly and in a non-discriminatory manner.

Here is as an example of a question: Are candidates of one political party being allowed to make these kinds of donations, while an opposing party candidate is being prevented from doing so?

IN SUMMARY, THESE ARE SOME QUESTIONS INTERESTED VOTERS MIGHT EXPLORE

• Are all candidates following this statute and rule?

• Are any candidates or incumbent office-holders double dipping?

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07/30/2019

PUBLIC HEARING on the “BALLOT QUESTION” RULES, conducted by the SECRETARY of STATE

This is Article #14 in a series—provided by the
ELECTION INTEGRITY PROJECT [a Task
Force of The New Mexico Justice Project]

OUR ANALYSIS OF TODAY’S HEARING, Tuesday, July 30, 2019

We listened with interest today to the Secretary of State’s public hearing in Albuquerque on her proposed new rules regarding 1) Ranked Choice Voting; and 2) Ballot Questions.

We appreciate that the Secretary of State’s office is providing “transparency” (of one type) by holding public hearings in three different New Mexico cities instead of just Santa Fe. We also noted that the hearing was well run by the new Deputy Secretary of State, Sharon Pino.

However, despite being able to see today’s process, the in-person audience appeared to question the “transparency” of the actual substance of the hearing—the true “understandability” of proposed rules themselves. We heard numerous comments today from citizens who said the rules were “confusing,” “not transparent,” and “very complicated.” One person noted that the rules raise the specter of corruption because of their complexity. Another said, “I don’t know what ranked-choice voting actually does.”

We offer some comments on today’s hearing.

THE RULE on BALLOT QUESTIONS

The rule on Ballot Questions being offered by the SOS covers ALL ballot question elections in New Mexico, both statewide and local, including constitutional amendments, bond issues, new tax assessments, and local ordinances—any question that can be properly placed on the ballot.

We offer this clarification because the second rule, on Rank-Choice Voting, only affects certain local elections in home-rule cities that already have or may adopt Ranked-Choice Voting. There appeared to be some confusion about the scope of each rule today.

Regarding Ballot Questions, we published a series of three articles on that topic, and like a number of the speakers today, we believe the proposed rule does not follow the statute.

In a nutshell, the proposed rule would allow the Secretary—not the legislature or local governmental entity that will have actually written the question—to determine exactly how a question will appear on the ballot, by empowering herself to “condense” the language. Keep in mind, this prevents the legislature, the city government, the county government, community college boards, school boards, et. al, from deciding how their OWN proposals are presented to the people.

Attorneys who spoke today pointed out that the rule raises a number of legal issues and that the intent of the duly elected officials could actually be thwarted by the “substitute, summarized, or condensed” language that might be placed on the ballot by the Secretary of State.

One of the main arguments offered in favor of “condensed” ballot questions is the need to take up less space on the ballot. Senator Daniel Ivey-Soto opined that democracy is hurt if voters can’t read the ballot or need a magnifying glass in order to do so. We agree, but as we pointed out previously, the local election act provides for multiple page ballots to avoid that problem.

The irony of the argument about "conserving ballot space" is the that the other rule, Ranked-Choice Voting, effectively negates it by taking vastly more ballot space that current process of casting one vote per candidate.

THE RULE on RANKED CHOICE VOTING

Ranked-choice voting, as noted by the Secretary herself, has been implemented in Santa Fe and Las Cruces, and is under discussion in Albuquerque. Yet, Albuquerque is one of the examples used where the ballots are printed in such small font that a magnifying glass is needed. In a typical contested race for public office, a ballot would have one vote circle for each candidate. We are all familiar with that.

So, a normal race would take up space on one column, about an inch, maybe two, when printed in normal size and readable font.

But a Ranked-Choice ballot for the same race would look like the ballot depicted below. As you can see, while taking up the same amount of space vertically, the race now takes four times as much space horizontally across the ballot. The number of columns required to “rank the choices” vastly increases as the number of candidates increases.

IRRECONCILABLE ARGUMENTS

It is difficult to reconcile the arguments of some of those present today who supported both the Ballot Question “condensation” as well as the multi-fold expansion of the ballot so as to accommodate the massive requirements of rank-choice voting.

Proponents of “condensed” ballot questions have said all along—and some testified again today—that complete, full disclosure ballot questions may sometimes simply be too big, and they need to condense the text in order to save valuable ballot space and prevent the ballot from being printed in microscopic font.

At the same time, however, many of these same advocates of condensing the ballot on the one hand, argue for its massive expansion on the other hand. One proposed rule actually opposes, counteracts, or works against the very rationale offered for the other rule.

Under the proposals being considered for Albuquerque city elections, the races for individual offices would take up much—if not all—of a standard ballot by providing several columns to fit in the Ranked-Choice voting process. (Municipal elections history shows that some offices could conceivably have numerous columns—with voters having to rank as many as 8 or 9 candidates.)

So, the Ranked-Choice Voting process does not conserve ballot space, but instead adds significantly to the length of the ballot

IN SUMMARY

What both of these concepts—Ranked-Choice Voting and the “condensed” text for ballot questions—do have in common is a lack of true transparency.