HB2004 refers to the people for approval a November 2024 ballot measure that would adopt ranked-choice voting for all state and federal elections.
The Senate passed HB2004 on June 25, 2023, by a vote of 17 to 8. We have assigned pluses to the nays because all attempts to enact ranked-choice voting should be opposed. This complicated, multiple-round, and unconstitutional method weakens election integrity by allowing a candidate to potentially win without genuine support from a plurality of voters. The scheme’s ballot casting procedures cause voter disenfranchisement by undermining each citizen’s right to vote and could deny them from being able to select the one and only candidate of their choice. In addition, the elections process in Oregon should be prescribed by the Legislative Assembly, and not be subject to popular vote via statewide ballot measure. Referrals directly to the people rely on a simple majority of voters to make statutory changes, making them insufficient safeguards from the “dangers of democracy” or “tyranny of the majority.” Article IV, Section 4, of the U.S. Constitution, expressly guarantees to “every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government,” which implies government limited to the ‘rule of law,’ as opposed to mere unchecked ‘majority rule.’