Maine Democratic Governor Primary Heads to 50% Ranked-Choice Runoff

Q: Whose supporters will decide the election: the front-runner's or the candidate who was just eliminated?

The decisive voters are usually the supporters of the candidate who was just eliminated, not the initial front-runner. In Maine’s ranked-choice primary, a candidate wins only by clearing 50 percent. If no one does that on the first count, the last-place finisher is removed and those ballots are reassigned to each voter’s next-ranked choice. That means the front-runner keeps the votes already won, but the race is often settled by where eliminated candidates’ supporters go next. In this contest, Angus King III was projected to finish last and be eliminated first, so his voters’ second choices will immediately matter. As additional lower-placed candidates are removed in later rounds, their supporters may become even more important, especially if the top four remain closely grouped. That is why ranked-choice systems change campaign strategy. Candidates are not only competing for first-choice votes; they are also trying to become acceptable second or third choices. The Maine race reflected that dynamic, with candidates stressing shared priorities such as health care and housing and often avoiding harsh attacks. The front-runner’s supporters decide the election only if that candidate already has a majority. Since The Associated Press projected that no one would reach that threshold on the initial count, the outcome will depend on transferred votes from eliminated candidates’ supporters.

Q: Why does Maine use a voting system for its primary that's banned for its general election?

Maine uses ranked-choice voting in gubernatorial primaries because state law allows it there, but the state constitution bars it in general elections for governor and the Legislature. The key difference is legal, not practical. Primaries are nomination contests governed mainly by statute, so Maine can use ranked-choice voting to ensure a nominee wins majority support after successive rounds of counting. That is why this year’s Democratic primary can go to additional tabulation when no candidate clears 50 percent on the first count. General elections for governor, state senator and state representative are different because the Maine Constitution sets the rules. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court said in 2017, and reaffirmed in 2026, that those constitutional provisions require winners to be chosen by a “plurality of all votes returned,” which the justices interpret as the result of a single tally, not multiple rounds of elimination and redistribution. The court also pointed to the constitution’s detailed language on how votes are sorted, counted and declared by local officials. In the court’s view, ranked-choice voting changes that process by turning one ballot into a sequence of preferences that must be retabulated centrally until someone passes 50 percent. So Maine’s split system exists because ranked-choice voting is lawful for primaries and federal elections, but not for state general elections unless the constitution is amended.

3 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Jun 10

No Democrat cleared 50% in Maine’s gubernatorial primary, sending the contest into the state’s ranked-choice tabulation process.
Four candidates remain in contention — Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, former state senator Troy Jackson, former state representative Hannah Pingree and ex-COVID response chief Nirav Shah.
Angus King III, the businessman son of Senator Angus King, was projected to finish last and will be eliminated first as lower-ranked candidates’ votes are redistributed in successive rounds.
Election officials are expected to confirm the winner in coming weeks after the instant-runoff count in a race where the five Democrats largely shared policy goals on health care, housing and working-class issues.