Voters Love Ranked Choice Voting: 78% of Votes Ranked More than 1 Candidate in 2025 Mayoral Primary

NEW YORK, NY (07/24/2025) (readMedia)-- Today, FairVote and Common Cause/NY released findings from the 2025 certified election results that show that voters across New York took advantage of ranked choice voting. In June, over 1 million New Yorkers ranked their choices for Mayor, City Council, and Borough President. It was the second time voters used it in Mayoral elections.

Key data findings from the Democratic mayoral primary include:

• 78% of voters ranked multiple candidates.
  • On average, voters ranked 3.5 candidates. 48% used all five rankings on their ballot.
• 80% of voters ranked Mamdani or Cuomo first, but 95% of voters expressed a preference between Mamdani and Cuomo – meaning RCV led to a 15-point increase in the number of voters who helped decide the winner. This represents 159,619 New York voters.
• Voters largely followed candidate cues, including cross-endorsements between Zohran Mamdani and both Brad Lander and Michael Blake; the active "DREAM" campaign that encouraged voters to rank several candidates other than Andrew Cuomo; and Andrew Cuomo's frontrunner status and lack of an RCV campaign strategy.
  • 92% of voters who ranked a candidate other than Mamdani or Cuomo first ranked at least one other candidate.
  • 91% of voters who ranked Mamdani first ranked at least one other candidate.
  • 55% of voters who ranked Cuomo first ranked at least one other candidate.
• The "DREAM" campaign and Working Families Party encouraged voters to rank Mamdani, Lander, Adrienne Adams, and Zellnor Myrie. This campaign also added Michael Blake to its slate in the days before the election. The campaign specifically discouraged voters from ranking Andrew Cuomo.
  • 70% of voters who ranked Lander, Adams, Myrie, or Blake first had their vote count for Mamdani in the final round, compared to 30% for Cuomo.
  • Of voters who ranked Brad Lander first, 75% went to Mamdani and 25% went to Cuomo. When Lander was eliminated in the RCV tabulation, 73% of those votes went to Mamdani. (Both of these bullet points exclude inactive ballots.)
• In State Assembly Districts that voted more heavily for Cuomo, there was a significantly higher share of voters who ranked only one candidate.
  • When analyzing demographic variables, race and income were not significant indicators for using multiple rankings.

Read the rest of the data here.

"The data is clear: voters and candidates successfully took advantage of Ranked Choice Voting, which is designed to yield consensus majority winners and broad buy-in from all New Yorkers. 78% of voters ranked two or more candidates, showing that voters not only understood the voting system, but took advantage of it. Candidates worked together, built broad coalitions, and expanded their outreach beyond their immediate base - and the voters benefited. That's a huge victory for everyone," said Susan Lerner, Executive Director of Common Cause/NY.

"Ranked choice voting gives voters more choice and more power, and this new data shows how New Yorkers are benefiting," said Meredith Sumpter, president and CEO of FairVote, a nonpartisan organization seeking better elections. "A supermajority of voters ranked candidates. Candidates built coalitions and campaigned together – and this new data shows how that's a winning strategy to win majority support. The nation's largest city is a model for our nation on how RCV can improve our politics and elections to better serve voters."

Ranked choice voting

In 2019, Common Cause/NY led the campaign to bring Rank Choice Voting to New York City, and voters overwhelmingly approved the ballot measure, adopting it by a margin of nearly 3-1. Since 2021, all New York City primaries and special elections for Mayor, Comptroller, Public Advocate, Borough President and City Council use ranked choice voting.

This year, ranked choice voting empowered voters just as Common Cause New York hoped it would. New exit polling from Common Cause New York and FairVote showed that nearly all voters (96%) said their ballot was simple to complete, and that the vast majority of voters were enthusiastic about the experience. Voters were also more engaged and informed, with 81% saying they understand RCV extremely or very well. More than three quarters of respondents said they want to keep or expand RCV for future elections.

According to data from the Board of Elections, 95% of all voters in the Democratic primary chose one of the final two candidates for Mayor - a huge improvement over the old plurality system that allowed a Mayor to be elected without a majority of the vote. Voters also elected a primary winner with more votes than any previous election since 1989. RCV forced campaigns to expand beyond their immediate base and canvas voters often ignored by politicians - and who turned out in this year's elections.