What do you think is the biggest flaw in the election process (assuming it all goes fairly)?

32 comments

1. It isn’t one

2. Letting We The People vote on things. This is a fatal flaw and we should really stop doing it.

3. Gerrymandering.

   Although to me that speaks to the “it all goes fairly” aspect.

4. Other than gerrymandering? How most states are winner take all for the EC instead of proportional splits

5. Needing an address to vote or some other form of identity verification that costs money. It should be 100% accessible for people to vote. Never had an address? Walk into your social security office and grab a new card. Present that at election day.

6. The Electoral College. They make it so the “majority” of votes in a region equal 1 vote for the region either Democrat or Republican. What really ends up happening is, it seems anyway, they vote however they want and we just roll with it because how can we fight the people that vote for us?

7. Gerrymandering or the electoral college.

8. Dark money in elections using a variety of financial vehicles. The Citizens United decision was a body blow to democracy.

9. First-Past-the-Post is a bad voting system that exacerbates the 2-party problem, something like ranked choice would be much better to encourage new parties to grow without the spoiler effect.

   A more representative government instead of “winner takes all” would be nice. We could have coalitions of parties instead of just 2.

   The electoral college is just silly.

   Gerrymandering is awful in a lot of states, it’s bonkers to me that one party can just decide to draw the election borders however they want to boot opponents out of office and guarantee reelection.

10. When voters ask for the impossible they will only be served with liers.

11. The electoral college.

12. I don’t know of any voting system that can’t be corrupted by evil people.

13. [The financing.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC#:~:text=Opinion%20of%20the%20court,-Justice%20Kennedy%2C%20the&text=Five%20justices%20formed%20the%20majority,Amendment's%20protection%20of%20free%20speech.)

14. That it isn’t mandatory. It should be required by law punishable by fines to not vote.

15. So im not going to claim to know the intricacies of all the issues but I like to think I have a decent grasp.

    Gerrymandering comes to mind. Its crazy to me that electoral district boundaries can be manipulated to favor one party. It even worse when you consider whose usually negatively impacted by gerrymandering.

    I’m also not sure how I feel about the electoral college with regards to presidential elections. I understand the intent but my gripe is that it really ignores the will of the people. Aside from the fact your have some 500 electors ultimately choosing the president (although ill concede some, not all, states have laws saying they must vote for the candidates for whom they pledged to vote), you can have cases where the majority of Americans choose a candidate but they still loose the presidential election. That doesn’t make much sense to me. It also gives way to much power to a handful of swing states. I think i’d prefer some sort of ranked-choice voting above all else (although popular vote wouldn’t be the worst thing IMO). I think that would get us the candidate most acceptable to the most people.

    Another thing im not too fond of is the 2 party system. I really don’t love either party and its unfortunate those are really the only 2 options in US politics

16. Whatever the flaw is , you can be sure a lawyer caused it

17. The electoral college.

18. That candidates are not vetted and that much advertising is false and/or negative.

    Maybe just be honest and tell what actual good things you can bring to the job.

    Two party system in the U S is broken

19. The Primary system. Despite the hype for all of the candidates that run, you end up with (essentially) only two choices on the ballot. Even if you participate in your party’s primary, the later your state votes, the less power you have. The guy you like at this stage of the process (~12 months until Election Day) might already have lost by the time you vote in your state’s primary.

20. The biggest flaw is the absolute lack of information. There is no education or information provided on who and what we’re voting for, and 90% of the time I’m looking at names on a piece of paper that I’ve never heard of running for Treasurer of some obscure department or college. It makes the entire voting process a fucking tedious, miserable task and people wonder why others don’t want to vote.

    Also people basically bullying others into voting. If some 22 year old kid tries to get you to vote and you tell them that you’re going to vote for a candidate that they don’t support, they suddenly no longer want to help you vote lol

21. The way that primary selection works. Only registered party members can vote in primaries, so the nominee ends up being a representation of the right/left (generally the center of the party, neither extremists nor moderates, which is why Bernie Sanders lost twice, as well as why John Delaney never stood a chance in 2020) meaning that the presidency always oscillates between two radically different ideologies and we don’t really have coherent leadership. I personally agree much more with the far left, but I would rather always have a centrist government that makes incremental progress than this pendulum between a pretty decent progressive and a literal authoritarian demagogue who wants to end democracy as we know it.

    Also saying the two-party system sucks is nothing novel but it’s true. It’s the reason why people who want lower taxes end up voting for violent homophobes.

22. The rotten boroughs of the US Senate. A person living in Vermont has 50x the voting power of a Texan. That’s ridiculous.

23. Uninformed or misinformed people voting

24. Gerrymandered congressional districts would be my largest complaint. A state that goes around 51-48% in favor of one party in statewide elections ends up with 10-3 congressional advantage because of gerrymandered districts.

25. For presidential elections, at least: Electoral college. It basically means my vote doesn’t matter, since my vote goes to the red candidate no matter what. Same for any other non swing state. Independent or blue voters in my state are just thrown out the window, just like independent or red voters in, say, California.

    I get that it makes it so the winner isn’t just “whoever big city residents want” every single time. But there’s gotta be a way that doesn’t also tell millions of Americans “the votes of you and nearly everyone you know will *never* make a difference, no matter what”

26. Gerrymandering and the electoral college.

27. Two parties

28. First past the post is objectively the worst way to go about conducting a democratic process.

29. The 2 party aspect to it. People just vote for the lesser of 2 evils because they’re afraid to vote for a third party. This allows incredibly unpopular candidates to win. This is why I’m a big proponent of ranked choice voting.

30. People thinking they only have the options they are served up with.

31. The vote of an impulsive moron with no skin in the game has the same weight as someone reasonably intelligent who carefully evaluated what’s at stake and made an informed decision.

32. * The Electoral College goes against the very concept of democracy. It’s what the Framers intended, and openly at that. I would like to believe we would evolve past that by now.
    * Disenfranchisement of felons and ex-cons.