Former GOP Presidential Candidate Bill Weld Joins Mass. Ranked Choice Voting Campaign

BOSTON, MASS. - It looks like former GOP presidential candidate and Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld supports bringing ranked choice voting to the commonwealth. He is included on a list of  7 high-profile individuals named honorary co-chairs  of the “Yes on 2” campaign to adopt RCV for state elections.

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The campaign released the names of all of its honorary co-chairs Wednesday, which along with Weld include::

• Deval Patrick, former Massachusetts Governor and Founder and Chairman of TogetherFUND;
• Kerry Murphy Healey, former Massachusetts Lt. Governor and President of the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream;
• Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University and Director of Harvard’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics;
• Lawrence H. Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor, President Emeritus at Harvard University and former United States Treasury Secretary; and
• Steve Pagliuca, Co-Chairman of Bain Capital and Managing Partner of the Boston Celtics;
• Tanisha M. Sullivan, President of the NAACP Boston Branch
  

“The Yes on 2 campaign is honored to have the support of such tremendous leaders who Massachusetts voters know and respect and we cannot thank them enough,” said “Yes on 2” campaign manager Cara Brown McCormick.

“Our growing political divide is not destined to continue if we unify behind reforms like ranked choice voting that can help fix a broken system and bring us together.”

The campaign to bring RCV to Massachusetts elections was officially certified for the November ballot after a record-setting signature petition drive that included nearly 129,000 Massachusetts voters in total.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made signature gathering difficult for ballot initiative campaigns across the country. However, Voter Choice for Massachusetts 2020 was able to collect the signatures it needed thanks to a Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling that allowed the campaign to collect signatures electronically. 

The campaign credits the hard work of volunteers for collecting more than enough signatures to pave a path to the 2020 ballot.

“Our volunteers had a tall order collecting these signatures, especially in the second round, which fell right in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Brian Bass, Organizing Director for the campaign’s 2019 and 2020 signature drives. 

“Not only did our volunteers come through in the clutch, but countless others have worked to bring this much-needed reform to our Commonwealth for years, laying the groundwork for this historic accomplishment.”

“Never in the history of this country has an electronic signature drive put a citizen’s initiative on the ballot and without the quick and fair action of the Courts and Secretary Galvin in the face of a pandemic we may not be celebrating this success,” said McCormick, the campaign’s leader. 

“Based on the enthusiasm of volunteers and voters during the signature portion of this effort, I’m confident that Massachusetts voters will see the benefits of the RCV system in leveling the playing field for candidates and giving more voice, more choice, more power and more freedom to voters.”

The campaign says ranked choice voting is a common sense reform that will give voters more power in elections, and transform the democratic process so that the system is more functional and elected leaders are more accountable to the people, not special interests.