Early voting for the August 16 primaries and special election to fill Alaska’s vacant congressional seat has begun. This means that for the first time Alaskans will use ranked choice voting and will vote in a nonpartisan top-four primary at the same time.

The special election is to fill the late Don Young’s seat in the US House for the remainder of the current term. RCV will be used to determine who is the preferred choice among a majority of voters in the three-person race between Democrat Mary Peltola and Republicans Sarah Palin and Nicholas Begich.

Nearly all of the most monumental and beneficial changes to political structures across the country have come at the behest of the people. From independent redistricting to anti-corruption measures, voters often take it upon themselves to fix a rigged political process. 

But what happens when the will of voters is stifled?

Can the partisan primary elections process be considered truly democratic? Not only do these elections often deny voters meaningful participation (if they are allowed to participate at all), but oftentimes the elections are decided by minority rule.

New analysis from the nonpartisan better elections group FairVote found that the winners of 55 statewide congressional and statewide primaries in 2022 so far garnered less than 50 percent of the vote. Nineteen of these elections were decided by less than a third of voters.