D.C. heads into its first ranked-choice general election with six weeks to go and uneven voter awareness

Six weeks from now, every D.C. voter who shows up to choose the city's next mayor will face a ballot unlike any they have seen before. Instead of filling in one oval and going home, they can rank up to five candidates in order of preference. If no one clears a majority of first-choice votes, the lowest-finishing candidate gets eliminated and those ballots transfer to their next-ranked pick. The rounds continue until someone crosses 50 percent.

That is how ranked-choice voting works. Whether most D.C. residents know that yet is a different question.

On September 24, the D.C. Board of Elections is running two street-level outreach events to try to close the gap: one at 3531 Georgia Avenue NW starting at 10 a.m. and a second at 475 School Street SW at 11 a.m. The DCBOE's voter education push has included stops across the city through late September, with events hitting neighborhoods from Southeast to Northwest. The agency began pre-election logic-and-accuracy testing of voting equipment on September 14, according to its newsroom. DCBOE has also issued reminders to military and overseas voters to prepare for the November 3 general election.

The stakes of getting this right are high. Incumbent Mayor Muriel Bowser is retiring after three consecutive four-year terms, making November 3 an open-seat contest. Janeese Lewis George, who won the Democratic nomination, will face Robert L. Gross of the DC Statehood Green Party in what is the first D.C. mayoral election to use ranked-choice voting, following the approval of Initiative 83 in 2024. Seven of the thirteen seats on the D.C. Council are also on the November ballot.

How D.C. got here

Initiative 83, which D.C. voters approved in 2024, permits ranked-choice voting and opens primary elections to voters registered as unaffiliated, a group that had been shut out of closed primaries. The initiative passed 72.89 percent in favor to 27.11 percent against.

That mandate did not translate into a smooth implementation. Although voters approved RCV by a supermajority, Mayor Bowser did not allocate funding to implement it in her budget. The council added the money at the last minute, and funds did not reach the elections board until October 1 of the prior fiscal year. That compressed timeline left DCBOE scrambling to build its education infrastructure from scratch.

Beginning with the June 2026 Primary Election, ranked-choice voting was used in eligible contests with three or more candidates. The November general election will be the first council election to use ranked-choice voting following the implementation of Initiative 83. The primary gave the city a dry run. The general is the main event, and it comes with a much higher-profile open seat at the top of the ticket.

Under the system, the process continues until a single candidate receives a majority of votes. For a general-election contest for at-large Council members, where two winners are declared, each ballot counts as one vote for the highest-ranked candidate on that ballot. The at-large Council races add a wrinkle specific to D.C., because two winners emerge from a single pool of votes counted in a different way than the majority-threshold races for mayor, attorney general, and ward council seats.

The awareness problem

Here is the blunt reality: awareness of how ranked-choice voting actually works has been uneven across the city, and the communities with the least political infrastructure tend to be the ones where confusion runs deepest.

Ward 7 Councilmember Wendell Felder, one of the chief proponents of RCV on the council, has said: "If our residents cannot understand ranked-choice voting or correctly use the ballot... then their votes may be cast but their voices will not be counted."

Patricia Stamper, an advisory neighborhood commissioner in Deanwood who supports the new system, has been running informal voter education sessions in Ward 7. Her approach is tactile. At a meeting late last month, she asked the audience to name their favorite go-go bands, then asked for a top three. "They gave them to me," she recalled, "and I said, 'That's ranked-choice voting.'"

The method works for people already in the room. The problem is the people not in the room. Stamper acknowledges that the change in how votes are cast and counted may confuse voters, and that confusion could prompt criticism that voters, especially minority voters, are being disenfranchised.

Election officials say they expect a learning curve. Voters may want to allow more time at the polls, because ranking candidates takes more time than selecting a single preferred winner. It may also take longer for officials to provide results, since votes are counted in rounds and mail-in ballots are valid if received up to ten days after election day.

That last point matters for D.C. newsrooms and candidates alike. Election night will not end with a winner in every race. Anyone expecting a clear mayor-elect by midnight on November 3 should adjust their expectations.

What DCBOE is doing about it

The Board of Elections has launched outreach across the city, including frequent information sessions. In March alone, officials scheduled events on most days of the month, both in person and online. That pace has continued through the fall. The DCBOE events on Georgia Avenue and School Street today are two of dozens the agency has held since September alone, covering addresses from Alabama Avenue SE to Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE to 14th Street NW.

Voters can also practice ranked-choice voting in person at DCBOE's office by calling (202) 727-2525 to schedule an appointment. Community groups have filled some gaps as well. The Anacostia Coordinating Council, for instance, hosted sessions at its monthly meetings at Martha's Table on Elvans Road.

DCBOE is tasked with implementing ranked-choice voting for each primary, special, and general election involving three or more qualified candidates for a long list of offices, including mayor, attorney general, council chair, State Board of Education, U.S. senator, U.S. representative, and advisory neighborhood commissioner. That covers virtually every race on the November 3 ballot.

During the 2026 election cycle, the board's goal is to recruit and train approximately 2,000 election workers. Ballot printing, tabulation, and the actual mechanics of counting rounds are handled by existing vendors: K&H Mail House handles ballot printing, and ES&S supplies the voting and tabulation equipment.

The fiscal deadline running in parallel

The November ballot does not exist in isolation. The D.C. Council is simultaneously sprinting through a packed fall legislative session with its own deadline pressure. The upcoming September quarterly revenue estimate, due by September 30, will be closely watched. The FY 2027 Budget Support Act directs that the first $150 million of any FY 2026 revenue increase identified in the September or December forecasts be used to replenish District reserves, which signals how tight the fiscal environment remains.

Councilmember Brianne Nadeau introduced legislation in July that would impose a surtax on passive income, including capital gains, for District households earning over $500,000 per year, and additional revenue-raising proposals are expected to surface during the fall hearings. Whether those hearings generate real votes before the November election, or whether lame-duck dynamics slow everything down as the incoming Council composition takes shape, is an open question in John A. Wilson Building hallways right now.

Businesses and high-income stakeholders are being urged to monitor the surveillance pricing bill and the fall tax hearings, as well as the September OCFO revenue estimate, which will signal whether additional revenue raisers are on the horizon.

The procurement reform bill, B26-0594, is moving through committee at the same time. That bill could reshape how the District manages contract modifications, evaluation panels, and the supply schedule, a set of changes that affects every government contractor doing business with the city.

The Council reconstitution factor

For anyone watching D.C. government past November 3, the composition of the next Council matters as much as who wins the mayor's race. Clients and advocacy groups are being advised to prepare for a significantly reconstituted Council in 2027 and to begin early engagement with incoming members and their staff.

That reconstitution includes at least one seat already changed by this year's unusual political events. The special election held June 16 filled an at-large seat after the resignation of Kenyan McDuffie, with former councilmember Elissa Silverman winning with 55.32 percent of the vote, defeating interim councilmember Doni Crawford, who had been appointed following McDuffie's departure. That race was also tabulated under ranked-choice rules.

The November 3 general will be bigger, messier, and watched far more closely. A new mayor, potentially new ward and at-large council members, and results that may take days to finalize. D.C. residents who want to shape those outcomes have until October 13 to register, according to DCBOE's published calendar for the general election.

What D.C. Residents Should Watch

• September 30: The Office of the Chief Financial Officer releases its quarterly revenue estimate. The number determines whether the Council has room to fund new programs or faces another round of cuts. Any figure that falls short of projections will accelerate the fall tax debate.
• October 13: Last day to register to vote for the November 3 general election, per the DCBOE election calendar.
• November 3: Election day. Ranked-choice counting means results for close races may not be final for several days after polls close. Watch for the DCBOE's tabulation updates at electionresults.dcboe.org.
• The procurement reform bill B26-0594: Committee hearings continue this fall. Any contractor or vendor doing business with the District should track its progress at lims.dccouncil.gov.
• Nadeau's passive income surtax proposal: If the September revenue estimate comes in below projections, expect this bill to gain momentum quickly as the Council looks for ways to close a gap before the fiscal year ends.
• DCBOE outreach events: If you are not sure how to fill out a ranked-choice ballot, the board still has events scheduled through October. The full list is at dcboe.org/events. You can also call (202) 727-2525 to practice in person at the DCBOE office.

Sources:

• DCBOE: Ranked Choice Voting in DC
• DCBOE: Home / Events calendar
• The 51st: Is D.C. ready for ranked-choice voting?
• Hill Rag: The ABCs of Ranked-Choice Voting
• Washington Informer: D.C.'s New Voting System
• ArentFox Schiff: DC Council Returns From Summer Recess
• DCBOE 2026 Performance Oversight Testimony (DC Council)
• Mayor Bowser Newsroom, mayor.dc.gov
• Wikipedia: 2026 Washington, D.C., mayoral election