Ranked-choice voting; application; procedure
HRS §11-100
in effect11-100. Ranked-choice voting; application; procedure
(a) Any federal election not held on the date of a regularly scheduled primary or general election and any special election for a vacant seat on a county council shall be conducted by ranked-choice voting.
(b) Except as provided in subsections (c) and
(d), the following procedures shall be used to determine the winner of an
election conducted by ranked-choice voting:
(1) Tabulation of votes shall proceed in rounds;
(2) In each round, the number of votes for each
continuing candidate shall be counted, with each continuing ballot counting as
one vote for its highest-ranked continuing candidate for that round;
(3) Inactive ballots shall not be counted for any
continuing candidate; and
(4) The round shall end with one of two potential
outcomes:
(A) If there are two or fewer continuing
candidates, the candidate with the most votes shall be declared the winner of
the election; or
(B) If there are more than two continuing
candidates, the last-place candidate shall be defeated and a new round shall
begin.
(c) A tie under this section between
candidates for the most votes in the final round or a tie between last-place
candidates in any round shall be decided by lot, and the candidate chosen by
lot shall be:
(1) Declared the winner if the tie is between
candidates for the most votes in the final round; or
(2) Defeated if the tie is between last-place
candidates in any round.
(d) The office of elections may modify a
ranked-choice voting ballot and tabulation; provided that:
(1) The number of allowable rankings shall be limited
to no fewer than six candidates; and
(2) Two or more candidates may be defeated
simultaneously by batch elimination in any round of tabulation.
(e) For the purposes of this section:
"Batch elimination" means the
simultaneous defeat of multiple candidates for whom it is mathematically
impossible to be elected.
"Continuing ballot" means a ballot
that is not an inactive ballot.
"Continuing candidate" means a
candidate who has not been defeated.
"Highest continuing ranking" means
the highest ranking on a voter's ballot for a continuing candidate.
"Inactive ballot" means a ballot that
does not rank any continuing candidate, contains an overvote at the highest
continuing ranking, or contains two or more sequential skipped rankings before
its highest continuing ranking.
"Last-place candidate" means the
candidate with the fewest votes in a round of ranked-choice voting tabulation.
"Mathematically impossible to be elected",
with respect to a candidate, means that:
(1) The candidate cannot be elected because the
candidate's vote total in a round of the ranked-choice voting tabulation, plus
all votes that could possibly be transferred to the candidate in future rounds
from candidates with an equal or lower number of votes, would not be enough to
surpass the candidate with the next-higher vote total in the round; or
(2) The candidate has a lower vote total than a
candidate described in paragraph (1).
"Overvote" means a circumstance in
which a voter has ranked more than one candidate at the same ranking on a
ballot.
"Ranked-choice voting" means the
method of casting and tabulating votes in which voters rank candidates in order
of preference, tabulation proceeds in sequential rounds in which last-place
candidates are defeated, and the candidate with the most votes in the final
round is elected.
"Ranking" means the number assigned
on a ballot by a voter to a candidate to express the voter's preference for
that candidate, in which the lowest number is the highest ranking, and the
highest number is the lowest ranking.
"Round" means an instance of the
sequence of voting tabulation steps established in subsection (b).
"Skipped ranking" means a
circumstance in which a voter has left a ranking blank and ranks a candidate at
a subsequent ranking.
[L 2022, c 47, §2]
Source: Hawaii State Legislature (capitol.hawaii.gov), via Internet Archive capturesURL: http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/hrscurrent/Vol01_Ch0001-0042F/HRS0011/HRS_0011-0100.htmFetched: 11/10/2026