While most of the attention in this year's midterms has been on Senate and House races, there is another important contest that I'll also be watching Election Day. Alaska will be voting (for the third time in the last six years) on what sort of elections system the voters prefer. And I for one think it would be a shame if an initiative on the ballot there -- which would change the elections system back to how it was before it was reformed in 2020 -- winds up winning. I say this because I have been a big fan of the reforms they did manage to institute, so I sincerely hope Alaska voters will retain their current system.

I wrote about the new system back in 2022, when it was first put to the test (in a special House election to replace Representative Don Young, who had died unexpectedly while in office). The title of my article was "Alaska's Goldilocks Ballot Reforms," which gave an indication of how I felt about it. It truly was an elegant and workable compromise between two competing ideas for ballot reform: ranked-choice voting and the "jungle" primary.

You can read that previous article for more details on these two election systems, but the short version is that Alaska now holds a top-four jungle primary, which is followed by a ranked-choice general election (between the top four candidates who emerged from the nonpartisan open primary). I called it "Goldilocks," because by implementing this hybrid version of elections reform they managed to get the best of both worlds and avoided the worst of either of them.

Unlike other states (California among them) which have instituted top-two jungle primaries, with the top four candidates advancing to the general election, it is a lot harder to game the system. In California, there are often dirty-tricks tactics used by (just for example) a leading Democratic candidate who would much prefer running in the general election against a Republican rather than a fellow Democrat. With California's electorate (split roughly 60-40 between Democratic voters and Republicans), this almost guarantees victory in the general election. But with the top four candidates advancing, such political gamesmanship is a lot harder to pull off. It's not impossible, but it is significantly harder to accomplish.

Then in the general election, there are only four candidates, which means a possibility of only three rounds of vote-tallying (until one candidate emerges with enough votes for a 50-percent-plus-one simple majority). This avoids the problem ranked-choice voting systems in other states run into, with (at times) seemingly endless re-tallying (because there are so many candidates on the ballot). In other words, not too hot, not too cold, but instead just right. The Goldilocks of elections!

But now once again (this has been tried before and failed) the new system is back on the ballot for the voters to decide whether to keep it or to go back to the old system (with closed partisan primaries and no ranked-choice general elections). And you can tell by who is funding the effort how annoying it is to hardcore partisans:

The effort to go back to partisan primaries is attracting heavy spending from outside of the state. Elon Musk and Jeff Yass, some of the most prolific Republican donors in the country, each have donated generously to Aurora Action Network, a Wisconsin-based PAC that is supporting the repeal campaign. Musk gave $1.5 million, and Yass gave [$]675,000, according to Federal Election Commission filings.

Alaska is a rather unique state, when it comes to partisan politics. But this actually pre-dates the elections reforms they passed four years ago. The legislature is currently controlled by neither Republicans nor Democrats but instead a coalition of the two:

Not having to worry about the threat of partisan primaries has allowed the state's robust political culture of bipartisanship to flourish, said Alaska's Senate president, Gary Stevens (R). Alaska is governed by a bipartisan caucus of moderates in both the state House and the Senate. The caucus has been able to muscle through enough votes for legislation at odds with Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R), including to increase funding for the state's troubled public schools.

"Everyone in my caucus knew that you couldn't do far-right crazy stuff. You couldn't do far-left crazy stuff. You had to be in the middle," Stevens said.

That kind of comity is necessary in a state such as Alaska, where state resources are vital for isolated communities to survive harsh conditions, said Scott Kendall, an attorney who wrote the 2020 ballot measure creating the current primary system. More than 80 percent of the state's communities are not connected to the North American road network, and state funds subsidize transport, medicine, food and shelter.

"There's not a Republican or Democratic way to plow the streets," Kendall said.

But this bipartisan coalition legislature majority was put in place in the 2016 elections -- six full years before the reforms took place. The fact that it still survives intact is evidence that the reforms themselves weren't as radical as opponents claimed (and are still claiming) they were going to be.

As mentioned, the top-four jungle primary system is still open to some partisan gamesmanship, as the parties vie for advantages in the general election:

[State Representative Jonathan] Kreiss-Tomkins could benefit from Alaska's unique system in his run for governor, despite the state not electing a Democratic governor since 1998. He is up against three Republican candidates, which could splinter the GOP vote.

Though ranked-choice voting is meant to prevent a "triangular firing squad" dividing the Republican vote, state Sen. Forrest Dunbar (D) said many Republican voters are still inclined to vote for only their preferred candidate and not rank anyone else. That could boost Kreiss-Tomkins.

Kreiss-Tomkins secured the sole Democratic nomination after the other Democratic candidate who advanced out of the primary, former state Sen. Tom Begich, dropped out of the running to consolidate the Democratic ticket. The move frustrated Republicans and opponents of Alaska's system, saying it was an example of Democrats gaming the system.

There are also two candidates who will appear on the general election ballot for the Senate race who are both named "Dan Sullivan" -- the incumbent Republican senator and what seems to be a gadfly candidate who happens to share the same name (their middle names are different, and middle initials will be included on the ballot). This is also seen as gaming the system by the Republicans, and it's easy to understand why they're upset.

Still, no elections system is perfect. And it's a lot more complicated to try gaming the system with the hybrid "Goldilocks" system Alaska now has. Most of the money boosting the repeal effort is from out of state, which matters a great deal to Alaska voters (who are fiercely independent). That political action committee mentioned is based in Wisconsin, after all.

I have no idea what the chances are for the "repeal the reforms" ballot measure -- Alaska is notoriously hard for pollsters to get accurate numbers, and oftentimes the polls turn out to be wildly wrong.

But I hope that Alaska voters (as they already have -- as noted, this is not the first repeal effort attempted) decide to stick with the system that they've got. In fact, I fervently hope that a few other states adopt the same system, because it truly does seem to be the best of two separate ideas for elections reform.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant