How are ranked choice votes counted for Portland's mayor, city council races?
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Oregon's first foray into ranked-choice voting is now underway with the City of Portland's mayoral and city council races, but just how does it all work?
Though business owner Keith Wilson has the finish line in his sights to become Portland's next mayor, it's not quite a done deal.
Wilson came in as a political outsider but the trucking company owner is now on track to potentially pulling off a surprise win.
With ranked-choice voting in play, the only candidate with a chance to overtake him is Portland City Commissioner Carmen Rubio — but even that is a long shot.
The first preliminary results released Tuesday evening show Wilson leading Rubio 63% to 37%. That's an advantage favoring Wilson by nearly 37,000 votes.
However, with nearly half the outstanding votes left to be counted, the numbers could change significantly before Wilson can be declared the winner.
"It's going to take a couple days but it is a good solid lead... something we're very proud about, we're very proud about that right now," Wilson said.
Wilson's potential victory is a surprise for many who saw the three current city commissioners running for mayor as the frontrunners to replace Ted Wheeler. On Tuesday night, Commissioner Rene Gonzalez did not concede but seemed to see the writing on the wall.
"We've got some wounds we've got to lick a little bit and we're going to see how the votes come in over the next two days," Gonzalez said. "But please stay engaged in the process… and thank you for being here tonight."
So when will we know if Wilson is indeed Portland's next mayor? Wilson needs 50%+1 of the total vote count to be declared the winner.
In ranked-choice voting, last-place candidates are eliminated round by round. If a voter ranked that person 1st, that voter's 2nd-6th place choices are apportioned to the candidates that remain. The process continues until a candidate reaches the 50% threshold, with all the outstanding votes counted.
Multnomah County Elections Director Tim Scott said the complicated counting process for ranked choice votes is why "there will be as many rounds as it takes for one candidate to reach the threshold for election and all of those rounds will be shown in each preliminary results report."
So even though Wilson has 63% of the votes counted in the first preliminary results, he needs to stay above the 50% threshold once all the votes are counted.
"So I say, let's just step back... give them the time and the space to do the job, check it twice, and then hopefully they deliver results in our favor," Wilson said.
More ranked choice voting results for Portland mayor and city council races are expected to drop at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 6.