FairVote

FairVote is a 501(c)(3) organization and lobbying group in the United States. It was founded in 1992 as Citizens for Proportional Representation to support the implementation of proportional representation in American elections. Its focus changed over time to emphasize instant-runoff voting (IRV), a national popular vote, and universal voter registration. It changed its name to the Center for Voting and Democracy in 1993 and to FairVote in 2004.

FairVote was founded as Citizens for Proportional Representation (CPR) in 1992 in Cincinnati, Ohio, as the result of a merger of several smaller groups promoting proportional representation into a single, national advocacy group. Early leaders included Robert Richie as executive director, Matthew Cossolotto as president, and Steven Hill as western regional director. John Anderson was head of its national advisory board and in 1992 published a New York Times commentary advocating for IRV in presidential elections.

FairVote is headquartered in Silver Spring, Maryland.

In his New York Times profile of FairVote co-founder Steven Hill, Scott James called FairVote a "left-wing group". Other writers have claimed that many FairVote policies, such as IRV, are popular in "liberal enclaves" and supported by "populist groups" such as Common Cause, an advocacy organization, and thus give the group a liberal tilt. Louis Jacobson, a writer for Roll Call, argued that any group supporting the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact would be perceived as liberal-leaning because of Democratic frustration with the Electoral College after the 2000 US presidential election.

FairVote co-founder Rob Richie claimed the group "is definitely not a Democratic stalking horse", arguing that John B. Anderson, the former head of their national advisory board, had been a Republican in the 1970s (prior to his 1980 run as an independent and his later support for Ralph Nader's campaign).

FairVote advocates for the use of ranked choice voting (IRV) in American elections. Specifically, it advocates for the instant-runoff form of RCV in single-winner elections and the single transferable vote for multi-winner elections. Under all forms of IRV, voters rank candidates in order of preference, in contrast to the more widely used plurality voting system. FairVote supports the Fair Representation Act, which would enact a single transferable vote system for U.S. House elections and an instant runoff voting system for U.S. Senate elections.

In 2002, FairVote backed a San Francisco ballot initiative amending Section 13.102 of the city charter to allow IRV in local elections. The city began using IRV to elect local officials on November 2, 2004. Subsequent ballot initiatives supported by FairVote have allowed the use of IRV in cities including Minneapolis, Oakland, Portland, Seattle, New York City, and Santa Fe.

FairVote has advocated for the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, an agreement among states and the District of Columbia to award their electoral votes to the candidate with the highest popular vote total in all 50 states and D.C. New York Assemblyman Fred Thiele said he first proposed New York's entrance into the compact after FairVote approached him.