You could have a voice in empowering a larger political spectrum in the future if a bipartisan coalition of Wisconsin voters gets its way. United Wisconsin co-chairperson Dale Schultz is leading the charge to reintroduce fusion voting to the ballot, taking his case to the Dane County Circuit Court. Fusion voting allows multiple political parties to nominate the same candidate, allowing them to pool votes on the same ballot. Wisconsin used to have it in place, but the practice was banned more than 130 years ago. Currently, only the states of New York and Connecticut allow it. Schultz, a former Republican legislator in Wisconsin, told WMTV that the state needs to find a new way forward, adding that empowering independents and smaller third parties would put “a little democracy back in our democracy.” Common Cause Wisconsin Executive Director Jay Heck remembers fusion voting during his time living in New York, recalling a time when a conservative candidate beat out a Democratic and Republican candidate in a U.S. Senate race during the 1970s. He believes there is some merit to the idea.

While Heck says the process would likely need some time to grow through education and pilot programs, critics are against it. Republican Party of Wisconsin spokesperson Anika Rickard said in a statement that fusion voting would confuse voters and create “an election integrity nightmare,” adding that “voters deserve to be free of deception” and “not be manipulated into voting for a major party candidate masquerading as an independent.” Fusion voting is different from ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to arrange their preferred candidates in order of preference rather than choosing one. Candidates with the fewest votes get eliminated, and their votes are redistributed to other candidates until one candidate has the majority of them.