My understanding is ranked choice only applies to NYC primary and special elections. General elections are not ranked choice, which I believe the final mayoral to be.
Probably the idea was that people aren’t familiar with it and wouldn’t have approved a general election ballot measure when RCV was voted on, so they did the “lower stakes” elections to get everyone comfortable with it first.
Ranked choice voting makes it a lot harder to be a spoiler.
My understanding is ranked choice only applies to NYC primary and special elections. General elections are not ranked choice, which I believe the final mayoral to be.
So then why even bother to RCV if some asshat can continue to run after losing?
Probably the idea was that people aren’t familiar with it and wouldn’t have approved a general election ballot measure when RCV was voted on, so they did the “lower stakes” elections to get everyone comfortable with it first.