Trump wants Lisa Murkowski gone. A voting reform might save her.

The Alaska senator may escape the GOP base’s ire over her impeachment vote, thanks to a ballot measure ending partisan primaries. Advocates call it a model for alleviating polarization.

Donald Trump’s victory in Alaska in 2020 extended a half-century run for Republican presidential nominees in that state. But at the same time, Alaska’s voters also approved a ballot measure that is now complicating the defeated president’s revenge campaign against GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who voted to impeach Mr. Trump over the Jan. 6 invasion of the U.S. Capitol. 

The measure, which passed by a narrow margin, replaced party primaries in Alaska with a single open primary. The top four vote-getters will proceed to a November election with ranked choice voting, in which voters list candidates in order of preference for runoff rounds if none wins a majority.

Other states have adopted open primaries and ranked-choice elections, but Alaska is the first to combine them. Proponents say the reforms should boost politicians who work across party lines, since they no longer have to cater to their party’s base to win the primary. If adopted more widely, advocates say the system could serve as an antidote to partisan polarization and government gridlock.