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BV11 — full & equal support (5,5) counted as abstentions

Method: STAR (single winner) · 1 seat · Expected winner: Ann · full count →

▶ Live on BetterVoting: vote · results ↗ (election 6xhfp8) · issue Equal-Vote/bettervoting#1053

Three voters each give both candidates the maximum score (5,5) — full, equal support. A valid STAR ballot. BetterVoting counts every one of them as an abstention.

What it teaches

  1. Full equal support is a cast vote, not an abstention. Each 5,5 contributes 5 to both candidates in the scoring round. BetterVoting's policy (#884) treats any all-equal ballot as an abstention, so it reports nTallyVotes = 0, nAbstentions = 3, and the submit dialog warns "Abstained / No preference" on a full-support ballot (#1053).
  2. Yet a winner is still declared off zero tallied votes — BetterVoting elects Ann.
  3. LH diverges. It counts all three as real votes (Ann 15, Bob 15), making it a genuine tie, resolved to Ann by lot (CSV column order). Same winner, opposite reasoning: BetterVoting says "everyone abstained," LH says "everyone tied." LH matches the view that full equal support is a real vote — the #884 dispute.

The ballots

The ballots as marked — the filled bubble is the score given, and the score is the number in its column:

# Ballot as marked Ann Bob
1 A 0–5 STAR ballot — Voter 1: Ann 5, Bob 5. 5 5
2 A 0–5 STAR ballot — Voter 2: Ann 5, Bob 5. 5 5
3 A 0–5 STAR ballot — Voter 3: Ann 5, Bob 5. 5 5

Every bubble that could be filled is filled — maximum support, three times over.

The result

Ann is elected — but as a tie broken by lot (Ann 15 = Bob 15), not off zero votes.

--- STAR Voting Method (single winner) ---

[STAR Voting]
 Tabulating 3 ballots.
Count × Ann,Bob
    3 ×   5,  5

[STAR Voting: Scoring Round]
 The two highest-scoring candidates advance to the next round.
   Ann           -- 15 -- First place
   Bob           -- 15 -- Second place
 Ann and Bob advance.

[STAR Voting: Automatic Runoff Round]
 The candidate preferred in the most head-to-head matchups wins.
   Ann           -- 0 -- Tied for first place
   Bob           -- 0 -- Tied for first place
   Equal Support -- 3
 There's a two-way tie for first.

[STAR Voting: Automatic Runoff Round: First tiebreaker]
 The highest-scoring candidate wins.
   Ann           -- 15 -- Tied for first place
   Bob           -- 15 -- Tied for first place
 There's still a two-way tie for first.

[STAR Voting: Automatic Runoff Round: Second tiebreaker]
 The candidate with the most votes of score 5 wins.
   Ann           -- 3 -- Tied for first place
   Bob           -- 3 -- Tied for first place
 There's still a two-way tie for first.

*** No official tie-breaking lot numbers were provided.
    Ties are resolved using a fallback order: CSV column order.
    Lot-number priority order: ['Ann', 'Bob']

[Tiebreaker: Lot Number Priority]
  Tie among: ['Ann', 'Bob']
  Resolved: ['Ann'] (selected by lot-number priority).

[Lot-decided tie — rare]
  ⚠ The ballots did not break this tie: the deterministic rungs
    (pairwise / score, then five-star) all came back equal, so the
    pre-published LOT order chose among the tied candidates — the
    result here was set by lot, not by the votes. Usually the
    "dead rung": no tied candidate held a score-5 vote (five-star
    counts fives, not fours). Verify the tied candidates' 5-counts.

[STAR Voting: Winner — STAR Voting Method (single winner)]
 Ann

BetterVoting result: elected: ["Ann"], nTallyVotes: 0, nAbstentions: 3.

Full engine detail: bv11_6xhfp8_full_equal_support_tabulated.txt · source .yaml. Part of the BV abstain issue index.