All moderator elections would do is let chuds stack the ballot. Look up shit like the sad puppies debacle.
The answer is that a site needs to decide what its rules are and then moderators need to enforce those rules, regardless of how the community feels. Which, ironically, is what ml is doing (even if they don’t publicize those rules). And if the community dislikes the rules, you disassociate with them.
The issue with the fediverse is that you need to defederate or else you are tacitly approving of their bullshit.