Electoral College critics push for popular vote
The system has twice this century vaulted the loser of the popular vote to the presidency.
SALEM, ORE. » When the Electoral College meets Monday, its detractors hope it marks the beginning of the end of a system that twice this century has vaulted the loser of the popular vote to the presidency.
This year’s presidential race provides the latest motivation for change to supporters of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. While Democrat Joe Biden scored a decisive win over President Donald Trump in both the popular vote and Electoral College, the race came down to narrow margins in a handful of swing states. If the results had turned out differently in some of those states, Trump could have lost the popular vote for the second election in a row but gained the presidency because of the Electoral College system.
“It’s an old, ugly mess that frankly should have been obviated some time ago,” said Virginia House of Delegates member Mark Levine, a Democrat who introduced a bill that would have Virginia sign on to the National Popular Vote movement. It would compel member states to award their electoral votes to the winner of the nationwide popular vote.
Levine’s measure passed the Virginia House earlier this year. Passage by the Senate would bring the movement 13 electoral votes closer to its goal. So far, 15 states and the District of Columbia have signed on.
For presidential candidates, 270 represents the number of Electoral College votes needed to secure a win. The move toward a national popular vote also is aiming for that magic number. It already has secured 196 and aims to gain more next year. Advocates hope, perhaps unrealistically, that it will be in place by the next presidential election in 2024.
Under the current system, each state’s electoral votes go to the candidate who won the popular vote in that state, with the runnerup getting nothing. Nebraska and Maine are the only exceptions.
National Popular Vote, the group pushing the compact, is focusing in 2021 on Virginia and eight other
states: Arizona, Arkansas, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, North Carolina and Oklahoma. The initiative has made progress in those states by passing at least one legislative chamber, but didn’t clear the finish line, spokesman Patrick Rosenstiel said.
They have a combined total of 88 electoral votes, enough to surpass 270.
“We’ll focus on any states that offer a credible chance of enactment between now and the 2024 presidential election,” Rosenstiel said.
Success in those states is far from assured. In the modern era, the Electoral College has benefited Republican candidates — George W. Bush in 2000 and Trump in 2016 won the presidency after losing the popular vote. Of the states targeted next year, Republicans will control both houses of the legislature in Arizona, Arkansas, Michigan, North Carolina and Oklahoma, and one chamber in Minnesota.