In the United States, the president is not elected by popular vote. Instead, the president is elected when a candidate secures 270 Electoral College votes during the presidential election. While this process is somewhat tied to popular votes in each state, it’s possible for candidates to receive more votes on a national level and still lose the election.
This happened with Al Gore in 2000 and with Hillary Clinton in 2016, both of whom secured the popular vote without managing to cross that 270-vote threshold.
A state offers a number of Electoral votes based on the number of lawmakers it sends to Congress. So, that’s the number of Representatives they have in the House, plus two for their two Senate seats. Large states like California and Texas offer huge heaps of votes, while smaller states might only offer eight or nine votes.
This causes outsized attention to be paid to states with unusually high numbers of electors: Pennsylvania, for instance, is a swing state that rewards 20 college votes, a huge prize for any candidate.
Why Does the Electoral College Exist?
The Electoral College represents something of a compromise reached by the Framers of the Constitution. Some members of the Continental Congress wanted Congressional leaders to choose the president, sidestepping the whims of the masses and deferring to expert lawmaker opinions.
Others saw this as a potential way to open up tyrannical tendencies, and instead proposed direct elections with the popular vote deciding who won.
This issue finally led to the creation of the Electoral College as a middle ground between the two ideas. While the popular vote would matter in each state, the guaranteed three Electoral College votes given to even the smallest states allowed for delegates from states in New England to be more comfortable signing off on the compromise.
Could it be Changed?
Many reform activists have called for the Electoral College to be done away with in favor of a direct popular vote for president. However, to change the process would require an amendment to the Constitution.
Such a move would be difficult when many states benefit greatly from the current system. Smaller states with more rural populations have an outsized influence on the outcome of presidential elections compared to people who live in very populous states like California and New York.
As such, it is unlikely that an amendment to the Constitution would be able to pass the states who benefit the most from the current system. However, an answer that could short-circuit the Electoral College could be met: if states comprising 270 or more College votes agreed, they could write legislation in their state houses saying they would certify a slate of electors to vote for the candidate who won the popular vote.
However, this would likely be met with outrage from supporters of the College, as well as litigation from the Supreme Court.
