Say there’s a close presidential election like this one, or Kennedy vs. Nixon in 1960 (decided by 112,827 votes out of more than 68 million cast) or Bush vs. Gore in 2000. Almost 5,000 emails now, and the number of messages on my Facebook page has risen into the hundreds.
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Graham said he’s received roughly 1,700 emails and letters.
My name is Jeremy Levine, from Brooklyn, NY.
In the aftermath of the election, much has and is being spoken and written about the Electoral College. Today, in this election, we have such a case. “You know, you get 100 million votes and somebody else gets 90 million votes and you win”.
Since the election of Trump, calls to end the Electoral College have been on display in everything from opinion pieces, online petitions to protests in the streets.
So, what’s going on here?
One, from a sender named Kristi Beal, who told the Tennessean she lives in Southeast Missouri, was sent to dozens of recipients, It said Trump lacks experience, is a misogynist and xenophobe, and that Clinton won the popular vote. These electors should and usually do respect their constituents and vote for the candidate chosen by the state; however, they are not required. Furthermore, Trump has already started assembling the leaders of his new administration, for both his cabinet and other key advisors.
Joseph Losco, a professor of political science at Ball State, said while many people are “upset” about the results of the election, it would be “very difficult” to change the Electoral College system.
When you look at the final vote totals in NY and California, you begin to understand just how regional Clinton’s popularity was this election: eighteen percent of her entire vote came from just those two.
We already vote for president in 50 states, so all you have to do is transmit the final tally for each candidate to the federal level and they add the 50 numbers; no need to convert the winner’s total to electoral votes and the loser’s votes to zero.
Trump won by accumulating victories in many smaller states. But the president overwhelmingly won the electoral college, 332 to 206.
One petition on change.org has received nearly 4.5 million signatures, and others are growing in signatures, too. Now in the recent election, Hillary Clinton triumphed nationally by 200,000 votes and will see Donald Trump take the oath of office, another miscarriage of democracy.
This raises another intriguing question: Is the Electoral College system fair? However, each state is allocated a number of electors supposedly in proportion to the population of that state.
How do the states get their assigned Electoral College vote count?
What’s up with that? The Associated Press estimates there are more than 4 million votes left to be counted. In a time where we are heavily questioning the validity of our democracy, it’s time we stand up and fight for what we believe in, more than ever. Because at least 290 electors voting in December will be Republicans, the petitioners encouraging them to vote for Clinton instead would have to convince them to abandon their party.
The 1800 race between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson took five days and 35 ballots in the U.S. House of Representatives before a president was elected, according to the National Archives. And, lest we forget, it would require amending the Constitution, no small or easy feat. It also plays down the relevance of votes in states that lean Republican or Democrat.
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But Utah was poised to become the first Republican state to join the compact until the election happened. In 1888, Democrat Grover Cleveland also clinched the most popular votes in the country but lost to Republican Benjamin Harrison in the electoral college, 233-168.
