Trump tells GOP he wants to get rid of electoral college..

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SolarPowered said:
Let Trump have this one. Bernie should whisper in Trump's ear about proportional representation across states, so those poor Trump voters in nasty blue states can finally have their votes counted too. No one tell him about Southern Democrats, though. :P
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Proportionally split electoral votes would be a start, but still not good enough. You still have states with more votes per citizens, get massive rounding issues, and it takes no regards for voter turnout in different states. The system really needs to be abolished.
 
Maybe the media should run a bunch of stories about how Trump is too scared to get rid of the electoral college, afraid he can't win a simple popular vote.


Use reverse psychology to make the world a better place.
 
peteykirch said:
I don't know, because then you still have the highly populated blue states that allowed Hilary to win the popular vote. Who cares if a democrat only gets 200K votes in Arizona, if they can get 6 million in California.
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No Democrat would get 6 million votes in California though.
 
TheGeniusArcana said:
I feel like people always forget that the EC has a huge role in having minority votes heard at all
Like it's obviously very flawed, but...
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In what way?

The EC could just as easily make NY, CA, or TX even more important than they would be under strict popular vote if they were the ones that happened to be swing states, and a coelition of those big states could lock out the smaller ones from having any say at all.

Who happens to get a larger say than normal basically comes down to sheer luck.
 
McConnell talked him out of it... I assume it went like this.

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Just so we're clear, article 2 section 1

"The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress"

Too many people are saying that it would take an amendment or that it's solely the electoral college. It is the state legislatures that determine how the candidates receive electoral votes.
 
Totally unsurprised that Trump's "stopped clock" propositions are being shut down by the rest of the GOP freakshow.
 
Good Mitch McConnell always gotta ruin things for other people.

Also, it's pretty obvious that Trump only considered getting rid of the EC to satisfy his ego, of course.
 
VivaciousSoul said:
Just so we're clear, article 2 section 1

"The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress"

Too many people are saying that it would take an amendment or that it's solely the electoral college. It is the state legislatures that determine how the candidates receive electoral votes.
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That discusses the appointment of electors.
 
TatorTots said:
If you were to base elections off popular vote most of middle America would be screwed. Mostly coastal states would decide everyone's fate. It reminds me of how Hillary Clinton said the midwest's way of living is a lost cause. Those states spoke up, hoping their way of living could be revived instead of being a hopeless wasteland. Those states do not want their fate in the hands of CA, NY, etc. The way of living is different there. Furthermore, nominees could simply focus on largely populated areas and ignore a big part of this country to win a election. The EC makes sense, but it needs to be tweaked.
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What more do people in middle America have to lose under Democrats than Republicans? "We wanna oppress people who aren't like us" isn't a way of thinking that should be accepted. (Not to mention, as others have stated, congress already has built in "protections" for less populated states)

Get rid of the EC and eliminate gerrymandering by having redistricting handled by a bipartisan commission and unbiased computers, and the US government would function dramatically better. Less voter suppression and less "us vs them" division.
 
TatorTots said:
If you were to base elections off popular vote most of middle America would be screwed. Mostly coastal states would decide everyone's fate.
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Representatives are given to a state based on its population, which means that states that have a ton of people who can't legally vote get extra electors. Southern states get extra votes, too (thanks, slavery), so it's not like the population imbalance problem is solved.

If middle America would be screwed by a popular vote system, then it's already screwed. The term "flyover country" wouldn't exist if the electoral college actually helped in that regard.
 
VivaciousSoul said:
Which is why nothing in the Constitution would need to be amended. The electoral process is what the states make of it.
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Yes, you can in practice "get rid" of the Electoral College if all the states separately agree to a process that basically makes it a rubber stamp for the national popular vote (it would still technically be there). You can also just get rid of it via a Constitutional Amendment.
 
KHarvey16 said:
I don't understand. How would the manner in which the state physically chooses their allotted number of electors achieve the change people want?
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The states don't choose their allotted number of electors. That is determined by population. But they way in which they have chosen to give those electors is winner takes all based on the popular vote in the state. A win of 1 vote is the same as a win of 2 million votes. The states could just as easily determine that they no longer give electors winner takes all but proportionally or winner takes all based on a national popular vote.

http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact
 
Valhelm said:
Totally unsurprised that Trump's "stopped clock" propositions are being shut down by the rest of the GOP freakshow.
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The opposite is happening of what we were assured of. All his crazy bullshit is being pushed through them and the few good things he could do are being blocked.
 
KHarvey16 said:
I don't understand. How would the manner in which the state physically chooses their allotted number of electors achieve the change people want?
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

Basically, it's a state law that says if enough states have the same law to make up 270 electoral votes, then the electors of that state will go to the party that won the national vote.

So far not a single red state or swing state has passed it yet.
 
If the election was decided by popular vote then campaign strategies and voter turnouts would be different. As-is there's no reason to vote unless you live in a swing state.

Republican candidates would still win. They'd just be different candidates, running different campaigns.
 
Kaiterra said:
The opposite is happening of what we were assured of. All his crazy bullshit is being pushed through them and the few good things he could do are being blocked.
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This isn't necessarily "being blocked," though. What's happened is he floated an idea they don't like, and said "don't do that."

The problem is that this mentally deficient narcissist doesn't care how many no's he has to hear until he gets his yes, and the GOP has shown that they will fucking bend the knee and kiss the ring if he fucking pouts hard enough.

They didn't want him pulling this popular vote bullshit, either. And now he's doing it.

All it takes is him mentioning this shit in public once, and then he'll see it as a thing he has to do.

And then you'll see the GOP in the interesting position of trying to figure out how best to fuck themselves.
 
Bobby Roberts said:
This isn't necessarily "being blocked," though. What's happened is he floated an idea they don't like, and said "don't do that."
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Well yeah I didn't mean literally but effectively. I was also referring to his advisors, not just congress.

The problem is that this mentally deficient narcissist doesn't care how many no's he has to hear until he gets his yes, and the GOP has shown that they will fucking bend the knee and kiss the ring if he fucking pouts hard enough.

They didn't want him pulling this popular vote bullshit, either. And now he's doing it.

All it takes is him mentioning this shit in public once, and then he'll see it as a thing he has to do.

And then you'll see the GOP in the interesting position of trying to figure out how best to fuck themselves.
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Yeah you're probably not wrong.
 
beril said:
Proportionally split electoral votes would be a start, but still not good enough. You still have states with more votes per citizens, get massive rounding issues, and it takes no regards for voter turnout in different states. The system really needs to be abolished.
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I agree, but this is the land of incremental changes, not the free. Everyone will take whatever positives they can get from this freakshow of a government.
 
Gruco said:
Can you explain to me why you think a person living in Philly is more important than a person living in Houston?

WI, MI and PA are homes to big cities and college towns that absolutely do have more in common with NY/CA and voted in solidarity with them. That's exactly why those states were so close. Give the upper penninsula to WI and the panhandle to AL and Clinton wins. Why is one way of drawing those lines morally superior to the other?

btw, can you help me find where Hillary said that the Midwest's way of living was a lost cause (can't find anything on google)?

Unfortunately, many people still don't realize how much of Hillary's popular vote lead came from Texas (and to a lesser extent, AZ and GA) in addition to the west coast. I mean, it makes sense for people who want to push the self-serving (but completely bogus) "coastal elites" narrative but the reality of the matter is there are cities and suburbs all over the country which came through for Clinton.

Also, California is deceptive because it is the biggest state. One could easily find a region in Appalacia where Trump wins a similar margin. The lines on the map aren't particularly meaningful in assessing an individual's rights to be democratically represented (or rather, shouldn't be).
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The problem is that trump winning these states by as much as hilary won CA in terms of raw percentage doesn't help him much with the popular vote since NY and CA and maybe other big democratic states just cancel out his margin in some of those states.

Gun Animal said:
If the election was decided by popular vote then campaign strategies and voter turnouts would be different. As-is there's no reason to vote unless you live in a swing state.

Republican candidates would still win. They'd just be different candidates, running different campaigns.
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If US elections were based off the popular vote only the republican party would be forced to pretty much shift towards the left in order to be competitive in certain states like CA

peteykirch said:
6 million as in that few? Because Hillary cleared nearly 9 million
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She got a bit over 8.75 million votes in CA in the recent presidential election.
 
TatorTots said:
If you were to base elections off popular vote most of middle America would be screwed. Mostly coastal states would decide everyone's fate. It reminds me of how Hillary Clinton said the midwest's way of living is a lost cause. Those states spoke up, hoping their way of living could be revived instead of being a hopeless wasteland. Those states do not want their fate in the hands of CA, NY, etc. The way of living is different there. Furthermore, nominees could simply focus on largely populated areas and ignore a big part of this country to win a election. The EC makes sense, but it needs to be tweaked.
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yeah, so it instead makes sense for these obsolete midwestern states to determine the fate(s) of much more populous coastal states and set the country back 100 years politically
 
Trump was right about the electoral college when he thought it would make him lose and he's still right about it even after it made him win.

He's a stubborn bastard, knowing that without the electoral college he would have lost to Hillary but he still want to kill it anyways. Killing both the EC and the TPP would go a long way towards making the horrible things about his Presidency forgivable.
 
Unknown Soldier said:
Trump was right about the electoral college when he thought it would make him lose and he's still right about it even after it made him win.

He's a stubborn bastard, knowing that without the electoral college he would have lost to Hillary but he still want to kill it anyways. Killing both the EC and the TPP would go a long way towards making the horrible things about his Presidency forgivable.
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Why would he want to kill the EC when he pretty much has a 100% chance of losing the next election if he gets rid of the EC
 
I'm not going to pretend I'm smart enough to say whether the EC is good or bad. But if enough want to push Trump into attacking it I'd begin by calling him a coward en masse for backing down to the GOP like he's their little pet doggy. Playing that man's ego is probably the best way to ignite a bomb.
 
mo60 said:
Why would he want to kill the EC when he pretty much has a 100% chance of losing the next election if he gets rid of the EC
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Because he's completely delusional and truly believes with all his being that he would win the popular vote if that's what matters?
 
its a lot easier to cry foul on the results on a popular vote than the electoral college, IMO.


i don't think we'll see Trump implement a peaceful transition of power if he isn't re-elected, and we may even see him talk a lot about repealing the amendment that has term limits in his second term if it comes to pass.
 
mo60 said:
Why would he want to kill the EC when he pretty much has a 100% chance of losing the next election if he gets rid of the EC
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His ego probably thinks he could win if he wasn't restricted from campaigning in swing states. He's most familiar with New York, Florida and California, after all.
 
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