Septiembre 2024 – Update

Septiembre 2024 Update Floridians for National Popular Vote

With the presidential election in less than 6 weeks, here are some little understood details about how the Electoral system works. By the way, it’s not a “college”. If you want even more info go here.

How does the president in the United States get elected?

The answer is by The Electoral College.

We all know that. But how does that really happen?

First your state legislators decide how the Electors’ votes will be cast nationally. In most states that means the winner of the most votes in your state, not nationally, takes all your state’s electoral votes. This is referred to as winner-take-all.
The problem with this system is that some states are reliably in either the Republican or the Democratic camp, so their electoral votes are predictably in one column or the other.

Two states, Maine and Nebraska, use a method called districting to award their electors. The Nebraska state legislators are currently attempting to change to winner-take-all because occasionally, one of their five electoral votes goes to a Democrat rather than all votes going to the Republican. Read the whole debate here.

Fewer and fewer states are “swing” or “battleground” states where the statewide election, and hence their electoral votes, are up for grabs. This forces candidates to spend time and money courting small constituencies rather than campaigning to the country as a whole. Consequently, we get policies and laws that benefit small groups while large problems go unsolved.

Secondly the parties each choose a slate of electors. The Electors are actually voting on your behalf based on how your legislators told them to vote. When the votes in your state are tallied and a winner determined, that slate of Electors casts a vote awarding the Electoral Votes. That vote is sealed, certified and delivered to the US Capitol. On Enero 6 (does that date sound familiar?), the votes are opened and counted. There is NO questioning the states’ votes. This is an administrative procedure. Clarification of these rules was passed in 2022. A recap of the Electoral Count Reform ACT is here.

And who are these electors? They are party loyalists, friends of influential people and even as young as 18 with no experience running an election!

After the 2020 election, some Electors tried to cast their votes even though the other party won in their state. This has lead to multiple states charging the electors with crimes. No surprise, these are all “battleground” states.

Now you know you are not directly voting for the president. The National Popular Vote rectifies this. All votes in all fifty states are added up and the winner is declared on who gets the most votes nationally. It preserves the Electoral College which means the states still run their elections and certify their results.

Floridians for NPV has subject matter experts available to speak to your group in-person or via Zoom. Here’s one presentation at Nerd Night in St Petersburg. Fill in the form here and we’ll be in touch.

Jesse Wegman wrote Let the People Pick the President and is a Member of the TY Times Editorial Board. Here he writes about Georgia’s current election board messing with last minute vote counting procedures.  And here, he tells us about Pennsylvania’s antiquated laws on mail in ballots.