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Maine Senate moves to award electoral votes to popular vote winner

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prometeus

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[h=1]Maine Senate moves to award electoral votes to popular vote winner


Maine Senate moves to award electoral votes to popular vote winner[/h]AUGUSTA, Maine —Maine's Senate has approved a plan to allocate the state's four electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote, instead of the candidate who wins the Electoral College.


An interesting approach the the real issue.
 
Interesting that it's part of the pact of multiple states, but so far this pact would not have worked in 2000 or 2016...

The pact endorsed Wednesday would only kick in if the states signed on to it achieve more than 270 electoral votes -- the number needed to win the White House.
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This makes sense!

... But now look at the states involved

California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Washington, D.C, have signed on to the pact.

The 14 states in the pact, and Washington, D.C., had electoral votes that went to Clinton in the 2016 election.
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With only blue states involved this would help a Republican if R wins popular vote but would NOT help a Democrat if D wins popular vote. I guess the idea is to get some R or flip-flop states on board...
 
prometeus said:
[h=1]Maine Senate moves to award electoral votes to popular vote winner


Maine Senate moves to award electoral votes to popular vote winner[/h]AUGUSTA, Maine —Maine's Senate has approved a plan to allocate the state's four electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote, instead of the candidate who wins the Electoral College.


An interesting approach the the real issue.
Click to expand...

If the existing bills still in legislation were all passed, that would move the threshold to over 270 electoral votes, and then the compact would be activated.
 
Slavister said:
Interesting that it's part of the pact of multiple states, but so far this pact would not have worked in 2000 or 2016...

This makes sense!

... But now look at the states involved

With only blue states involved this would help a Republican if R wins popular vote but would NOT help a Democrat if D wins popular vote. I guess the idea is to get some R or flip-flop states on board...
Click to expand...

I've never looked into this but I'm pretty sure it is improbable if not impossible for Republicans to win the popular vote and lose the electoral vote.
 
Slavister said:
Interesting that it's part of the pact of multiple states, but so far this pact would not have worked in 2000 or 2016...



This makes sense!

... But now look at the states involved



With only blue states involved this would help a Republican if R wins popular vote but would NOT help a Democrat if D wins popular vote. I guess the idea is to get some R or flip-flop states on board...
Click to expand...

I'm not sure I follow your logic. If the pact had existed in 2016 then 270 electoral votes would have automatically gone to the popular vote winner, which was Clinton.

And in any case, even if this ends up working in Republicans' favor and Trump wins the popular vote, then all that means is that he wins according to an unassailable argument, which is that it isn't a democratic principle for a minority of the country to choose the next head of state.
 
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This would be massively helpful in depolarizing the Republican party as they would have no choice but to appeal to more moderates and shuck the lunatics or never hold the presidency again.
 
Cue the inevitable and idiotic "Our founding fathers never intended for city people to choose the next president, for reasons I have no intention of sourcing" argument.
 
Cardinal said:
If the existing bills still in legislation were all passed, that would move the threshold to over 270 electoral votes, and then the compact would be activated.
Click to expand...

you really think that's going to happen?
 
Verax said:
I've never looked into this but I'm pretty sure it is improbable if not impossible for Republicans to win the popular vote and lose the electoral vote.
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Oddly enough it's getting rather normal for a democrat to win the popular vote and lose the election.
 
Cardinal said:
If the existing bills still in legislation were all passed, that would move the threshold to over 270 electoral votes, and then the compact would be activated.
Click to expand...

And the court battles would commence a second later.
 
Cardinal said:
Cue the inevitable and idiotic "Our founding fathers never intended for city people to choose the next president, for reasons I have no intention of sourcing" argument.
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Nope, but the founding fathers did intend to give each state at least three EC votes. Thus, the more small (by population) states that enter the compact with those big blue states the better the demorats will do.
 
Cardinal said:
Cue the inevitable and idiotic "Our founding fathers never intended for city people to choose the next president, for reasons I have no intention of sourcing" argument.
Click to expand...

Don't you know that a bunch of rich white slaveholding elitists in the 18th century could predict with crystal clarity the exact constitutional needs in the 21st century? /s
 
Yet another states that gives up it sovereignty and the right of their people to cast their votes for who they want as president.
wow. i thought government job was to secure freedom not give it away.

people of the states should sue their government for the violation of their voting rights.
 
ludin said:
Yet another states that gives up it sovereignty and the right of their people to cast their votes for who they want as president.
wow. i thought government job was to secure freedom not give it away.

people of the states should sue their government for the violation of their voting rights.
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What would prohibit the citizens of Maine from casting a vote for President in 2020 if this passed?
 
where are the democrats in defending minority rights? small states getting dominated by large states
 
Trump said:
where are the democrats in defending minority rights? small states getting dominated by large states
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States don’t cast votes under a popular vote system. That’s the point.
 
tres borrachos said:
What would prohibit the citizens of Maine from casting a vote for President in 2020 if this passed?
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They support a republican president yet the popular vote supports a democrat.
the people pretty much had their voice nullified as to who they support as president.

you should put more thought behind your posts.
have a nice day no further response to you is needed.
 
Greenbeard said:
States don’t cast votes under a popular vote system. That’s the point.
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actually they do. they cast their votes in a popular vote in that state.
that way all votes are weighted equally.
 
Verax said:
I've never looked into this but I'm pretty sure it is improbable if not impossible for Republicans to win the popular vote and lose the electoral vote.
Click to expand...

In 2012 if you took 4% off Obama's margin from each state across the board, Romney would have won the popular vote and lost the electoral vote. You could've done that in 2008 too with Obama's popular vote margin. In fact it's been oscillating which party it would favor pretty frequently over the last century, although the only times there's actually been a split it's been in favor of the Republicans.

But 2012 in particular, with the "blue wall", supposedly favoring Democrats in the electoral college really did cause a lot of Republican opposition to the electoral college. It was especially true on the night of the election before all of California and Washington's vote had come it looked like Obama would win without winning the popular vote. This led to some Republicans ardently opposing the EC, with President Trump as an example going on a Twitter tirade about how it shouldn't exist. It's also how the Popular Vote Compact passed some Republican controlled legislatures in states like Arizona and Oklahoma with broad bipartisan support.
 
ludin said:
They support a republican president yet the popular vote supports a democrat.
the people pretty much had their voice nullified as to who they support as president.

you should put more thought behind your posts.
have a nice day no further response to you is needed.
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Sounds like everyone on the losing side in a winner-take-all state has a case against the EC.
 
Cardinal said:
I'm not sure I follow your logic. If the pact had existed in 2016 then 270 electoral votes would have automatically gone to the popular vote winner, which was Clinton.

And in any case, even if this ends up working in Republicans' favor and Trump wins the popular vote, then all that means is that he wins according to an unassailable argument, which is that it isn't a democratic principle for a minority of the country to choose the next head of state.
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I am conflicted on this. The idea of the electoral college was to prevent a tyranny of the majority, as well as to give smaller states a bigger voice in elections.
 
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