Democratic Governor Signs Bill Allowing State To Potentially Bypass Electoral College
Colorado is planning to join the effort to bypass the Electoral College and elect a president based upon the popular vote total.
Gov. Jared Polis, a Democrat, said Sunday that he will sign a law passed by Colorado lawmakers that would add Colorado to the states pledging to award their electoral votes to the candidate with the highest popular vote total.
Polis called the Electoral College an “undemocratic relic” of the past, The Hill reported.
His comment somewhat echoes criticism of the Electoral College leveled by Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.
“It is well past time we eliminate the Electoral College, a shadow of slavery’s power on America today that undermines our nation as a democratic republic,” she tweeted last fall.
It is well past time we eliminate the Electoral College, a shadow of slavery’s power on America today that undermines our nation as a democratic republic. https://t.co/00HZN3MI6F
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) October 6, 2018
In line with that thinking, Democrats have introduced a constitutional amendment that would abolish the Electoral College.
Polis said the presidential election should be simple.
“I’ve long supported electing the president by who gets the most votes,” Polis said. “It’s a way to move towards direct election of the president.”
Republican state Sen. Jerry Sonnenberg saw things differently and told NPR that candidates would flock to major media markets in New York and Los Angeles.
“You drop us from nine (electoral) votes to 5.5 million people, all of sudden Colorado is irrelevant,” he said. “This is all about making sure presidential candidates realize Colorado is important to the rest of the country.”
So far, 11 other states have approved similar measures. Collectively, the states total 172 electoral votes.
The agreement among the states says that it takes effect when partner states have at least 270 electoral votes in all, the number needed to elect a president.
Proponents of awarding the presidency based on the popular vote say that too much attention gets paid to swing states, and this would right the balance.
“Under a national popular vote, the 38 non-battleground states long ignored by presidential campaigns will be powerful again, because no candidate can win 270 electoral votes and the White House without also winning the popular vote across all 50 states and the District of Columbia,” said John Koza, chairman of National Popular Vote.
President Donald Trump has said that the popular vote is actually simpler for a campaign than the current system.
“The popular vote would be much easier to win if you were campaigning on it. You know, it’s like running the 100-yard dash versus a 10-mile run. You train differently. Nobody explained that to Hillary Clinton, by the way,” Trump told The Associated Press in October.
Calls for changing how America votes have been debated off and on for years but gained new traction after the 2016 presidential election in which Democrat Hillary Clinton received 65,853,516 votes against 62,984,825 for Trump, according to the Federal Election Commission.
Those totals gave Clinton roughly a 2.9 million popular vote edge.
However, those totals mask the fact that two states — both of which support the national popular vote project — alone vastly increased Clinton’s totals.
In California, Clinton topped Trump 8.75 million votes to 4.48 million votes, while in New York, Clinton received 4.55 million votes against 2.82 million for Trump.
Clinton’s 4.27 million vote margin in California and her 1.73 million vote margin in New York gave her a 6 million vote margin over Trump in those two states.
Thus, Clinton trailed Trump in the other 48 states by 3.1 million popular votes.
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