Nothing seems likely to prevent the upcoming Presidential Election from being another disaster for U.S. political institutions and popular confidence in elections. My (worthless) gut feeling is that Trump will win another term. Whether it will be overwhelming, a squeaker in which he again loses the popular vote but wins the electoral vote, or whether Biden gets elected, popular unhappiness with the Electoral College system (certainly not the only problem with elections or our political system!) will likely remain highly disruptive going forward.
There was a long and interesting article Sept. 8 in the “liberal” NY. Times which discussed the proposal for a “National Popular Vote” for President. Unfortunately, you may find it’s behind an Internet pay wall. It was rather provocatively titled “The Electoral College Will Destroy America...” A few excerpts below:
“If Mr. Biden wins by five percentage points or more — if he beats Donald Trump by more than seven million votes — he’s a virtual shoo-in. If he wins 4.5 million more votes than the president? He’s still got a three-in-four chance to be president.
Anything less, however, and Mr. Biden’s odds drop like a rock. A mere three million-vote Biden victory? A second Trump term suddenly becomes more likely than not. If Mr. Biden’s margin drops to 1.5 million — about the populations of Rhode Island and Wyoming combined — forget about it. The chance of a Biden presidency in that scenario is less than one in 10....
“Given that abolishing the Electoral College is not on the table at the moment, for a number of reasons, the best solution would be to do what Madison tried to do more than two centuries ago: get rid of statewide winner-take-all laws. That can be achieved through the
National Popular Vote Interstate Compact ...
If you think this is a plot by bitter Democrats who just want to win, consider this: Texas is going to turn blue. Maybe not this year, maybe not even in 2024. But it’s headed in that direction, and when it gets there, Republicans will be in for an unpleasant surprise. In 2016, Donald Trump won about 4.5 million votes in Texas. The moment the Democratic nominee wins more, all those Republican voters suddenly disappear, along with any realistic shot at winning the White House....
“Every time a new national poll ... is released, it’s followed by a chorus of responses along the lines of, Who cares? The national popular vote is meaningless. Well, I care. So do tens of millions of other Americans.
“And so does Donald Trump. ‘
The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy,’ he
tweeted on election night 2012. Why? Because he believed Mitt Romney would win the popular vote and lose the Electoral College. Not only has he never taken that tweet down, but he
continues to claim that he won the popular vote in 2016. Why does he care so much about making that case unless he believed in his heart, like the rest of us do, that the person who gets the most votes should win?“
Opinion | The Electoral College Will Destroy America