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Nothing has brought the power disparity between voters in less populous states and those in more populous states into greater relief than Hillary Clinton's Electoral College loss against the backdrop of her historic popular vote win (now at nearly 2.7 million votes). House Democrats met Tuesday to discuss the current system's shortcomings along with possible solutions. Igor Bobic writes:
Democratic lawmakers hailing from states like California, New York, Virginia and Texas argued the balance of power unfairly skewed toward smaller, less populous states, and said that battleground states carried disproportionate influence in presidential elections. In the entire 2016 election, for example, almost every appearance by both candidates occurred in just 12 states.
“Under our current system, the votes of millions of people in non-swing states are effectively lost when they vote for the candidate who loses their state because all of that state’s electoral votes will be given to the other candidate,” Conyers said in his opening statement. [...]
Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) noted that the Golden State, where votes are still being counted and where Clinton won by a historic margin, sent a disproportionate amount of tax dollars to the federal government compared to smaller states, which are net recipients of federal tax dollars.
“I don’t think we can sustain our American democracy by having the majority ruled by the minority,” she said.
Amen. Having a majority ruled by a minority that also receives an outsized share of the tax benefit given what they contribute is a recipe for pitchforks at some point down the road.
Solutions discussed included ending the "winner take all" practice used in 48 states (excluding Maine and Nebraska) and passing a constitutional amendment, among other things. But smaller states, accustomed to wielding more power than their numbers warrant, will likely hold on to that power at all costs right up until they see the pitchforks coming. In other words, the chances are slim of passing a constitutional amendment, which requires ratification by three quarters of the states. But there's one prospect that holds some hope:
The National Popular Vote initiative, has been enacted into law in 11 states with 165 electoral votes. But it needs to be passed by states with 105 more electoral votes in order to take effect. A new nonprofit, called One Nation One Vote, announced Tuesday it would work to help move the plan across the finish line. It also called on President Barack Obama to endorse the NPV before he leaves office.
Akhil Reed Amar, a professor of constitutional law at Yale University who testified before the panel, said an interstate compact was needed in order to uphold the principle of “one person, one vote.” The NPV would ensure that “everyone is a swing voter, whether you are a urban voter in Houston, Texas or a rural voter in the rural valley of California,” he said at the forum.
Our own Chris Bowers has written more about the effort here: The surprisingly realistic path to electing the president by national popular vote by 2020.