Tag Archives: Electoral College

January 29, 2013 · 9:46 AM

Walker starts to get cold feet on electoral scheme

The Maddow Blog

Over the weekend, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) offered cautious encouragement to Republicans hoping to rig the 2016 presidential election by changing how his state allocates electoral votes. The conservative governor didn’t explicitly endorse the idea, but Walker called it “interesting” and “worth looking at.”

Yesterday, the Wisconsin Republican was far more circumspect.

Gov. Scott Walker says he has a “real concern” about a Republican idea to change the way the state awards its electoral votes, conceding the move could make Wisconsin irrelevant in presidential campaigns. [...]

“One of our advantages is, as a swing state, candidates come here. We get to hear from the candidates,” said Walker in an interview Saturday at a conservative conference in Washington, D.C. “That’s good for voters. If we change that, that would take that away, it would largely make us irrelevant.”

That’s a far cry from what Walker was saying over the weekend, and it’s a welcome change. What’s more, it’s worth noting that the governor happens to be correct — if Wisconsin changed to a system in which electoral votes are dictated by gerrymandered district lines, the state would immediately go from key, contested battleground to campaign afterthought.

Indeed, that applies to any of the other states (Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, and Florida) where the election-rigging scheme has been discussed — candidates and their campaign teams wouldn’t have any incentive to invest time and energy in states where the outcome is predetermined.

So, does this mean Walker is against the idea?

It remains unclear — he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he’s “qualified” his comments from the weekend, and he’s “not embracing” the scheme, at least not yet.

Walker added, “The most important thing to me long-term as governor on that is what makes your voters be in play.” And if that’s true, this plan is a non-starter, since it would do the exact opposite.

This would, incidentally, put Walker at odds with RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, a long-time ally of the governor who’s also from Wisconsin and who’s endorsed the scheme.

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· 12:15 AM

Virginia Electoral College Rigging Scheme Would Further Disenfranchise Minority Voters

History will not look kindly upon these types of proposals nor the people who support them…

Think Progress

As the Virginia Senate’s Privileges and Elections Committee prepares to take up a bill to rig bill the state’s electoral college vote, Democrats and even Republicans are distancing themselves from the effort, calling it “a bad idea,” “skewing,” and a “partisan bill aimed at defying the will of the voters.” A Think Progress analysis of Virginia voter demographics reveals another major flaw with the proposal: it would significantly dilute the influence of minority voters.

The 2012 Virginia Congressional maps, authored by Delegate Robert Bell (R) based on the 2010 U.S. Census, divided the state’s estimated 8,001,024 people into 11 Congressional districts. Though the state population is more than 20 percent African American — and more than 31 percent non-white — just one Congressional district contains a majority of non-white voters (the Third District, which is majority African American). Though white non-Hispanic Virginians makeup just 68.6 percent of the population, they comprise at least 58 percent of the population in all of the other 10 districts.

While many of the electoral college-rigging schemes being pushed by Republicans nationally would still allocate two electors based on the popular winner in the state — the Virginia plan would not even do that. State Sen. Charles “Bill” Carrico Sr.’s Senate Bill 723 would allocate 11 electors based on the popular winner in each of the House districts and two to whichever candidate won the majority of those gerrymandered House districts.

So, with more than one-fifth of the population, African American Virginians would go from having about 20 percent of the say to just controlling one-thirteenth of the state’s electoral votes under the Carrico plan. And racial minority voters overall would go from having about 31 percent of the say, to also controlling just 7.7 percent of the state’s electors.

And while African American voters would of course have some say in districts where they do not make up a majority, more than a quarter of them them are packed into the 3rd district, meaning the remaining 73 percent would be in districts where they comprised, on average, just about 16 percent of the population. This would be a significant retrogression of influence for minority voters. Given Virginia’s history of racial discrimination and the fact that much of the state remains a Voting Rights Act covered jurisdiction, this maneuver might well be not just anti-democratic, but also illegal.

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January 24, 2013 · 9:01 PM

The GOP’s Plan to Rig the Electoral College & Steal the White House

Rachel Maddow sounded the alarm on this effort earlier this week.  Now it has taken hold in “mainstream media” reports as well…

ThinkProgress War Room

Republican politicians have a big problem. Their massively unpopular policiesand offensive rhetoric about minorities, women, and LGBT people havealienated vast swaths of the electorate, making it increasingly difficult for them to win national elections. And these problems are only getting worse as the country’s attitudes evolves and its demographics change. In fact, the Republican candidate has lost the popular vote in 5 of the last 6 presidential elections. The Republicans’ Solution: Re-Write the Rules to Game the System and Rig Elections Instead of addressing their fundamental problems, Republican politicians have instead devoted themselves to re-writing the rules and rigging the game:

  • Make it Harder to Vote: Republican politicians are engaged in a systematic campaign to change voting laws and election procedures in order make it harder for young people, minorities, and others likely to vote Democratic to vote.
  • Gerrymander: Because of partisan gerrymandering after the 2010 Census, Republicans have a structural advantage when it comes to the House of Representatives. Even though more than a million more people voted for Democrats for the House in 2012, Republicans still managed to hold on to the House with a 15-seat majority.
  • Rig the Game: Now Republican-controlled swing states are trying to rig the Electoral College in order to steal the White House.

How It Works

  • Red States Stay the Same: Truly red states keep the current winner-take-all system, thus delivering all of their electoral votes to the Republican candidate.
  • Swing States Get Divided Up: Swing states currently controlled by Republicans (VA, OH, WI, MI, PA, NC, and FL) will award their electoral votes by Congressional District. Through gerrymandering, Republicans have managed to pack Democrats into a small number of districts, giving the GOP a large advantage in the aggregate number of House seats they hold in these states.
  • Bonus Votes for Republicans: In some versions of this plan, the two remaining electoral votes in each state that are not associated with a House district would still be awarded to the winner of the state’s popular vote. Virginia, however, has an even more pernicious plan; its plan would award the other two votes to the winner of a majority of the state’s congressional districts. If other swing states adopted this plan, it could shift an extra dozen or more electoral votes to the Republican candidate — a number equivalent to the electoral votes of Virginia or the votes of Iowa and Nevada combined.

The Result — President Romney

The GOP plan to rig the Electoral College means that even if a Democrat wins the popular vote in a state by a comfortable margin, the Republican candidate could still walk away with as many two-thirds or even three-quarters of the state’s Electoral College votes.
If Republican-controlled swing states had put this plan into effect before the 2012 election, Mitt Romney would likely be the president today thanks to the shift in electoral votes in key states. If all of these states chose the Virginia model that gives Republicans two bonus electoral votes per state, then Mitt Romney would definitely have been the one to be sworn in this past Monday.

This Threat Is Real & Is Happening Now

This GOP plan to rig the Electoral College and steal the White House is not simply theoretical in nature. It’s a real threat to our democracy. Republicans — including two GOP governors — are actually considering this plan in several of these states, including Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Republicans in the Virginia Senate are trying to pass just such a plan right now. For more information on this scheme, please see the full report released today by the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

BOTTOM LINE: Instead of trying to win fair and square by persuading voters that their values and ideas are the best for America, Republicans are now instead trying to re-write the rules in order to rig the system in their favor and steal the White House.

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December 14, 2012 · 1:12 AM

Orly Taitz Sues To Stop Electoral College Vote

If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, the self-described Birther Queen, Orly Taitz might just be a candidate for the nearest “nut-house”…

OrlyTaitzOwl2

The Huffington Post

Birther queen Orly Taitz has teamed up with a convicted felon who challenged President Barack Obama in the West Virginia Democratic primary to sue Vice President Joe Biden and Congress, in an effort to block the Electoral College vote.

Taitz announced on her website Wednesday evening that she had filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of federal prison inmate Keith Judd, along with two minor presidential candidates and Republican and Libertarian candidates for members of the electoral college. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Sacramento on Monday, is an attempt to prevent Congress from counting the Electoral College vote for Obama. Taitz did not announce the suit until Wednesday.

Taitz, an attorney and dentist based in Santa Monica, Calif., used the court papers to reiterate claims that Obama is a citizen of Indonesia and was not born in the United States. She alleges that Obama has used forged documents, including a fake birth certificate, Selective Service card and Social Security number from Connecticut, to run for president. Taitz has filed numerous state and federal court cases nationally seeking to have Obama thrown off the ballot.

Judd received 41-percent of the vote against Obama in May’s West Virginia primary, the most of any candidate against the president. In her court filing, Taitz claims that Judd would be the Democratic Party nominee if Obama was removed from the ballot and could not be voted on by the Electoral College next week. Taitz also filed on behalf of Edward Noonan, who won the American Independent Party presidential primary in California; Thomas Gregory MacLeran, who filed to run as a Republican for president; and Republican James Grinols and Libertarian Robert Odden, who both ran for elector in Minnesota.

Continue reading here…

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November 10, 2012 · 9:27 AM

Why John Boehner Has Gerrymandering to Thank for His Majority

Many uninformed voters and political pundits believe that the GOP led Congress had a mandate this election, hence their retention of a majority inin the United States Congress.  Not so…

Mother Jones

In November 2010, I reported that GOP control of all elements of state government in key swing states—including but not limited to Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania—could ensure a “Republican decade” in control of the House of Representatives. The Democrats’ massive 2010 losses couldn’t have come at a worse time for the party. Because the census was taken in 2010, GOP control of state legislatures and governors mansions around the country gave Republicans the power to draw congressional district lines largely as they chose. They seized that chance, aggressively gerrymandering so as to protect Republican incumbents and endanger any remaining Democrats. The Dems would have done the same thing, of course, had they won control of these crucial states in 2010. But they didn’t.

On Tuesday, the GOP cartographers’ hard work paid off. Despite sweeping wins for Democrats in US Senate races and a broad Electoral College victory for President Barack Obama, it was clear early in the night that Republicans would hold on to the House. As Slate‘s Dave Weigelnoted, “ridiculous gerrymanders saved the House Republican majority.” In many states the president won convincingly, Democrats elected a minority of the House delegation. Here are the numbers for states that Obama won or came close and where Republicans drew the congressional map:

  • North Carolina, which Obama lost by around 2 percentage points: 9-4 GOP
  • Florida, which Obama won by around half a percentage point: 17-10 GOP
  • Ohio, which Obama won by nearly 2 percentage points: 12-4 GOP
  • Virginia, which Obama won by around 3 percentage points: 8-3 GOP
  • Pennsylvania, which Obama won by more than 5 percentage points: 13-5 GOP*
  • Wisconsin, which Obama won by 6 percentage points: 5-3 GOP
  • Michigan, which Obama won by 8 percentage points: 9-5 GOP

It goes to show that when you get to choose the ground on which electoral battles are fought, you’re very likely to win them.

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October 29, 2012 · 8:41 PM

Electoral College for Kindergartners

Thank you Claudia for this very useful article…

Claudia Just Saying

I live in Florida, a swing State, and evidently a swing County, Flagler.  The News Journal, our local paper, recently reported an Associated Press pre-election analysis that points fingers at 106 communities in nine states. Bullseye, voters living in Flagler County got real influence.

electorl

Remember the Chad uproar of the 2000 Bush/Gore election, the nation held hostage for a month, while volunteers inspected ballot tickets.

Nominee
George W. Bush Al Gore
Party Republican Democratic
Home state Texas Tennessee
Running mate Dick Cheney Joe Lieberman
Electoral vote 271 266
States carried 30 20 + DC
Popular vote 50,456,002 50,999,897
Percentage 47.9% 48.4%

Bush won 271 electoral votes, Gore 266, because of the twenty-five(2000 census) votes in question. Gore lost the election by 4 electoral votes. The chads spiced up the questionable  recount vote. Gore would have won 291 to Bush 246, so we know the significance  of Florida swinging.

Thirty states went to Bush; Gore, twenty; plus, the District of Columbia. However, Gore won the popular vote by five tenths of one percent, 50,999,897 to Bush, 50,456,002.

Does this make sense? Not to me either.

I went online to refresh my knowledge of the Electoral College, and by the way, there is no campus.

Each state is allocated a number of electoral votes equal to the number of members it has in the U.S. Congress.

The most recent Huffington Post   a “snapshot of where the presidential race stands based on hundreds of state-wide and national opinion polls, filtered through a poll tracking model and updated throughout the day.” On October 29th the polls  indicated the electoral vote distribution below:

Barack ObamaBarack Obama  277

(217 Strong Obama + 60 Leans Obama)

Mitt RomneyMitt Romney 206

(15 Leans Romney + 191Strong)

The graph shows five tossup states; Colorado 9 , New Hampshire 4, Virginia 13, North Carolina 15 and Florida 29, a total of seventy electoral votes. Polls have confidence Obama will win New Hampshire, Colorado and Virginia, and that Romney will win North Carolina.  In Florida the polls are split 48% to 48% with a 10% greater confidence Romney will win.

It takes an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to change the electoral college and popularity does not count.

The way Florida swings needs watching.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            …just saying
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· 8:32 PM

A Ray of Hope

1209_POL_Obama_RoH_250

This is an interesting feature on Slate Magazine‘s site…

Slate

Eight days to go:

Today’s Good News for Obama: As Hurricane Sandy hurtles toward the East Coast, Mitt Romney has canceled all campaigning in Virginia for the foreseeable future, axing his intended tour through the critical swing state. The timing couldn’t be worse for Romney: A new poll shows Obama leading the Republican challenger 51 percent to 47 percent among likely voters, recovering a lead that had disappeared throughout most of October.  Other polls show the candidates at a dead heat, but the momentum in Old Dominion appears to be in Obama’s favor during the closing days of the election. Romney is missing a valuable chance to make closing arguments in Virginia, giving Obama the opportunity to nab the state’s highly coveted 13 electoral votes on Nov. 6.

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October 23, 2012 · 12:05 AM

Debate Roundup – 10-23-2012

Fact-checking the third presidential debate

Winners and losers from the final presidential debate

Ryan and Boehner Rally Includes Eyebrow Raising Jokes

Obama zings Romney over his defense knowledge (video)

Washington Post/ABC News poll: The good news for Obama

Romney was against going after Osama, now he’s for it (video)

Romney relative posts pics of US ambassador’s corpse to Facebook

Women react negatively to Romney talk of repealing Obamacare (video)

FiveThirtyEight: State Polls Show Edge for Obama in Electoral College

Washington Post/ABC News poll: The good news for Obama

 

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September 19, 2012 · 10:00 AM

Wednesday Blog Roundup

 

Politicians, Pundits and Polls

Why Are the Rich So Damn Angry?

Arctic sea ice to collapse by 2016

 Obama makes more swing state gains

19 Successful People Who Barely Sleep

Who receives government benefits, in six charts

 FiveThirtyEight Forecast: G.O.P. Senate Hopes Slipping

The Caucus: Democratic Ad Hits Romney on 47 Percent Remarks

Pat Buchanan: If Welfare Is Like “A Narcotic,” “Obama Is A Drug Dealer Of Welfare”

The Onion:Romney Apologizes To Nation’s 150 Million ‘Starving, Filthy Beggars’

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November 5, 2011 · 1:00 PM

Who’s Paying for the GOP’s Plan to Hijack the 2012 Election?

I’m appalled but not surprised at the lack of coverage on this issue from the Mainstream Media…

Mother Jones

Someone is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to rig the rules of the presidential election against Obama. But the source of the money is a mystery.

Over the past six months, someone—or a group of someones—has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund an effort to change the rules of the 2012 presidential election tomake it very difficult for President Barack Obama to win reelection. But the shadowy lobbying group mounting this campaign hasn’t disclosed its donors—and under current law, it doesn’t have to.

In two states, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, GOP legislators have introduced bills that would change how electoral votes—a candidate needs 270 of the 538 to win the presidency—are awarded in a presidential election. Under the current system, the winner of the statewide popular vote receives all of the electoral votes from that state.

If the Republican plan becomes law in either Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, those states would change how electoral votes are awarded. The new plan would allot electoral votes on the basis of vote totals within congressional districts. If a candidate wins a congressional district, he or she would receive one electoral college vote. Whoever does best in the statewide race would receive two electoral votes.

Because Republicans will draw the boundaries of the congressional districts in both states, the new rules would mean that Obama could win the states but still receive fewer electoral votesthan his Republican opponent. Should a Republican split the states’ electoral votes with Obama (even if Obama draws more votes), that could provide the GOPer with the margin of victory in a close race. (Under the US Constitution, it is up to the states to allot electoral votes as they see fit.)

Continue reading here…

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