Supreme Court Decision about Electoral College

[FM123]

Rick Hasen
@rickhasen
·
5m
Breaking: Supreme Court unanimously holds that states can require presidential electors to vote the way the state says (no faithless electors). https://supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/19-465_i425.pdf This is great news. A contrary decision would have been a disaster:

Link to document: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/19-465_i425.pdf

[Baitball Blogger]

1. The federalist strategy: Challenge everything in court.

Why did it take us so long to see this? It's been happening since Newt Gingrich's time.

[plimsoll]

17. Hence the need to pack the courts.

The irony of "activist judges" is pretty rich.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. A ruling in the opposite direction would have given deep-pocketed special interests the green light

Rick Hasen Retweeted

"A ruling in the opposite direction would have given deep-pocketed special interests the green light to openly bribe the individuals who vote in the Electoral College and would have ushered in electoral mischief at the highest levels" says
@IOMcGehee
https://issueone.org/supreme-courts-decision-in-faithless-electors-cases-is-a-relief/

Link to tweet

[UTUSN]

3. K&R!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Stuckinthebush]

24. Absolutely

In the end it is probably a good decision.

[roamer65]

4. With this decision, time to get rid of the EC.

It’s a useless entity now.

Elect presidents from a direct popular vote runoff system.

[Demsrule86]

13. The electoral college is in the constitution. It would need an amendment

to change this and ratification by the states...and it will never never happen as small states will not vote for taking down the EC.

[roamer65]

14. That's why secession may eventually be the best route for states with larger populations.

There is no language in the Constitution preventing secession and via the 10th Amendment unless a power is reserved by the federal government or denied to the states, it is a power left to the states and/or people.

https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendment/amendment-x

Any secession referenda will definitely be a SCOTUS case. The SCOTUS would then have to rule according to the Constitution.

This is why the federal government dropped its case against Jefferson Davis after the Civil War.

[wryter2000]

16. Uh, right

And who would deliver the mail? And what about everyone on Social Security? No thanks.

[sarisataka]

23. When some states suggested secession

Under Obama, the idea of secession was ridiculed. The DU consensus was the matter of secession was settled in 1865.

Furthermore, if a state was allowed to secede, it was put forth that the state should compensate the Federal government for any infrastructure or construction paid by the Federal government within the state's boundary.

[Hortensis]

27. I'm imagining my state bordering, or even partially surrounded

by, impoverished ex-states sacked by their wealthy conservatives and taken over by "elected" organized crime. Bringing the problems of Mexico and Central America into North America, right up close and personal around our blue redoubts.

Not a good idea. Rural America only became electrified because of redistributed wealthy-state money spent where state governments wouldn't and often couldn't. Same for roads, etc. Wealthy states haven't been supporting less wealthy and/or more conservative states that maintain large populations in poverty ONLY because liberals are such nice people.

Btw, how ABOUT controlling such things as pandemic diseases and global warming? Which have to be done. Abandoning responsibility probably isn't the answer.

[Demsrule86]

29. No to succession.

It is a very bad idea...we need to work to win hearts and minds.

[roamer65]

32. Secession.

[Demsrule86]

34. Thanks! um No to secession.

[roamer65]

35. Lol.

One man, one vote.


Time will tell, especially if Dump steals the election.

[Demsrule86]

36. That is the least of our problems if Dump steals the election.

[roamer65]

33. Give it 20-30 years, when temps in the South are hitting 130 plus deg F...

and we are having to hold back millions of former climate deniers from moving north.

All of this stuff right now is a sideshow to the BIG EVENT.

[wryter2000]

18. There's a work around

https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/&p=1&pos=1

If enough states agree that, no matter who their voters choose, they will order their electors to vote for the person who won the popular vote across the country, the popular vote winner will also win the electoral college. Many states have signed on. When that number reaches 271 electoral votes, the electoral college becomes irrelevant.

[Demsrule86]

28. That is unlikely...and a compact can be broken...who would ever trust the GOP?

[wryter2000]

30. True but

It's theoretically possible. We'd never get a constitutional amendment passed.

[Demsrule86]

31. I think we have to accept the EC will be with us and stop wasting time fighting

it...figure out how to turn it to our advantage.

[struggle4progress]

38. It might take a while but I think it's doable: the EC handed us the worst President in US history

a few years back, and then not long afterwards it outdid itself and handed us Trump

[lagomorph777]

5. Amazing. Will the pendulum swing away from the Citizens United and VRA disgraces?

Is SCROTUS trying to salvage its image and stave off the inevitable expansion of the bench and term limits? Too late, I think.

[Wounded Bear]

6. That's actually a small win for the good guys...

No more sneaking in and snagging individual electors from blue states.

[Voltaire2]

7. This is a huge win for the national popular vote initiatives.

While the specific case was faithless electors, the ruling makes the compact initiative difficult to challenge in court, or sabatoged by faithless electors going rogue.

[Amishman]

9. read it closely, it puts a knife to the throat of the popular vote interstate compact

by affirming the rights of states to enforce penalties against electors that go against their state's popular vote it helps build the case for the argument that the interstate compact would be unconstitutional by requiring electors to go against their state popular vote.

This ruling advances the legal precedent that electors are bound to their state's popular vote, which undermines the compact. A 9-0 ruling adds to the gravitas.

[Demsrule86]

11. That was never going to happen anyway.

[RedSpartan]

22. I'm not so sure.

Currently, the electors take a pledge to vote for the winner of the state's popular vote. So the court's decision was addressing the "faithless elector" in that scenario.

But the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact would create a new scenario, whereby electors would pledge to vote for the winner of the national popular vote. In that case, the court's decision means that a state could punish a "faithless elector" who did not do so.

So in my view, this actually strengthens the NPVIC, if and when it is implemented.

[Voltaire2]

26. that is my view as well.

electors are required to follow their state's rules.

[backtoblue]

8. K&R

[Demsrule86]

10. Thank God.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

12. Good!

[mcar]

15. Takes one of IMPOTUS' election stealing strategies out of the playbook

[obamanut2012]

19. GREAT NEWS

[not_the_one]

20. I'm wary of this decision. Let's wait for the pretzel logic that explains the REAL affect

it will have on the popular vote margin being larger than the electoral vote margin...

According to this, the popular vote of a state wins the electoral vote. That would seem to negate the EC for the purpose of selecting the president.

I don't see Diana and all 8 of the Supremes taking a hatchet to the republicans' wet dream.

I need further reassuring....

[hedda_foil]

37. Read it again. You have it reversed.

[RhodeIslandOne]

21. This just shows how pointless it all is

Why do we even need "electors". The scoreboard says what the scoreboard says.

[sarisataka]

25. The electors are the score on the board

We have just told ourselves the lie that the people elect the President for so long, we have come to believe the lie is the truth.