Cook Political: Trump was only 65,009 votes away from winning -- despite Biden's 7 million vote lead

[pnwmom]

Reminder: an amendment to the Constitution to eliminate the Electoral College would need to be ratified by 3/4 of the states. What are the odds of that happening?

Link to tweet

?



Dave Wasserman
@Redistrict
·
7h
Fact: in 2016, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 2.9 million and came within 77,744 votes of winning the presidency.

In 2020, Donald Trump lost the popular vote by 7.1 million and came within 65,009 votes of winning reelection.

[Stinky The Clown]

1. That's frightening

[pnwmom]

4. Terrifying.

[Demovictory9]

9. Horrifying

[Funtatlaguy]

2. The Electoral College is a huge scam. It needs to die.

[RAB910]

11. It was created to count black people for representation purposes without allowing them to vote

[bamagal62]

42. This!

[JanMichael]

3. Ban the EC. nt

[madaboutharry]

5. The American people need to demand getting rid of this bullshit.

The Electoral College is anti-democratic.

It is an anachronism and has no place in the 21st century.

[Crunchy Frog]

13. Won't happen until a Democrat loses the popular vote but wins the EC.

[pecosbob]

6. So seven million voters were disenfranchised by the Electoral Vote

Because rural states deserve more power?

[Drunken Irishman]

7. In 2004, Kerry came within 37,547 votes of winning despite losing the popular vote by three millions

Well technically tying, but close enough.

It sometimes goes both ways.

[JanMichael]

12. 1st time I've seen that #. But winning EC (lose pop) for Dems not recently or in the last 40 years.

Don't know the last time that happened with a Dem winning the EC and losing the popular vote?

It's happened for conservatives twice since 2000. That I know.

[Crunchy Frog]

16. I believe 1888 was the last time it happened in any election prior to 2000.

I don't know the circumstances or which party. Just that it wasn't a normal occurrence before this century.

[Drunken Irishman]

32. There's people who believe Kennedy actually lost the popular vote in 1960 due to Alabama's voting...

I don't know if I share it.

But you're right that in the last something years, it's hurt the Democrats.

I will say 2000 is a crapshoot. That election was so close nationally (Gore won the popular vote by a mere 547,398 votes) that really, the electoral college/popular vote difference wasn't terribly in favor of Bush (especially since Al Gore lost the electoral college by 537 votes in Florida - or, if you want to get crazy, 7,211 votes in NH (had he won NH, Florida would have been irrelevant). The closeness of the popular vote there I think reflected on the electoral college, which was, probably more than at any point in the last 100-plus years, a true toss-up.

I can't think of any scenario in modern presidential history where the election came down to so few votes in just one state.

Every other example, like 2004 and 2016 and 2020, either include a candidate needing a significant amount of votes in one state to flip the EC (Kerry lost Ohio by 118,000 or so - and had he won it would've won the White House despite losing the popular vote by three-million) or a less than 100,000 across additional states to win (in 2016, Hillary still needed to eke out wins in PA, MI and WI, while Trump would have needed to win three-plus states).

Another close election was 1976, where Carter won the popular vote by two-points and 297 EV. But again, you'd need some radical changes to flip that race.

1960, too, as despite people focusing on Illinois, even if Kennedy had lost Illinois, he would have won the presidency.

[moose65]

41. It's actually never happened

In all of the cases where the popular vote loser won the electoral college, the “winner” has been a Republican:

1876 when Republican Hayes won over Democrat Tilden (and the only time in history where the loser actually won more than 50% of the popular vote);

1888 when Republican Harrison won the electoral college but lost the popular vote by about 91,000 votes to Democrat Cleveland;

2000 when Democrat Gore lost but got 550,000 more votes than Republican Bush;

And of of course 2016 with Trump.

There is also the 1824 election, where some states chose electors by popular vote and some still appointed them by state legislature. John Quincy Adams won, although Andrew Jackson got more votes in those states who elected by popular vote. There were also two other major candidates. All 4 candidates were Democratic-Republicans. That election is so far in the past and pre-dates both modern parties, really, that it doesn’t fall into the same category as the other 4.

Some scholars think that Kennedy may have lost the popular vote to Nixon in 1960, which would have been the only time that a Democrat won while losing the popular vote. We’ll probably never know about that one, definitively.

[dsc]

45. actually it never has

The times it has happened were Hayes (GOP), Harrison (GOP), Bush (GOP), and Trump (GOP)

[Rstrstx]

23. Where are you getting that number?

Ohio was the deciding state and Bush took it by over 100,000 votes. There was about a 20k difference in Nevada and only a 6k difference in New Mexico but those states only had 10 electoral votes at the time and Bush won 286 EVs.

EDIT: Ah ok I see where Iowa was really close, about a 10k margin, which yes would have dropped Bush to 269 electoral votes with its 7 electoral votes.

[Drunken Irishman]

24. I love when people answer their own question!

[LuvNewcastle]

8. That's why Trumpy thought he had it in the bag.

The Republicans didn't anticipate the turnout in this election, all because of Covid and the mail-in ballots. If Trumpy had handled the pandemic problems better, maybe there wouldn't have been such a need for mail-in ballots and he would have won. He really fucked himself, which is his proper legacy.

[Demovictory9]

10. Yes. Even with pandemic..if trump just pretended he cared

[Sympthsical]

14. That's why the Democratic Party needs to change

We have the system we have. It's not going anywhere anytime soon. And for forty years, moderate incrementalism has been the order of the day.

It. Does. Not. Work.

Saying, "We need to get rid of the electoral college!" solves nothing. Of course we do. But we won't. So saying that and doing nothing else to change how we approach national politics is a recipe for more disaster down the line.

We have lost state governments over the years. We have allowed Republicans to rule the ground game. We won this one by a hair. Our messaging has been milquetoast and mealy-mouthed. Not Trump was barely enough to squeak Biden in under our system. And it did nothing for down ticket races. Never Trumpers voted for Biden and kept their local preferences intact.

We came this close to disaster. And the response was to immediately punch Left - go after, you know, the people who don't hold very many reins of power. Of course, it's the people without power's fault! The people in power? Just keep doing what you're doing.

As a Millennial, I have lived my entire life dealing with the fall out of Reaganism and the Democratic Party's rightward shift in response. We are where we are today because of this long slide and our ineffectual combatting of it.

We need to change and rapidly. We no longer have time for incrementalism. See: the environment. People who advocate for it are consigning us to a dreadful fate. If we can't come out from under Trump and truly push for liberal and progressive change in a fundamental way, I don't think we'll ever do it. We'll just slide into further inequality, environmental disaster, and a decline that would leave Rome baffled.

[BarackTheVote]

20. Preach!

How many young people were energized by the protests this summer? How many of them saw and lived through police brutality and held the line against fascist tactics, organized, registered to vote and registered people to vote, and showed up at the polls en masse to deliver this country from fascism? And then they were immediately thrown under the bus while the very few Republicans who turned coat were praised and fawned over?

We cannot afford to shut down young voters, or else we are going to lose in 2022. Don’t whine when the youth vote and the millennial vote doesn’t show up for you, when you don’t show up for them.

[still_one]

22. We won the presidency because Biden was the nominee.

If we want to win, follow the lead of Rep. Clyburn and Stacy Abrams

It is not one size fits all. Howard Dean's 50 state strategy recognized that.

[Buckeyeblue]

54. You're not necessarily wrong however

We haven't figured out how to advocate for these positions in a way that will attract new voters and convince swing voters. That's our problem.

[pat_k]

15. And many here dismissed. . .

. . . the notion that this election was within trump's the reach through systematic voter suppression.

And some did more than "dismiss." They lambasted me whenever I sounded an alarm about how critical battling voter suppression would be to winning -- and how the margin in the polls might not be large enough to overcome suppression. I was labeled "defeatist," accused of "trying to depress turnout" (I was doing the opposite), and on, and on.

The fact is, if we don't mount a well-funded, effective, nationally coordinated effort to end long lines, voter registration purges, and the numerous other barriers that disproportionately suppress the vote of black, urban, young voters, and others who tend to vote democratic, we will remain at high risk of seeing the will of the voters thwarted in future election.

[still_one]

17. That is why it is paramount that we must ALWAYS win and keep the blue wall intact

[still_one]

18. That is why it is paramount that we must ALWAYS win and keep the blue wall intact

[hlthe2b]

19. Absolutely underscores why we must get rid of the EC.

[pnwmom]

21. How will we get 3/4 of states to ratify?

[hlthe2b]

25. Start of with the National Popular Vote compact. Read up on it.

Even Laurence Tribe believes it may pass constitutional muster and is in favor of it. Don't let the naysayers (who largely have NOT read about it and do not understand it automatically tell you it won't work, it is unconstitutional, we should just give up--they don't know and don't bother to read up on it**)

Colorado has passed it through both the legislature AND ballot initiative.

https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/written-explanation

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/critics-of-electoral-college-push-for-popular-vote-compact

https://ballotpedia.org/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

National Popular Vote Myths and the US Consitution
https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/section_9.1

http://www.every-vote-equal.com/sites/default/files/everyvoteequal-4th-ed-2013-02-21.pdf

[pnwmom]

28. I know about it. How does it work with the high number of states that disallow faithless electors"

[hlthe2b]

30. This is addressed in the links provided. SCOTUS ruled that states can enforce faithless electors

statutes.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2020/07/14/supreme-courts-faithless-electors-decision-validates-case-for-the-national-popular-vote-interstate-compact/

[pnwmom]

33. If states can enforce those statutes, that would seem to hobble the National Vote compact. n/t

[hlthe2b]

34. No. Please read this link

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2020/07/14/supreme-courts-faithless-electors-decision-validates-case-for-the-national-popular-vote-interstate-compact/

Supreme Court’s “faithless electors” decision validates case for the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

[dsc]

46. they aren't faithless if they are voting as their state tells them to

if they tell them to vote for the popular vote winner then by doing so they are being faithful, not faithless.

[pnwmom]

47. Where do the state laws say that? n/t

[dsc]

48. that is the entire point of the compact

it is a law that each state in the compact passes that when the electoral votes of the states which have passed the law reaches 270 or more their votes will go the popular vote winner. they are in the low 200's now I think.

[pnwmom]

49. But there was a court decision last summer that seemed to make that tougher.

The issue isn't being faithless to the state or the popular vote winner -- it's being faithless to the individual voters who gave them their vote.

[dsc]

50. nope it is the state not the voter to whom they have to be faithful

States can hold their electors to the rules they set, but they get to set the rules (as long as they do so prior to the election). In theory a state could have as it's rule we will appoint electors that are the same party as wins the legislature.

[Poiuyt]

39. The Electoral College will stay until Republicans lose the presidency due to it.

They will block any effort to eliminate the EC because they know it benefits them. But if a Republican candidate wins the popular vote but loses the EC, then you can bet that it will be gone the next day.

[hlthe2b]

43. Post # 25, 30, 34

[a kennedy]

26. and why post this, why make us feel even MORE terrible because of this???

[pnwmom]

31. It's a reminder that we have to work just as hard to take over as many state houses as we can

because having Democratic governors in place was key to our win.

[yardwork]

27. That's terrifying, and we're still paying the price for 2016.

[AmericanCanuck]

29. This is why we can't have rebel factions who pout if their candidate/s don't win the primary

After the primaries, ALL Democrats must be united and work tirelessly to get the winning candidate elected in the GE - regardless of who supported said candidate.

Vote Blue No Matter Who.

[colsohlibgal]

35. Mass Disinformation Has Brought This About

Fox, OAN, Newsmax, right wing radio. 30+ years of this have warped the mind of Millions. Diaper Donnie threw it into high gear.

It took awhile. This is the first time anyone has tried to subvert the clear result of an election with the support of the far right.

The Neo Nazi makeover has driven moderate Republicans away with some switching to the Democratic Party....like Steve Schmidt.. So what’s left is wackjobs like Sidney Powell. These folks live in an alternate Universe.

Not sure how they can be brought back to reality. Bringing back the Fairness Doctrine and ditching The Citizen United Scam.

[BGBD]

36. A lot of you have this backward

Voting today isn't about convincing people to vote for you, its about convincing you that the other guy is a threat to you. General election victories are about negative partisanship. Nobody is persuaded to support someone. Instead it is about how scared you can get your supporters so that they show up and some if the other guys to stay home.

Thats why Trump won in 2016 and why he lost in 2020. The reason he was close is because he used the socialism/defend the police stuff to get his voter out.

So no, having a more progressive message won't get more supporters and will make other stay home while getting more of them out. It should be evident since Biden ran away from all of that and beat an incumbent President with a big EC advantage.

While that's true every election will be close. If you win a primary you will have 47% or so of the vote locked up. There are very few ticket splitters, its all about being the lower precieved threat to the biggest group of people.

The electoral college right now has a built in R advantage and will as long as demographics stay in the ballpark of where they are.

[MillenialDemLXXXIII]

37. This is surprising but true

President-Elect Biden surpassed 270 electoral college votes by narrow margins in 3 states, WI, AZ and GA. If those had slipped away, we'd be living in a nightmare right now wherein Trump wins by 271-267 or 270-268. Scary!

[BGBD]

44. Sure, but look at how

The other side is reacting. A lot of them think it is Armageddon now because Biden won. They think we will be a further left version of Venezuela by February. It's ridiculous, but goes to show how bought in the sides are and how negatively the other side gets viewed regardless of their actual positions.

[BumRushDaShow]

53. These same people thought it was "Armageddon" when Obama won

TWICE.

Remember the "FEMA Camps" and the "He's gonna take away ma guns" crowd?

I think trying to tie the suggestion from the OP to narrow things like "defund the police" and "socialism" or other slogans is silly. Similar nonsense was spewed in 2008 (to include Obama attending a "radical Muslim madrassa", etc.), but he won anyway.

The bigger issue is that it also depends on the personality and dynamics of the candidate and certainly the reality show candidate, who was primed to play to the television audience, was forced to actually plumb to further depths then just sloganeering to get voters. And this was done by literally and overtly embracing the most fringe of some of the previously non-voting electorate - the white supremacists and anti-government conspiracy theorists, who are the fruit of the domestic terrorists that orgs like the SPLC and even the FBI, have warned about.

And do keep this in mind - although these factions have been out there for a long time (some iteration since the end of the Civil War) and have been courted by the GOP since Goldwater, they were subsequently thrown on the back burner by Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Poppy Bush, & Shrub. However for the first time, they were given free reign after the 2016 election - literally after 50 years of being suppressed during their modern existence.

Whether the demons can be shoved back into the bottle is another story given the "voice" (social media) that has been gifted to them that until recently, was completely unregulated by the creators of that "voice", and is a challenge. But their last appearances in the '90s eventually resulted in them being neutered when their funders were prosecuted and bankrupted. The same needs to happen today.

[The Genealogist]

38. I don't know what the odds are...

but I can tell you this: the idea of abolishing the EC scares the ever-loving shit out of Republicans. OMGEEEE LOS ANGELES WILL DECIDE ALL THE ELECSHUNNZZZZZOMG!11!! AND YOU KNOW WHAT KIND OF PEOPLE LIVE THERE!1!!1!!

When Texas inevitably goes blue, suddenly every Republican will be falling all over each other to get rid of it. We aren't there yet, of course, but the day is coming.

It may sound unlikely, but I think it would be easier to find a way to neutralize the RW propaganda machine. That is the glue that holds the deplorable Republican base together. It would involve buying up an awful lot of radio stations. Stations don't necessarily have to play Democratic messages, either. Change their formats to oldies or something. Teach people how to cook or talk about kittens. Anything besides 24/7/365 RW propaganda.

[David__77]

40. It was close to a nightmare scenario.

It was one I was bearing in mind before the election. I could envision Biden winning by 8 points and doing pretty well in Texas and other places and falling just short where it counts. That could happen in the future.

[bamagal62]

51. I wrote a long post about the EC and then deleted it.

In the end the EC is crap and doesn’t work in today’s world. The EC needs to be revisited. It might have been fair many, many years ago. It’s not fair today. It’s insane. It makes no sense. My guess is the EC was more beneficial to land and slave owners.

[moondust]

52. EC was a bad idea.

At the time it was passed the drafters didn't really know where the growing population moving westward would end up settling and perhaps later relocating. Had they even heard of the word "urbanization"? It should never have been virtually carved in stone requiring a supermajority to change it.

[Hortensis]

55. Horrifying. Everyone who complains "get rid of the EC," though, is NOT serious

about addressing this problem before it destroys us. And this OP should make everyone serious.

Even the original supporters of the EC watched it fail in its intent and regretted not doing a better job. But going to the currently popular national popular vote would require constitutional amendment, and that's not going to happen within most of our lifetimes. (We average older here on DU.) Plus, when we did it, we'd have to do it very carefully and right because there's alligators in them waters.

A simple popular vote would create proliferation of potentially dozens of parties, many of them single-issue, which would a far less stable situation that would be used to splinter away votes and leave us with the same vulnerability to extremist takeover as now -- but worse. Also, inevitably, small parties often make devils' bargains with each other to defeat the candidates winning the popular vote -- and in so doing routinely betray those supporting them. The pursuit of power is extremely corrupting.

BUT, itm, there are big things that CAN be done legislatively to make our elections more democratic.

The EC itself can be changed. Just for an example of one proposal because it's all I remember: add more electors, two per state, to be allocated to whoever wins the popular vote. Etc.

And/or states can change how they allocate their electors, to be proportional to the popular vote, instead of winner takes all. Each state can do this individually -- wherever the voters insist.

[Roisin Ni Fiachra]

56. We must remain united against fascism, and

we must add to our numbers. 81,000,000 votes won't be enough next time around.