When a President is selected by the Electoral College, he has not been elected by the people...

[kentuck]

....necessarily.

Donald Trump was NOT elected by the people. He received almost 3 million votes less than the winner, Hillary Clinton.

So let us stop talking nonsense about the "will of the people".

Let us stop pretending that Donald Trump cannot be held accountable because the people put him in office. The people did not put him in office.

The people are not obligated to Donald Trump. Donald Trump is obligated to the people.

There is no automatic respect whenever a president is chosen in such a manner.

It is he that should be showing gratitude.

[Crafty Girl]

1. Do you know how many presidents have been elected by popular vote?

None.

[kentuck]

2. How many have been "elected" with a minority of the vote ?

Two of the last five ...

It's becoming a pattern .

[Crafty Girl]

3. But, we don't

elect POTUS by popular vote. Never have. When the popular vote and EC vote outcomes are the same, that is only by coincidence.

Whether you like the EC or not, and I don't, that's the way we elect presidents, and always have. To change that, we will have to change the Constitution.

[kentuck]

4. I understand that.

But they should not say it's the "will of the people" when they have not won the popular vote.

[pnwmom]

7. It wasn't only by coincidence. It was meant to reflect the will of the people and that's why it has

the vast majority of the time.

We wouldn't have to change the constitution if enough states passed the popular vote pact.

[former9thward]

9. No it was not meant to reflect the will of the people.

It was intentionally put in the Constitution by the founders to prevent tyranny by high population states. You may not like that but that it what they said in the debates. The popular vote pact is unconstitutional. Article 1, Section 10 says states can't enter into agreements each other.

[pnwmom]

11. It was put in the Constitution because we didn't have a communication system that could have

supported a popular vote count.

And here's an argument about why it IS constitutional:

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/386588-dont-believe-the-myths-about-a-national-popular-vote

[former9thward]

13. You are trying to change history.

Not surprising... If you want to change the Constitution that is fine, just admit it. Don't pretend the people who wrote it agreed with you.

[pnwmom]

14. No, I'm not. There were DEBATES during the writing of the constitution,

and different debaters had different views.

[former9thward]

15. And they lost.

You can't admit that.

[pnwmom]

6. In the 20th and 21st centuries, how many winners of the popular vote lost? Only 2.

Gore, who won the popular vote by half a million.

Hillary Clinton, who won the popular vote by 2.9 million.

2016 was an aberration.

[MichMan]

5. Since voter turnout has been between 50-60% for decades

…..I would argue that no president has been selected by the will of the people in any of the elections

[Alea]

8. lol

[maxsolomon]

10. Deck chairs on the Titanic

We have bigger problems, like the Rule of Law being obsolete.

[Crunchy Frog]

12. If the situation had been flipped, the R's would NEVER have accepted the outcome.

There would have been blood in the streets.

Dump even said as much before the election.

There's no reason why ANY of us should recognize his legitimacy as "president".

[Poiuyt]

16. I'm guessing that if a republican ever won the popular vote but lost the electoral college,

we'd see some pretty fast action in Congress to change that.

[not_the_one]

17. One Person, One Vote

The EC is nothing but a work-around to subvert majority rule.

I find that unconstitutional.

Either each person's vote counts the same, or it does not. If not, we need to completely get rid of that little gem of trouble making wisdom...

And this ONLY applies to the presidency?

If it is good enough for deciding the presidency, let's see what other areas it would work in.



There needs to be a national push to educate the American people as to what the EC is, how and why it was created, and what the actual ramifications are (like the thousands in the state of Wyoming having more power than the millions of NYC...).

The current rationale is easy to see, Wyoming (as an example) residents are (largely) white, and the NYC (as an example) residents are (largely) POC, immigrants of all nations, Jews, homos.



What was I thinking?

Nevermind. (channeling Rosanne RosannaDanna)