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Hi,
In two of the last six presidential elections, the candidate who got the most votes nationwide lost the election because of the archaic, undemocratic Electoral College.
Worse yet, with polls now showing President Biden in a dead heat against nearly every one of the major Republican candidates, there’s simply too much risk that the loser of the popular vote will once again win the White House — and this time, our democracy might not survive.1
The good news is that we have a solution.
The National Popular Vote compact is a bottom up, state-by-state strategy whereby states representing 270 electoral votes pass laws requiring that their electoral votes go to the winner of the national popular vote.2 Already, states comprising 205 electoral votes have gotten on board, and we need to push hard right now to get the final few states we need before 2024.
In 2000, George W. Bush won the White House despite losing the popular vote by 543,000 votes. It happened again in 2016, when Donald Trump lost the popular vote for president by nearly 3 million votes.
As a result, we have a Supreme Court wildly out of step with the American people, and more and more Americans are losing faith in the basic institutions of democracy.
Abolishing the Electoral College would require a constitutional amendment, and that’s an incredibly steep hill to climb. But passing the National Popular Vote compact is comparatively easy. It’s simply a legal agreement by the states to award their electoral votes to the winner of the nationwide popular vote. For the National Popular Vote compact to go into effect, we only need enough states to reach the magic number of 270 electoral votes.
Already 16 states and the District of Columbia have passed the compact into law. That’s 205 electoral votes.3 If just a few more states join the compact, it will ensure no president can be elected while losing the popular vote.
Demand Progress Action has been advocating for the National Popular Vote compact for years, and now that it’s close to reality, we need to massively turn up the heat.
With gratitude for all that you do,
Tihi and the team at Demand Progress Action
Sources:
1. RealClearPolitics, "2024 Latest Polls," accessed September 8, 2023.
2. National Popular Vote, "Status of National Popular Vote Bill in Each State," accessed September 8, 2023.
3. National Popular Vote, "Status of National Popular Vote Bill in Each State," accessed September 8, 2023.
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