US Senator Will File Bill to Dissolve ‘Outdated, Undemocratic’ Electoral College
‘Only Office in the Land Where You Can Get More Votes and Still Lose’
Democratic U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer of California will file a bill to dissolve the Electoral College, an integral part of the American presidential voting system that has overruled the will of the people five times, including twice in recent years.Â
How exactly does the US Electoral College work?https://t.co/hUB7rTNBWA pic.twitter.com/KTj8wT3ksR
— CNN (@CNN) November 12, 2016
“In my lifetime, I have seen two elections where the winner of the general election did not win the popular vote,” Sen. Boxer said in a statement. “When all the ballots are counted, Hillary Clinton will have won the popular vote by a margin that could exceed two million votes, and she is on track to have received more votes than any other presidential candidate in history except Barack Obama.”
“This is the only office in the land where you can get more votes and still lose the presidency. The Electoral College is an outdated, undemocratic system that does not reflect our modern society, and it needs to change immediately. Every American should be guaranteed that their vote counts.”
“In 2012, Donald Trump tweeted, ‘The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy,’ ” Boxer added. “I couldn’t agree more. One person, one vote!”
Boxer is correct. Clinton will likely end up beating Trump in the popular vote by about 2 million ballots.
According to many, and as this BuzzFeed video proves, the Electoral College favors white voters over non-white voters, in some cases by an almost 2-1 margin:
How the Electoral College favors white voters pic.twitter.com/1BnnmWmiMp
— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) November 14, 2016
Sen. Boxer is not alone. Former Attorney General Eric Holder recently called for the archaic convention to be eliminated:Â
Unfortunately, it will take more than an act of Congress to remove the Electoral College.
“It takes a constitutional amendment to abolish the electoral college, which means a two-thirds vote of Congress would be needed as well as ratification by three-quarters of the states,” McClatchy DC notes. “There’s been more than 700 proposals over the years to change the electoral college.”
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