(10-14-2021 12:20 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:01 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 11:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  I wish we just awarded states cites as proportional to their votes. For example if a state with 10 votes votes 60/40, 6 go to one candidate, 4 to the other. Seems the most fair to me.

And allocate House seats this way as well…
right now, a state like Tennessee has 40% of its electorate vote Democratic, yet only 2 of 9 house seats. Arkansas has zero house seats, yet 35-40 of their voters are Democrats. I think it’s fair to say, gerrymandered districts & non competitive house races have helped lead to this intense polarization.

there’s no questioning Gerry-rigged-meandering …. however, that has nothing to do with senate/presidential elections … we’ve evolved past the founders’ schema …

there’s only one way to solve this relative to those elected to federal positions … and a constitutional convention ain’ a happenin’ in today’s world…. and if it were to happen, imagine what a clusterfk that would become…

the bottom line is having secure elections in all 50 states with a standard in place that eliminates fraud is THEE ONLY OPTION WORTH DISCUSSING!!!

Election security is a pickled red herring. It plays to the losers and ensures for the overturning of future elections and the subsequent end of this democratic experiment. Outside of unsubstantiated conjecture, there is nothing credible that’s been presented… certainly not worth sacrificing our democratic processes over. Trump lost by millions of votes. He’ll have another shot in 3.5 years. Instead, he’s focused on boxing out voters and turning oversight of state elections over to partisan legislatures. Soon we’ll have Russian level election security and 75% of the vote supporting the winner.

(10-14-2021 01:07 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:20 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:01 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 11:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  I wish we just awarded states cites as proportional to their votes. For example if a state with 10 votes votes 60/40, 6 go to one candidate, 4 to the other. Seems the most fair to me.

And allocate House seats this way as well…
right now, a state like Tennessee has 40% of its electorate vote Democratic, yet only 2 of 9 house seats. Arkansas has zero house seats, yet 35-40 of their voters are Democrats. I think it’s fair to say, gerrymandered districts & non competitive house races have helped lead to this intense polarization.

there’s no questioning Gerry-rigged-meandering …. however, that has nothing to do with senate/presidential elections … we’ve evolved past the founders’ schema …

there’s only one way to solve this relative to those elected to federal positions … and a constitutional convention ain’ a happenin’ in today’s world…. and if it were to happen, imagine what a clusterfk that would become…

the bottom line is having secure elections in all 50 states with a standard in place that eliminates fraud is THEE ONLY OPTION WORTH DISCUSSING!!!

Election security is a pickled red herring. It plays to the losers and ensures for the overturning of future elections and the subsequent end of this democratic experiment. Outside of unsubstantiated conjecture, there is nothing credible that’s been presented… certainly not worth sacrificing our democratic processes over. Trump lost by millions of votes. He’ll have another shot in 3.5 years. Instead, he’s focused on boxing out voters and turning oversight of state elections over to partisan legislatures. Soon we’ll have Russian level election security and 75% of the vote supporting the winner.

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

it's already been stated by data collectors and census people, that if you do go a national vote of any sort, you need approximately _23_ counties to win the Presidency of the United states.

That's not 23 states, that's _23_ counties.

(10-14-2021 01:27 PM)DaSaintFan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

it's already been stated by data collectors and census people, that if you do go a national vote of any sort, you need approximately _23_ counties to win the Presidency of the United states.

That's not 23 states, that's _23_ counties.

LA, HOU, NYC, CHI, ATL would basically do it + the remainder…

Nah, let's just keep it the way it is. If the Demons don't like it then tough. Those conniving minds are always like Satan, dreaming up ways to screw people up, and like someone stated as soon as it doesn't suit the Demons they'll want to change it back, aka the Reid Rule.

(10-14-2021 01:32 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 01:27 PM)DaSaintFan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

it's already been stated by data collectors and census people, that if you do go a national vote of any sort, you need approximately _23_ counties to win the Presidency of the United states.

That's not 23 states, that's _23_ counties.

LA, HOU, NYC, CHI, ATL would basically do it + the remainder…

I want to say it's:

Los Angeles and the surrounding counties
New York City and the surrounding counties
Chicago and the surrounding counties
Houston and the surrounding counties (MAYBE?)
Cleveland (or it might be Cincinnati?), i know it's North Ohio
And Philadelphia

Basically if those 6 population heavy areas go blue, and you have a national "vote" election. You would never see a Republican in political office.

I think it's legal, unfortunately.

I noticed swing states join it when they turn Blue. It's creeping up on the country & most people dont' even realize it's a thing.

If we ever go to a National Popular Vote instead of the Electoral College, it will be the end of our Republic. I picture the whole country looking like Detroit or the Southside of Chicago. Democrat controlled slums from sea to sea.

Thanks but no thanks….

I'm sure they have run the numbers and determined this trick will always work to the dems advantage, and never the Conservatives advantage.

All it does is add another finger to the scales.

(10-14-2021 10:27 PM)Todor Wrote:  I'm sure they have run the numbers and determined this trick will always work to the dems advantage, and never the Conservatives advantage.

All it does is add another finger to the scales.

Trump in June 2019 – Fox News interview
“It’s always tougher for the Republican because, . . . the Electoral College is very much steered to the Democrats. It’s a big advantage for the Democrats. It’s very much harder for the Republicans to win.”

Trump, April 26, 2018 on “Fox & Friends”
“I would rather have a popular election, but it’s a totally different campaign.”
“I would rather have the popular vote because it’s, to me, it’s much easier to win the popular vote.”

“I would rather have a popular vote. “
Trump, October 12, 2017 in Sean Hannity interview

“I would rather see it, where you went with simple votes. You know, you get 100 million votes, and somebody else gets 90 million votes, and you win. There’s a reason for doing this. Because it brings all the states into play.”
Trump, November 13, 2016, on “60 Minutes”

"The phoney electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. . . . The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy."
In 2012, the night Romney lost, Trump tweeted.

(10-14-2021 06:30 PM)CardinalJim Wrote:  If we ever go to a National Popular Vote instead of the Electoral College, it will be the end of our Republic. I picture the whole country looking like Detroit or the Southside of Chicago. Democrat controlled slums from sea to sea.

Thanks but no thanks….

The bill is ONLY about presidential elections.

The U.S. Senate and U.S. House and Governors, state legislatures, and local government officials, etc. would continue to represent us.

A presidential candidate who focused only on America’s cities and urban centers would lose. There aren’t anywhere near enough big city voters nationally. And all big city voters do not vote for the same candidate.

New York city, Los Angeles and Chicago have only 4.7% of the nation’s population. Their voters OBVIOUSLY could NOT choose every president.

The population of the top 5 cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Philadelphia) has been only 6% of the population of the United States.

Voters in the biggest cities in the US have been almost exactly balanced out by rural areas in terms of population and partisan composition.

59,849,899 people have lived in the 100 biggest cities.

59,492,267 in rural America.

In 2004, 17.4% of votes were cast in rural counties, while only 16.5% of votes were cast within the boundaries of our nation’s 100 largest cities.

19% of the U.S. population have lived outside the nation's Metropolitan Statistical Areas. Rural America has voted 60% Republican. None of the 10 most rural states matter now.

19% of the U.S. population have lived in the top 100 cities. They voted 63% Democratic in 2004.

The rest of the U.S., in SUBurbs, have divided almost exactly equally between Republicans and Democrats.

Now, because of statewide winner-take-all laws, in some states, big city Democratic votes can outnumber all other people not voting Democratic in the state. All of a state’s votes may go to Democrats.

Without state winner-take-all laws, every conservative in a state that now predictably votes Democratic would count. Right now they count for 0

The current system completely ignores conservative presidential voters in states that vote predictably Democratic.

Under a national popular vote, rural voters throughout the country would have their votes matter, rather than being ignored because of state boundaries.

(10-15-2021 06:54 AM)mvymvy Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 10:27 PM)Todor Wrote:  I'm sure they have run the numbers and determined this trick will always work to the dems advantage, and never the Conservatives advantage.

All it does is add another finger to the scales.

Trump in June 2019 – Fox News interview
“It’s always tougher for the Republican because, . . . the Electoral College is very much steered to the Democrats. It’s a big advantage for the Democrats. It’s very much harder for the Republicans to win.”

Trump, April 26, 2018 on “Fox & Friends”
“I would rather have a popular election, but it’s a totally different campaign.”
“I would rather have the popular vote because it’s, to me, it’s much easier to win the popular vote.”

“I would rather have a popular vote. “
Trump, October 12, 2017 in Sean Hannity interview

“I would rather see it, where you went with simple votes. You know, you get 100 million votes, and somebody else gets 90 million votes, and you win. There’s a reason for doing this. Because it brings all the states into play.”
Trump, November 13, 2016, on “60 Minutes”

"The phoney electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. . . . The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy."
In 2012, the night Romney lost, Trump tweeted.

And your point?

(10-14-2021 05:30 PM)DaSaintFan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 01:32 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 01:27 PM)DaSaintFan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

it's already been stated by data collectors and census people, that if you do go a national vote of any sort, you need approximately _23_ counties to win the Presidency of the United states.

That's not 23 states, that's _23_ counties.

LA, HOU, NYC, CHI, ATL would basically do it + the remainder…

I want to say it's:

Los Angeles and the surrounding counties
New York City and the surrounding counties
Chicago and the surrounding counties
Houston and the surrounding counties (MAYBE?)
Cleveland (or it might be Cincinnati?), i know it's North Ohio
And Philadelphia

Basically if those 6 population heavy areas go blue, and you have a national "vote" election. You would never see a Republican in political office.

The most populous 6 STATES are California, Texas, New York, Florida, Pennsylvania and Illinois.
All voters in those state, and all other states, do not all vote for the same candidate.

In 2016,
CA, New York state, and Illinois Democrats together cast 12% of the total national popular vote.

In total New York state (29 electors), Illinois (20), and California (55), with 19% of U.S. electors, cast 20% of the total national popular vote

In total, Florida (29), Texas (38), and Pennsylvania (20), with 16% of U.S. electors, cast 18% of the total national popular vote.
Trump won those states

All the voters – 62% -- in the 44 other states and DC would have mattered and counted equally.

States are agreeing to award their 270+ electoral votes to the winner of the most national popular votes.

All votes would be valued equally in presidential elections, no matter where voters live.

(10-14-2021 02:28 PM)olliebaba Wrote:  Nah, let's just keep it the way it is. If the Demons don't like it then tough. Those conniving minds are always like Satan, dreaming up ways to screw people up, and like someone stated as soon as it doesn't suit the Demons they'll want to change it back, aka the Reid Rule.

The current presidential election system of state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) “is a math equation, and its sole remaining impact on American politics is to magnify the political power of some Americans and reduce that of others. “ – Boston Globe, 7/6/20

“Let’s quit pretending there is some great benefit to the national good that allows the person with [fewer] votes to win the White House. Republicans have long said that they believe in competition. Let both parties compete for votes across the nation and stop disenfranchising voters by geography. The winner should win.” – Stuart Stevens (Republican)

When presidential candidates who more Americans voted for lose the Electoral College, the situation is unsustainable. This is how a government loses its legitimacy.

Unfair election systems can lead to politicians and their supporters who appreciate unfairness, which leads to more unfairness.

In Gallup polls since they started asking in 1944 until before the 2016 election, only about 20% of the public supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided).
A September 2020 Gallup survey found 61% of American voters support moving to a popular vote system. 89% of Democrats, 68% of independents 23% of Republicans.

Support for a national popular vote for President has been strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in every state surveyed. In the 41 red, blue, and purple states surveyed, overall support has been in the 67-81% range - in rural states, in small states, in Southern and border states, in big states, and in other states polled.

21,461 choices and votes in 3 states were 329 times more important than the more than 7 million national vote lead in the country.
There were several scenarios in which a candidate could have won the presidency in 2020 with fewer popular votes than their opponents.
That could have reduced future turnout more, if more voters realized their votes do not matter.

Most Americans don't ultimately care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state or district. Voters want to know, that no matter where they live, even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it is wrong that the candidate with the most popular votes can lose. It undermines the legitimacy of the electoral system. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.

The National Popular Vote bill was approved in 2016 by a unanimous bipartisan House committee vote in both Georgia (16 electoral votes) and Missouri (10).

Since 2006, the bill has passed 41 state legislative chambers in 25 rural, small, medium, large, Democratic, Republican and purple states with 283 electoral votes, including one house in Arizona (11), Arkansas (6), Maine (4), Michigan (15), Minnesota (10), North Carolina (16), Oklahoma (7) and Virginia (13), and both houses in Nevada (6).

(10-14-2021 01:27 PM)DaSaintFan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

it's already been stated by data collectors and census people, that if you do go a national vote of any sort, you need approximately _23_ counties to win the Presidency of the United states.

That's not 23 states, that's _23_ counties.

Because of the current state-by-state winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) . . .

A small number of Americans are the ones who really matter.

In 2016, voters in 9 counties in 4 battleground states (AZ, FL, PA, WI) could swing the presidential election. – New York Times – 9/26/20

"The reality is: Given our Electoral College and our current politics, national elections are decided in this country in a few precincts, in a few key swing states," former DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson
The former secretary of DHS, Kirstjen Nielsen, echoed those comments– 3/21/18

According to Tony Fabrizio, pollster for the Trump campaign, the president’s narrow victory was due to 5 counties in 2 states (not CA or NY).

In 2012, under the current state-by-state winner-take-all system (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), voters in just 60 counties and DC could have won in states with 270 electoral votes to elect the president in 2012 – even though they represented just 26.3% of voters.

The twisted logic of the Electoral College makes the only voters whose opinions are worthy of concern, the voters who live in about a half-dozen swing states. Knowing how the election is going to turn out requires spending “time talking to those precious swing voters in those precious swing counties in those precious swing states.” . . . It’s “a necessary strategy for them to win the election.”

All voters in the biggest states do not vote for the same presidential candidate.

With current statewide winner-take-all laws, a presidential candidate could lose despite winning 78%+ of the popular vote and 38 smaller states.

With the current state-by-state winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), it could only take winning a bare plurality of popular votes in only the 12 most populous states, containing 60% of the population of the United States, for a candidate to win the Presidency with less than 22% of the nation's votes!

But, the political reality is that the 12 largest states, with a majority of the U.S. population and electoral votes, rarely agree on any political candidate. In 2016, among the 12 largest states: 7 voted Republican (Texas, Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Georgia) and 5 voted Democratic (California, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, and Virginia). The big states are just about as closely divided as the rest of the country. For example, among the four largest states, the two largest Republican states (Texas and Florida) generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Bush, while the two largest Democratic states generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Kerry.

With National Popular Vote, it's not the size of any given state, it's the size of their "margin" that will matter. Under a national popular vote, the margin of your loss within a state matters as much as the size of your win.

In 2004, among the 11 most populous states, in the seven non-battleground states, % of winning party, and margin of “wasted” popular votes, from among the total 122 Million votes cast nationally:
* Texas (62% R), 1,691,267
* New York (59% D), 1,192,436
* Georgia (58% R), 544,634
* North Carolina (56% R), 426,778
* California (55% D), 1,023,560
* Illinois (55% D), 513,342
* New Jersey (53% D), 211,826

To put these numbers in perspective,
Oklahoma (7 electoral votes) generated a margin of 455,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004 -- larger than the margin generated by the 9th and 10th largest states, namely New Jersey and North Carolina (each with 15 electoral votes).
Utah (5 electoral votes) generated a margin of 385,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004.
8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).

Candidates do NOT campaign only in the 12 largest states now.
Candidates do NOT campaign in at least 4 of them.
Successful candidates would NOT campaign only in the largest states.

(10-14-2021 01:12 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 01:07 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:20 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:01 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 11:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  I wish we just awarded states cites as proportional to their votes. For example if a state with 10 votes votes 60/40, 6 go to one candidate, 4 to the other. Seems the most fair to me.

And allocate House seats this way as well…
right now, a state like Tennessee has 40% of its electorate vote Democratic, yet only 2 of 9 house seats. Arkansas has zero house seats, yet 35-40 of their voters are Democrats. I think it’s fair to say, gerrymandered districts & non competitive house races have helped lead to this intense polarization.

there’s no questioning Gerry-rigged-meandering …. however, that has nothing to do with senate/presidential elections … we’ve evolved past the founders’ schema …

there’s only one way to solve this relative to those elected to federal positions … and a constitutional convention ain’ a happenin’ in today’s world…. and if it were to happen, imagine what a clusterfk that would become…

the bottom line is having secure elections in all 50 states with a standard in place that eliminates fraud is THEE ONLY OPTION WORTH DISCUSSING!!!

Election security is a pickled red herring. It plays to the losers and ensures for the overturning of future elections and the subsequent end of this democratic experiment. Outside of unsubstantiated conjecture, there is nothing credible that’s been presented… certainly not worth sacrificing our democratic processes over. Trump lost by millions of votes. He’ll have another shot in 3.5 years. Instead, he’s focused on boxing out voters and turning oversight of state elections over to partisan legislatures. Soon we’ll have Russian level election security and 75% of the vote supporting the winner.

Trump to skip 2024 campaign and go straight to claiming he won – Borowitz Report, 10/12/21

(10-14-2021 12:53 PM)shere khan Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 09:34 AM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 09:07 AM)bobdizole Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 08:55 AM)gdunn Wrote:  So I know we've had this brought up a few times over the past.. But earlier this week I saw where Michigan was trying to get in on it.

For those who don't know, several states are trying to band together and when they hit 270 electoral votes they'll have legislation in place to award their electoral votes to the President who wins the popular vote not who wins their state.

So my question to the group is do you think this is constitutional or even legal?

It seems to be a clear violation of the Compact Clause and the 12th and 20th Amendments. If it ever passed the required number of states I can't see the supreme court not striking it down.

^^^ or secession begins…

I can here it now...

Grandpa, what started the Second Civil War?

Most Americans don't ultimately care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state or district. Voters want to know, that no matter where they live, even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it is wrong that the candidate with the most popular votes can lose. It undermines the legitimacy of the electoral system. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.

The National Popular Vote bill was approved in 2016 by a unanimous bipartisan House committee vote in both Georgia (16 electoral votes) and Missouri (10).

Since 2006, the bill has passed 41 state legislative chambers in 25 rural, small, medium, large, Democratic, Republican and purple states with 283 electoral votes, including one house in Arizona (11), Arkansas (6), Maine (4), Michigan (15), Minnesota (10), North Carolina (16), Oklahoma (7) and Virginia (13), and both houses in Nevada (6).
The bill has been enacted by 16 small, medium, and large jurisdictions with 195 electoral votes – 72% of the way to guaranteeing the majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency to the candidate with the most national popular votes.

When enacted by states with 270 electoral votes, it would change state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), in the enacting states, without changing anything in the Constitution, again using the built-in method that the Constitution provides for states to choose how to vote.

(10-14-2021 12:20 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 12:01 PM)Marc Mensa Wrote:  

(10-14-2021 11:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  I wish we just awarded states cites as proportional to their votes. For example if a state with 10 votes votes 60/40, 6 go to one candidate, 4 to the other. Seems the most fair to me.

And allocate House seats this way as well…
right now, a state like Tennessee has 40% of its electorate vote Democratic, yet only 2 of 9 house seats. Arkansas has zero house seats, yet 35-40 of their voters are Democrats. I think it’s fair to say, gerrymandered districts & non competitive house races have helped lead to this intense polarization.

there’s no questioning Gerry-rigged-meandering …. however, that has nothing to do with senate/presidential elections … we’ve evolved past the founders’ schema …

there’s only one way to solve this relative to those elected to federal positions … and a constitutional convention ain’ a happenin’ in today’s world…. and if it were to happen, imagine what a clusterfk that would become…

the bottom line is having secure elections in all 50 states with a standard in place that eliminates fraud is THEE ONLY OPTION WORTH DISCUSSING!!!

The Arizona fraudit reported finding more votes for Biden.
A multitude of unsubstantiated claims, and no proof of fraud.

“Georgia’s historic first statewide audit reaffirmed that the state’s new secure paper ballot voting system accurately counted and reported results,” said Secretary Raffensperger.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger recertified the results with a second recount.
Both recounts upheld the race’s original outcome

Election investigators in Georgia couldn't find the counterfeit ballots that Republican vote-counters said they observed last November. Georgia judge dismissed lawsuit seeking Georgia election audit.


Michigan Republicans proved that 2020 election conspiracy theories are utterly bonkers.

Wisconsin's 2020 election recount resulted in Biden gaining 87 votes overall, reaffirming his victory over Trump

Idaho’s re-canvass resulted in a lower number of votes for Trump.

A judge in Pennsylvania asked the Trump campaign to provide evidence of mail-in ballot fraud after it sued to prevent the state from using drop boxes for mail voting
In 524 pages the Trump campaign couldn't cite a single instance of mail-in voting fraud.

Trump and his Republican allies have tapped into the power of the mob that the Founders feared could subvert the country. The Trump Republican’s Big Lie illustrates how keen they are to prey on the disaffected and uninformed, Republican leaders have successfully manipulated and exploited the mob to harvest their votes and their donations. The lie is so big, blatant, pernicious and damaging it prevails over intelligence, truth and conscience. – Neil Baron

The Trump campaign knew days after the 2020 election that wild claims of voting machine tampering — pushed by Sidney Powell and others allied with Donald Trump — were not true, court filings show. Still, they promoted the false theories.

Voter fraud allegations in the 2020 presidential election were rejected by more than 50 courts including the Supreme Court (three times), state election officials in every state, and all federal election officials and agencies, including Trump’s own Attorney General and FBI Director.

“We have not seen historically any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election — whether it’s by mail or otherwise,”
There is no sign of national voter fraud effort now.
There is no evidence of a voter fraud effort targeting mail-in or other ballots.– Trump’s FBI Director,

Senators Lindsey Graham and Mike Lee personally vetted Trump’s fraud claims. They were unpersuaded

Trump’s Attorney General Barr bluntly dismissed Trump's election fraud allegations as bulls***.
"There had been no discrepancy reported anywhere, and I'm still not aware of any discrepancy."

John Boehner, the Republican former House speaker says the former president “incited that bloody insurrection” by his supporters at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and that the Republican Party has been taken over by “whack jobs.” . . . After the election — Trump refusing to accept the results and stoking the flames of conspiracy that turned into violence in the seat of our democracy, the building over which I once presided.” . . . Trump “incited that bloody insurrection for nothing more than selfish reasons, perpetuated by the bull**** he’d been shoveling since he lost a fair election the previous November.” . . . “He claimed voter fraud without any evidence, and repeated those claims, taking advantage of the trust placed in him by his supporters and ultimately betraying that trust.”

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said “It was not rigged. It was not stolen. Donald Trump lost the election. Joe Biden won the election. It's really clear,”

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie urged Republicans "to face the realities of the 2020 election and learn, not hide from them,"…"Pretending we won when we lost is a waste of time and energy and credibility."

There is no actual proof of widespread fraud.
There are conspiracy theories that hurt our system of government.

The Freedom to Vote act includes voter ID requirements.

(10-14-2021 11:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  I wish we just awarded states cites as proportional to their votes. For example if a state with 10 votes votes 60/40, 6 go to one candidate, 4 to the other. Seems the most fair to me.

Proportional awarding of electors by state would not be a fair “compromise” or solution.

There are good reasons why no state even proposes, much less chooses, to award their electors proportionally.

In 4 of the 8 elections between 1992 and 2020, the choice of President would have been thrown into the U.S. House (where each state has one vote in electing the President).
Based on the composition of the House at the time, the national popular vote winner would not have been chosen in 3 of those 4 cases, regardless of the popular vote anywhere.

Electors are people. They each have one vote. The result would be a very inexact whole number proportional system.

Every voter in every state would not be politically relevant or equal in presidential elections.

It would not accurately reflect the nationwide popular vote;

It would reduce the influence of any state, if not all states adopted.

It would not improve upon the current situation in which four out of five states and four out of five voters in the United States are ignored by presidential campaigns, but instead, would create a very small set of states in which only one electoral vote is in play (while making most states politically irrelevant),

It would not make every vote equal.

It would not guarantee the Presidency to the candidate with the most popular votes in the country.

The National Popular Vote bill is the way to make every person's vote equal and matter to their candidate because it guarantees the majority of Electoral College votes to the candidate who gets the most votes among all 50 states and DC.

(10-14-2021 12:00 PM)49RFootballNow Wrote:  This is a plan, like full national popular vote, to turn the election into a game to win a few large cities and ignore the rest of the country. Our Founding Fathers were pretty far-sighted. They also knew "pure" Democracy was basically Mob Rule. We have built in protections in our systems.

This is an attempt to circumvent those protections, plain and simple.

Article II, Section 1
“Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors….”
The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as "plenary" and "exclusive."

Alexander Hamilton, the other Founding Fathers, and the rest of the Founding Generation were dead for decades before state-by-state winner-take-all laws become the predominant method for awarding electoral votes.

James Madison, the "Father of the Constitution," was never in favor of our current system for electing the president, in which nearly all states award their electoral votes to the statewide popular vote winner. He ultimately backed a constitutional amendment to prohibit this practice.

Gouverneur Morris declared at the Constitutional Convention of 1787: “[If the president] is to be the Guardian of the people, let him be appointed by the people.”

There is nothing in the Constitution that prevents states from making the decision now that winning the national popular vote is required to win the Electoral College and the presidency.

95% of the U.S. population in 1790 lived in places of less than 2,500 people, and only a few states let males, with substantial property, vote

Now, the Electoral College would not prevent a candidate winning in states with 270 electoral votes from being elected President of the United States

Now 48 states (and DC) have winner-take-all state laws for awarding electoral votes to the statewide winner.
2 award one electoral vote to the winner of each congressional district, and two electoral votes statewide.
Neither method is mentioned in the U.S. Constitution.

The electors have been and will be dedicated party activist supporters of the winning party’s candidate who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable rubberstamped votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges.

The current system does not provide some kind of check on the "mobs."

Mob rule is defined as “control of a political situation by those outside the conventional or lawful realm, typically involving violence and intimidation.”

“ . . . the mechanics of the Electoral College allowed the defeated president to incite his followers into mounting the first attempt in U.S. history to seize the presidency by violence. Far from preventing them, the anti-majoritarian mechanisms of presidential elections were the crucial culprit in creating the “tumult and disorder” and the “heats and ferments” that so worried the authors of the Constitution.”- David Frum, 2/15/21

"In the past, [Republican] party elders, party leaders … exploited the crazies in order to win elections and then largely ignored them after the elections," "What has happened since then is that Trump opened Pandora's box and let them out. He not only let them out, he affirmed them and provoked them. And so now they're running wild and they are legitimatizing these delusions."- Mac Stipanovich, former GOP operative from Florida

Every other elected political office in the US is elected by one person, one vote popular vote.

“Republic not a democracy” is one of the more overt examples of the GOP slide toward fascism in an era already rife with undemocratic Republican power plays. It is part of ongoing efforts to delegitimize the election process itself.

[The] difference between a democracy and a republic [is] the delegation of the government, the latter, to a small number of citizens elected by the rest."
In a democracy, the people meet and exercise the government in person; in a republic, they assemble and administer it by their representatives and agents."- Madison

Being a constitutional republic does not mean we should not and cannot guarantee the election by the Electoral College of the presidential candidate with the most popular votes. The candidate with the most votes wins in every other election in the country.

Guaranteeing the election of the presidential candidate with the most popular votes and the majority of Electoral College votes (as the National Popular Vote bill would) would not make us a pure democracy.
Popular election of the chief executive does not determine whether a government is a republic or democracy. It is not rule by referendum.

Pure democracy is a form of government in which people vote on all policy initiatives directly.

With the National Popular Vote bill, we would not do away with the Electoral College, U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, state legislatures, etc. etc. etc.

The presidential election system, using the 48 state winner-take-all method or district winner method of awarding electoral votes used by 2 states, that we have today was not designed, anticipated, or favored by the Founding Fathers. It is the product of decades of change precipitated by the emergence of political parties and enactment by states of winner-take-all or district winner laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution.

The Constitution does not encourage, discourage, require, or prohibit the use of any particular method for how to award a state's electoral votes

The National Popular Vote bill is 72% of the way to guaranteeing the majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency to the candidate who wins the most popular votes in the country. It would change state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), without changing anything in the Constitution, using the built-in method that the Constitution provides for states to make changes.

The bill retains the constitutionally mandated Electoral College and state control of elections, and uses the built-in method that the Constitution provides for states to make changes. It ensures that every voter is equal, every voter will matter, in every state, in every presidential election, and the candidate with the most votes wins, as in virtually every other election in the country.

Every voter, everywhere, for every candidate, would be politically relevant and equal in every presidential election. Every vote would matter equally in the state counts and national count.