Tag: National Popular Vote

Advocates Warn of ‘Desperate’ Movement to Undermine the Electoral College

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An organization’s efforts to circumvent states’ rights are “getting desperate” as they try new ways to push their interstate compact through state legislatures, two pro-Electoral College advocacy groups told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The National Popular Vote (NPV) is a group initiative to reform the U.S.’ two-step, Electoral College system by ensuring that the candidate with the most popular votes nationwide becomes the president. Now that NPV has enacted its interstate compact in all of the “easy,” bluer states as a standalone bill, it is getting creative to force the law through in swing states like Minnesota, Nevada, Michigan and Maine, Trent England of Save Our States and Jasper Hendricks of Democrats for the Electoral College told the DCNF.

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Majority of Michigan Republican Legislators Oppose National Popular Vote Proposal

Cooper Moran
Rep. Matt Hall and Senator Aric Nesbitt

A proposal to force Michigan’s presidential electors to cast ballots for the national popular vote winner — regardless of the results in the state — is meeting opposition from a majority of Republican legislators.

State Sen. Aric Nesbitt (R-Lawton) and state Rep. Matt Hall (R-Marshall) spearheaded the effort to collect 57 signatures from legislators opposed to the idea. According to the Detroit News, 17 of the 20 Republican senators and 40 of the 57 Republican representatives signed on in opposition.

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Commentary: House Republican Leader Supports a Democrat-Backed ‘Popular Vote’ Scheme

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In 2011, before serving for the House of Representatives’ 6th Congressional District, U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer (R-MN-06), current chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, was a national spokesperson for the National Popular Vote initiative, legislation that forms a state-to-state compact with other states agreeing to pledge their state’s electors in the Electoral College to the winner of the national popular vote once participating states reach 270 electoral votes.

This would effectively eliminate the current winner-take-all system in the Electoral College, which has been in place since the election of 1824, whereby whoever wins the popular vote in a state wins the state’s electoral votes.

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Commentary: The One-Two Punch to Knock Out Electoral Democracy

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by Michael S. Kochin   If you thought, or hoped, that the brave (or nobly self-interested) Democratic Governor of Nevada, Steve Sisolak had thwarted the push for a National Popular Vote by vetoing the bill, think again. On June 12, 2019, Oregon Democratic Governor Kate Brown signed it into law for her state. As of this writing 15 states and the District of Columbia, each with 196 electoral votes, purport to have ratified it. According to its terms as few as three more states (say Texas, Michigan, and Pennsylvania) with 74 electoral votes need to enact the bill for it to go into effect. Should it go into effect, the compacting states, together accumulating a majority of the Electoral College, will cast their electoral votes for whomever is the plurality winner of what the scheme’s backers call “the national popular vote:” whichever presidential and vice-presidential slate gets a plurality of votes when the total votes of all the states (compacting and non-compacting) are aggregated. The scheme, of course, is an effort to change the Constitution without the bother of securing the consent of three-fourths of the states that the Article V Amendment procedure requires. It is also of questionable validity without the consent of Congress.…

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Commentary: A Bad Idea for Ohio and a Terrible Idea for America

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by CHQ Staff   A proposal making its way through the Ohio Statehouse would award Ohio’s electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote in presidential elections if it passes. According to reporting by Breitbart’s Katherine Rodriguez, the constitutional amendment, which state lawmakers certified on Monday, would require state lawmakers to ensure state electoral votes would go to the winner of the national popular vote instead of the candidate who wins the most votes within Ohio. If Ohio’s legislature approves the measure, it would be the 14th state legislative body to pass a bill agreeing to award Electoral College votes to a presidential candidate who wins the popular vote, noted Ms. Rodriguez. No Republican has ever been elected President without Ohio, and Ohio has furnished eight Presidents with Ohio roots – all Republicans. So why the Buckeye State’s Republican-controlled legislature and Governor would want to dilute their state’s Electoral College votes via this Democrat proposal is a complete mystery to us. As we explained in our article “Far Left Anti-Electoral College Plan Building Momentum” Democrats have long opposed the Electoral College because with overwhelming margins of victory in high-population states like California they could dominate future presidential elections based…

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Popular Vote Compact Adds New Mexico, Now Has 189 Electoral Votes

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by Whitney Tipton   New Mexico Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed legislation Wednesday officially joining a group of states agreeing to elect the president by popular vote. By formally adding HB55 to the Governor’s list of signed legislation, Grisham confirmed that New Mexico is the 14th state the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC). The measure passed through both chambers of the New Mexico legislature with no Republican votes, according to the state’s website. The NPVIC is an agreement between states to pool their electoral votes together for the candidate who wins the states’ aggregated popular vote. States will award their electoral votes regardless of individual state voting results. States that have passed similar legislation to join the NPVIC now represent 189 electoral votes. The compact could become official when that number hits 270, enough votes to elect the president of the United States. Under the U.S. Constitution, a state gets one Electoral College vote for each of its seats in Congress. New Mexico is a winner-take-all state, which means it allocates all five of its Electoral College votes to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote in the state. If the NPVIC ever takes effect, New Mexico…

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Proposed Ohio Constitutional Amendment to Award Electoral Votes to Winner of National Popular Vote Clears Initial Hurdle

Zachery Schmidt

A state constitutional amendment to award Ohio’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote cleared of one of its earliest hurdles this week. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost called it a “fair and truthful statement of the proposed law” in an April 1 letter to Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose. The amendment was submitted to Yost’s office by election lawyer Don McTigue, who sent a petition to the Attorney General’s Office with 1,000 signatures. The petition states: This amendment would add Article XX, Section 1 of the Ohio Constitution to: Express the will of the people that every vote for president be valued equally and that the candidate who wins the most votes nationally becomes President. Require the General Assembly, within sixty days of the Amendment’s adoption, take all necessary legislative action so that the winner of the national popular vote is elected President. In his response, Yost said it is his “statutory duty to determine” whether the petition contained a “fair and truthful statement of the proposed law or constitutional amendment.” With Yost ’s certification, the proposal heads to the Ohio Ballot Board, which has 10 days to determine if “the submitted ballot language only contains one…

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Who’s Bankrolling the National Popular Vote Movement

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by Fred Lucas   The nonprofit organization building a coalition of states that favor choosing the president by popular vote promotes itself as nonpartisan, but is financed by millions of dollars from left-leaning groups. Some of the leaders of the movement are prominent Republicans, and most of the funding for the nonprofit, National Popular Vote Inc., has come from a wealthy Democrat and a billionaire independent. However, many large, liberal organizations back the movement, according to the Capital Research Center, a conservative investigative think tank that monitors nonprofits. It gathered donor information on National Popular Vote Inc. using a commercial database. The Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros Foundation, for example, gave $1 million to the nonprofit in 2011. Jonathan Soros, 49, heads an investment firm and is the son of George Soros, a hedge fund manager known for financing left-leaning causes around the world. Although the Soros Foundation does not publicly list contact information, The Daily Signal sought comment through the George Soros-backed Open Society Foundations. The Stephen M. Silberstein Foundation made donations totaling $1 million to National Popular Vote Inc. from 2008 to 2012, according to the most recent data. The Silberstein Foundation gave $350,000 in 2008, $250,000 in…

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