Colorado voters approve compact seeking to neutralize the Electoral College

[brooklynite]

Vox

Colorado voters have backed the National Popular Vote Compact, a nationwide effort that would effectively neutralize the Electoral College and ensure that the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in the nation as a whole becomes president.

The issue was on the ballot as Proposition 113, which passed according to the Associated Press and New York Times. For the moment, Colorado’s decision to enter the compact will have no effect, but it could prove consequential if several more states join this agreement.

The Electoral College is the Rube Goldberg-like device that the United States uses to choose a president. Each state is assigned a certain number of electoral votes, equal to the number of lawmakers it sends to the Senate and House of Representatives. Constitutionally, the District of Columbia gets three electoral votes. To secure the presidency, a candidate must win a majority of these electors, or 270 in total.

Most states assign all of their electoral votes to the candidate who wins the state as a whole. But the Constitution permits states to assign electors “in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.” The core insight of the National Popular Vote Compact is that, if a bloc of states that controls 270 electoral votes all agree to assign their electors to whoever wins the national popular vote, rather than the candidate who wins their state, then whoever wins the national popular vote will become president in every election.

It will never reach 270 EV and if it ever did, it would fall apart the first time a State was obliged to give its EVs to a candidate who didn't win there.

[soothsayer]

1. It's a cool idea, short of eliminating the electoral college

Interesting