@@Dylan-ii3wt Which electoral vote? The 2020 electoral vote (which will actually happen 1 month from now) or the electoral college altogether? Either way, it would be your opinion. I, and most other Americans, would say no to the entire system. After watching this video, what do you think?
I've watched 4 other videos trying to understand the Electoral College and this is the only one that made it make sense and actually answered my questions. Thank you!
Ok, but Puerto Rico isn't a state because they have voted not to be one. PR doesn't get to bitch about not having representation when they vote not to have it.
@@quintus920 most people don't want it, dumbass. Plus, having Puerto Rico would make a republican voice close to impossible, since most of PR would obviously choose democrat
tu tu Are you ok? If you find yourself screaming uncontrollably, maybe you should see a doctor. I’m not a medical professional, but I think that screaming at a comment on the internet may not be a good sign.
A few corrections: 1. The electors meet in their respective state capitals, not in D.C. Their ballots are sent to DC though, where congress meets in a joint session presided over by the VP to count the ballots. 2. There aren't 438 representatives, there are 435. 3 electors are added for DC 3. Several states, around 20, have laws to prevent so called faithless electors. One such state is Minnesota, which will replace any elector that doesn't vote how he/she was supposed to 4. Two states, Nebraska and Maine, are not winner take all
There are 435 representatives in Congress, not 438. The extra 3 comes from the District of Columbia, which has no senators or representatives but still votes for President
There are 441 people that have a seat in the House of Representatives. Of those, 435 voting representatives are sent by the states and 6 non-voting delegates sent by territories, 1 by DC, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Of course, 5 of these places get no vote, but DC gets 3, which is the same amount of votes as the least-populous state, now Wyoming. This is explained 1:55 Congress refers to the combination of the lower house, the House of Representatives, and the higher house, the Senate.
There are laws in most states that prevent electors from voting against the popular vote in their respective states. There has never been a proven case of any elector being bribed or bought. Faithless electors have never changed the outcome of a Presidential election.
You're welcome. There are also laws in some states than punish a faithless elector with a fine if they change their pledged vote. Electors are generally party regulars and have little incentive to change their pledged votes.
D Smith I feel like GCP grey should have mentioned that at some point, but thanks again. I obviously just found out about the electors. Although they seem to be trust worthy enough, but I'm still not 100% that his shoudl be a thing. Lol
The vid says that the Electoral College was designed to make election results more timely, and that's the truth, but not the _whole_ truth. Apparently more than one founding father also believed the Electoral College was a hedge against an "unfortunate" choice by the citizens... meaning; many founding fathers thought the average voter was too uninformed to be relied upon to elect the leader of the government. Apparently that attitude holds true today, since we still have an Electoral College...
***** Thanks and may I say that I agree with your statement in it's entirety. As for the question, I think it would take a Constitutional Amendment to abolish the Electoral College. Maybe it's time to wake up the "I don't knows" and "I don't cares"... although I don't know how to do that before it's too late.
It absolutely would require a Constitutional Amendment to abolish the electoral college. That would require 2/3 vote of the House of Representatives AND a 2/3 vote of the Senate AND a majority vote of both houses of 3/4 of the states legislatures. That's not going to happen any time soon.
Caelroigh Blunt Actually, I think it's because the words "under god" are still in the Pledge of Allegiance, when they were added during the Red Scare. In other words, Washington still doesn't want to even bother.
+Sandro Uy I presume you mean 26 seconds in? Well, in the video, CGP Grey states that there are 100 senators and 438 Representatives in the House. This is a factual mistake, there aren't 438 Representatives. There are only 435 Representatives, the 23rd amendment granted DC three electors, but DC even today still doesn't have Representation in either the House or the Senate. The Constitution states that each state gets 2 Senators and the number of seats in the house is based on the population but a state shall get at least one seat regardless. The Constitution also states that the number of electors each state gets shall equal to the number of seats this state gets in the Congress. This is the reason why DC gets 3 electors. The video also states that when the Constitution was written, the electors would be sent to DC except for that when the Constitution was written, District of Columbia didn't even exist, another factual mistake.
D.C gets 3 electors for the elector college, not 3 representatives. D.C still doesn't have representatives in the House of Repersentives.Grey was wrong to say 438 representatives.
if the US had proportional representation, then 3rd parties would actually be viable choices, and neither of the big 2 parties would end up with a majority. everyone's votes would count equally, an there'd be no territory that was irrelevant for campaigns.
So when the newspapers announce in November who the president will be, there is a chance that the electors will say, "Nope!" and vote for the other one?
+Quadrant4Delta No not quite. In November the Electors will choose the president and then allow it to be announced. The President is only confirmed (and hence the newspapers will only report it) after the Electoral College has chosen.
+ArcticTemper No, it hasn't and won't ever happen because it would be obvious since we all know the outcome way before Dec. This video and the others like it that this guy makes it just trying to confuse the stupid and paranoid people out there. He basically makes a living off of making a big deal about little things that don't matter.
+Evamael Presidential electors are party regulars and they have little incentive to change their pledged votes. Therefore, faithless electors are extremely rare and none have ever changed the expected outcome of and election.
Well, they have in the past been the majority for an election without the popular vote if that's what you mean, as you can see in "The Problems With the Electoral College" video.
the part where astronauts get to vote when others don't got me bursting in to laughter. this is so hilarious. one might think that we as humans could actually do better... but nope ... still idiots... (...and the laughter goes on)
@@DEV3N87 Imagine the weight of your vote within your own country changing based on where you live. Now imagine that there are parts of your country where your vote has no weight whatsoever... but emigrants who went to Europe, Africa, or even SPACE still keep their weight. So, people who don't even live in your country, effectively getting more say on how it should be run than you, the person who actually has to live with the consequences. Plus, CA and NY only make 17% of the US' population together. Hardly enough to dominate. Just enough for the large number of citizens they represent to actually be heard.
+luvmyctd Keeping out Hillary is the 1 good thing that the Electoral College ever did. It doesn't do what It's supposed to do.It was supposed to make presidential candidates care about the interests of smaller states but It doesn't.
Except that isn't how a Constitutional Representative Republic works. The Founding Fathers quite literally hated pure democracy because you can end up with 51% of people choosing for the other 49%.
This video left out a much more important concept... The Electoral College also exists to give areas of smaller population just a little bit more leverage per person than densely packed cities, if you look at the way the electoral votes are distributed by the population they represent. This ensures that a candidate has to appeal to and be in favor of ALL people in the country. If not then someone could win by promoting themselves in only 5 or 6 major hot spots of population, and leave out all of the smaller towns and communities. Pure democracy, 1 person 1 vote winner take all, is actually a really unstable form of government and risks one party taking way too much power. If we didn't have the EC it's possible that the US wouldn't be a democracy any more, democracy would have collapsed decades ago. This was designed to be a balancing system. It did exactly what it was designed to do in this past election, not the first time either, there have been a few other elections in the past that the Electoral College flipped the candidates after the popular vote. Hillary won in several areas of high population, but Trump had a few big cities and nearly all of the smaller towns and rural areas.
The progressive method would treat grade school like college/university instead of a factory designed to produce factory workers in an assembly line fashion. So no.
Patrick Morrison for presidential elections, this is true if you don't live in a swing state. But you should always vote on everything else because only the presidential race uses the electoral college.
PJ Mo in the presidential election it’s legit, though the voter turnout rate does sort of muddy that (I was surprised at how the US compared to the rest of the first world in this regard, they’re all around 70% and we’re around 30-35%). What I mean is, if there really were closer to a 70% turnout rate, who know how things would change…but as someone else previously said, in state and local elections where an electoral system isn’t used your vote can absolutely count.
It made sense back when electricity didn't exist and you could maybe get information between distant towns without everyone dying, but in the modern world, it is 100% outdated and needs to be completely redone to take into account, you know, the last 200 years worth of scientific advancement in information technology
Yumiko the Random well I mean the territories chose this. Every time they hold a referendum to become a state they stay territories choosing not to have a vote for president, or representation that can vote in congress. This might seem strange but they do it to stay out of taxes
So, flash forward into the future, the democrats win under similar circumstances...is that not a valid win, too, or are we going to want to go by the popular vote, also?
I've watched 4 videos on this game-changing topic, and this one explains it best as I remember from my Civics class. Indeed the Elector can look at his state, see a 60-40 vote, and then choose to vote for whoever he sees fit. He can vote for the pres. candidate who got that 40%.
The electors can vote for anyone. In 2016 there were 7 faithless electors, they didn't vote for the other candidate, they each just voted for random people they liked who weren't even running.
@Teddye Kuma Right. And most of our population isn't even educated on this, so everyone still thinks their presidential vote actually matters. To me, one citizen's vote only matters if it's the tiebreaker.
You got the why right! I love that. There was also an interesting interlocking problem involving the Presidency's power, length of term and how they're picked. It's the book Original Meanings.
It's not odd that the territories don't have electoral college votes. If you remember "no taxation without representation" it makes sense. US territories don't pay federal taxes because they don't have any representation in the federal government. They can have representation any time that they want, but they have to write a state constitution, request to join the union, and the people have to vote in favor of joining. They remain territories because they want to, not because they have to and because of how our constitution is written, they do not have to pay any taxes because they have no representation.
+Ian Belletti Plus, Puerto Rico in particular has no right to complain. They're unwilling to assimilate into American culture (read: learn English, they aren't even willing to go bilingual like Hawaii or New Mexico) and they receive billions in federal welfare every year while contributing little to nothing in return. They should count themselves lucky that we haven't cut them loose altogether, especially during this ongoing recession.
TBustah You obviously didn't follow what I said. I've never heard of Puerto Ricans complaining about their political status. Being a territory and not a state means that they don't have to make any concessions in their culture to assimilate into the general American culture. Federal welfare is another topic altogether. I will not speak neither good nor ill of it here because it goes outside the bounds of the discussion. Our constitution prevents us from taxing them because they have no representation, but does not prevent the federal government from providing aid, and it is expected that we provide military protection for them. We are also prevented from quartering (housing) our military in their homes or businesses by force just like any citizen of the 50 states.
Ian Belletti I understood perfectly what you were saying, I was merely adding to it. If you don't agree with what I had to say, whatever, but what you said in your original comment and what I said are not mutually exclusive.
TBustah Your comment may have been intended to add information, but it was presented in a manner that appeared to be showing complaints with a repeat of what I had said before. (1) Your first sentence sounds as if Puerto Ricans are complaining about their political status. If that is true, please show evidence. (2) You talked about their refusal to assimilate into the general American culture. The way you made the statement appears to be a complaint. Hawaii and New Mexico are states and not territories, therefore they have an obligation to make cultural concessions. (3) You mention them receiving welfare which also appears to be a complaint. The way your entire post reads is as if you are making complaints and not making productive additions to what I said. I'm sorry if I mistook your intention. If that is so, let this be a lesson that you should be careful about the wording and content of your post.
For those saying that their vote doesn't even count because of this, you also have to remember during voting season that it's not only the president you're voting for. He isn't the only politician here and there are so many more people who can shape policies in *your* state to make life better for the community.
One slight error: you say that the Electors all get together in DC to cast their votes. They don't, they gather in their respective state capitols (or DC city hall), and then the record of who they voted for is sent to Congress to be counted and certified. The Electoral College never actually meets together, which was also part of the original idea.
I would argue they are sent to DC to be counted. Not certified. The stated already certified their votes. They don’t send them to DC to be certified again. The VPs job is to count and tallied the votes. He doesn’t even read them aloud. The “tellers” do that. After safe harbor has passed any last min challenge has to come from both houses of congress the day the EC votes are read.
The electoral college is not the members of Congress. Slates of Presidential electors are elected by the people independently from the members of Congress.
I am talking about the numbers of the EC, not the people who participate. The numbers are worked out by adding the amount of representatives a state sends to the HoR, and then you add 2 to that number, because of the number of senators the sate sends. Is that a better explanation?
Except DC has people in Congress, they just can't vote on bills. So no, it's not really adding anything. If anything the EC understates the number of people in DC becuase the territories (which have delegations like DC's) have no EC votes.
THANK YOU xM ! And welcome aboard !!! This very important "shit" certainly isn't taught in government controlled schools any more ! By Power Mad Political Design, I must stress. Another reason so many Federal 'Departments of ' like Education, should never have been allowed to exist. . . and Constitutionally they aren't supposed to.
Hang in there H ! There are other posts on the internet to explain it. Keep trying. It really is important and schools getting federal money are not teaching it.
Not really. Some states have laws requiring the electors to vote with the popular vote in that state. Often if an elector votes against the popular vote in that state other electors will switch their vote to balance it out and make sure it’s fair. The system has worked pretty well for 250 years and hasn’t caused any issues with elections.
There is an error at 0:27. There are only 435 representatives. There are 538 electoral votes because it's: 100 Senators + 435 Representatives + an additional 3 electoral votes allocated to the District of Columbia (which has neither Senators nor a voting member in the House of Representatives). And the Electors have never met together in Washington! The Constitution says that they meet in their states.
@@mahaanpadri mob rule thats why. Psychologically people that live in similar enviornments tend to think the same. Most people live in large coastal cities and they tend to think the same. These people should not be able to tell the rest of the country how to live. The 49% needs a voice as well. People are not spread out homogenously across the country. We also have state govnements that need to be represented in the presidential election.
Uhhh, make that 5: Andrew Jackson in 1824 (lost to John Quincy Adams), Samuel Tilden in 1876 (lost to Rutherford B. Hayes), Grover Cleveland in 1888 (lost to Benjamin Harrison), Al Gore in 2000 (lost to George W. Bush), now Hillary.
Wait so you are telling me if a state cast a majority vote to candidate A but the electoral REPRESENTATIVE of state selects candidate B ... basically candidate B Become President .... and your vote doesn't count ... bruhhh.... this is so stupid .... so we are not selecting the president but electoral representative are doing that .... i mean it makes no sense
If the president was chosen that way then New York alone would decide who the president would be due to their jam packed population despite the rest of the counties around the country voting the other way.
I really think it wouldn't have been confusing or derailed the video if C.G.P had said, "Why 538? Because that's the number of Senators (100), plus the number of Representatives (435), plus 3 votes for the District of Columbia -- the special non-state that gets to vote for President but otherwise is basically like the territories."
Our founding fathers had also studied the history of both pure democracy and aristocracy and hated both as a method of electing the president. They feared an uninformed populace might be duped into electing a tyrant, and a group of "experts" might be too disconnected from the people and just choose whomever they wished. The electoral college was a compromise of both. You have a roughly popular vote represented by an informed group of people who are trusted to make the best decision for the country (and not necessarily the one they were elected for.) I think it would be better to give the two "senator" votes to the popular candidate and apportion the remainder according to the congressional districts. That way, the outnumbered party members in California and Texas get to cast a meaningful vote. Another option might be a Mixed-Member Proportional system.
There are 435 Representatives and 100 senators. The extra 3 comes from DC. Furthermore, electors never actually met in DC, they all meet in state capitols and mail them.
Meena Pharo Because if it didn't exist, we would be ruled by the majority voters. Canidates would only campaign in states with big populations like NY or CA, and states like Iowa would be unrepresented.
It was a good idea back in the late 1700s to get the southern states to agree with how the president was to be elected and ratify the constitution. The less populated southern states had very different interests in mind than the northern states, so they would have had little impact on an pure popular vote system.
Love everything about this video EXCEPT a candidate does not need to win a majority in a state to secure all of the electoral votes. They simply need a plurality (the most). Thank you for creating this.
I like this channel but this explanation is ridiculous. Without the electoral college would be similar as two wolves and sheep voting on what's for dinner. It's 1;30 am for me so I'm gana skip the long winded explanation. If you want to know more just ask.
FYI, Neither Maine nor Nebraska distributes it's electoral vote on any percentage. No state does it that way. What Maine and Nebraska each do is give 2 eclectoral vote to the winner of the whole state and 1 electoral vote to the winner of each congressional district. It has nothing to do with any percentage of votes won.
That's not the reason why we have an electoral college... the reason why we give little states a boost is so that the majority can't take advantage of the minority. If we lived in a pure democracy the majority (Whites, Urban people) would take advantage of minorities (Blacks, Native Americans and Rural people). Thanks to the electoral college, you can't win by appealing to only one group of people (New Yorkers, Californians, Floridians and Texans) but isntead a more diverse national electorate.
Thanks for the video it cleared things up a little! (Can't help but feel that "Please vote for orange" bit and the orange guy actually winnning was giving us a little taste of the future)
Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin were the closest states in the election of 2016. All of them were decided by less than 1 point. Let's imagine that all 4 states switch parties. Hillary Clinton wins the election 274-264 electoral votes. Not so fast. 2 faithless electors (electors voting against the major candidate of the same party) broke away from Trump, dropping him to 262. *5* broke away from Clinton, bringing her down to 269. Nobody has a majority, so we move on to the house. Most states in 2016 had a Republican-majority in the House, 30 to be exact. Maine was a tie, and 19 states were mostly Democrat. Thus, Trump because the next president. Yeah that's right. Electors could have changed the ENTIRE election, just because 5 of them left Hillary. Get rid of the electors. All of them.
I'd just like to make a quick note about the amount of representatives you stated. There are only 435 reps in the House. So 435+100= 535. The 3 extra votes are for D.C. and they come from a solution proposed in the 23rd amendment that stipulates that D.C. is entitled to the same amount of electoral votes as the least populous state. That is all.
That would mean Donald Trump is Illuminati which makes NO SENSE since he wants to break federal government and give complete sovereignty back to the states.
Faithless electors aren't even the biggest problem with the system. The biggest problem is how a president can be elected with less than 25% of the popular vote by exploiting the distribution of Electoral votes. Watch Grey's second part of this to see the details.
They're supposed to. But even if they do, the Electoral College is absurd. You can win with just 22% of the popular vote if you just win the right states.
Yes but it doesn't explain is which party are the 538 electoral college representatives affiliated with, who nominates them and how long their terms are...And who determines how many electoral college delegates each party gets to appoint? Anyone know?
As CGP Grey mentioned (briefly): After the popular vote in each state, the Candidate (*or Party) who gained the most votes in that state is given the number of Electors equal to that State's electoral votes. To use Florida as an example, if the Democratic candidate gained the most votes then Florida would give the Democratic Party 29 seats for Electors. Afterwards, each party given electoral votes would then select (or elect, depends on the state those seats came from) a number of Electors equal to the number of seats that they were given. How, when, and with what method they are selected (or elected) is unknown by me at least.
I don't really get this. So is the electoral college votes allocated to a presidential candidates based on which which party wins a state? Or does the electoral college refers to people who vote to elect the president? I really need to understand this.
How about this: Each presidential election, let's pay a group of experts in politics, law, economics, and history to compile an enormous list of questions about their respective fields. On voting day, citizens have to answer a set of randomized questions from this list (no internet help allowed!); if we can answer them correctly, we get to vote.
***** I can see why you'd think that, it is definitely intended to control who is voting. The difference is, who are the targets? Literacy is not a direct indicator of political awareness; general questions about a person's political knowledge are.
HIGH FIVE kind of resembles a literacy test designed to suppress the vote than increase it. that goes against our democratic principles that ensure no matter your education, religion, gender, socioeconomic background, etc. that you have the right to vote if you are a legal citizen of the United States of voting age. a test of any sort would be susceptible to bias and compromised due to the digital age we live in. also, not everyone can vote on election day due to their profession or geographic location (nor is it physically possible because there are not enough polling locations or volunteers) so some would be taking the test early and letting others know the answers in advance. it's just a bad idea to go down that road.
Sandpaper Snail As said above, I can see why you would make the literacy test comparison, but the fundamental difference is the target of the filter. If you're interested, the discussion is above. I disagree with your assessment in relation to democratic values on a few counts. One, it sounds as though you are asserting that our current voting system functions according to democratic principles; it does not. If you are strictly talking about accessibility to voting, the test would be open for anybody to take. Even in the most ideal democratic election where anybody can vote, the minority loses and has to tolerate the decisions made by the majority; this system would not remedy that, it's true, but if conducted correctly it could improve the quality of those decisions by controlling for knowledge. You're right though, a system where a small handful of people control the votes is susceptible to tampering, safeguards would need to be assessed and implemented. A enormous pool of questions would be paramount. However, I don't believe it is more risky than what we currently do. Just ask Bernie Sanders ;)
HIGH FIVE You missed my point. Your test is based on the principle that eligible voters are required to have a reason for their vote, a reason decided by a small, educated, and elite group. A legal citizen of voting age should be unencumbered, free of any restrictions that impact their fundamental right to express their political opinion through a ballot vote. A test would discourage a growing republic from voting (mostly due to education and finances, even intimidation) which is counterproductive to a democracy of ideas born from a diverse group of people. Your test, or any test for that matter, is biased before any question is written due to the fact that your placing importance on topics the elite argues is (or should be) relevant to voters. The act of voting is unique to each and every voter and should remain that way. Selecting the voting public through a group-think test based on politics, law, economics, and history is, I believe, counter to the democratic principles are founders sought to establish (women and slaves technically weren't considered people but property so there was no action of exclusion from their perspective). The selection of a voting public should happen naturally through personal decision making of every eligible voter; a governmental body or a third party contracted by the government to conduct a test that limits the amount of eligible voters undercuts our founding principles of fair and free elections. If the majority of voters vote solely based on personal feelings of goodwill for or animosity against particular candidates who are you or any group to say those types of feelings aren't worthy? Your test would squeeze the circle of eligible voters even smaller for (what some would consider) illegitimate reasons and raise the ire that already exists between the classes. Lastly, even if 100% of potential voters consented to being tested to prove their eligibility, it would remain physically impossible (at the very least impractical) due to the number of polling locations and volunteers available, not to mention potential voters who are unable to vote or test on election day due to their profession or current geographic location. Scaling for a major event such as an election on one day is hard enough as is when we know approximately how many voters will show up (and we currently can estimate this by the amount of absentee ballots received on or before election day). It's hard to imagine how each state would scale in advance for how many volunteers or polling locations they would need when they have to coordinate with the federal government on how many of their residents qualify as eligible voters until hours/days later. Anyways, the logistical issues would start way before election day. Is a sample test given so that people can study for it? How far in advance? If so, individuals and testing companies would look to profit and charge potential voters desperate to get a chance to vote while locking those out that can't afford it either in time or money. How would the test be conducted and for what length of time? Do you have to show ID? What type of ID? What if your state does not currently comply with the new test ID law? What range of elected officials would conduct it? Or would volunteers with no requirement whatsoever be able to conduct it? If voter turnout is currently 120 to 130 million people on average, where will the test be conducted to house this number of people across the country in various neutral, partisan-free designated areas? Or can people take the test in the privacy of their own home with no supervision? How will you account for people who choose to take the test in groups and share answers? Or is it based on the honor system? What if you are disabled and cannot get to a testing location? What if you are outside the country due to work or inside the country due to work but cannot get to a testing location at the designated time and place? Does the test happen simultaneously across all time zones in the country? Or multiple times throughout the day? How can you account for people afterwards to not share answers face-to-face or via cell phone? How many questions would the test contain? Would there be a variety of questions between each test ensuring uniformity of the degree of difficulty? Who or what group would ensure this uniformity? For potential voters that paid directly or indirectly (via tax) for the test and do not receive a passing grade, do they get a refund? If you pass the test, are you eligible indefinitely or do you have to keep paying for and taking the test for each election cycle (at every level: city, county, state, and national elections)? If only national elections, why? As you can see, creating a voting test is easier said than done. It creates more problems than it solves, in my opinion. Our current system isn't perfect but it's the best that we have.
At 0:49, we see that the more populated states (like California, Texas, and Florida) still get a massive number of votes and the smaller states still get a small number of votes. But at 2:00, CGP Grey makes a good point that I've never considered.
How to argue for the Electoral college: 1. Pause video 2. Say America isn't a democracy 3. Pretend like popular vote is the only alternative Congrats you won your argument!
Some people use the argument that abolishing the electoral college would would strip stats of there voice. Would like to know what people think about that?
