Add New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to the chorus of Democrats calling for the abolition of the Electoral College, even though President-elect Donald Trump just won the popular vote.
In a speech given as she presided over New York’s presidential electors casting their votes Tuesday for Vice President Kamala Harris, Ms. Hochul called the institution undemocratic.
“We, the people, forming a more perfect union, and I strongly believe that the people of New York state and the United States of America, should and must have their votes count equally, and that the popular vote should prevail,” the Democratic governor said.
“It’s time to amend the Constitution and relegate the institution of the Electoral College to the history books,” Ms. Hochul said.
She claimed, according to an account in The Hill, that the Electoral College gives less populated states an “outsized influence” and thus “the votes of their residents count more than the residents of a state like New York.”
Ms. Hochul’s remarks come the day after three progressive Democratic senators, all from reliably blue states, introduced a constitutional amendment to abolish the Electoral College and pick the president by a national popular vote.
SEE ALSO: Democrats introduce constitutional amendment to abolish Electoral College
Under the Electoral College system, the president and vice president are formally chosen by electors who represent their respective states.
The 50 states and the District of Columbia get varying numbers of electors, depending on their population and the apportionment of seats in Congress.
Almost all the states including New York — Maine and Nebraska are the only exceptions — grant all their Electoral College votes to whichever candidate got more votes in the state, whether it’s by one vote or a million votes.
The winner of the popular vote has almost always has won the Electoral College also.
But two of the exceptions have occurred in the last quarter-century and both benefited Republicans — George W. Bush in 2000 and Mr. Trump in 2016. As a result, recent calls to abolish the Electoral College have almost exclusively come from Democrats.
In her speech Tuesday, Ms. Hochul called that a “worst case scenario.”
“And in the worst case scenario, it means that a person can become president of the United States, even if he or she did not win the popular vote. Something I recall as I sat in this room, right there, next to President Bill Clinton when we were both electors in 2016,” Ms. Hochul said.
Former first lady Hillary Clinton was one of the two Democrats who lost because of the Electoral College, and she is among many top Democrats who have called for its abolition in recent years.
For that reason also though, the needed constitutional amendment has basically no chance to get the required two-thirds majority in both houses of a closely-divided Congress.
It may have even less chance of then being ratified by three-fourths of the states, many of which would become less important under a national popular vote system.
For the last few election cycles, the vast majority of states have been considered uncompetitive — any credible Democrat will win California and New York and Republicans barely try there; and vice versa in Texas and Florida.
In 2024, almost all the campaigning by Mr. Trump and by President Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris was done in seven key “swing states” that were close enough in polling to make a concerted effort worth the while — Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada and Arizona.
Ms. Hochul argued Tuesday that this effectively disenfranchises the other 40-odd states.
“This convoluted process also leads candidates for president to spend an inordinate amount of time in a few swing states, rather than appealing to the voters of our entire country,” she said.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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