In order for a candidate to win the election, they must gain a certain number of electoral votes. Currently, there are eight presidential electoral votes awarded by congressional districts. If a candidate wins more than one of these votes, they would be awarded the presidency!
In order to be awarded the presidency with this method, Hillary needs at least one vote in New York and California. Donald Trump also needs one vote in New York and California to be president, but he has a much better chance of winning due to his larger margin of victory in those states.
This article will talk about how many electoral votes Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have won so far, as well as what county they were won in if they were won as presidents.
Contents:
Clinton wins popular vote
Unlike the 2016 presidential election, where Clinton won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College, this year she wins the electoral vote but loses the popular vote.
In 2016, Trump won the popular vote but lost in the Electoral College. This year, Clinton has a better chance of winning in both areas.
She does not have a strong chance at winning in both areas due to her low number of electoral votes and her popularity. However, if she did win with more popularity, she would be more electable as a president.
A good way to think about this is how many people would vote for you if you were running against an extremely unpopular candidate and needed to win just one percent of the population to get elected.
Trump wins electoral college vote
In the 2016 presidential election, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton received more votes than Republican candidate Donald Trump. She received about 70,000 more votes than him. This is a big difference!
However, there were enough electoral votes to go around for both candidates. One candidate was awarded 190 votes and one candidate was awarded 304 votes. That is over half of the total electoral vote!
The House of Representatives elects the President and Congress has two branches with one person per position. So, while there are fewer voters in total, each one gets a vote.
This is why Trump was not elected President because he did not win enough support from voters in Congress. He only collected 50% of the vote in the House of Representatives and Senate which means he did not get enough support to be elected President.
States Clinton won
Former secretary of state and former First Lady Hillary Clinton has the most electoral votes for president, with 200. There are a total of 536 in effect, as each one is awarded to the winner by Congress.
She won more states than her opponent, Donald Trump, but not by much. She increased her number of electoral votes from 231 to 202 during his campaign.
This includes winning Florida and Ohio, which were critical states for the election. Adding those two was enough to put her over the top and give her enough Electoral College votes to win the presidency.
Trump won the national popular vote by about 3 million ballots, so it is not just that he did not win many others nationally, he lost many in California and other large voting regions. Clinton also won big in other areas where voters went for Trump, such as Pennsylvania and North Carolina.
States Trump won
While most election experts agree that close elections like this one are very rare events, there are several points to keep in mind when you’re looking at a map of states that are Trump or Clinton-majority.
1. Narrow Election Maps Most of the time
While it sounds scary, narrow maps are what allow campaigns to run statewide and nationwide advertisements. Without those ads, no one knows who is voting for whom!
2. Small Electors Prefer Candidates Who Support their Policies
Electoral votes aren’t just about backing the winning candidate – they were designed to represent your opinions on issues and how you’ll affect the government.
3. Vice President Has an Influence in Some Elections
The position of vice president has some effects on elections, mainly through casting a tie-breaking vote if two candidates have an absolute majority in the electoral votes .
Need to win 270 electoral votes to win election
If Hillary does not reach at least 270 electoral votes, then Donald Trump will be the president. This is the case if voters do not choose her or she does not win enough Electoral College votes.
In that case, Congress would appoint a vice president to take her place and serve as president until a new president is elected. This happened in 1824 when John Quincy Adams was appointed as vice president instead of John C. Calhoun, who was elected as president that year.
It would only happen if there was a tie in the Electoral College at that point. Otherwise, Congress would choose someone to serve as president until a new person was elected.
If this did happen, it would last for about six months before the new person took office and confirmed by Senate. After that time stop, the vice president would take over and serve as President until the next day after Congress convened again.
Popular vote versus electoral college vote
The popular vote does not mean much if the majority of Americans do not live in the largest states. Most people live in small, medium, or large states with limited impact on national elections.
The electoral college was created to give more power to smaller states and rural areas. This is why it is so hard for a non-politician like Hillary to get elected president!
Although she has won the popular vote, she does not have enough electoral votes to be elected president. There are 18 individual state electoral colleges that elect the president, but only one gets the job every four years.
The job of being president is difficult and demanding, so many people do not make it. Since there are only 18 votes in all of government, anything less than a unanimous decision will send someone to the White House.
This article will go into detail about how many electoral votes each state has and how they are distributed, making this information very important.
Who wins if the election were based on the popular vote?
In an election based on the popular vote, Hillary would win the presidency because she has more votes than Trump.
In an election based on the popular vote where Hillary had no lead, she’d need to win more votes than Trump to win.
She’d almost certainly end up with about 552 votes in her favor compared to his 590 votes.
Because of plurality voting, her best chance at winning is if someone else drops out or doesn’t run. Then her supporters can focus their energy on one candidate and pull him or her over the finish line.
Plurality voting was adopted in European countries before being introduced in the United States.
Why the electoral college exists
In contrast to how the popular vote works in the United States, the electoral college system gives more power to smaller groups.
Using an election as a competition makes each group try to win as many votes as possible and thus increases their influence. Because of this, some states receive more electoral votes than others.
The distribution of these electoral votes is part of how the president is chosen. Since more popular candidates do not receive enough support to be elected, a portion of the population that supports one candidate receives other candidates who are supported by more people.
This happens in Europe and Asia, where there are significantly more voters than Americans have! This is one reason why there are several Asian countries that don’t have an American-style election. They use instead a festival format where people gather and vote for their favorite person.