How a US presidential candidate can win more votes and still lose

Washington, United States:

When political outsider Donald Trump defied polls and expectations to defeat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US presidential election, he described the victory as “beautiful”.

Not everyone saw it that way – considering that Democrat Clinton received almost three million more votes nationwide than her Republican rival. Non-Americans were particularly stunned that the second-highest vote-getter would be crowned president.

But Trump had done what the U.S. system requires: winning enough individual states, sometimes by very narrow margins, to surpass the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win the White House.

Now, as the 2024 election race between Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris approaches, the rules of this enigmatic and, for some, outdated system are coming back into focus.

Why an electoral college?

The 538 members of the U.S. Electoral College gather in their state capitals after the quadrennial presidential election to determine the winner.

To win, a presidential candidate must achieve an absolute majority of “voters” – or 270 out of 538.

The system originated in the 1787 U.S. Constitution and established the rules for indirect presidential elections in a single round.

The country's founding fathers viewed the system as a compromise between direct presidential elections with universal suffrage and election by members of Congress – an approach that was rejected as insufficiently democratic.

With many states predictably leaning Republican or Democratic, presidential candidates are focusing heavily on the few “swing” states that the election is likely to focus on – all but ignoring some large states like left-leaning California and right-leaning Texas.

Over the years, hundreds of amendments have been proposed to Congress to change or abolish the Electoral College. Nobody made it.

Trump's victory in 2016 reignited the debate. And if the 2024 race turns out to be the tremor point that most polls predict, the Electoral College will surely come back into the spotlight.

Who are the 538?

Most are local elected officials or party leaders whose names do not appear on the ballot.

Each state has as many electors as it has members in the U.S. House of Representatives (the number depends on the state's population) and Senate (two in each state, regardless of size).

California, for example, has 54 voters; Texas has 40; and in the sparsely populated areas of Alaska, Delaware, Vermont and Wyoming there are only three each.

The US capital Washington also receives three voters, although it has no voting members in Congress.

The Constitution leaves it up to states to decide how their electors' votes should be cast. In all but two states (Nebraska and Maine, which allocate some electors based on congressional districts), the candidate with the most votes theoretically wins all of that state's electors.

Controversial institution

In November 2016, Trump won 306 electoral votes, significantly more than the 270 needed.

The extraordinary situation of losing the popular vote but winning the White House was not unprecedented.

Five presidents have come to office this way, the first being John Quincy Adams in 1824.

More recently, the 2000 election in Florida saw an epic clash between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore.

Gore won nearly 500,000 more votes statewide, but when Florida was awarded to Bush – ultimately after an intervention by the US Supreme Court – his Electoral College total increased to 271, a victory by a whisker.

Real vote or simple formality?

Nothing in the Constitution obliges voters to vote one way or another.

If some states required them to respect the popular vote and they failed to do so, a simple fine was imposed on them. But in July 2020, the Supreme Court ruled that states could punish such “faithless electors.”

So far, unbelieving voters have never decided the outcome of the US election.

Electoral College schedule

Voters will gather in their state capitols on December 17 and cast their votes for president and vice president. Under U.S. law, they “meet and vote on the first Tuesday after the second Wednesday in December.”

On January 6, 2025, Congress will convene to certify the winner – a closely watched event this cycle, four years after a mob of Trump supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol and tried to block certification.

But there is a difference. Last time, it was Republican Vice President Mike Pence who, as President of the Senate, was responsible for overseeing the certification. He resisted strong pressure from Trump and the Mafia and confirmed Biden's victory.

This time, the President of the Senate, who normally oversees the pro forma certification, will be none other than today's Vice President: Kamala Harris.

The new president is scheduled to be sworn in on January 20th.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)