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The Electoral College is a body of electors established by the United States Constitution, which forms every four years for the sole purpose of electing the president and vice president of the United States. The Electoral College consists of 538 electors, and an absolute majority of at least 270 electoral votes is required to win election. According to Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 of the Constitution, each state legislature determines the manner by which its state's electors are chosen. Each state's number of electors is equal to the combined total of the state's membership in the Senate and House of Representatives; currently there are 100 senators and 435 representatives. Additionally, the Twenty-third Amendment, ratified in 1961, provides that the District of Columbia (D.C.) is entitled to the number of electors it would have if it were the least populated state. U.S. territories are not entitled to any electors as they are not states.
Elections in the United States are held for government officials at the federal, state, and local levels. At the federal level, the nation's head of state, the president, is elected indirectly by the people of each state, through an Electoral College. Today, these electors almost always vote with the popular vote of their state. All members of the federal legislature, the Congress, are directly elected by the people of each state. There are many elected offices at state level, each state having at least an elective governor and legislature. There are also elected offices at the local level, in counties, cities, towns, townships, boroughs, and villages; as well as for special districts and school districts which may transcend county and municipal boundaries. According to a study by political scientist Jennifer Lawless, there were 519,682 elected officials in the United States as of 2012.
FairVote is a 501(c)(3) organization that advocates electoral reform in the United States.
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) is an agreement among a group of U.S. states and the District of Columbia to award all their electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the overall popular vote in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The compact is designed to ensure that the candidate who receives the most votes nationwide is elected president, and it would come into effect only when it would guarantee that outcome. As of December 2019, it has been adopted by fifteen states and the District of Columbia. Together, they have 196 electoral votes, which is 36.4% of the Electoral College and 72.6% of the 270 votes needed to give the compact legal force.
The Presidential Election Reform Act was a proposed initiative in the state of California to alter the way the state's electoral votes for president are distributed among presidential candidates.
Electoral reform in Virginia refers to efforts to change the electoral system in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Virginia has undergone much electoral change since its settling in 1607, many of which were required by federal legislation. However, it remains a relatively conservative state in this respect compared to California and others which have experimented with various alternative systems.
Electoral reform in the United States refers to efforts to change American elections and the electoral system used in the United States.
Electoral reform in California refers to efforts to change election and voting laws in the West Coast state of California.
Ranked-choice voting (RCV), also known as instant-runoff voting (IRV), is used for state primary, congressional, and presidential elections in Maine and for local elections in more than 20 US cities including San Francisco, California; Oakland, California; Berkeley, California; San Leandro, California; Takoma Park, Maryland; St. Paul, Minnesota; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Santa Fe, New Mexico; Portland, Maine; Las Cruces, New Mexico; and St. Louis Park, Minnesota. New York City is by far the largest voting population in the US that has opted for RCV, pending implementation in 2021. RCV is commonly used for student leadership and other non-governmental elections. It has been proposed for presidential elections and will be used in four states in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries.
Instant-runoff voting (IRV) is a type of ranked preferential voting method used in single-seat elections with more than two candidates. Instead of indicating support for only one candidate, voters in IRV elections can rank the candidates in order of preference. Ballots are initially counted for each voter's top choice. If a candidate has more than half of the vote based on first-choices, that candidate wins. If not, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. The voters who selected the defeated candidate as a first choice then have their votes added to the totals of their next choice. This process continues until a candidate has more than half of the votes. When the field is reduced to two, it has become an "instant runoff" that allows a comparison of the top two candidates head-to-head. Compared to plurality voting, IRV can reduce the impact of vote-splitting when multiple candidates earn support from like-minded voters.
The election of the president and the vice president of the United States is an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty U.S. states or in Washington, D.C., cast ballots not directly for those offices, but instead for members of the U.S. Electoral College, known as electors. These electors then in turn cast direct votes, known as electoral votes, for president, and for vice president. The candidate who receives an absolute majority of electoral votes is then elected to that office. If no candidate receives an absolute majority of the votes for President, the House of Representatives chooses the winner; if no one receives an absolute majority of the votes for Vice President, then the Senate chooses the winner.
An electoral system is a set of rules that determine how elections and referendums are conducted and how their results are determined. Political electoral systems are organized by governments, while non-political elections may take place in business, non-profit organisations and informal organisations.
The 2020 United States presidential election is scheduled for Tuesday, November 3. Voters will select presidential electors who in turn on December 14, 2020, will either elect a new president and vice president or re-elect the incumbents. The series of presidential primary elections and caucuses is likely to be held during the first six months of 2020. This nominating process is also an indirect election, where voters cast ballots selecting a slate of delegates to a political party's nominating convention, who then in turn elect their party's nominee.
Maine Question 1 was a people's veto referendum that appeared on the June 12, 2018 statewide ballot. It sought to reject a law passed by the Maine Legislature that suspended the implementation of ranked choice voting, authorized by Maine voters in a previous referendum, for use in Maine elections until and if an amendment to the Maine Constitution is passed to expressly permit it; failing that, the law would be automatically repealed in 2021. It qualified because supporters of the original referendum collected the necessary number of signatures from registered Maine voters. This vote coincided with primary elections in which party nominees for governor, U.S. Senate, U.S. House, and the Maine Legislature were chosen to run in general elections on November 6.
Maine Question 5, formally An Act to Establish Ranked-Choice Voting, is a citizen-initiated referendum question that qualified for the Maine November 8, 2016 statewide ballot and was approved by a margin of 52% to 48%. It would change how most Maine elections will be conducted from a plurality voting system to a ranked-choice voting system. It appeared on the ballot along with elections for President of the United States, Maine's two U.S. House seats, the legislature, five other ballot questions, and various local elections. Maine would be the first state to use such a system for its statewide elections for governor and U.S. Senate if implemented.
California state elections in 2020 will be held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. Unlike previous election cycles, the primary elections will be held on Super Tuesday, March 3, 2020.
The 2020 United States presidential election in California is scheduled to take place on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States elections in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia will participate. California voters will choose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote. The state of California has 55 electoral votes in the Electoral College.
The 2020 United States presidential election in Delaware is scheduled to take place on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States elections in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia will participate. Delaware voters will choose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote. The state of Delaware has 3 electoral votes in the Electoral College.
The 2020 United States presidential election in Maine is scheduled to take place on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States elections in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia will participate. Maine voters will choose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote. The state of Maine has 4 electoral votes in the Electoral College. Unlike all other states except Nebraska, Maine awards two electoral votes based on the statewide vote, and one vote for each congressional district. In the 2016 election, Maine split its vote for the first time since 1828, awarding one electoral vote to Donald Trump as he got the most votes in Maine's 2nd congressional district.
The 2020 Maine Democratic primary will take place on Tuesday, March 3, 2020, as one of 14 contests scheduled on Super Tuesday in the Democratic Party presidential primaries for the 2020 presidential election, following the South Carolina primary the weekend before. The Maine primary is a closed primary, with the state awarding 32 delegates, of which 24 are pledged delegates allocated on the basis of the results of the primary. Though the primary is only open to party members, voters are permitted to enroll in a party at the polls with same day registration.
References
- ↑ Worldwide Efforts to Lower the Voting Age, National Youth Rights Association.
- ↑ Sherpard, Michael (September 6, 2019). "Maine will use ranked-choice voting in next year's presidential election — but not the 2020 primaries". Portland Press Herald . Retrieved September 6, 2019.
