The Electoral College system is seriously flawed. Five times in our history, a president was elected by the Electoral College while getting fewer votes than his opponent, including Donald Trump in 2016. There is an ongoing move to eliminate this problem – the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC).
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes across all 50 states and the District of Columbia. It will apply the one-person-one-vote principle to presidential elections, making every vote equal.
Currently, every vote is not equal throughout the United States – for reasons including the formula for allocating electoral votes to the states, intra-decade population changes, and turnout differences that increase or decrease the value of a voter’s vote.
On April 13, Governor Spanberger signed bills to allow Virginia to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC), an initiative in which member states agree to award their Electoral College votes to the presidential ticket that receives the most votes nationwide. With Virginia signing on, NPVIC has been enacted into law by 19 jurisdictions, including six small states (DE, HI, ME, RI, VT, DC), 10 medium-sized states (CO, CT, MD, MA, MN, NJ, NM, OR, VA, WA), and 3 big states (CA, IL, NY). Together, they have 222 of the 270 electoral votes needed to activate the law. Significantly, legislatures in six additional states with 61 electoral votes have sponsored legislation and/or cast votes in favor of the NPVIC.
A continuing problem is that myths abound about NPVIC. One of these myths is that the NPVIC would abolish the Electoral College. That is not true. It would do the opposite. The National Popular Vote compact would preserve the Electoral College. It would not abolish it. Rather, it would not affect the structure of the Electoral College as outlined in the U.S. Constitution.
The National Popular Vote plan is based on the states’ power to choose their preferred method for awarding electoral votes. The compact would replace existing state winner-take-all statutes with a different state statute, namely one that guarantees the presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
The popular vote is a common method in national elections. Our current method is unusual. As the Richmond Times-Dispatch previously reported, “Of the 28 freest presidential democracies, 21 use the majority of votes to award the presidency.”
Under the National Popular Vote plan, states would retain their exclusive and plenary power to choose the method of awarding their electoral votes, including the option to make other changes in the future.
Another myth is that the National Popular Vote would be imposed without the consent of the majority of Americans. Numerous polls conducted by different polling organizations over several years, using a variety of question wording, all report high levels of support for a national popular vote. The latest Pew polling from 2024 showed that 63 percent of Americans support shifting to a popular-vote system.
Yet another myth is that NPVIC is a plan of Democrats. That it appears so now reflects the country’s harsh political divide. Republicans have been strong supporters of the National Popular Vote plan. For example, then-Congressman George H.W. Bush (R-Texas) said on September 18, 1969, in support of the direct popular election of the President: “This legislation has a great deal to commend it. It will correct the wrongs of the present mechanism by calling for the direct election of the President and Vice President. Yet, in spite of these drastic reforms, the bill is not detrimental to our federal system or one that will change the departmentalized and local nature of voting in this country.”
NPVIC is a non-partisan effort, unaffiliated with any political party. The NPVIC Advisory Board currently includes three Republicans: Thomas Campbell, Jake Garn, and Michael Steele, former chair of the Republican National Committee. And it previously included former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
NPVIC makes every vote equal, something our current plan does not do.
