A new bill was passed by the Maine legislature designed to award the state’s presidential electoral votes to the candidate who wins the national popular vote.
“The Maine House voted by the slimmest of margins Tuesday to join a compact that would replace the Electoral College with the national popular vote.
The House voted 73-72 to enact LD 1578 ‘An Act to Adopt an Interstate Compact to Elect the President of the United States by National Popular Vote’.
Maine lawmakers have considered similar versions of the same bill since 2007 but have failed to join the compact.
Under the compact, all of a state’s electoral votes are awarded to the presidential slate with the most popular votes in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
So far, 16 states and DC have agreed to join the compact, representing 205 electoral votes.
But more states need to join to get to 270 electoral votes so the system can be used in presidential races across the country, Rep. Art Bell (D-Yarmouth) told members of the Legislature’s Veterans and Legal Affairs Committee in January.
Maine has only four electoral votes and supporters argued that switching to a popular vote system would make smaller states like Maine more relevant.
Opponents say Maine is already well positioned because it’s one of only two states to split its electoral votes”. -Susan Cover, Spectrum News
In an effort by the Pine Tree State to push America toward a supposedly more equitable and democratic system, one can’t help but find it a bit ironic that even if every registered Maine constituent casts their vote for a candidate other than the one who wins the national popular vote, the state’s electors will be bound to vote for the candidate whom no one in the state elected.