In my last post, I considered ways to reform the Electoral College (EC). One way is for states to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC). The other option is for states to adopt the Congressional District Method which Maine and Nebraska currently use to apportion their electoral votes.
I noted in my analysis that it was not clear what Americans currently think of the EC or the NPVIC. Luckily, this week’s The Economist/YouGov Poll asked its panel a number of questions connected to this debate. The results tend to be in line with Gallup’s 2016 findings, which I discussed in my last post.
The Economist/YouGov Poll asked three questions.
While the last of these questions did explain how the NPVIC works, it is surprising how many Americans are not sure whether or not they like the idea.
What can we learn from this poll’s findings? Here are three observations, which largely reflect the country’s political mood.
Democrats do not hold too much regard for the EC and they want to amend the Constitution to eliminate the system and let voters directly elect the president.
Republicans have favorable views of the EC and prefer to keep the system as is.
Independents are divided on this issue and many of them are not sure what to think of the current electoral system.
Given these divisions, the EC is here to stay! The best the EC’s critics can hope for is for states to reform how they award their electoral votes. Clearly, the NPVIC is one possible reform, but most people are not aware of this initiative. The other option is for states to adopt the Congressional District Method I reviewed in my last post. A final proposal, which I did not discuss in my proposal and has been discussed by considered by some state legislatures, is for states to apportion their electoral votes proportionally.
For the last days, I have been thinking about the way Americans elect their president and I am not the only way thinking about this issue, according to Google Trends data.
To win the presidency, a nominee has to earn a minimum of 270 electoral votes, rather than a majority of votes cast. This is not the place to review the history of the Electoral College (EC), but it is important to keep in mind that it totals 538 votes. Each state and the District of Columbia gets a proportional share of these electoral votes, according to the following formula:
States receive two electoral votes, which corresponds to each’s allotment of two seats in the U.S. Senate.
The remaining electoral votes are distributed among the 50 states based on each’s number of Congressional Districts.
With the adoption of the 23rd amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the District of Columbia has three electoral votes.
The EC is a much-maligned system. In a recent town-hall, Massachusetts Senator and presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren explained why she wants to get rid of the EC and let Americans vote directly for their president. Here is one of Senator Warren’s tweets summarizing her position:
Every vote matters. We need to get rid of the Electoral College so that presidential candidates have to ask every American in every part of the country for their vote, not just those in battleground states. #WarrenTownHallpic.twitter.com/UT3mYHXHQ2
Even President Donald Trump, who won the EC but lost the popular to Hillary Clinton by almost 3 million votes, entered the debate, sharing his thoughts on Twitter.
What do Americans think of the EC? Do they want to get rid of it?Last summer, the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) conducted a poll that found that close to two-thirds of Americans want to directly elect their president by popular vote. It also demonstrated that Democrats strongly favored getting rid of the EC while Republicans’ attitudes are mixed. A Rasmussen survey of likely voters carried out in early October 2018 did not corroborate the PRRI’s findings. Only 46% of respondents favored “eliminating” the EC. In December 2016, Gallup found that 49% of Americans wanted “to amend the Constitution to allow for a popular vote for president”, but this was lower than the 62% of respondents who in 2012 wanted to get rid of the EC. In addition, Gallup’s research also suggested that 81% of left-leaning and 19% of right leaning Americans wanted to do away with the EC.
While many Americans are dissatisfied with the EC, amending the constitution is unrealistic in today’s hyperpartisan environment. So what can we do?
One solution, as Jamelle Bouie recently argued in the pages of The New York Times, is for states to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. This initiative is quite simple. It requires states (and the District of Columbia) to pledge their delegates to the winner of the national popular vote. So far, 13 states, equaling 181 electoral votes, have passed legislation supporting this project. But the system goes into effect once the initiative attracts 270 electoral votes.
State
Governor
State Legislature
2016 Pres. Winner
Vote Margin
CA
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
30%
CO
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
5%
CT
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
16%
DC
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
86%
HI
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
32%
IL
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
17%
MA
Republican
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
27%
MD
Republican
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
26%
NJ
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
14%
NY
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
25%
RI
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
16%
VT
Republican
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
26%
WA
Democrat
Democratic Mayority
Hillary Clinton
16%
While other states are considering joining the Compact, the biggest hurdle, as the table shows, is that Republicans still dominate a majority of the states’ legislatures and governor mansions across the country. For now, the Compact is an unrealistic option.
Another solution could be for states to adopt what I call the Maine-Nebraska Model or what is also known as the “Congressional District Method“. These two states distribute their electoral votes using the following formula:
The winner of the popular vote receives the two electoral votes associated with their states’ representation in the U.S. Senate.
A presidential candidate can lose the state’s popular vote, but still earn electoral votes if he or she can win a majority of the vote in each of the state’s Congressional Districts.
In 2008, Nebraska split its electoral votes, awarding John McCain four of its five electoral votes and one to Barack Obama. Obama won the majority of the vote in the state’s 2nd Congressional District, which includes Omaha and its suburbs. In 2016, Hillary Clinton won three of Maine’s four electoral vote, while Donald Trump won the electoral vote of the mostly-rural 2nd Congressional District.
What if all the states adopted this Maine-Nebraska Model? Would it have affected the results of the 2016 presidential race?
The table below includes numbers for the actual outcome of the elections, while the next column looks at the results if we apply the Maine-Nebraska Model. The table also includes the number of Congressional Districts and states each candidate won. The last column shows who won the District of Columbia’s three electoral votes.
Actual Outcome
MN_Model
States
Congressional Districts
DC
Clinton
232
237
20
194
3
Trump
306
301
30
241
0
If all states had apportioned their electoral votes using Maine’s and Nebraska’s approach, President Trump would have still comfortably won the presidency. Should this disqualify this alternative to the EC?
Let us apply the Maine-Nebraska Model to the 2012 and the 2008 presidential elections.
Actual Outcome
MN_Model
States
Congressional Districts
DC
Obama
332
265
26
210
3
Romney
206
273
24
225
0
Under the Maine-Nebraska Model, President Obama would have been a one-term president. And Obama’s victory in 2008 would have been narrower.
Actual Outcome
MN_Model
States
Congressional Districts
DC
McCain
173
255
28
199
0
Obama
365
283
22
236
3
What if we applied the model to the 2004 and 2000 elections?
Actual Outcome
MN_Model
States
Congressional Districts
DC
Bush
286
318
31
256
0
Kerry
251
220
19
179
3
Actual Outcome
MN_Model
States
Congressional Districts
DC
Bush
271
300
30
240
0
Gore
268
238
20
195
3
Under the Maine-Nebraska Model, President Bush would have earned more electoral votes in both elections.
What can we learn from this analysis? If we agree we Senator Warren’s belief that we need to change the EC in order to force presidential candidates to campaign outside “battleground states”, the Maine-Nebraska Model accomplishes this goal. After all, would Maine or Nebraska have received any attention during the last presidential elections, if they distributed their electoral votes as the other 48 states?
It is important to note that Senator Warren would probably not support the Maine-Nebraska Model. But, her desire to eliminate the EC is unrealistic. Amending the constitution will not take place in the next years.
Republicans’ opposition to reforming the EC is understandable. If it was not for the EC, Al Gore and Hillary Clinton would have won their respective races. But if public opinion starts to turn against the EC, Republicans could propose that states adopt Maine’s and Nebraska’s approach as a measure that seems more democratic than the current electoral system.
Would this be good for democracy? It would be a step in the right direction. But the chances that states will adopt Maine’s or Nebraska’s approach is also a long shot. It is not in either party’s interest. By turning battleground states into battleground districts, the parties would have to adapt their campaigning structures and raise more money to target even more districts.
For now, it seems we will just have to accept the EC’s limitations as it is unlikely that Americans will be able to reform or replace the current electoral system.
On March 3, 2019, a series of tornadoes hit towns across Alabama, Georgia, Florida and South Carolina. The worst one decimated a number of communities around Beauregard, Alabama, claiming 23 lives and injuring close to 100. The next morning President Trump tweeted:
FEMA has been told directly by me to give the A Plus treatment to the Great State of Alabama and the wonderful people who have been so devastated by the Tornadoes. @GovernorKayIvey, one of the best in our Country, has been so informed. She is working closely with FEMA (and me!).
Needless to say, President Trump’s words angered many. Although the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) should be impartial when it reacts to a natural disaster, the tweet suggests that the President affects the amount of assistance FEMA provides. Has Trump be playing favorites, favoring red states over blue states? Have his negative views of Puerto Rico explain why the federal government has been slow at disbursing the funds appropriated to finance the island’s recovery?
This is likely to become an issue in next year’s presidential elections. For instance, both Elizabeth Warren and Julian Castro have recently visited Puerto Rico to highlight the Trump administration’s “‘disrespectful’ treatment” of the island’s 3.3 million U.S. citizens. Do Americans share Warren’s or Castro’s views?
The most recent Economist/YouGov Poll (March 10-12, 2019) asked its panel the following question: “Do you think the federal government was more responsive to the tornadoes in Alabama or the hurricane that struck Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands?”
Sadly, but not surprisingly, many Americans think that the federal government has favored Alabama over Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Could this be problematic for the White House? A close look at the survey’s crosstabs show that 66% of Democrats believe the federal government favored Alabama over the other U.S. territories, while only 32% of independent and 28% of Republicans share this opinion.
The survey also asked respondents to evaluate the President Trump’s and the federal government’s response to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. This is the fifth time this survey posed this question, allowing us to track Americans’ attitudes for the past 18 months.
The numbers have not fluctuated too much since YouGov asked this question in last year’s surveys. As noted above, partisanship determines how negatively respondents feel about Trump’s handling of the response. Thus, 80% of Democrats disapprove of his response, while 77% of Republicans approve of his performance. Independents, an important voting group, are more divided with 31% approving and 39% disapproving of President Trump’s actions.
Respondents were also asked to rate the federal government’s response to Hurricane Maria.
As noted above, there is not too much change in the last few months. Republicans are more likely to have positive views of the government’s response, while Democrats are more critical. Today, 43% of independents tend to be critical, though this represents a 4% drop from September 2018.
How salient is this issue? Will it affect the 2020 presidential elections? Right now, other issues will likely overshadow the Trump administration’s treatment of Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. But this issue will prove be problematic with President Trump in Florida, a state he needs to win if he hopes to win reelection.
Author’s Note:A version of this post is also found in the The Puerto Rico Data Lab, a blog I created to reflect on US-Puerto Rico relations in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. You can follow me in Twitter at the following accounts: @cyordan or @pr_datalab.
We are just 334 days from the Iowa presidential caucuses!
So far, twelve Democrats have announced their intention to run for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination and we are still waiting for a few more candidates, including Vice President Joe Biden and former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke, to join the race.
Which of these candidates has generated the most buzz?
For today’s post, let’s look at Wikipedia “pageviews” data for the 10 candidates who declared their candidacy before February 28, 2019. In the past, political scientists (i.e. Smith and Gustafson 2017; and Yasseri and Bright 2016) have looked at ways these “pageviews” can help investigators predict the outcome of elections. While it is too early to predict who will win the Democratic presidential nomination, it is never to early to see how different indicators can help us think about different political events.
Wikipedia data suggests that these 10 candidates’ pages earned 4,633,621 “pageviews”. Among these candidates, Harris leads the field in terms of average daily “pageviews”.
I am surprised that Klobuchar is in second place, edging both Booker and Sanders. I am even more shocked that Buttigieg’s presidential aspirations have generated more buzz than Gillibrand’s or Castro’s candidacies.
This graph fails to take into consideration each candidate’s “pageviews” per day. For example, while Sanders may have the fourth highest average daily “pageviews”, he did not announce his second presidential run until February 19,2019 and since then many people have visited his Wikipedia page.
The following stacked barplot captures each candidates share of daily “pageviews” in relation to all candidates’ “pageviews” for February 2019. Given that Delaney’s daily “pageview” average is 28, I did it not include his data in this graph.
This plot helps us visualize Wikipedia readers’ interests on each of the nine candidacies over time. It important to note that these “pageviews” are not indication of readers’ approval for a candidates’ campaign. After all, their Wikipedia pages include information that could turn-off potential supporters. But the plot demonstrates that many people are paying attention to the ever expanding group of Democratic contenders vying for their party’s presidential nomination.
Bibliography:
B. Smith and A. Gustafson. 2017. “Using Wikipedia to Predict Election Outcomes: Online Behavior as a Predictor of Voting,” Public Opinion Quarterly, 81(3): 714-735.
T. Yasseri and J. Bright. 2016. “Wikipedia traffic data and electoral prediction: towards theoretically informed models,” EPJ Data Science, 5(22).
