Could presidents start being elected by popular vote? It is not clear, but Democratic victories in Tuesday's midterm elections have rekindled attention to the possibility, with five states potentially able to push a long-discussed agreement past the threshold needed to take effect.
Under the current system, presidents are chosen by the Electoral College, a group of delegates based on each state's number of seats in Congress who are supposed to cast votes mirroring their state's results. The method has been criticized for giving smaller-population states outsized influence in presidential elections based on their representation in the Senate.
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is a long-discussed agreement between states that would shift presidential elections away from the Electoral College. States joining the compact pledge their electoral votes to whoever wins the national popular vote, not just who wins their state.
Five states with Democrats newly in control of the governorships and legislatures — Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — could potentially push support for the compact past the 270 electoral-vote threshold needed to adopt it. But it is not clear they will.
"It's now a very real possibility. And these state legislatures will meet soon and start their sessions, and I imagine this is going to be at the forefront of some pretty aggressive lobbying efforts," said Derek Muller, an election law professor at the University of Notre Dame.
