All right, We all know Trump isn’t going to win. Play along please.
But theoretically there is a microscopic whisper of a quark of a hint of a possibility that given the right alignment of the fates there kind of could almost sort of maybe might be a tie in the electoral college.
If that happens, and assuming the Republicans keep the House, what do you think will happen? I say the Representatives would vote for whomever received the most popular votes (which will probably be Hillary). If I had to take a second guess I’d say they would vote for Hillary outright no matter what.
Interesting. It could be possible that the Republicans intentionally and directly make the bitch they’ve hated most for over 3 decades POTUS. The irony is delicious.
Not that I think it could/would happen but ---------- I would say they fall back on the popular with a tiny spark in me saying they go for Hillary no matter what. The Republicans are almost sure to lose ground in the House and there will be enough Representatives who fear a President Trump as much as I do to make sure that never happens.
The popular vote would not matter one whit. There would perhaps be a tiny number of defectors, but not enough to flip enough states. The only outcomes would be an enthusiastic vote for Trump or a intentional deadlock and refusal to hold any more votes. And the latter would happen only if Mike Pence was elected VP by the Senate (and even then I don’t think it would).
Edit: I forgot about Egg McMuffin maybe picking up Utah. I guess he’d be a factor (although I think they’d pick Trump anyways), but good lord, can you imagine what would happen if the probable fifth-place finisher, a faceless ex-CIA agent, was elected by a cabal of politicians in Washington over the wishes of ~97% of the national electorate?
Not that I think it’s likely, but a hypothetical that I find interesting:
Neither Clinton nor Trump hit 270 on Election Day. McMullin gets Utah’s 6 Electoral Votes.
Utah (if Wiki is to be trusted on this matter) has no law against Faithless Electors.
The day after Election Day, the report might be “Uh-oh! It’s going to the House!” but McMullin and/or his electors could be in a position to call it one way or the other. McMullin voters don’t like Clinton but he is, in effect, more of an anti-Trump candidate than an anti-Clinton candidate since he’s courting voters who would normally vote Republican but can not, in good conscience, vote for Trump.
Would McMullin ask his electors to vote for Clinton? Or Trump?
Or, if McMullin chooses not to direct his electors to vote for anyone other than him, might any of the 6 electors decide on their own to vote either Clinton or Trump?
There’s no way Trump doesn’t become president if it goes to the House.
Another less likely, but possible, scenario is an election which appears to show one candidate winning but the official results of which are disputed at the local level and in congress.
If it was Satan ® vs. Jesus (D) and it was up to the current House, Satan would be sworn in. Not sure what book he’d place his hand on, but he would have gotten each and every R vote in the House.
My understanding is that, even in those states that have such laws, the penalties for breaking them - if actually enforced - are pretty minimal. Not to mention, their Constitutional status is still ‘who the fuck knows?’
So I really wouldn’t expect the presence or absence of faithless-elector laws to make much difference if things got interesting.
Actually, a deadlock is a very real possibility. It’s by state, and the winner has to have a majority of states. If the House can’t decide, then whoever the Senate picks as VP(which is simple up or down vote) becomes President. Some Republicans will not vote for Trump, and it won’t take many to scupper everything.
Which is why if it goes to Congress, I think Tim Kaine is the President.
There is no chance whatsoever that the Republicans would vote for anyone other than Trump. I am incredulous there is any speculation to the contrary.
In any scenario where Trump wins the election, the Republicans will retain a majority of states in the House. (Bear in mind it is not the House voting as representatives; it’s the House voting as state delegations. If a state has 7 Republicans and 5 Democrats, it goes to Trump as one vote.)
Utah very well might if McMullin wins Utah and that’s the reason for the election going to Congress. You’re also not factoring evenly divided delegations, which can deadlock. In that environment, even a tiny handful of Never Trumpers can deadlock the House. If the GOP controls the Senate, then this actually becomes likely, IMO, because it puts Pence in the White House.
I tend to agree. Those Republicans voting for anyone else would be highly likely to be primaries out of office ASAP (if nothing happened before that) if they voted for McMullin or Clinton and that cost Republicans the Presidency. Especially if Trump won popular vote, it’s “denying the will of the people.”
Voting for the democrat will not endear them to their base, and voting for someone who got less than 10% of popular vote would enrage almost everyone and make a mockery the electoral college (though it’d be the biggest boon ever to the National Popular Vote proponents) if enough did it to get him the Presidency (all Republicans, really).
Does anyone know how that process actually works? Like do the reps meet as states and pick their choice, or does everyone vote at once and they sort it out after?
All that the 12th Amendment says is, “the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote”.
I tried looking in the United States Code and the Rules of the House of Representatives to see if there are more specific procedures, but I did not see any.
I would assume the Speaker would do a voice roll call of the states.
In the 1800 election, it looks like each state delegation met together to decide how to vote, and then cast a single ballot, for either Jefferson or Burr, or blank, if the delegation was evenly split.
[QUOTE=wikipedia]
While it was common knowledge that Jefferson was the candidate for president and Burr for vice-president, many Federalists were unwilling to support Jefferson, their principal political opponent since 1789. Seizing an opportunity to deny Jefferson the presidency, most Federalists voted for Burr, giving Burr six of the eight states controlled by Federalists. The seven delegations controlled by Democratic-Republicans all voted for Jefferson, and Georgia’s sole Federalist representative also voted for him, giving him eight states. The Vermont delegation was evenly split between Federalists and Democratic-Republicans and cast a blank ballot. The remaining state, Maryland, had five Federalist representatives to three Democratic-Republicans; one of its Federalist representatives voted for Jefferson, forcing that state delegation also to cast a blank ballot.
[/QUOTE]
In any scenario where Trump wins, Republicans control a majority of state delegations, by a sizable margin. Utah or not. All those delegation will vote for Trump, without exception.
“No matter what” is a bit more certain than I feel, but the Republicans haven’t yet shown the backbone it takes to say no to the basket of deplorables.
If McMullin wins Utah, there’s an excellent chance he’s president.
This election also makes Maine and Nebraska’s split votes extremely important. The temptation to defect to a third-party candidate would be extremely high, to give him or her at least one EV.