# Hillary won the popular vote, yet lost - obvious flaw in the system? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 14, 2016, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946 "2016-11-14T08:45:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/1 "2016-11-14T08:45:45Z")
It means some votes had more weight than others. Something which should be corrected for future? ---
**Author:** ![DerekMichaels00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f14d63/32.png) [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/2 "2016-11-14T08:57:37Z")
depends; if a split keeps happening, then yea scrap it. But there are new problems to be [had with doing so](http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2016/11/10/electoral-college-popular-vote-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-editorials-debates/93609562/). ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/3 "2016-11-14T13:43:58Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > It means some votes had more weight than others. Something which should be corrected for future? Wyoming has just north of 600,000 residents. It gets one Representative in the House. Montana has just north of 1,000,000 residents. It also gets just one Representative in the House. Guess which state has voters whose votes have more “weight” than others? Rhode Island has a whopping 24,000 more people than Montana (2% or so). It gets two Representatives. So its voters have twice the power of Montana’s voters. Obvious flaw in the system? Or have we simply forgotten that **you don’t even have a constitutional right to vote for President in the first place.** It’s entirely up to the individual states how they choose their electors. The state I currently live in didn’t use popular vote for the first nineteen presidential elections (it was the last holdout for the option of the state legislature choosing the electors). It has not ever been a national contest; it’s a contest held simultaneously in 51 polities. As I pointed out elsewhere, had Hillary Clinton eked out wins in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Maine’s 2nd Congressional district, she’d be President-elect now. Mr. Trump would be pointing out that he would have won 28 states to her 22 (plus the D of C). We can imagine the tweet: “NOT FAIR!!” Possibly not, but just as irrelevant as the popular totals nationwide are. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/4 "2016-11-14T13:50:39Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > It means some votes had more weight than others. Something which should be corrected for future? It’s a feature, not a bug. Removing the feature has been discussed, but although reforms have passed the house, they’ve never passed the Senate, which isn’t surprising since the Senate is an even stronger manifestation of the same feature. You should sit down and read some history of the US system of elections before starting threads on it. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/5 "2016-11-14T13:51:19Z")
Maybe it is flawed, but it is not necessarily because of the popular vs. electoral split. However, both candidates played knowing the rules so Trump, for example, didn’t go to California or NY a lot to “get out and vote”. A couple of percentage points is “lost cause” states would’ve made no difference in the EC count and cost a lot of money and time. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/6 "2016-11-14T14:40:18Z")
But the fact of the matter is, after an exhaustive campaign in electronic and print media lasting many months and reaching every corner, Hillary Clinton got more votes than Trump and yet she lost. Doesn’t sound right to me. And it is bound to happen in future as well. All votes should have equal weights… … If u must have higher weights for some people’s votes, then that should be on basis of education levels, IQ etc… ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/7 "2016-11-14T14:49:20Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > But the fact of the matter is, after an exhaustive campaign in electronic and print media lasting many months and reaching every corner, Hillary Clinton got more votes than Trump and yet she lost. Doesn’t sound right to me. And it is bound to happen in future as well. All votes should have equal weights… > > … If u must have higher weights for some people’s votes, then that should be on basis of education levels, IQ etc… Yeah, maybe we should put in some sort of literacy test, or charge a poll tax to prove that you are a contributing member of society before you are allowed to vote. Look up “Jim Crow” to see how those ideas worked out historically. (The current American system for presidential elections is flawed but it is flawed in relation to the historical fact that this country started as a confederation of mostly independent states whose leaders did not really trust the mob.) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/8 "2016-11-14T14:52:02Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > Hillary Clinton got more votes than Trump and yet she lost. Doesn’t sound right to me. This seems like insisting that the only fair way to decide the winner of the World Series is to award it to the team that got the most total runs. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/9 "2016-11-14T14:58:19Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > Yeah, maybe we should put in some sort of literacy test, or charge a poll tax to prove that you are a contributing member of society before you are allowed to vote. > > Look up “Jim Crow” to see how those ideas worked out historically. > > (The current American system for presidential elections is flawed but it is flawed in relation to the historical fact that this country started as a confederation of mostly independent states whose leaders did not really trust the mob.) I said ‘if u must have different weights’, I didn’t say ‘u should have’. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/10 "2016-11-14T15:01:06Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > This seems like insisting that the only fair way to decide the winner of the World Series is to award it to the team that got the most total runs. comparing apples to oranges? ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/11 "2016-11-14T15:23:10Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > This seems like insisting that the only fair way to decide the winner of the World Series is to award it to the team that got the most total runs. Maybe the winner of each game should be who scores the most runs in innings 3, 6, and 7. If one team runs up the score in innings 1, 4, or 8, those runs shouldn’t count as much, should they? ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/12 "2016-11-14T15:34:07Z")
OP and every other millennial that didn’t pay attention in civics class or US history, go back and research 2000 election, even here on the Dope. We’ve debated this before. You aren’t the first person or 10,000th that has had this revelation. :rolleyes: Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/13 "2016-11-14T15:36:02Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > I said ‘if u must have different weights’, I didn’t say ‘u should have’. It was still a stupid statement in the context of previous racist voting laws in the US. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/14 "2016-11-14T15:38:52Z")
Has anyone heard Trump even mention it? Not like Bush. Remember? How he looked at the voting totals and said “Well, I’m technically elected, but I got less votes than my opponent. That tells me I must govern like a centrist, must be more open to policy from the Dems…” Oh, wait, no, that never happened, did it? Never mind. Well, there’s the Republican response to Obama’s win, how they stepped up and offered full cooperation with the winner, because, you know, the people have spoken. They would criticize and make suggestion, of course, that was their duty. But “obstruction”? No, no, they wouldn’t even think it, after all, the people had spoken. I’m sorry this fairy tale lacks wizards and dragons. Couldn’t think of any way to include them. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/15 "2016-11-14T15:47:28Z")
One thing the current system does which a direct popular vote wouldn’t is that everyone is represented regardless of if they voted or not. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/16 "2016-11-14T15:56:14Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > comparing apples to oranges? Not really. If the elections were changed to go by popular voting the campaigns would be run completely differently and the vote counts would be very different. Looking at the current popular vote totals in a system not set up to care about popular vote isn’t very enlightening. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/17 "2016-11-14T15:57:28Z")
> [@naita](#): > > It was still a stupid statement in the context of previous racist voting laws in the US. Stop being rigid or butt-hurt or angry in ur head, otherwise u can come across as uncool or stupid sometimes. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/18 "2016-11-14T16:04:19Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > Not really. If the elections were changed to go by popular voting the campaigns would be run completely differently and the vote counts would be very different. Looking at the current popular vote totals in a system not set up to care about popular vote isn’t very enlightening. Good point. For this time, Trump should be the president elect of course. I never meant otherwise. But for future, president should come out of popular vote in my opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/19 "2016-11-14T16:18:25Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > It means some votes had more weight than others. Something which should be corrected for future? So because your guy didn’t win the entire system needs to be changed? No. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2016, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946/20 "2016-11-14T16:27:12Z")
> [@Drunky\_Smurf](#): > > So because your guy didn’t win the entire system needs to be changed? No. In the end ( when elections were close), I wasn’t supporting anyone but for the most part of the race I was supporting Trump. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-won-the-popular-vote-yet-lost-obvious-flaw-in-the-system/771946.md?page=2)