In the 2000 U.S. presidential election, changing just 269 votes in Florida from George W. Bush to Al Gore would have changed the outcome of the entire national election. Similarly narrow results have happened in nearly one-third of the country’s presidential elections – and five winners of the nationwide popular vote did not become president, including in 2000 and 2016.
The Electoral College divides one big election into 51 smaller ones – one for each state, plus the District of Columbia. Mathematically speaking, this system is built to virtually ensure narrow victories, making it very susceptible to efforts to change either voters’ minds or the records of their choices. In fact, in certain circumstances the Electoral College system is four times more vulnerable to manipulation than a national popular vote.
Few Votes, Big Consequences
In at least 18 of the 58 U.S. presidential elections held between 1788 and 2016, the popular vote count may have seemed to indicate a clear winner, but looking more closely – at the number of votes required to change the Electoral College result – the election was actually very close.
That shows how the Electoral College makes meddling a lot easier, and more effective, when an adversary – whether a vote-machine hacker or a propaganda and disinformation campaign – changes just a small fraction of votes in a few states.
In 1844, for instance, James Polk defeated Henry Clay by 39,490 votes in an election that saw 2.6 million people cast their votes. But if just 2,554 New Yorkers – 0.09% of the national total – had voted differently, Clay would have become the 11th U.S. president.
The closest Electoral College victory ever – except for 2000’s – came in 1876, when Rutherford B. Hayes lost the popular vote to Samuel Tilden by about 250,000 votes but won the Electoral College by a single vote.
The election ..
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