Further to my Switzer Daily article of 21 January 2025: Mackerras on return of President Trump https://switzer.com.au/the-experts/malcolm-mackerras/mackerras-on-trump-202/ I note that the second presidency of Donald Trump is now clearly emerging to be just as big a disaster as the first presidency of this man. That such would be the case was predicted by me in my Switzer Daily article posted on July 19 last year: June 27 and July 13 gave Trump the 2024 election https://switzer.com.au/the-experts/malcolm-mackerras/june-27-and-july-13-gave-trump-the-2024-election/ That article included this further prediction: Mark my words. The second Trump aberration will be just as bad for America as the first.
When I get into conversation with Americans or Australians of the type I describe as “Americanists”, the question typically revolves around the American political system, and it then inevitably moves into a discussion of the electoral college method by which the President is chosen. Consequently, I think it appropriate for me to put into print my view of this system which is so peculiarly American. The President of lots of countries is popularly elected and none of them would contemplate the idea that the country in question should copy America. The reverse is always the case.
I have taught American politics at university level since 1974, and my students have been surprised to learn that I defend the electoral college system. My defence doesn’t take the form of suggesting this system should be copied by any other country. Rather, it takes the form of asserting that it accords with all the other features of American democracy.
There are four federations in the world whose politics I have taught: the USA, Germany, Canada and Australia. The way I classify them is to say that America differs from the other three in that the US is a federal federation where the other three are national federations. The conduct of elections best illustrates the point. In Germany, Canada and Australia, national elections are conducted nationally. In the US, they are conducted by the states and local governments. So, in the national federations, the same rules apply throughout. That is not the case in the USA. For example, in Maine, preferential voting applies and (mark my words) other states will follow in quick time. At present, the other states have first-past-the-post voting and counting of votes.
For example, suppose one votes for Jill Stein, the perpetual candidate for the Green Party. Outside Maine, that’s a wasted vote. By contrast, the Maine elector could vote first preference Green and second preference Democratic or Republican. In other words, Maine recognises the right of the voter to transfer her/his vote from an excluded candidate to one who is still in the count. Like Australia and Ireland do. The electoral college system merely acknowledges that such is the way America does its democracy. According to the aphorism “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” we can be sure that this system is permanent. I have always taken the view that if a system is clearly permanent, one might just as well defend it.
Apropos of Maine, readers may be interested to know that the rural second congressional district is naturally Republican. In 2024 it gave 212,763 votes to Donald Trump and 176,789 to Kamala Harris. However, it re-elected its Democratic member of the House of Representatives, Jared Golden. He had first won the seat in 2018 by defeating then Republican incumbent Bruce Poliquin who had led Golden on the primary vote. However, the distribution of the preferences of a third candidate gave Golden a final vote of 142,440 to 138,931 for Poliquin who was furious – as was his party. But the people of Maine had, at a referendum in 2016, voted for this system which is known in America as “ranked choice voting”.
My main argument in favour of this system takes the form of noting the results of all presidential elections in my lifetime. In 1940, 1944, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2020 and 2024 the man who won the presidency also won the popular vote. That is 20 elections. By contrast there were only two elections to “misfire” as the Americans say it. The first was in 2000 when Republican George Bush junior polled 50,455,156 votes and Democrat Al Gore polled 50,992,335. Details of the second case are given below.
The Trump propaganda machine has had remarkable success in persuading people that he has performed much better in the voting than was actually the case. By contrast, Hillary Clinton in 2016, Joe Biden in 2020 and Kamala Harris in 2024 performed far better in votes than people seem to understand. That point is best understood when people know that Biden defeated Trump in 2020 in a landslide – yet the Trump propaganda machine has persuaded a substantial minority of Americans that the 2020 election was “stolen”.
Consider these points. First, the popular vote for Biden was 81,282,965 votes and for Trump 74,223,509, a margin of 7,059,456 votes. Second, Biden won eight of the nine swing states. He lost only North Carolina but he won the other eight swing states, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.
Here is where my argument about the electoral college comes in. After the 2016 election I became convinced (as did many other pundits) that the electoral college system was loaded against the Democratic Party. However, following 2020, my analysis told me that the bias had disappeared. But American pundits thought otherwise. They are much better mathematicians than I am, so they were able to demonstrate by using multiple regression analysis that I was wrong.
Therefore, I have decided to compare like with like by considering the two cases of narrow Trump wins against female Democratic candidates.
The first case was 2016 when the result was this:
Hillary Clinton (Democratic) 65,853,652 votes 51.11% 232 electors
Donald Trump (Republican) 62,985,134 votes 48.89% 306 electors
Margin 2,868,518 votes
Clinton carried three swing states, Nevada, New Hampshire and Virginia. Trump carried the other six.
The second case was 2024 when the result was this:
Donald Trump (Republican) 77,302,169 votes 50.75% 312 electors
Kamala Harris (Democratic) 75,015,834 votes 49.25% 226 electors
Margin 2,286,335 votes
Harris carried only two swing states, New Hampshire and Virginia. Trump won the rest. However, the interesting feature of the above statistics is that Harris won 226 electoral college votes, only six fewer than Clinton won in 2016. That is accounted for by the fact that the two women won the same states except Nevada which Clinton carried, and Harris lost. To me that indicates the supposed bias in the system against the Democratic Party (illustrated so dramatically in 2016) has clearly now disappeared.
I am a mere bush mathematician but my way of proving this proposition is to compare the two results in this way. First, look at my pendulum following the 2016 election. Whereas the national Clinton figure was 51.11 per cent her figure in the tipping point state of Wisconsin was 49.59 per cent. That is a difference of 1.52 per cent. Second, look at my pendulum following the 2024 election. The national figure for Harris is 49.25 per cent but her figure for the tipping point state of Pennsylvania is 49.14 per cent. That is a difference of only 0.11 per cent. The difference between the two statistics has fallen by 1.41 per cent. I take that as proof that the bias in the system has disappeared. I’ll be very interested to learn what the American statisticians conclude after they have done their sophisticated multiple regression analysis.
So, why has this occurred? I would say that Clinton wasted her vote by doing exceptionally well in these big states she won: California, New York, Illinois and New Jersey. She also polled reasonably well in Texas and Florida, but she lost those so her respectable vote was useless to her. Meanwhile, Harris still easily won California, New York, Illinois and New Jersey and lost Texas and Florida by big margins. She used her vote much more economically than Clinton had done.
So, the case for keeping the electoral college is strong and I confidently predict that in 2028 the candidate who wins the presidency also will win the popular vote.