8 ms·

Faithless electors will not invalidate the results, especially in this case where Biden has much more than 270 electoral votes.

Izkata 6y ago
Still a bit early to say "much more": Arizona can still flip (it's been inching ever closer and is at 0.6% difference at 90% counted) and Georgia has already announced a recount because it's so close. If those do both actually end up in Trumps favor, that puts him only 11 electoral votes short. If the voting machine errors in Michigan do turn out to be a thing (and the error is large enough), or he wins legal battles there or in Pennsylvania, that's enough to flip the whole election. It's a very long shot, but this isn't actually over yet until everything is counted and verified.
- GavinMcG 6y ago
  The legal battles in Pennsylvania aren't even substantial enough to trigger a mandatory recount - the number of ballots the GOP is fighting over is too small. Also, the Michigan "errors" were errors in publishing the data, not in balloting: https://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,4670,7-127--544676--,00.html https://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,4670,7-127--544676--,00.html
- MilnerRoute 6y ago
  Michigan's results are accurate, and were never in question after one county's glitch. “Because the clerk did not update software, even though the tabulators counted all the ballots correctly, those accurate results were not combined properly when the clerk reported unofficial results,” the Department of State said. https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-technology-voting-michigan-6beeef230376e75252d6eaa91db3f88f https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-technology...
CalChris 6y ago
Probably true but faithless elector laws are at the state level. There were 7 validated faithless electors in 2016, the most ever. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_electors_in_the_2016_United_States_presidential_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_electors_in_the_2016... https://www.fairvote.org/faithless_elector_state_laws https://www.fairvote.org/faithless_elector_state_laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector#Legal_rulings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector#Legal_ruling...
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  All of them knew their symbolic votes would not change the result, and they didn't all switch in the same direction. The majority of them were pledged to the loser Democrat, and went faithless so that Republicans could be faithless without risking electing a democrat. Only 2 Republicans took the bait, and that only happened because many Republicans hated Trump, whereas Biden is extremely popular among Democrats.
- minimaxir 6y ago
  2016 had a similar electoral vote margin, so a few faithless electors could not and did not affect the outcome. If today's electoral vote split was 270-268 (as was a possibility if Trump won PA and GA), then things may have been more iffy.

Izkata 6y ago

Still a bit early to say "much more": Arizona can still flip (it's been inching ever closer and is at 0.6% difference at 90% counted) and Georgia has already announced a recount because it's so close. If those do both actually end up in Trumps favor, that puts him only 11 electoral votes short. If the voting machine errors in Michigan do turn out to be a thing (and the error is large enough), or he wins legal battles there or in Pennsylvania, that's enough to flip the whole election. It's a very long shot, but this isn't actually over yet until everything is counted and verified.

GavinMcG 6y ago
The legal battles in Pennsylvania aren't even substantial enough to trigger a mandatory recount - the number of ballots the GOP is fighting over is too small. Also, the Michigan "errors" were errors in publishing the data, not in balloting: https://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,4670,7-127--544676--,00.html https://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,4670,7-127--544676--,00.html
MilnerRoute 6y ago
Michigan's results are accurate, and were never in question after one county's glitch. “Because the clerk did not update software, even though the tabulators counted all the ballots correctly, those accurate results were not combined properly when the clerk reported unofficial results,” the Department of State said. https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-technology-voting-michigan-6beeef230376e75252d6eaa91db3f88f https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-technology...

CalChris 6y ago

Probably true but faithless elector laws are at the state level. There were 7 validated faithless electors in 2016, the most ever. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_electors_in_the_2016_United_States_presidential_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_electors_in_the_2016... https://www.fairvote.org/faithless_elector_state_laws https://www.fairvote.org/faithless_elector_state_laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector#Legal_rulings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector#Legal_ruling...

srtjstjsj 6y ago
All of them knew their symbolic votes would not change the result, and they didn't all switch in the same direction. The majority of them were pledged to the loser Democrat, and went faithless so that Republicans could be faithless without risking electing a democrat. Only 2 Republicans took the bait, and that only happened because many Republicans hated Trump, whereas Biden is extremely popular among Democrats.
minimaxir 6y ago
2016 had a similar electoral vote margin, so a few faithless electors could not and did not affect the outcome. If today's electoral vote split was 270-268 (as was a possibility if Trump won PA and GA), then things may have been more iffy.