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Forum to discuss electoral process, popular vote compact

Tom Stillings

ALPENA — Members of the Keep Our 50 States group in Michigan will visit Alpena on Friday to share their views on the possibility of Michigan joining the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.

The compact’s member states pledged to award their electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the national popular vote across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

That means a candidate who does not earn the most votes in Michigan, may not receive the state’s 15 electoral votes, but a more popular candidate in other states would.

Currently, House Bill 4156 and companion Senate Bill 126 were introduced in state government for consideration. Because the state legislature can set election law, if the bills pass, they would not need the signature of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to take effect.

If passed, Michigan would join the Interstate Compact and join 15 other states and Washington, D.C., in the compact, which consists of 195 out of the 270 electoral votes needed to be elected president.

On Friday at 7 p.m. in the Granholm Theater at Alpena Community College, elected officials and other supporters of keeping the current electoral vote practice will host a public forum to explain what the possible ramifications could be if Michigan changes the way its electoral votes are awarded.

Organizer Tom Stillings said it is important people know the ramifications of switching to the popular vote. He said during presidential elections, populous states, like New York and California, will be able to flex their political muscles more because of how many voters each has.

He said medium and small states will have little impact on elections if all of their electoral votes go to the winner of other states, no matter the outcome in those states.

“We would be giving up control of our electoral college and that would be a disservice to the people of Michigan and put them at a disadvantage,” Stillings said. “This is the key thing that the other side doesn’t want people to understand. We don’t have the clout of a New York, California, and it is possible Michigan could elect a candidate it liked, but be forced to give the electoral votes to a candidate that didn’t even win here.”

Stillings said the public forum is free to the public and there will be a question-and-answer session after the panel discussion. He said events like the one in Alpena are happening all over the state because it is important to educate people on how important the issue is.

“We need people to know what is going on and to call their representatives and tell them they do not support this,” Stillings said.

The National Popular Vote group is a 501(c)(4) non-profit corporation that supports doing away with the traditional electoral college voting system.

On its website, it claims the current state-by-state winner-take-all system shifts power from voters in the small and medium-sized states to voters in a handful of big states that happen to be closely divided battleground states in presidential elections. It says the popular vote method would make a voter in each of the medium and small non-battleground states as important as a voter in battleground states such as New Hampshire. In fact, the National Popular Vote plan would make every vote in every state politically relevant in every presidential election.

State Representative for Northeast Michigan Cam Cavitt, a Republican from Cheboygan, said the current vote distribution system is still the best practice and he intends to vote no on any legislation that tries to change it.

Cavitt will be part of the panel that will present on Thursday.

“I’m not for this at all and I think our electoral votes should be distributed as they are now,” he said. It is just another attempt to tear down the pillars of our democracy and I will not support any action to do so.”

Stillings said if Michigan’s leaders choose to transition to a popular vote, it would also reduce the amount of visits presidential candidates make to the state to campaign. He said most will focus on larger states with huge populations, instead of states that have more rural territories, like Northeast Michigan.

“Las Angeles County, in California, has more people in that one county than we have in our entire state,” he said. “If someone wants votes, that is where they are going to go. Not Michigan.”

Doris Feys, president of the League of Women Voters of Northeast Michigan, said the League supports the state entering the compact and moving toward the president being decided by the popular vote.

She said it is the more democratic way of electing a candidate and each vote counts. Feys added that should a candidate be elected in Michigan, that is not the leading vote getter nationwide, she would have no issue distributing Michigan’s electoral vote to them.

“That person should win despite winning in Michigan,” she said. “It is a national election.”

Because the legislature makes the election rules for the state, Stillings said Michigan could teeter between the popular vote, if it joins the compact, and the current electoral college practice. He said the law could change each time Democrats and Republicans reclaim majorities.

“All they have to do is have the votes to change it back,” he said. “It’s pretty simple. Much too simple in my opinion.”

According to the terms of the compact, if Michigan were to join, the state could withdraw from the compact at any time except during the six-month window between July 20 of an election

year and Inauguration Day.

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