Graduating from the Electoral College

The other day, I mentioned the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact -- and referenced it a while back, as well -- and it occurred to me that some people may not know exactly what it is.  Or what it is at all.

The unwieldly-named National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is an initiative to get around the huge challenge of having to pass a Constitutional Amendment that would eliminate the Electoral College.  The Compact says that a state will give all its Electoral votes not to the candidate who wins its state (as is currently the case), but instead to whichever candidate wins the national popular vote.  The thing about the compact that's offbeat, but is the whole point, is that if a state passes the Compact into law, it won't actually take effect immediately.  The law doesn't kick in until enough states have passed it so that their collected Electoral votes add up together to a minimum of  270. That, of course, would then be enough to give the election to the candidate who won the national popular vote -- even if no other state has passed the law.  After all, once a candidate receives those 270 Electoral votes from the states who have passed the Compact, that candidate is elected president,  

One of the very interesting things about the Compact is that if only 20 states have passed the law, but together they make up at least 270 Electoral votes, it doesn't matter if the other 30 states have not passed it.  You win with 270 Electoral votes, whatever other states do, which (in essence) makes the Electoral College moot.

The hurdle has been that most Southern states and very Red states and tiny states aren't all that anxious to give up the power and importance they have from the Electoral College, so they aren't likely to pass the law.  The problem for them, though, is that if enough other states do pass it and go across the 270 Electoral vote threshold, it doesn't matter, as I said, what these states do.

At the moment, 15 states plus Washington, D.C. have passed the law for 195 Electoral votes, which is about 73% of the number needed.  What's so interesting, though, is that there are still several major states that have not yet passed the law, but for whom it is extremely reasonable to think they could -- making it one short of the ​the 270 mark.  This includes such states as Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia and North Carolina.  All of which voted Democratic in 2020.  And those states alone hold 74 Electoral votes right there, which would be enough to make the compact active.  But there are other states, too, like Ohio, Arizona and Georgia who -- while they aren't traditional Democratic states -- either have voted Blue in the past, or (like Arizona and Georgia) did in 2020. 

The point being that passage is not a pipedream and a very real possibility.

What will happen?  Will there be a big push now to get those very-possible states to pass the compact?  Watch this space...