Gallup: 61 percent support abolishing the Electoral College

A strong majority of Americans support amending the U.S. Constitution to replace the Electoral College with a popular vote system, according to a new poll from Gallup.

The survey found that 61 percent support moving to a popular vote system, up 6 points from 2019 and up 12 points from 2016.

Eighty-nine percent of Democrats and 68 percent of independents support replacing the Electoral College system, while only 23 percent of Republicans favor moving to a popular vote system.

President Trump won the Electoral College in 2016 despite losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by about 3 million votes.

A candidate has won the White House while losing the popular vote only four times in U.S. history. But it’s happened twice in the past five presidential elections, with Trump and George W. Bush both winning the White House and losing the popular vote count. 

At the moment, public sentiment is near what it was after Bush defeated Democrat Al Gore in 2000, when 60 percent supported abolishing the Electoral College and 36 percent opposed.

Democratic support for abolishing the Electoral College is the highest on record, while GOP support is near its all-time low.

The nation was fairly evenly divided when Gallup polled the question after Trump’s victory in November of 2016, when 49 percent supported amending the Constitution and 47 percent opposed it.

It would require a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress and 75 percent support among the 50 states to abolish the Electoral College, an extremely unlikely prospect in this polarized political environment.

The Gallup survey of 1,019 U.S. adults was conducted Aug. 31-Sept. 13 and has a 4 percentage point margin of error.