Bill granting Oregon’s electoral votes to national popular vote winner heads to governor’s desk

The Oregon House voted overwhelmingly to pass legislation that would award the state’s Electoral College votes to whichever candidate wins the national popular vote in a presidential election.

The state chamber voted to advance the measure in a 37-22 vote on Tuesday, CNN reported. The bill, which sailed through the state Senate earlier this year, now heads to Democratic Gov. Kate Brown for consideration. 

{mosads}“Prior to the time set by law for the meeting and voting by the presidential electors, the chief election official of each member state shall determine the number of votes for each presidential slate in each State of the United States and in the District of Columbia in which votes have been cast in a statewide popular election and shall add such votes together to produce a ‘national popular vote total’ for each presidential slate,” the bill text states.

“The chief election official of each member state shall designate the presidential slate with the largest national popular vote total as the ‘national popular vote winner,’” the bill continues. “The presidential elector certifying official of each member state shall certify the appointment in that official’s own state of the elector slate nominated in that state in association with the national popular vote winner.” 

The bill also notes that if the legislation is passed, it won’t take effect until a number of states possessing a majority of the Electoral College’s 538 votes join the agreement, also known as the National Popular Vote interstate compact. 

“This agreement shall take effect when states cumulatively possessing a majority of the electoral votes have enacted this agreement in substantially the same form and the enactments by such states have taken effect in each state,” the bill states. 

So far, only 14 states and Washington D.C. have joined the pact.

Since the Electoral College’s creation in 1781, there have only been five instances in which a presidential candidate was elected without winning the popular vote — the most recent being the 2016 presidential election between President Trump and Hillary Clinton.