Virginia joins slow-motion plan to sidestep Electoral College

With dozens of electoral votes to go and lawsuits basically guaranteed, this is less “done deal” and more “check back in a few election cycles.”

The State of Virginia has signed onto the long-running, slow-build effort to make the Electoral College reflect the actual popular vote, nudging the National Popular Vote Compact a little closer to the magic number it needs to matter.

With Virginia, the total number of states signed on to the interstate compact is now 18, plus the District of Columbia, for a total of 222 electoral votes.

The compact doesn’t go into effect, though, until there are enough states signed up to reach the required 270 electoral votes to elect a president.

“This [effort] started 20 years ago and it’s been slow and steady … constant forward momentum across these 20 years,” said Alyssa Cass, a strategist for the National Popular Vote Project and a Democratic consultant. “Bills have been introduced in almost every state, most passed in a bipartisan way. This is on the 5-yard line of making this a reality.”

But with dozens of electoral votes to go, it’s unclear which other states would seek to enact the compact next. And even if it were to cross the 270 threshold, legal challenges would likely await.

NPR

Still 48 votes short of a number that matters, don’t get your hopes up. The largest states likely to join this compact already have, California and New York. With dozens of electoral votes to go and lawsuits basically guaranteed, this is less “done deal” and more “check back in a few election cycles.”