So it is my pleasure now to introduce bob cusack, the editorinchief of the hill who will moderate a panel on how will candidates messages and platforms change with the popular vote. Bob. Thanks, jim. I want to introduce our panel. Norm orenstein, michael steele. Bianca carmen. I was looking back at the states that were visited most by donald trump and Hillary Clinton in the last election. Not surprisingly North Carolina, florida, pennsylvania, of course democrats wish Hillary Clinton had visited wisconsin a bit more. But the first question would be if we did change the system and, norm, ill start with you. What would be the impact of campaigns and their strategy . So, as you mentioned, bob, they visited the large states. And i was kind of amused when senator cramer of north dakota defending the Electoral College said awfully close in terms of popular votes. Then every vote would count, and candidates would have an incentive to try and maximize the turnout even in places like north dakota. You know, one of the things when we dissected Hillary Clintons loss, one of the things that kept coming up was not whether she visited pennsylvania or michigan but that the analytics on the team said go to the places where your votes are. And instead of going to places where she lost 80 20 and might have moved it, they ignored those areas. If youre looking at a reality where the votes count as they do within states, the smart thing to do is go everywhere and make sure you can get votes even in places and counties and states that you would lose. So i think what we would see is television adds in places like north dakota which of course are very cheap. Youd see a ground campaign. Because if youre going to lose by, as Richard Nixon did in 1960, one vote per precinct, and you know you could shift two, youre going to go everywhere. The paradox here is that the major defense of the Electoral College, that it gives clout to small states, is exactly wrong. Small states would have much more cloud in the world we live in if we had a National Popular vote. Michael, youve been in the war rooms of campaigns. In president ial elections, i mean other than the primaries, do states like north dakota, are they even discussed . No. They arent. The fact is no, theyre not. Only to the extent, though, you do mention how much money you can get out of north dakota, because it becomes a donor state like my home state of maryland. If youre a republican, you only come to maryland if you want to have a fund raiser. Youre not going to go to the campaign for the votes the way normally. And i think thats an important thing to understand. The way the system is designed through the Electoral College, what we have wound up doing, folks, is were not, you know, Holding Elections in the United States of america. Were Holding Elections in the battleground states of america. So youre only talking in any given president ial cycle somewhere between eight and 12 states, that the president ial campaigns give a damn about. Because the rest of it is just its just sidelined. Its flyover or donor. Youre not going to take the time, spend the money, because youre going to konsz trait on those winnertakeall states that you need as dictated to by the current political cycle or other things that you look at and say, well, okay, michigan in the last cycle would have been a battleground state, had Hillary Clinton played effectively. But she sort of took it for granted. And donald trump didnt. And that actually kind of speaks to the nature of this particular effort. It does open up the prospects. It forces candidates to have to Pay Attention to every state, because every state becomes important. So if im running for president as a republican, all of a sudden california is equally important to me as my home state of maryland or florida or ohio. Why . Because im about churning my vote, getting my vote. Yeah, i may lose the vote in california, but that vote is now added to a bigger number that will help me in a national campaign. So we talk a lot about National Races here in the United States. And, you know, this is a national campaign, national polling. The end of the day, folks, theyre only polling and really care about a handful of states, and if youre not in one of those states youre not going to see the benefit of it. As my good friend who was chairman of the Michigan Party at the time of the 2008 cycle, michigan was a big player until the Mccain Campaign decided to pull out because they made this conclusion, this is no longer relevant. Well, it was relevant to all the races that were taking place in michigan at that time. And the impact of that premature removal from the race resulted in losses not just of the state by the president ial candidate but down ballot as well. You can see there are connections here beyond just the president ial and why making as norm put out the platform available to every voter to participate, everyone gets to play, and everyone up and down the system benefits from it. Brianna, how would this if we went to a National Popular vote, how would it affect voter turnout . Ive talked to a republican in maryland who literally said recently my vote doesnt count in president ial, but a lot of people feel that way. Would it help it significantly . I absolutely believe that it would. So we see that one of the key reasons why people dont turn out to vote is because they feel like their vote doesnt matter. Its this apathy that continues to grow so that way as an individual, campaigns arent reaching out to you and its a vicious cycle. I think virginia is a good example of how we could correct this. In 2000 it was solidly republican. No one went out to it. Flash foord to 2016, its a contested state. You saw 23 president ial events there. That means that virginias individuals in virginia ended up turning up more in states that were traditionally considered safe. So you had about 66 turnout in virginia up to 2000 wherein states like texas, you saw voter turn out, when people feel like it matters people would turn out. Just to follow up on that, the critics say the candidates would just go to the big cities. Right. So i think it is definitely an increase from what we see now because candidates, they completely ignore 40 or so states right now. Theyre just solely focusing on ten battleground states like michigan, pennsylvania, wisconsin, and if we switch to the National Popular vote you would have to reach out to more individuals in more diverse areas so you would be reaching more of the mass because the Current System for goes about 80 of the electorate. You have a back to thats coming out in the spring on this. What did you learn, what did you hear from people on this topic . Its interesting. The book looks at the history of the Electorial Colleges and efforts to change it over the years. But i end with a chapter on talking to Campaign Managers and field directors from the last 20 or so years from both republicans and democratic campaigns. And what was fascinating to me was almost to a person, they all wanted a National Popular vote. Both sides . Yep, both sides. There were a couple of exceptions which you can buy the book to find out about. But the vast majority of them understood how much this warps american democracy. And i think, you know, one of the things thats interesting to me is in the Previous Panel, professor wong was talking about this risk of the one in three risk that a person who wins the popular vote nationally doesnt become president. And it struck me, i was like, why are we calling that a risk . If the Electorial College defenders are right and this is a system that is there for a good reason and it was put there by the framers of the constitution and its been with us for more than two centuries, why is that a risk . Whats the problem with having a popular vote winner not be the president . I think the answer is pretty obvious. Which is that nobody feels that that is a legitimate way to elect the president. Republicans dont feel it if it can happen to them, democrats havent when its happened to them. What you find is that campaigns understand this. They dont want to campaign in battleground states only. They do it because its politically smart. They have limited time, limited money, and theyre not stupid. They know they got to spend it in ways that maximize their chance of winning under the system we have right now. In contrast, if you had had popular vote, you would have a system in which, as all the other pan list have been saying, candidates would be free to go to the places where the votes were. That doesnt just mean big cities. I think one of the interesting pieces of research that ive seen lately comes from the National Popular vote team, these are the people who are running the compact, center state compact thats been gaining steam. It uses what happens in battleground states right now as a proxy for a National Popular vote. Were all speculating on how would a National Popular vote election run . Theres a pretty good answer to that, which is, we can see it right now happening in battleground states. Theyre elections in which every single vote counts the same and the person who gets the most votes wins. Thats what it is. How do campaigns actually run their elections in battleground states . They go everywhere, across the state. Every Campaign Manager i spoke to said this, this is campaigning 101. You go everywhere. You spend about 30 of your time if 25 of the people live in rural areas, you spent 25 of your time there. It happens again and again. I think thats a pretty good illustration of what we would see with a popular vote election. There was another i think important area to consider here. Its not just where you would go and spend the dollars. Its how you would campaign. In our tribalized polrized time, there is no incentive to reach out to people on the other side. But if you are trying to get every vote and were talking about moving into the rural areas, democrats would have an incentive to be more sensitive to the issues and concerns of rural voters. Theyre going to change the rhetoric and possibly change some policies. Michael talked about california. You know, we now have a sort of National Republican campaign led by the president and a war against california trying to undermine everything that california is doing. If youre out to get a sizable number of votes in california, youre not going to do that. So it isnt just about whether youre going to Pay Attention to the states by campaigning and putting in money. Youre going to change the way you talk and youre going to change your policies at a time when we desperately need those changes. Michael, how would youre on tv all the time. How would the media, how would it change how the media covers campaign . Thats actually a very good question, because the media has various i guess stress tests that they go through to figure out where they want to send their people and which states they want to concentrate their time very much the way campaigns do. Youre looking at the value added. Am i going to spend time in north dakota when the candidates are just going there to do a flyover or a donor event . The answer is probably going to be no, theyre not. But if that candidate is going to go there and campaign and spend time, you will see the media will have to adapt their strategies as well, because their goal ostensibly is to follow the candidates and report the news that they are making or not making. And so i think that you will see some change in how the on ground reporters do their job and where they go and the decisions that their editors are going to be making in terms of their assignments and where they send them. This idea that you now open up all 50 states as a voter playground is a fascinating and important one, i think, if we really believe that the system should allow for everyone to vote and every vote to matter and every vote to count. You either believe that or you dont. This notion that candidates under a National Popular vote would somehow, you know, concentrate their time in urban interests is just silly, because clearly the person who says that or thinks that has never run a campaign or been a candidate. Youre not going to get votes. If 50 of your population that youre going after is in one place and you leave the other 50 to your competitors, what do you think is going to happen to you . Youre not going to win, because that 50 of that vote that youre concentrated on is still split up between the other candidates that are running. You dont have the market. No candidate corners the market. That is why when you open this up and say to the voters, youre now in play, those candidates will take note of that. And the media has to follow that. Theyre going to follow the script. Theyre going to follow where the news lines are going to be taking them and theyre going to follow where the candidates begin to make noise. If you get a republican candidate sticking with the california example who suddenly sees a bump in the numbers, yes, theyre behind but competitive in california, you dont think the press is going to cover that . Theyre going to cover that story. And what happens . That then feeds the narrative downstream. Its very much the way the system is set up now. What do we anchor or president ial elections on . Two friging states. Iowa and new hampshire. You have people writing stories if you dont win there your campaign is over. Tell that to the candidates running in South Carolina and who are running in nevada, who are running right now in places like california and florida. So the idea is to open the process up a lot more, to engage the voters for sure, but also to bring those other components of the process, the media and the political system in line with what the voters are doing. Brianna, you traveled the country and talked to voters and young voters in particular. What are you hearing on this issue and which communities do you think are underrepresented the most . So traditionally it is communities of color and other marginalized groups that have been under represented in our electorial process. And these students feel p. They live in california and feel their vote doesnt matter. They live in texas which has traditionally been considered a safe state. Having that in mind you feel like this sorry, everyone you definitely feel as if these candidates dont preel represent your values. I think much to what my copanelists were saying as far as candidates really focusing on battleground states they focus on fringe voters in these battleground states that allow them to capture a sliver of that margin so they can win electoral votes in that state. If you care about the millions of People Living in california and texas as you would in a popular vote you would have to change the narrative of your candidacy. You wouldnt be able to win on a racist xenophobic agenda. Jessie, we were talking about history backstage about in 2000, which i remember at the time was amazing that there was no violence after that contested election. But there was everyone thought maybe it would flip, that gore would not would become president but then bush would win the popular vote and we saw the flip of that. And then in 2004 it was very important for the bush team to win the popular vote, which they did. So the question is, is do you think donald trump is going to focus on the National Popular vote in 2020 . Well, depends what day you ask him. I mean, theres you know trump has said both that he has won the popular vote, that he would have won if millions of illegal voters hadnt cast their ballots, and that he he would win the popular vote if he campaigned differently. I dont know quite what his position is today. I do think, going back to what jim quoted at the beginning of this event, he tweeted the Electoral College is a disasters for democracy on Election Night 2012. You know when he tweeted that it was around 7 00 p. M. And the reason he tweeted it was because it looked briefly as the early returns were coming in like barack obama was going to win the electorial and mitt romney could win the popular. All this takes is the hint for this, for people to get very upset at the system. I think what youre referring to with the 2000 and 2004 elections is instructive. Theres reporting from before the 2000 election, that that election, as bob just said, was looking like it might go the other way. There was a lot of reporting that there might be a split in 2000 before the vote but it was going to go the other way. People thought that george w. Bush would win the popular and lose the Electoral College. There was reporting that some people in his campaign were working on a strategy to essentially do what the hamilton electors did in 2016, a public push, pr blitz, to get the electrictors to get with the popular vote winner and say Electoral College is an an ak roenism and we need a president elected by the people. They didnt have to take that route given how it turned out. But four years later because they had lost the popular vote the Bush Campaign team became perhaps the only one in American History that abtively sought to win the popular vote. No other campaign probably has or should. It would be politically crazy to do that. But the bush team understood the issue of legitimacy and how important it was for him to be seen as legitimate in the eyes of the country after what had happened in 2000. He ended up winning by 3 million votes which is roughly