Explainer: Dueling Electors and the Upcoming Joint Session of Congress Presidential candidates in the United States win elections by winning the most electoral votes. The Electoral College system apportions a certain number of votes to each state. When voters in a state vote for a party’s candidate, they’re actually casting a vote for that party’s slate of electors, or people chosen to cast electoral votes. Those electoral votes are counted by Congress. If a candidate gets 270 or more, they win the presidency. Dueling Electors In seven states on Dec. 14, a slate of Democratic electors chose Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. Republican electors, even though Biden was certified as the winner in the states, also cast votes for President Donald Trump.