Those who fail to understand a system are always the first to want to change it without understanding the consequences.

DC works for themselves, not the people they claim to represent.

"but but the Electoral College restrains the Democracy of the election" The founding fathers: Yes, that's based.

It's actually a meaningless discussion. Abolishing the electoral college would require a constitutional amendment. That would require a 3/4 majority of the legislatures of the states to ratify. Since the few largest states would be the only ones to benefit, this would never happen.

Just wish the states had something similar so big cities wouldn't have total power to the whole state!

Hillary Clinton ignored my home state of Wisconsin. The election was called with Wisconsin's elector count. She concentrated on the states with high populations, forgetting the rest of us!

It’s just annoying how large cities often control the vote for the whole state. I’m from Alaska and most people throughout Alaska vote red, while the city folk in anchorage vote blue, I understand that they have more people, but it’s like they don’t realize how their votes affect those who live differently from them. This happens to farmers a lot, who don’t have a lot of voting power and live in rural areas. People in cities often just don’t think about people who don’t live in cities, the electric vehicle policies is a great example. I know it was good intentions, but they only think about having an electric car in a city and don’t realize how difficult and impractical that Is for most of rural America.

If the big cities control everything then it will all fall apart. The rural areas have their own culture, we don’t need the cities dictating our way of life when it’s completely different from theirs. This just creates more divide within our country

The EC only shows the genius behind the founding fathers they knew what they were doing

People from smaller states are still ignored like wyomming, idaho, the dakotas, and west cirginia.

John C. Calhoun said that one difference between a democracy and a republic is that, in a republic, the majority rules, but only to the extent that the rights of the minority are protected. For example, the rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights are so fundamental that no one, even a majority of 99%, has the right to take them away.

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner.

Thanks, Nick. I'm Canadian and I do not fully understand how American elections work. This helps.

I would to see a video on the 17th Amendment; direct election of Senators, instead of being elected by the State's legislatures. I think the States gave up oversight of the Federal government, since the Senators don't have the state's interest anymore.

Without the EC, a politician can offer a region an incentive that doesn't benifit the rest of the nation to garner a large percentage of the vote in that area. Lets say they offer citizens in Gulf States a percentage of oil revenues from the Gulf of Mexico. This results in winning 70% of the votes from those states tipping the popular vote of the nation in their favor. With the EC, 51% of the vote in these states gives them the same result as the 70% forcing a candidate to pay attention to the entire nation.

The exact thing that is missing from the EU to be fair. Anything to lower the weight of Germany (and France) so it can not be accused of being the Fourth Reich.

Decentralization of power is essential to the survival of the American Republic, but as we can see, those who want bigger and more government don’t see it that way. Think about this the next time you head to the polls.

I am in favor of abolishing the electoral college and have issues with the arguments presented here. Argument 1: The United States is not a unitary state, but rather a federal state comprised of 50 coequal states each with their own issues. The electoral college ensures that each state has a voice in electing the president. Correct, the United States is a federal state. But states do not elect the president, electors from each of the states do. The people from those states elect said electors. The way you describe it makes it sound like the state governments each cast a vote for president, which is not at all what the electoral college is or was. When the founders set this up, the thinking was that you couldn't trust the common people to elect the highest office in the country, so you had people elect electors, who were supposed to be these "high minded intellectuals" who supposedly had educated, well thought out opinions about who should be the leader of the country. However, the modern electoral college is beholden to the people. Most states have laws on the books preventing electors from voting for anyone who didn't win that state's popular vote. In many ways, the electoral college is merely a shadow of what it was meant to be. Instead of coming up with a cabal of intellectuals to elect the president, we elect the president based on the popular votes of individual states, in a winner take all system with a pointless middleman. The winner take all system doesn't help things either. The hardest pill to swallow for the electoral college is this: if you are a Republican in California, your vote does not matter. If you are a Democrat in Mississippi, your vote does not matter. To the electoral college, everyone is either red or blue, fueling political polarization. I see no point in keeping the electoral college around just so that we can pretend it's the states who elect the president. Argument II: The United States was never meant to be a purely majoritarian system. This is a complete non argument, just because the US wasn't set up that way doesn't mean that setup was "good" or "correct". By that logic, the way the electoral college was supposed to function is the right way to do it, and the people shouldn't be voting for president at all. If you support the electoral college, you are ok with minority rule. You are ok with someone in Wyoming's vote for president counting more than someone in California's vote for president. This video completely sidesteps that issue by making an argument from authority. They then claim that the electoral college disperses power. The only thing this system does is consolidate power towards the minority. Would a national popular vote seek to consolidate power in the big states? Not necessarily. The electoral college is ultimately dependent on a few swing states, because it's a winner take all system. In the electroral college, it doesn't matter if Ohio is 51% Republican or 67%, they still get all those votes. If it was instead reformed to a proportional system, then those votes would matter. It would force candidates to campaign across all states, hearing the interests of Democrats in Arkansas and Republicans in California, to get those votes because in a proportional system because those votes matter. The electoral college, in its current state, allows for minority rule while paradoxically making sure that the voices of the minority in each state are neglected. I am in favor of either abolishing the electoral college completely and doing a national popular vote (with either ranked choice voting or runoff elections) or reforming to a proportional electoral vote system.

As an outsider, I think the US's biggest problem is the lack of political parties. With many parties, they are forced to work together and find a compromise. Instead the US are extremely divided and radicalized which makes progres stall. A part of the solution to this is the removal of the “winner takes it all” principle.

I live i Eastern oregon. We are at the mercy of portland/ salem area. They have the numbers andcwe get stuck with stupid laws and regs that make no sense whrre i live.

HMM... its almost as if we shouldn't have a massive overarching empire controlling vast and diverse cultures that all have their own needs.

One of the things most desired by our founders was to have a government of predictability, of continuity. For better or worse, a predictable government is something we can all work with. A government elected by simple majority would almost certainly be a fickle one, an unpredictable one, or as James Madison called it, a mutable one. The internal effects of a mutable policy are still more calamitous. It poisons the blessings of liberty itself. It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood: if they be repealed or revised before they are promulg[at]ed, or undergo such incessant changes, that no man who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. -- James Madison.

The idea that the swing states determine elections and that all other states don't matter under the electoral college system is also idiotic. It ignores the fact that swing states change over the years, that parties rise and fall, and that the swing states are only relevant if the rest of the states are relatively evenly matched in voting power. It's like if you put two 50 pound weights on a scale, then you add a little sand to each side randomly, and say the sand had all the weight

Perhaps the greatest threat we can face his ignorantly of the the basic fundamental principles our county is built to upon. If there was ever a time and place for "Chesterton's Fence" (don't tear down that which is was built by others in the ignorance of why it was was built to that way in the first place) it is here and now vis a vis the ignorant screeching and the pitching a fit to tear down those crucial foundations.

It's a good system, to allow for regional representation. I think more countries ought to adopt something similar. In fact I believe Germany's system also has strong regionalism. The problem in the US is the lack of proportional representation and the current winner takes all (FPTP) system. The number of electors per state ought to be divided based on vote share, instead of entirely going to one candidate. Such a system doesn't reflect the vote and forces a two-party system. Hypothetically, instead of one party with 34% of the vote winning all 10 electoral votes of a state, and the other two parties with 33% each winning 0 seats, it should be that the state gives out 4, 3, and 3 electoral votes to these three parties.

“It’s not democratic”, yes. Exactly…

Every state would matter if places like California and New York didn't vote overwhelmingly one way and thus end up taken for granted. The last time anyone bothered campaigning for my state's electoral votes was 1992.

Thanks, Nick. "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." (Lord Acton, 1887)

One of the saddest things about where our nation has gone, when it comes to our political discourse, is our INABILITY to dialogue and engage in discussions involving nuance. With nearly every issue of the day it inevitably turns into two points of view that overwhelming dominate the attention of the majority. And in this case it is either get rid of the EC or keep it exactly the same.😢

I always ask people who are for abolishing the Electoral college by asking them this: "Given how the SCOTUS is selected, why should Texas or California have more say in a dispute between North and South Dakota than those states themselves? "Given how treaties and national borders are determined, why should Texas have more say over a treaty with Canada than Michigan or Washington, or New York more say over a treaty with Mexico than Arizona or New Mexico? Their answers typically indicate they hadn't considered that, or that they just don't care, as they often amount to, "So what" or "Because democracy". However, for the latter I remind them that every state entered the federal union *democratically*, so the rules by selecting the federal government are in line with democracy. They're just not in line with majoritarianism, because *federate republics* aren't majoritarianism. In fact, the overwhelming majority of modern democracies don't select their head of government or head of state by a simple popular vote. They're selected by either the legislature like in parliamentary republics, or an analogue to Electoral College like in Germany for head of state, while their head of government (Chancellor) is selected by the Legislature.

Two additional reasons to keep the Electoral College are that (1) some cities and states currently encourage non-citizens to vote, even in federal elections, although this is illegal, and (2) some states fail to adequately safeguard their voting systems to ensure that only legal votes are included and counted. These practices allow the offending states to inflate their voting numbers. The Electoral College puts some brakes on the extent that illegal voting influences the outcome of federal elections.

Ran into this channel today. Very informative.

It's not that the electoral college needs to be abolished, it's that the electoral ballots should be distributed according to the support rate for each candidate. That way, it doesn't all go one way or the other. Candidates would have to campaign in small and large states to win instead of focusing only on swing states.

"Two thirds of Americans favor abolishing the electoral college..." what happens when you take out the voters in NYC, Philadelphia, DC, Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, Austin, Denver, Seattle, Sacramento, San Francisco, LA and San Diego? THAT is why the Electoral College is needed.

Robert Welch's essay "Republics and Democracies" is a must read.

This is why people should be better educated about the political and constitutional history of their country.

Thanks Nick.

Yes could you go into more detail on how exactly the electoral vote works please & Thank you 😊

The Electoral College is one mechanism the States can use to keep the feds in check. The 17th Am. interferes with another mechanism. The States aren't any better. But if we have corruption checking corruption, then we have a better change keeping government in check in whole. Is there an episode regarding the 17rh Amendement?

Thank you for the great video!!

Can you do a show on convention of states COS. That should show the population of the way the constitution has avenues for keeping the federal government from having to much power. Thank you

Interesting video, and one that aligns to my point of view. What you didnt bring up, under the original intent, the winner would become president and the first runner up would become vice president. Now in our current radicalized climate, such an idea would create chaos if in force today, and practically did in the early years of the republic. But the concept is sound and fair, it allows the vanquished a seat at the table, the minority a voice, and insight into compromise and bipartisan consensus.

This was a great explanation and I appreciate you making it.

The EC disincentivizes more people on either side from voting which cements the state differences.

Could you do a video on the filibuster? I see it as the best thing ever for a legislative body but also the worst thing ever for a legislative body.

Thank you Nick for all the hard that you do. You explained it simply about how the US system works. Can you explain how Net Zero would become a total disaster please. Thank you.

Hi Nick, I'm curious as to what effect you think the following proposal might have: I would like to see the financial responsibility for all members of Congress moved to the respective States with no funds provided by federal taxpayers. For example, each State's legislature would be responsible for determining the salaries of their House representatives and their Senators. I would include pensions, health insurance, staff costs, office space rental, travel costs, postage, security details, and office supplies down to the paper clips. Any services currently available to members in the Capitol (i.e. gym, haircuts, meals, office assignments) would also be paid for by the State. Congressional office space could be rented out based upon market factors, securing income for their upkeep. My thought is that it would keep the members focused on the wants and needs of their constituent States and greatly reduce the number of life-long politicians currently infesting the Capitol. Also: Repeal the 17th!!!

Something else to consider is the fact that the majority opinion (by population) is already favored in the House of Representatives. So, if a bill is to become law, then a majority of the Representatives in the House must agree to it. Additionally, the Senate is a place for each state to have equal weight. Thus, it will also take a majority of the states to support the bill to become law. Finally, because the Electoral College does give slightly more weight to the smaller states (in terms of Population per Electoral Vote) the smaller states cannot be completely ignored. This is because every bill must pass the House & Senate, and then be signed into law by the President. This was intentionally set up to make it hard for change to happen too quickly, but it could still happen quickly if needed.

As WE are seeing NOW. Thank you for the easy way to understand the Electoral College.

Factor in number of counties won in the state when delegating electoral college votes, rather than simply the number of votes cast per candidate, and the stranglehold of the big cities would end overnight.

We really need to repeal the 16th and 17th amendments...

🤔 . . . I have a question: while upholding your justifications to not switch to the ‘popular vote’ system, what other system of voting would you be willing to replace the electoral college system? Preferably something that appeals to those who’s votes weren’t enough to get the person they want in office, but they’re still listened to…

Also, this may be an unintended but definitely beneficial side-effect, but a majority is not always right. Packing too many people together in one space seems to make them all collectively dumber or at the very last breeds a disconnect form one another and from basic necessities they now take for granted. the Holodomor happened in Ukraine during the Cold War because the Bolsheviks and their followers (a majority at the time) seized land from farmers and in doing so eliminated the people who knew how to work the land effectively and 10 million people starved, similar situation went down in South Africa fairly recently. Majority =/= right, majority =/= smart, those who consume do not get to boss around those who produce.

VERY well said!

How do other countries fare without the electoral college?

The main reason is that most people, and by most I mean close to all, don't know a single thing about politics. In fact most people who register for a party don't even know what the name of that party means.

No lies detected.💯

How do rural states benefit in an electoral system college if presidential elections are really focused on just 4 states?(Pennsylvania, Ohio, Arizona Virginia and Florida receive the most visits and campaign funding, north Carolina and other big states don't lag behind much). Electoral college doesn't benefit rural areas, it benefits swing states, typically bigger swing states at that. Furthermore, sure the U.S. wasn't set up to be 'majoritarian' as you put it, so why can't it be now? We don't need to just loosely follow what the founding fathers intended, and you're right this puts more power in bigger states... But bigger states have bigger populations and currently they are being misrepresented (not being given proportional votes to their population) by electoral college. Big states have bigger population and the whole point of democracy is to sway more population because it's a POPULAR vote.

Tell me it’s an election year without telling me it’s an election year

An idea for you: A video on how the Electoral College of today is so dramatically different from the Electoral College that Alexander Hamilton envisioned in Federalist 68. The latter effectively being a Council of "Elders", chosen from amongst the voting populace, sitting for the _sole_ purpose of choosing the President and Vice President. The closest analogy in modern times is how the NCAA has a committee to determine schools that qualify for Basketball and Football tournaments, but anyone who can vote in a State election is eligible to be an Elector on this committee and said Electors are elected by their fellow citizens, not _appointed_ by outside bodies (e.g., State Legislatures in the antebellum era, State chapters of Political Parties in modern times).

Thank you, it is cool to learn more about the opporation of the government.

If it works so well, why does no other country use this system?

Relative size of states is an issue. In Australia we dealt with this by giving states equal representation in the Senate. The lower house (= your Congress) is representative.

I have to admit this changed my mind. I hadn't heard the other side of the argument.

Isn't youtube AMAZING (WINK, WINK)!! I love how my 12 attempts to post are not there! I'm now attempting to articulate my "praise" for them to get my post to stick! Those on the left seem to... really not like our domicile on this continent and would welcome its unaliving, so deleting one of its founding principles would be heralded as brilliance of accomplishment

The Senate works on the Same Principle as the Electoral College, it protects the right of smaller states. Should Wyoming have the same number of Senators as California, yes. The only mistake was the 17th amendment.

I have had this argument in so many "overthrow the EC" threads and conversations, it's nice to see a video actually in agreement.

I wish states would do a Nebraska and Maine instead of the winner takes the state system the other 48 have

I disagree, I learn conservatives on some issues but no one is elected president this way, and the electoral college becomes too explosive, I used to think it was good, but Republicans in California are completely ignored and Democrats in Wyoming are ignored too. Also now the Electoral College favors republicans but it can favor Democrats, what if Texas became a blue state? Then there is no path of ever winning the president, the electoral also exists because of slavery. Slaves were to be counted as 3/5 of the electoral college. If the electoral college did not exist probably the US was not facing democratic back sliding.

Would those who want to go popular vote only be okay with only a plurality (most votes) being needed to win? I ask because we had three elections in a row (92, 96, 00) as well as several others where no candidate got a majority (>50%) of the popular vote (remember that's what the Electoral College requires, a majority, not just a plurality). Would they really be okay with those elections being decided in the House/Senate? Or if we had to do a second run-off vote between the top two candidates? They might want to be careful what they're wishing for.

I agree the Electoral College is necessary. However, in the event a 3rd party candidate garners enough electoral votes to give no one a majority, (270) votes to win, then the House of Representatives decides the President. But their is a catch, each STATE casts only one vote in the House, not each congressmen. In a country where over 50% of the population resides in just 10 states, that means those 10 states only have 20% of the voting power, over the vastly smaller population of the remaining 40 states that has less than 50% of the total population, now having 80% of the voting power.

You nailed it! I wish more people understood the nature of the country they live in. Don't the schools teach this stuff anymore?

So so so wrong. It wasn’t about protecting small states. It was about giving slave states weight. That’s why Virginia dominated for so long. We settled the “republic of republics” issue in 1865 and shifted to a more federal system. One point you didn’t make but I’ll give to you is the electoral college generally helps to isolate problems and discrepancies, for better or worse. In 2000, we only had to sort out FL (whether we did or not is debatable tho). We didn’t need to examine votes throughout the country. Here’s a better solution for everyone that few talk about. Shrink congressional districts. Not down to the 30,000 or so people that we had originally but perhaps something like 100,000 people. With 750,000 per district, a state with 600,000 people has as much representation and electoral votes as one with twice as many people. Shrinking districts will make electoral votes more proportionate to population. It’ll also make Reps more accessible to their constituents, make Congress more diverse, make running for office less expensive and make buying influence nearly impossible. What’s more, it wouldn’t require a Constitutional Amendment. It would only require an Act of Congress, like the one over 100 years ago that fixed the number of reps.

Our society has a habit of throwing away what worked without thinking through the consequences of it.

I want to know, what are those ways to remove power from the hands of the government that it shouldn’t have? It’s why I’m one of the many Texans (and southerners in general) who increasingly like the idea of succession.

Oh, now I can see how the current system doesn't breed radicalism. Bullshit! Every vote should have the same weight.

The EC exists because the Founding Fathers did _not_ want POTUS elected by popular vote. That's all. However, they also didn't want political parties and they didn't want the VP to be an afterthought, rather than the runner-up of the EC vote. The political and legal landscape is vastly different than it was when the Constitution was ratified. It's time elections reflected those changes.

To be fair, the closest the US ever came to abolishing the electoral college was in the 1960’s and they wanted to replace it with a two-round system. While I personally oppose abolishing the electoral college, it was an interesting idea.

I think we should do away with winner take all rules

It was also to keep the voices of the less educated majority from having too much power. Now, less educated doesn't mean school educated, it's talking about the majority of Americans who don't understand how their government works or how the other half lives.

I might be in favor of some kind of reform to the Electoral College, but not abolishing it or changing the number of electors per state.

The Electoral College benefits underpopulated, largely rural states that just so happen to lean Republican. It is inherently unfair, where a candidate preferred by the majority of Americans loses. In what other case does the person who finished second, win? As I read the comments, I notice many people are complaining that there minority views should take precedence over the majority's. Small states are already overrepresented in the Senate. My state of Michigan has 10,000,000 residents. Wyoming has less than 800,000. Both states get two Senators. That is hardly democratic.

It's not just representation in campaigns but political concern that would falter without the dispersed nature of the EC vote. It could be improved though; for instance instead of the winner-takes-all method of choosing electors, all the states could use a method similar to Nebraska or Maine, where electors are chosen by district or even a method in which the two electors representing the state's Senate seats are chosen based on the popular vote in the state and the others are chosen in proportion to the vote, so voters in a reliably red or blue state won't feel like their votes don't matter.

The Electoral College forces candidates to focus on states where the voters are evenly split. Abolishing it would push candidates to be more extremist to fire up the voters at the ends of the political spectrum.

The Electoral College was actually a last minute compromise because the founders were tired and just wanted to go home as they couldn’t agree on the best method to elect a chief executive. As some of the framers such as James Madison wanted the Congress to elect the President, others wanted a popular vote, and also some wanted state legislatures to elect the president as well. They agreed on the Electoral b/c they believed it work best during their time. But this is the 21st century and the country has changed both culturally and politically. I believe we should abolish the Electoral College, and move to a parliamentary system in which the House of Representatives elects the President and Vice President in which representatives are elected through any system of proportional representation (though I prefer a party list system). Where the number of votes a party gets in one state determines how many seats they get in the lower house of Congress. This will allow third parties to have greater influence helping to form the government as they can make demands to one of the major parties that we will help you in forming the government; but you have to give us something in return such as the first Supreme Court seat that opens up or gives us some cabinet appointments. A parliamentary system will still preserve the federal system that our country is built on.

One of the errors in stating the GOP needs the Electoral College because they are winning despite losing the popular vote, is assuming that in the absence of the EC they would have campaigned the exact same way. That’s like saying a football team got more yards than the other team and would have won if they were going off of yards to win. But if that were the case the teams would shift their strategy to prioritize yards over points on the board. The EC forces candidates to campaign outside of the populated areas. It’s not perfect because of the outsized influence swing states wield, but swing states can change as they get more diverse. Metro areas rarely change and only get more and more dense.

The problem is not the electoral college. The problem is the "winner takes all" rule which is in place in the vast majority of states. Your argument of "without the electoral college, small states would be ignored" is not relevant because right now, with the electoral college, not only are small states ignored, but so are big states. Nobody cares how I vote if I'm registered in small "states" (from an electoral college standpoint) like DC, North Dakota or Alaska, who are always turning the same color. And nobody cares how I vote if I'm registered in big state like CA, TX or NY. Only the swing states matter. So, because of the "winner takes all" rule of the electoral college, we don't have a system where "49% of Americans decide for the rest", but a system where 12% of Americans decide.

Frankly, individual states should have an electoral college for state offices. Would solve alot of problems in NY and California.

because democracy is doing such a swell job of things. we're all just swimming in prosperity these days.

It could be replaced by single transferrable voting or mixed proportional representation.

Isn't the senate the the means of ensuring small states are represented?

Not only is the Electoral College necessary on a federal level, it has now become necessary at the state level as well.

Democracy has almost no place in a republic. Only on the smallest scale does voting work well. And by smallest, I mean least important to the individual. Law is never up for a vote. Statutes and codes are voted upon, because those are corporate rules, which do not apply to living human beings, unless they identify as corporate property, like US citizens do. that's why I don't live in the US citizen. I'm an American national, nonresident, alien to the United States corporation. People need to learn this stuff.

Tackle the inflow of money from corporations and PACs which the SCOTUS ruled in favor, saying the entities had voice in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce; which effectively reduced citizens “the People’s” ability to be heard by their representatives as congressmen or more focused on raising money to stay in office therefore small individual contributions get very little attention. With the unintended consequences of silencing People.

This does absolutely nothing for me. One person, one vote. Count the freakin votes.

I have a nagging suspicion that if electoral college favored democrats instead of republicans we would be getting a very different video.🤔

You’re aware the electoral college doesn’t even do the job you already claim it should. Most every presidential visit is to high-population swing states, destroying the electoral college merely reduces innacuracies in what the system allows. It doesn’t even do the job you want it to, that was originally out of fear of early states encroaching upon one another, which is why the system originally existed, however, the federal government’s own power already allows us to counteract these issues with what we gained after the civil war. It’s lost it’s purpose, valuing one vote over the other based off of land, which destroys the entire “one person, one vote” concept, a desperately needed aspect of both republics and democracies.

States should allocate votes proportionally instead of winner takes all, as most currently do. This way, rather than having about 10 swing states who can decide an election, and thus candidates focus almost all their time and resources, all states are at least partially up for grabs. If Republicans are 40% of California voters, then rather than being ignored by Republican Presidential candidates because its not worth trying to win in California, they could get 22/55 Electoral College votes. And in reverse, if Democrats are 45% of Texas, they could still get 17/38 EC votes. This way, a handful of close state results won't skew the whole election, but smaller states still get greater representation than their population alone would give.

The Electoral college is uniquely American, part of our history & Constitution so it MUST stay!!

There's a good reason the two points in the video are usually ignored. It's because they're utter horseshit. 1. We don't live in the 1800's anymore. America is a much different country than it was hundreds of years ago. America has a much stronger national identity and people no longer associate themselves with their states anymore. People in smaller states aren't gonna be upset about larger states having more of a sway because they know their vote is worth the exact same as a vote from someone in a big state. Unlike now where someone in Wyoming has far more say in an election than someone in California purely because of where they live. In fact they'll be happier as they won't be forced to have their voice be affected by what the people around them think. States are not monoliths as they are presented to be in this video. Every state has a different history and needs, but so does every region within the state, and every person within those regions. This whole America was always meant to be a federal republic shtick is just an excuse to abide by an archaic system just because the founding fathers thought it was best back in the 1700's. 2. This power consolidation point has absolutely nothing to do with the electoral college. It's fine if you think the federal government should have less power, but that has nothing to do with how federal officials are elected. 3. The video then proceeds to talk about a high stakes power struggle and national division, which again has absolutely nothing to do with the electoral college.