US Presidential Polls 2020: Can a candidate become President without winning popular vote?

The United States is gearing up for general elections to choose the next US President between incumbent Donald Trump and his Democratic rival Joe Biden. While the US citizens vote for either Trump or Biden, they won’t be directly responsible for the election of the next US President because of the electoral system.

US citizens technically vote for “electors” and not the presidential candidates themselves, who subsequently elect the President. However, the electors, who are usually state officials or senior party leaders, are not named on the ballot. Each elector then generally cast vote for one of the two presidential candidates since a candidate from a third party rarely enters the race.

All US states and Washington DC have a fixed number of electors in the electoral college based on the size of the state. Each state gets at least three electoral votes, which represent the sum of state Senators and Representatives. District of Columbia has neither Senators nor Representatives in Congress but the 23rd Amendment gave it three electoral votes.

Popular vote v/s Electoral vote

All states except Maine and Nebraska use a winner-takes-all system, which means a candidate winning the most votes in those states takes its entire haul of electoral votes. The margin of winning popular vote could be very low in a state with a greater population, assuring more number of electoral votes. A party winning a state, which has a comparatively lesser population and subsequently lesser electoral vote, with high margin could ensure more popular votes but less electoral votes.

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There are a total of 538 electors and a candidate needs to win the majority of electors, i.e. 270, to become US President. It is important to note that a candidate can win the popular vote yet lose the electoral vote. There have been five US Presidents in the history of the United States, including Donald Trump, who lost the popular vote but won the electoral vote. 

The US Consitution does not make it mandatory for the electors to follow the popular vote but several states have passed laws requiring them to do so. The US Supreme Court has also ruled that electors must follow the popular votes that have passed such a law. In 2016, Trump lost to Hillary Clinton by 2.9 million popular votes but won the electoral college.

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