Electoral College Vote

The electors of the Electoral College have assembled in their state capitols and voted.  For the first time since 1912, there were multiple faithless electors.  Amazingly, Hillary Clinton lost more votes than Trump!

In Minnesota, a Clinton elector refused to submit a ballot but was replaced by an alternate who voted for Hillary.

 

In Colorado, a Clinton elector voted for someone other than Clinton and was replaced.  The replacement voted Clinton.

In Maine, a Clinton elector voted for Bernie!  The vote was invalidated and switched to Clinton.

In Washington, 4 electors went rogue.  3 of them voted for Colin Powell and 1 for Faith Spotted Eagle.  These votes were not changed, placing Colin Powell as the third place contender in a race where he was not on the ballot.

In Texas, two Trump electors jumped ship.  One voted for Ohio Governor John Kasich and the other for former Texas Congressman Ron Paul.  Another elector resigned in order not to vote for Trump but was replaced by an alternate who did vote Trump.  There was even an elector who voted Trump but chose Carly Fiorina for VP instead of Pence.

The final tally is:
Donald Trump: 304
Hillary Clinton: 228
Colin Powell: 3
Faith Spotted Eagle: 1
Ron Paul: 1
John Kasich: 1

Who is Faith Spotted Eagle?  I had not heard of her before today.  It turns out that she is a member of the Sioux Nation and has been part of the effort to block the Keystone XL pipeline and the Dakota Access Pipeline.

 

It is peculiar that Hillary, who by her silence tacitly supported the intense lobbying of electors to change their votes, lost more electoral votes in the end.  It makes no difference to the state of the race but it does make for an interesting footnote in history.  Though I mention 1912, that was a case of a VP candidate dying prior to the electoral college.  For electors to abandon the nominee, we have to go back to 1808 when 6 electors chose someone other than George Clinton over James Madison.  It is a bad precedent to have so many faithless electors and will encourage more such lobbying in the future.

 

With the electoral college finally behind us, let us move on to the next effort to derail the Trump Presidency.  I've already heard calls for impeachment.  Which party was demanding that the other party accept the results of the election?  Yeah, there are those double-standards again.

UPDATE: An elector in Hawaii voted for Bernie Sanders, so that he joins the pool.  The electors who were reversed in Maine, Colorado, and Minnesota had all tried to vote for Bernie.  Had they not been invalidated, Bernie would now have 4 electoral votes.