On Monday, the Electoral College’s 538 members will meet at 50 state capitols to cast the ballots that will elect the U.S. president.
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And while this is usually a mellow affair, this year is gearing up to be more dramatic. At least 62 members of the Electoral College have demanded intelligence briefings before the vote on Monday. And a growing movement to use the Electoral College as the final stand to block a Trump presidency.
The effort to block the Donald Trump the presidency by trying to convince Democratic and Republican electors to back someone in the vote is surely a long shot. But the growing controversy surounding Russia’s hacking of the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign chair John Podesta have reenvigorated the effort to use the Electoral College to block Trump.
The effort is being driven by a group calling itself Hamilton Electors, which is led by two Democratic electors from western states. The name of course is a nod to Alexander Hamilton’s explanation of the need for the Electoral College, an entity the first U.S. Treasury secretary said existed to make sure that “the office of the president will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications.”
Only 37 Republican Electoral College members needed to block Trump
Bret Chiafalo one of the Electoral College members who is organizing the Hamilton Electors says, “If only 37 Republican electors change their vote, Donald Trump will not have the 270 electoral votes he needs to be president,” he says. “Thirty-seven patriots can save this country.”
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Chiafalo wants the Electoral College to return to what he says is its original concept: a deliberative body that uses the popular vote as a guide.
And Lawrence Lessig, a Harvard University law professor working with the stop-Trump effort, told reporters on a conference call Thursday afternoon that there are likely “at least” 20 Republican electors who are “seriously considering” defections.
However, the Associated Press reported Thursday after interviewing more than 330 electors that “Republican electors appear to be in no mood for an insurrection in the presidential campaign’s last voting ritual.”
And some Democrats have also called for the Electoral College voting to be pushed back until more is known, something that would take an act of Congress. Particularly once President Barack Obama directed U.S. intelligence agencies to deliver a report on Russian hacking of Democratic Party e-mails.
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