were actually endorse and pursue this sort of electoral college rigging scheme. no i'm not look party that has over the last couple of years structured all of its political initiatives toward advancing itself as an electoral entity scrapping policy left and right with with one goal and that is to maintain its position in power is it's not surprising that they would be trying to gain the electoral college remember this is a party that tried to push out all sorts of voter id laws trying to get rid of same day registration they've tried to get rid of early voting gamed the system in key swing states around the country long lines so it was very very hard for people collar elderly folks to vote so no this doesn't surprise me and it doesn't surprise me that we're looking at pennsylvania the two states that they have wanted desperately are pennsylvania and michigan everybody's look at virginia florida and some other places but the reality is they want pennsylvania and michigan because those are two states where they have very can serve as legislatures that are willing to

we're actually endorse and pursue this sort of electoral college rigging scheme. no i'm not look party that has over the last couple years structured all of its political initiatives toward advancing itself as an electoral entity scrapping policy left and right with with one goal and that is to maintain its position in power is it's not surprising that they would be trying to gain the electoral college remember this is a party that tried to push out all sorts of voter id laws trying to get rid of same day registration they've tried to get rid of early voting gamed the system in key swing states around the country long lines so it was very very hard for people of color elderly folks to vote so no this doesn't surprise me and it doesn't surprise me that we're looking at pennsylvania the two states that they have wanted desperately or pennsylvania and michigan everybody's look at virginia florida and some other places but the reality is they want pennsylvania and michigan because those are two states where they have very can serve the legislature is that are willing t

candidate wins the national popular vote even if that candidate lost that particular state's electoral college the nine states that have passed national popular vote laws which include california illinois and maryland accounted for one hundred thirty two electoral votes nearly half of the two hundred seventy needed in the electoral college to win the presidency if the national popular vote movement continues to spread and enough states sign up to bring their combined electronic electoral college votes to two hundred seventy in the electoral college will be dead along with many of the republican efforts to regard elections and corrupt our democracy this needs to be our game plan from here on our out hard working middle class americans are the majority in america not democracy destroying billionaires and the republican cronies it's up to us the ninety nine percent to push back against those nations corrupt conservative minority in their billionaire backers and stop them once and for all from rigging elections in america join the movement go to national popular vote dot com and click on the take

people instead the framers put it into the constitution that the president is elected by the electoral college and the states can each decide how their electoral votes are divvied up in all the two states whoever wins the majority of votes in that state wins all of that state's electoral votes although there have been a few cases where one candidate got more votes nationally for example al gore getting a half million more votes than george w. bush generally speaking throughout the history of our country the winner of the national popular vote has also won the electoral college vote and of course because the constitution says that the electoral college vote decides who's our president it's pretty important which is why now that the republican party has been hijacked by a small group of cranky billionaires the republican party is trying to rig the electoral college particularly in what has historically been blue or democratic leaning and voting states in the first election after the citizens united decision hundreds of millions of dollars in outside spending by billionaires like the koch brother

few weeks we've seen unprecedented efforts by republicans in several blue states to rig the electoral college ahead of the next presidential election to make a virtually impossible for a democrat to win the white house but those efforts have slowed down in recent days with a lot of publicity on them on tuesday the virginia state senate privileges and elections committee voted down a bill which would have changed how that state awards its electoral college votes at least for now all democrats on the committee voted against the bill as did four of eight republicans seemingly putting an end to the election rigging effort in that state at least for now meanwhile in michigan where republicans are considering a similar scheme and governor rick snyder slammed the idea saying he doesn't think it's the appropriate time to look at it he also said i'm very skeptical of the idea i really view it as a question of you don't want to change the playing field so it's an unfair advantage to someone. number of other prominent republicans have also come out against the idea including ohio governor john k. sick v

votes are counted in blue states by handing out those electoral college votes based on who wins each congressional district in the state which thanks to republican jeremy mandarin and two thousand and ten would have made it virtually impossible for democrats to win future presidential elections a plan was shot down by a number of prominent republicans who saw it as blatant maybe to blatant election rigging but now republicans in pennsylvania are trying something new rather than handing out electoral college votes on a winner take all system like pennsylvania nearly every other single state does republicans want to hand out electoral college votes based on the proportion. the popular vote barack obama won pennsylvania in two thousand and twelve and won all of that state's twenty electoral college votes but it is new republican vote rigging scheme he would only receive twelve votes and mitt romney would have received eight votes it's a blatantly political move to help republicans win the white house in two thousand and sixteen and here's the thing this is a plan being pushed by cr

on the second part of your question with respect to the electoral college issue, how is it fair that how is it fair we would award mitt romney 8 votes when the president got 20 electoral votes under our current system? why would we reward him 8 votes when he lost by 300,000? this is a very unpopular governor with a republican controlled senate and hanging on by its fingernails. this is not a popular idea here. they're going to push it, but i don't know if they're going to be successful. >> do you think corbett would dare hang it on himself? it seems to me it will be one heck of a thing to carry across the finish line if he has this on top of his popularity. >> this is not a popular governor. this is probably the least popular governor in america right now. no governor has been this abysmal in the ratings this close to a re-election. for tom corbett that's next year. so, no, he's trying to stay over the plate right now and trying to get his ratings up. he's failing miserably. i don't see him wanting this type of political baggage when he has enough problems as it is. >> let me go back

. >>> debate continues over republican plans to redraw the electoral college map. governor scott walker calls it an interesting idea, but he has concerns. michigan governor rick snyder was open-minded about it before he was against it, and virginia governor bob mcdonald opposed it from the beginning. >> both democrats and republicans have introduced that idea right they've lost a presidential election. i think it's a bad idea no matter who does it. it changes the mix. i mean, the winner take all is the right way to go. >> yes, but there are a host of other ways in which the gop is trying to cement conservative rule. we will discuss them when michael waldman joins us next on "now." ♪ they see me rollin' ♪ they hatin' ♪ patrolling they tryin' to catch me ridin' dirty ♪ ♪ tryin' to catch me ridin' dirty ♪ ♪ tryin' to -- [ woman ] hi there. why do we always have to take your mom's car? [ male announcer ] the security of an iihs top safety pick, the 2013 volkswagen tiguan. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease a 2013 tiguan for $219 a month. ♪ let's se

few weeks we've seen unprecedented efforts by republicans in several blue states to rig the electoral collegeahead of the next presidential election to make a virtually impossible for a democrat to win the white house but those efforts have slowed down in recent days with a lot of publicity on them on tuesday the virginia state sun it's privileges and elections committee voted down a bill which would have changed how that state awards its electoral college votes at least for now all democrats on the committee voted against the bill as did four of eight republicans seemingly putting an end to the election rigging effort in that state at least for now meanwhile in michigan where republicans are considering a similar scheme governor rick snyder slammed the idea saying he doesn't think it's the appropriate time to look at it he also said i'm very skeptical of the idea i really view it as a question of you don't want to change the playing field so it's an unfair advantage to someone. number of other prominent republicans have also come out against the idea including ohio governor john a sick virgi

every state does a proportional vote or every state abolishes the electoral college.e can't have do it some proportionally and some winner takes all. >> they're getting ready for hillary. they know they can't beat hillary clinton so they have to do it in the best way they can. >> they don't seem too confident right now. >> no doubt. ari berman, thanks for joining us. i appreciate it. that is "the ed show." i'm ed schultz. "the rachel maddow show" starts right now.

every state does a proportional vote or every state abolishes the electoral college.

he is ready to save the republican image and put a stop to the electoral college losses, right? of course, this is not the first time eric cantor has tried to save the party. you see, it actually is the fourth attempt that he has had. in 2009, cantor held a pizza party, remember that? with jeb bush and mitt romney by launching the national council for a new america that didn't work. a year later, cantor was back at it. he was one of the young guns ready to take the republican party by storm. >> there is a better way, and a new team is ready to bring america back. eric cantor, kevin mccarthy, paul ryan joined by common-sense conservative candidates from across the country. together, they are ready to make history. together they are the young guns. >> the good old days. in 2011, cantor launched the you cut program. he wanted to get the public to vote on weekly cuts to federal government. another year, another failure. so today cantor launched the "making life work" campaign. he is trying desperately to avoid the republican brand. >> the average american is not thinking about and t

the electoral college doesn't do that. this would. and by the way, both republicans and democrats might be in favor of this because the electoral college today isn't skewed to either party. it helped george w. bush in 2000, but it could have helped kerry in 2004. obama could have have possibly people were predicted in september and october won the electoral college while losing the popular vote. so the current system right now isn't skud. there is one red joker there is one blue joker in the deck. they wop up-- pop up but it is not a stacked deck. both parties might favor it states have road tested the idea. it adds to equality. >> rose: erol warren where do you place him in the mant panth onof chief justices. >> there a chapter on him, he is up there in my view with john marshal. >> rose: perhaps the greatest. >> and that say controversial statement, it seems. i think he made one huge mistake and i'm this, i'm with the conservatives. i think the warren court let criminal defendants off on crummy technicallities unrelated to guilt or

. >> rose: should we do away with the electoral college? you can do is what some states have started to do which is to say we will give the electoral votes statewide to the person who carries the state. but we will also give votes to the person who controlleds or carries each congressional district. maine does that it's a way that it's not winner take all. both parties have a chance to do well. >> rose: and you just elected an independent senator. >> angus king said he is going there -- he's going caucus with the democrats. but he has said that what he's going to do is decide every issue on its merits, talk to people in both parties. and we need more of that. we need more people who say my allegiance is to the country, not my political party. >> rose: when you look at politics today, the dysfunction it's there, do you believe it will be different or more extreme in the next four years of the obama administration? >> you know, already we're looking at who's going to be the nominee for president in both parties and we've already started that

. >>> it was this day way back in 1789 when the 69 members of the electoral college voted george washingtonhe first president of the united states, the former commander of the continental army and the chairman of the continental congress is still the only president to be elected unanimously by the electoral college. >>> it's panel time, gaggle time, karl rove is backing a new effort to revive republican hopes in key senate races after last year's disappointing losses in missouri and indiana. the conservative victory project will be funded by some of the party's biggest donors and led by american crossroads. steven law told the "new york times" there is a broad concern about having blown a significant number of races because the wrong candidates were selected. we don't view ourselves in the incumbent protection business but we want to pick the most conservative candidate who can bin. the new group will attempt to weed out daents considered too vulnerable to win the general election. the senate conservative group says the conservative defeat project is yet another example of the republican es

so i am trying to figure out, this is an evil genius, and change order to give the electoral college no, it is for the republicans. >> well, it is a three-step process for the republican takeover. the first process was to win in 2010 and gerrymander the seats to be in power for the next decade. second step is to pass more voting restrictions so that the opponents are less likely to turn out to vote and the third step is to gerrymander the electoral college on the same lines that you gerrymandered after the 2010 elections, so it will work together in terms of a thought-out scheme by republicans, and maybe they will fail at one step in the process, the electoral scheme might fail, but they have gerrymandered schemes, and you have the fight it on so many levels. >> it feels that part of the reason na we are getting a pushback is that the one thing it does is to koucounter very notion of the state as the primary identity of it citizens and one of the big fights that we have been having is a federalism fight that says are we sit zens of america or citizens of virginia, california, new yor

what's next of obviously restricting the right of people to vote changing the way we count the electoral college reducing taxes on corporations and billionaires you know throwing throwing a bone to the gun industry and but back to the war on women there was a general sense and i think we're seeing a little mini war going on in the republican party right now between the the karl rove let's go back to republican principles they don't want to go back to the eisenhower principles he was in favor of unions and things but but you know at least not the tea party you know the anti tea party and the tea party and and yet it seems to me that both the tea party republicans and the regular good old fashioned kind of sean hannity republicans or whatever you call them that they're all you know part of this war on women and they decided that that wasn't going to help them out and yet they're still doing it i thought i don't get it. this is just built into the republican party well i think massaging me in truth is built into our culture let's not beat around the bush on that one but i think you know you get in

some of the power plays that could completely change the game the united states still uses the electoral college to determine the winner of the presidential elections it's a complex system that apportions a point value to different states and most states it's winner take all red means the republican candidate won the state and blue means democrat currently maine and nebraska are the only states that can split their electoral votes but all of that could change so-called swing states that went blue in two thousand and twelve despite having republicans in charge at the state house like michigan virginia ohio florida pennsylvania and wisconsin began to consider changing the rules the change would result in the electoral votes being spread out between candidates so instead of this winner takes all approach. to give you an idea what this would mean if these changes were enacted before the two thousand and twelve election republican candidate mitt romney would have be an incumbent president obama two seventy six to two sixty two despite losing the popular vote by almost four percentage points well afte

over one had to 15 flaws in the 17 states over the last two years we have got involved in the electoral college's was over 100 politicians and allow win rate of 75% so we are beginning to level the playing field on behalf of kids and we still have a long way to go. >> host. >> guest: average to a nation is $84 from the everyday people parents, teachers, grandpare nts, business owners who know the future of this country is going to be based if we can fix the public education system today. >> host: questions before the book signing i will repeat your question. >> speeeleven [inaudible] how do we take that stand when you're -- [inaudible] that is part of the reason why i wrote this. because i want to tell my story and explain to people why i had come to the views i do. part to get teachers and educators to understand that. but partially for the average mom out there who is frustrated with what she sees and wants to do something about it and doesn't know how. what i would say is this, take right here in new york city. it doesn't matte r where you sendt your kid to school. whether it's the highest or