Democracy: A Journal of Ideas published this piece that I wrote on the failure of the electoral system to produce an outcome corresponding to “the real preference of the Voters” (Madison’s term for when a third candidate is preferred by a majority of voters compared one-on-one against each of the top two candidates).
The piece emphasizes our nation’s inability to understand correctly Trump’s victory over Harris in November because Trump won the national popular vote, unlike in 2016. Trump’s second term certainly cannot be considered an Electoral College mistake, but as the piece explains “a difference in the outcomes of the Electoral College and the national popular vote is not the only way that the existing electoral system distorts the results.” Instead, partisan primaries block a candidate less popular within a party from demonstrating in November that she would be more popular among all the nation’s voters than either her own party’s nominee or the opposing major-party nominee. The piece contends that Nikki Haley is that kind of candidate (technically, a Condorcet Winner, which is the same as a Madisonian “real preference of the Voters”), but you don’t need to be convinced of that point to believe that the existing system is flawed insofar as it doesn’t let a candidate like Haley demonstrate whether or not in fact she would beat either major-party nominee one-on-one.
On the eve of Trump’s second inauguration, the media is replete with stories reflecting this pervasive misunderstanding of Trump’s popular vote victory over Harris. In The New York Times, for example, Peter Baker writes today: “Mr. Trump arrives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue not as a fluke Electoral College winner who fell short in the popular vote. He takes the oath on Monday with a burst of momentum propelled by a victory in the popular vote.” Baker’s point is that Trump’s popular vote victory has caused even his opponents to believe that the country is now “on Mr. Trump’s side.” Baker quotes Patrick Gaspard, president of the Center for American Progress (a progressive think tank): “‘The humbling reality of a popular vote victory for him requires a lot of self-reflection and inward looking.'” Indeed, there are at least two other pieces on the front page of the Times‘s website today attempting to grapple with the significance of Trump’s popular vote victory: one concerning how it deflated popular resistance to Trump, and the other (an opinion essay by Ezra Klein) on the magnification of Trump’s victory as a cultural force.
To understand Trump’s popular vote victory properly, I believe that it’s essential to imagine what it would be like if tomorrow Nikki Haley’s presidency were beginning rather than Trump’s second term. Some things I think would be the same, as they should be assuming that Nikki Haley also would have beaten Kamala Harris head-to-head in the national popular vote. For example, many commentators have observed the corporate abandoning of DEI programs in the wake of Trump’s victory, interpreting it as a backlash against excessive wokeness. I suspect that if a Haley presidency were commencing tomorrow, this curtailment of DEI excess would be essentially the same, as Haley’s campaign on this point would have been substantially similar to Trump’s (although more measured in tone).
In other respects, however, a Haley presidency would be very different from Trump’s second term. No Kash Patel. No threats of revenge. No risk of Orban-style authoritarianism.
The correct way to understand Trump’s popular vote victory is to understand that it represents a mandate to the extent, but only to the extent, that Nikki Haley would be pursuing the same agenda. It is not, however, a mandate for all that distinguishes Trump from Haley–especially his dictatorial aspirations.