As the world is trying to come to terms with the reality after the huge election upset of the year, with Donald Trump winning the Presidential Elections in the United States, we see more and more people opening their eyes towards the faults of this man. What is more, these people include the members from his own party – The Republicans.
Many a party member are aghast at the way Trump has been taking on things since he became the President-elect and are appalled at the outcome of the elections. So much so, that a record number of 8 members of Electoral Collage have gone on publicly to say that they will not be voting for Trump in the Electoral College voting of December 19th. These persons are technically called “faithless electors” as they are moving away from the popular vote of their State and opting to vote for another candidate so as to protect the Oval Office from an “unfit President”.
One such electors is the Washington state member, 19-year-old, Levi Guerra, who has stated that she will join hands with the ‘Hamilton Electors’, the term deriving from Alexander Hamilton who cited in the Federalist Papers, “The process of the Electoral College affords a moral certainty, 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.” In effect, the President is not voted directly into the office by the citizens of the country, but instead they show their vote depending on which the 538 electors have a moral responsibility to foresee the effect of the popular vote and help prevent demagogues from entering the White House.
Guerra has said that “I stand behind Hamilton electors. I promised those who elected me that I would do everything I could to keep Donald Trump out of office.” Not only she, but several other electors have come forward to show their disgust at even the thought of Donald Trump taking the office. Christopher Suprun, a paramedic and first responder to the Pentagon on September 11, stated to The Guardian “Mr. Trump lacks the foreign policy experience and demeanor needed to be commander in chief … Mr. Trump urged violence against protesters at his rallies during the campaign. He speaks of retribution against his critics.” All such antics and more have caused an outrage at the oldest President-elect ever with the mind of an immature juvenile.
But will these 8 voters have any impact on the oncoming voting? Firstly, the thing to keep in mind is that these electors, although they have pledged not to vote for Trump, aren’t voting for Hillary Clinton either. Coming from a Republican Party background, they have just specified that they would rather vote for an “alternative republican candidate” than Trump. Ironically this ire falls both on Trump and Clinton. Secondly, even if they do go beyond their party duties to vote for Hillary, it will take a total of 37 voters or more to take her to the Oval Office. A 270 votes to a certain candidate out of the total 538 ensures a win. If the votes are otherwise divided between various contenders, then the decision goes to Supreme Court for a judgement call after the applicants in question have each presented their case.
The only time such deviation from the electors was seen was back in 1912 in Washington, when the Republican vice presidential candidate had died before the vote took place. More recently in 2004 a special circumstance of a single faithless elector was seen when a Democrat mistakenly voted for John Edwards in both presidential and vice-presidential roles.
Although a petition has been signed by more than 4.6 million people urging electors to break ranks with Trump and go over to Hillary, it is quite uncertain if they could upend the result. But still, one can dream.
