Virginia Becomes Latest Blue State in Push to Bypass Electoral College
They characterized HB 965 as “a bill to render Virginians’ vote for president NULL AND VOID!” and “an unconstitutional assault on our democracy.”
Virginia’s Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed HB 965, the National Popular Vote Compact, into law on Tuesday. Under this interstate agreement, whichever presidential ticket wins the national popular vote will receive Virginia’s 13 electoral votes, even if a majority of the Commonwealth’s voters chose a different candidate.
Fox News reported that the interstate compact:
[O]perates on a conditional trigger that keeps the law dormant until it can guarantee a victory for the national popular vote winner. While member states pass the legislation individually, the compact only activates when the total electoral weight of all participating states reaches a majority of the Electoral College, at least 270 electoral votes.
With Virginia officially joining, the compact currently sits at 222 electoral votes, meaning it remains 48 votes short of the threshold.
The following states have enacted the compact to date (via The National Popular Vote website):
California: 54
Colorado: 10
Connecticut: 7
Delaware: 3
Hawaii: 4
Illinois: 19
Maine: 4
Maryland: 10
Massachusetts: 11
Minnesota: 10
New Jersey: 14
New Mexico: 5
New York: 28
Oregon: 8
Rhode Island: 4
Vermont: 3
Virginia: 13
Washington: 12
District of Columbia: 3
It’s no coincidence that the list includes only blue states.
The summary of the Virginia bill states:
National Popular Vote Compact. Enters Virginia into an interstate compact known as the Agreement Among the States to Elect the President by National Popular Vote. Article II of the Constitution of the United States gives the states exclusive and plenary authority to decide the manner of awarding their electoral votes. Under the compact, Virginia agrees to award its electoral votes to the presidential ticket that receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
The compact goes into effect when states cumulatively possessing a majority of the electoral votes have joined the compact. … The bill also provides for the manner of appointing electors when such agreement does and does not govern the appointment of electors.
Needless to say, the Virginia Republican Party was rightly outraged by the “fake moderate” governor’s latest move, calling it “an unconstitutional assault on our democracy.” They characterized HB 965 as “a bill to render Virginians’ vote for president NULL AND VOID!” in the social media post below.
🚨🚨🚨
Fake Moderate Spanberger just signed a bill to render Virginians’ vote for president NULL AND VOID!
HB965 says that all of Virginia’s Electoral College votes will go to the winner of the national popular vote – no matter who wins the popular vote in our Commonwealth.… pic.twitter.com/wUzyhG0VQc
— Virginia GOP (@VA_GOP) April 14, 2026
According to NPV, “six additional states with 65 electoral votes … are especially promising places for obtaining the 48 electoral votes needed before 2028.”
These states, which are all swing states, include:
Arizona: 11
Michigan: 15
New Hampshire: 4
Nevada: 6
Pennsylvania: 19
Wisconsin: 10
It’s worth noting that if the compact had reached the 270-electoral vote threshold in 2024, President Donald Trump, who won the national popular vote, would have received the electoral votes of every participating state. His victory in the Electoral College over former Vice President Kamala Harris would have been even more decisive than it already was.
By contrast, had the threshold been met in 2016, Trump would have lost the presidency to Hillary Clinton, who won the popular vote that year.
A Republican winning the national popular vote, however, has been relatively rare in recent decades. Before Trump’s 2024 victory, the last Republican to do so was President George W. Bush in 2004.
The Democrats have been trying to abolish the Electoral College for at least two decades. While the framers of the Constitution had several reasons for creating it, a central concern was that states with smaller populations would be overshadowed by larger ones, leaving them with little meaningful voice in presidential elections.
The Electoral College, like Congress itself, was designed as a compromise. It blends population-based representation, reflected in the House, with equal state representation in the Senate. In this way, it ensures that presidential candidates must build geographically broad support rather than relying solely on dense population centers.
If the Electoral College were abolished in favor of a national popular vote, presidential campaigns would concentrate overwhelmingly on the nation’s largest population centers. Candidates would maximize their vote totals by focusing on states like California, New York, Texas, and Florida, along with a handful of major metropolitan areas, rather than competing across a broad range of states. In such a system, voters in smaller or less populous states could see their influence diminished, as campaigns devote fewer resources and less attention to regions that offer fewer raw votes, raising concerns about whether those communities would be fully represented in the national political conversation.
Virginia voters delivered Spanberger a landslide victory in November over her Republican opponent, then–Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears. But despite presenting herself as a moderate during the campaign, Spanberger’s congressional voting record — nearly 100% aligned with the Democrats’ progressive agenda — suggested her governance would be anything but.
Within 48 hours of taking office, she moved to end the state’s cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Meanwhile, the Democrat-controlled legislature began advancing a slate of bills aimed at implementing her agenda, including a wave of new taxes, the elimination of mandatory minimum sentences for certain serious crimes, restrictions on hand-counting election ballots, and race-based limits on eligibility for certain government contracts under $100,000.
For many constituents, the shift felt like a bait-and-switch. Had they taken the time to look at her voting record in Congress, none of this would have come as a surprise.
Virginia Democrats have moved quickly to lock in their progressive agenda and it was always just a matter of time before they turned their guns on the Electoral College.
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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Comments
Is the Popular Vote Compact legal?
Interstate compacts require Congressional approval, which this one lacks.
It probably can’t or won’t be challenged until it activates.
Yes, it is legal. It’s a really bad idea, and even if it were a good idea the Democrats can’t be trusted to abide by it when it goes against them, but it is constitutional.
It does not require congress’s approval. The interstate compacts clause applies only to those compacts that increase the states’ power at the expense of congress’s power. Compacts that don’t do that are none of Congress’s business, and therefore don’t require its consent. Virginia v Tennessee.
By no means do I want to present myself as an expert – I’m not. However, I looked up that case, and it looks to me more like the court was saying the Congress’ inaction on this compact between two states can be taken as their approval. Tentatively, I think both this being limited to two states and Congress taking no action on it for decades, are both important.
For this popular vote initiative, it’s between many states, not just two. But they’re also taking no action while states are arranging this compact. So I’m not sure at all which way the court would go based on this precedent.
I can make a Constitutional argument either way. On the one hand, this is very clearly an interstate compact, and so requires Congressional approval. On the other, the states are very clearly given the authority to decide how to allocate their electoral votes, and could do so by coin flip if they so desired. Anyway, it sounds like you’ve given this more thought that I have, so interested in more information.
the court was saying the Congress’ inaction on this compact between two states can be taken as their approval
And,. even then, just because the court said so does not make it actually in accord with the Constitution. Cf. Roe v Wade.
The constitution gives the federal courts the exclusive power to say what the law is. “The judicial power of the united states shall be vested in one supreme court, and in such inferior courts as the congress may from time to time ordain and establish.” So long as Roe v Wade had not been overturned it was the law. cf Deuteronomy 17:8-13.
BTW, the courts’ current inaction is due to the effect the compact hasn’t taken effect yet – so there’s no one with “standing.”
You must have missed the entire section where the court explicitly says that any compact that doesn’t affect Congress’s power relative to the states does not need permission. It makes no difference how many states are involved, so long as it doesn’t enhance the states’ power at Congress’s expense.
For instance the court gave the example of Ohio contracting with New York for passage on its canals. It’s purely between those states and none of Congress’s business. Likewise if one state wants to rent an office in a building owned by another state. It doesn’t affect Congress. Here too, how states choose to have their electors chosen is none of Congress’s business, so its consent is not required.
We’ve had this dance before. And, once again, you’re referring to made-up judicial BS.
The entirety of what the Constitution says on the matter is here:
“No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.”
Unless my understanding of the English language is faulty, this means that all agreements between States require the consent of Congress.
Also, the question asked, “Is this legal?”, has two aspects. You’ve replied to only one aspect – “Can the States make this compact?” The other aspect is “Does assigning a State’s electoral votes based on the votes of people in other States violate the Constitution or any law?” That is, the “means” may be legal (compact between the States) but the “ends” may not be. It seems to me that this may be a civil rights violation when a State’s electoral vote is switched to a candidate other than the one elected by a true vote of a State’s citizens such that it’s citizens’ votes are effectively disregarded.
“Revolutionary arguments surface even when long standing practices appear to have firm judicial support.”
Ren Jander, JD
Virginia v Tennessee is the law of the land on this subject. The plain text of the clause is not what it means. So said the supreme court, so that is what it means until a later supreme court says otherwise. And the court’s logic is solid. It’s simply impossible to imagine that the constitution’s ratifiers, or the public reading it in the 1790s, seriously understood it to mean that if California wants to rent an office in a building owned by the NY state government, Congress must approve the lease! It just doesn’t stand to reason. Despite its plain text the clause must mean only when the compact affects Congress, when it diminishes Congress’s power.
That is very obviously a wrong argument, because a state’s citizens have no right whatsoever to vote on the selection of that state’s electors. The state legislature chooses to grant them such a privilege, and it can choose at any time to take it away. All the states have currently chosen to let people vote for president, but that was not always the case; early in the republic’s history some states did not allow any vote on the matter, and that was 100% constitutional.
The interstate compacts clause applies only to those compacts that increase the states’ power at the expense of congress’s power.
No, it does not. The Supreme Court once said that it did, but that is NOT what the Constitution says at all.
The constitution itself says that the law means whatever the courts say it means. That is the judicial power: “to say what the law is”.
“The interpretation of the laws is the proper and peculiar province of the courts. A constitution is, in fact, and must be regarded by the judges, as a fundamental law. It therefore belongs to them to ascertain its meaning, as well as the meaning of any particular act proceeding from the legislative body.” Federalist 78.
Our governor is a scumbag. She doesn’t care about “legality,” only what gives power to the Dimtards.
While it appears on the surface to be Constitutional, written to obey the basic rules of interstate compacts, it is not.
The idea that state governments can abrogate the votes of their citizens in favor of this compact is plainly unconstitutional.
But moreso, it is the job of Congress to decide the winner of elections if the electoral count does not provide one, it is not the purview of state Democratic parties. So if they ever meet the threshold, they will need congressional approval.
Lastly, does anyone believe that creatures like Newsom or Spamberger or Hochul would EVER assign their states votes to the Republican popular vote winner.
Even now all of them are trying to disenfranchise Republican voters in their states–particularly those who will benefit from their grift blowing up in their faces in California.
The filthy liar is heard from again.
What a liar you are. The state legislatures have full and absolute power to decide how their state’s electors are to be chosen. They have no obligation whatsoever to let their citizens have any say in the matter.
More lies. The state legislatures decide how their electors are chosen. Once those electors are chosen, in whatever manner the state legislatures decided, if a majority of those electors vote for someone then that person has been elected, and Congress gets no say in the matter.
A state legislature could simply provide that the state’s electors shall be chosen by the Democrat Party. That would be perfectly constitutional. If the state’s people don’t like it, their only recourse is at the next state election to elect a new legislature that will change this law.
Congress only gets a role in the election if the electors’ votes are split between more than two candidates, and none gets a majority of votes cast.
No.
It seems to me that a strict Constitutionalists would view this as disenfranchising voters in a presidential election and therefore would be illegal.
How could that be illegal? There is no right to vote in a presidential election. Your franchise is a privilege granted to you by your state’s legislature, and it can change its mind whenever it likes.
Whether it is legal or not, it is a profoundly stupid idea. The compact does not require that the “popular vote” be a majority vote, but rather a plurality, If for example, it has been in effect in 2016, Bloomberg, Sanders, and JEB would likely have jumped into the fray, after Hillary and Trump won the Democrat and Republican primaries, respectively, in addition to the multiple third parties who collectively got 6% of the popular vote. Assuming the third parties got their six percent, Trump, Hillary, JEB, Bloomberg and Sanders would have split the remaining 94% of the popular vote and the “winner” could have as little as 20% of the popular vote.
The compact would be dissolved before the next presidential election by the liberals right after they had to accept that voter and candidate behavior would be altered by the changes in the rules.
Democrats are shoveling the BS hard. Expect it to get worse.
Note none of these states sent faithless electors to vote Trump when Trump defeated Kamala
But some sent faithless electors in 2016
No state “sent” faithless electors in 2016. On the contrary, all states did their best to stop faithless electors, but their best wasn’t always enough.
Hawaii sent two sets of electors in 1960. Neither group was considered faithless.
The compact hadn’t gone into effect yet. It doesn’t start until there are enough states signed up to control a majority of electors.
Had it been in effect in 2024, would the Dems really have had their states’ electors vote for Trump?! I think they would, but only because he already had a majority of electors anyway. But supposing he had not won a majority of electors I don’t believe they would have obeyed the compact. They would have found some excuse to renege on it, “just this once”. But that’s my cynicism talking; I can’t prove it.
You are almost certainly correct.
Maybe the Republican party would sue to force them to execute their own (the Blue States’) law.
They would try, but I don’t see how they could succeed. The constitution clearly gives the state legislatures the absolute right to determine how their states’ electors are to be chosen. It doesn’t say that once they’ve chosen a method they have to stick by it.
Just heard a radio ad featuring the utterly insufferable, pompous, greasy and dishonest narcissist-incompetent-dunce, Obama, in a D.C. cab, warning that Satan (AKA, President Trump) his devilish Republican minions) want to engage in re-districting schemes, in Virginia.
I guess Obama is still worshipped, in Dhimmi-crat circles. Hearing this puke’s snake oil propaganda is enough to make me barf.
They have been pounding the state with ads saying that they have no choice but to fight back against Trump’s power grab. It sucks living here right now.
Amen.
No, they’re saying that Satan has already redistricted in Texas and Missouri, so Virginia should fight fire with fire by voting for a Dem redistricting.
As always, you’re missing the point entirely, Nillhouse, in your breathless rush to correct any statement made by any person on this website, in a bout of self-reverential and self-congratulatory narcissism.
The point isn’t that the GOP has engaged in advantageous re-districting tactics. Both parties have — that’s common knowledge.
The point is Obama’s brazen hypocrisy and dishonesty, in alleging that President Trump and the GOP are engaged in some nefarious, anti-democratic scheme, when the GOP is merely fighting fire with fire, to combat the Dhimmi-crats’ own, far more pervasive and far more underhanded redistricting shenanigans.
Except that Spanberger explicitly said she would not gerrymander prior to her election.
She’s a liar, however. People who were dumb enough to vote for her either knew this and didn’t care, or didn’t know which makes them doubly stupid.
Texas at least did it under their laws, while VA just decided to ignore theirs (or rewrite as CA did-either way it was a horse of a different color)
Actually, the referendum due in 6 days is to provide a one-time exemption to the Virginia Constitution. It’s a lot more egregious than simply changing the law.
The GOP in Wa had wanted to allow their electoral college votes to be de coupled from the Wa popular vote – thus freeing college to vote as they had voted for. They had sound logic in that they wanted candidates to be forced to campaign there and not take the state for granted.
Huh? That is in a language that sounds almost like English, but isn’t quite. I have no idea what you think you wrote. Please explain it in English.
Hey, Nillhouse — here’s an exercise you should attempt — try not to be an obnoxious prick, for twent-four hours. Make an earnest attempt.
It means popular vote winner at the state level would not take all. It would have split the electoral college votes. So if it’s 60/40… for a blue state that means a couple electoral college votes would go to the loser.
There are already a couple (?) of states that do that, but it’s apparently not very popular. (no pun intended).
Even if you don’t believe illegals are voting, that mail in ballots are prone to fraud and that turnout in poor urban areas should never approach 95%, you should still be concerned. Every election year, millions and tens of millions of votes are harvested by Democratic political operatives in California and other Blue States. Why should these votes decide our elections? These harvested votes are NOT secret and they are prone to pressure and intimidation. This is not how a democracy works.
I remember a stupid ad from 2024 where they depicted two wives of MAGA men who happy and smiling went into the polls and voted for Kamala without telling their husbands. It could be modified to show them filling out mail in ballots at the kitchen table with the Evil MAGA men threating them to vote Trump.
This seems like exactly the scenario that could move moron Dems to be against mail in ballots except for the fact they know that they are much more likely to cheat and intimidate than any Republican.
Interesting that the progressives that bounced up and down in their seats and clapped to the musical Hamilton are trying to undermine one of the central tenets of our Constitution that the actual Hamilton strongly advocated for – the Electoral College.
If Democrats are so strongly opposed to the Electoral College, they can simply offer a constitutional amendment to remove it.
It’s interesting that they don’t.
They don’t because they know it will never pass. That’s also why they routinely use extra-legal measures to force their positions on everyone – ex-post-facto laws, lawfare, voter fraud, financial fraud…
One reason is that the left wants to turn America into one giant country, where the states are nothing more than administrative boundaries. They’ve already come close, The goal is to stop localism so they can transition to a globalist government.
They don’t dare offer an amendment because – as with money (a la Hillary) – we might vote the wrong way. If they can achieve it via some sort of sleight of hand, they’re much happier.
If this ever becomes law (national popular vote elects president) it will be the final nail in the coffin of this country before the muslims or chinese take over. It will allow the ignorant unwashed and often illegal masses to vote themselves anything they want to regardless of the cost to the rest of us.
the democrats can take their view of democracy and shove it.
Why don’t they just end the winner-take-all aspect?
If they really cared about making the EC reflect the popular vote, all they have to do is apportion their EC vote by percentage of state vote. They don’t do that because CA and IL, et al., don’t want to give R’s ANY EC votes.
Given they don’t, I’m not sure how much effect it will have when Blue states give their EC votes to the person who usually wins their state anyway.
Mainly because those states you mention have a LOT of population, but some other states that might not vote correctly do, too. They want to ensure those “battleground” states can never again swing an election toward anyone but a Democrat.
Also, I highly doubt that if they hit 270, they would ever actually deliver their votes for a Republican. They will find a way to cancel it for that election.
The law will be worthless if enacted. Does anyone seriously believe Virginia – or any other blue hellhole – would have cast its electoral college votes for Trump in 2024 if the law had existed then? They would have gotten some #Resistance judge to rule in their favor, or failing that just done whatever they pleased.
The Communist Party recognizes it own authority to do whatever it wants – and nothing else. That is the single most important fact in the US today.
Oh, it certainly isn’t worthless.
If it becomes enacted (at 270) they will use that as force of law to squash everyone else. And they will find easier ways to cheat (if all they have to do is plus up the numbers in one or two states).
So let’s see. The last two Republican presidents to win the popular vote were Trump and Bush.
Who were the last two Republican presidents?
Trump and Bush.
Okay, so then the previous Republican president didn’t win the popular vote, right?
Well, no. Bush won the popular vote.
So did Reagan.
And Nixon.
And Eisenhower.
A Republican winning the national popular vote, however, has been relatively rare in recent decades. Before Trump’s 2024 victory, the last Republican to do so was President George W. Bush in 2004.
Apparently, this is something made up by the left. Like their support for civil rights.
Why is LI perpetuating it?
Because Dems openly cheated in 2000, 2020, and 2024 (and very likely 2008 and 2012)?
Dems DID cheat to get Kennedy and Johnson in. And they screwed the entire system with the Roosevelt/Truman farce.
But let’s ignore all that and act as if they’re playing fair now.
It is becoming increasingly obvious to anyone paying attention that the ONLY way Democrats/the left wins is through cheating.
To keep California blue they’ve made it illegal to prevent cheating. That should tell everyone what’s going on.
But we al still pretend they’re playing by the rules.
WHY?
And? popular vote inly disagrees with thr electoral college once in 15 elections. 2024, Trump won the popular vote, so…
ugh… i didnt mean this as a reply…
You sort of glided over the fact that although Trump won the popular vote he also lost it… once each.
No. Based on their actions–not their statements or their propaganda, but their actions, watching what they actually do, there is no indication that they have ever gotten the popular vote at any point past when they installed Kennedy.
Past that point, Republicans won by beating the fake.
SCOTUS punted in 2020 when it simply ruled that other states lacked standing when challenging the presidential results. They have since made it easier for candidates to sue preemptively for voting rules before an election. It would seem as well that this preemption would be accepted by the court as well.
Forget Iran. Trump needs to consider domestic operations
Is there some reason why millhouse seems to automatically down voted? You may not agree with his point of view, but hits responses are usually well thought out and NOT just somebody trolling.
You can see above that I butt heads with Milhouse. I do so regularly. But I also appreciate Milhouse and am usually glad to read his comments. He can get snarky, but he’s not often wrong (by my lights).
Millhouse doesn’t troll.
He is the official mouthpiece on this site of the ‘we’re deeply sorry but the leftists are always right’ line of propaganda.
And the ‘we’ in that phrase refers to his fellow Democrats.
Azathoth is a literal demon from Hell, who is constitutionally incapable of ever telling the truth.
I only downvote him when he’s being pedantic to the point of stupidity.
But others have been so ticked off by his pedantry they just slam him with a downvote.
There is also the Random Downvoter on here who goes along and just downvotes people for no discernable reason. So, always allow for 1 or 2 downvotes on anyone’s comment.
I don’t see how this violates the Constitution. It is basically an agreement to have the state’s electors vote for the nationwide popular vote. The agreement itself is of no consequence, legally – that agreement is probably not enforcable. The law that was signed affecting the state is what matters. This may violate each states laws (unless changed) on how to handle faithless electors. The constitution allows each state to determine how it votes for President.
I don’t see how this violates the Constitution. It is basically an agreement to have the state’s electors vote for the nationwide popular vote
regardless of what the states voters actually vote for.
I don’t see how this violates the Constitution.
Article I, Section 10, Clause 3
Like I said, the agreement is probably not enforceable, but will not affect the votes.
The constitution allows each state to determine how it votes for President.
It does, however, require a “republican form of government.” So it can’t simply toss our votes into the hopper.
Yes, it can. It doesn’t even have to allow a vote at all. It can decide that the electors will be chosen directly by the legislature, or that they will be chosen by the governor, that they will be chosen at random from the state voter list, or that they will be chosen by the Democrat Party.
A republican form of government simply means that each state must have an elected legislature and executive. That’s all.
Guess no one in Virginia has to bother voting anymore,
Virginia’s your vote is null and void. And the Constitution doesn’t care according to oldvet50.
Nope. Even if this ever takes effect (which I doubt will ever happen), all it will mean is that Virginians’ presidential votes will be pooled with the whole nation’s. They still get counted, but they don’t get counted separately from everyone else’s. Instead of being one of 6 million voters who choose 13 electors and have no say on the other 522, a Virginian will be one of 100 million voters who choose at least 270 electors and possibly all 535. A smaller say in return for a bigger prize. There’s still a point in voting, just not the same point.
But I don’t believe this will ever get implemented, and if it is then I believe the first time it goes against the Democrat Party they will blow it up.
I agree that it should not be this way, but the Constitution has no specific wording that prevents this. The compact has no effect since THAT is not what is driving the voting results. The governor signed a bill that directs the electors to vote for the US popular vote winner. period.
Enters Virginia into an interstate compact
They wrote right in the beginning that it violates the Constitution.
Again, Virginia v Tennessee says that is not what that clause means.
The Demsocialists are always monkeying with the law to consolidate power and hurt America. Between ranked choice voting, gerrymandering, empowering illegals, blowing up the SCOTUS numbers, impeaching with impunity etc., you have a record of, I dare say, non patriotism that could only be equaled by a hostile foreign country, most of which they align with politically.
Context is important. Lawyers and economists seem to like making decisions in a vacuum, whether it’s ignoring historical examples or pretending to not understand what the left is actually trying to do, regardless of “legality.”
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