One day after the midterm elections, The New Republic spotted something in the returns that could change the way Americans elect their presidents. TNR asked its readers to share their day after the election piece on the Electoral College redux. Here's what we're sharing, thanks New Republic editorial inspiration.
By Thomas Shess | PillartoPost.org | November 5, 2026--It took one day. One day after Americans delivered a sweeping midterm election victory to the Democratic Party, The New Republic published an article suggesting that the most consequential result of November 3 might have little to do with who controls Congress.
The headline was enough to stop a reader over his morning coffee: “Democrats Win Enough Seats Nationwide to End Electoral College.” Hafiz Rashid, writing for the magazine on November 4, had spotted something remarkable in the election returns. While the country was counting new senators, representatives and governors, another story was emerging in the state legislatures.
The arithmetic of presidential elections was changing. And the Electoral College, that curious 18th-century contraption through which Americans have selected their presidents for more than two centuries, suddenly had a reason to look over its shoulder.
The development was neither a constitutional amendment nor an actual abolition of the Electoral College. Instead, it concerned the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, a state-by-state agreement under which participating states would award their electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the most votes nationwide.
The agreement already has 222 electoral votes committed. It needs 270 before taking effect. The Democratic election victories have opened a possible route to 283.
For a proposal that has been discussed for twenty years, that is quite a morning after.
The Blue Wave Reaches the Statehouses
Most national election coverage naturally concentrates on Washington. Who won the House? Who controls the Senate? How much political authority remains with the president?
But America's political architecture doesn't begin or end at the Capitol. The November 3 elections also delivered an extraordinary expansion of Democratic power in state government. Democrats captured five Republican-held governorships: Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Ohio and Texas. Their victories included Gina Hinojosa's defeat of Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a result that would have seemed extraordinary only a short time ago. The legislative results were equally consequential.
As of November 5, Axios reported that Democrats were positioned to flip 12 state legislative chambers and control 51 of the nation's 99 legislative chambers if outstanding results held. That would end a 16-year period of Republican dominance in statehouse control.
In Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, Democrats emerged with control of the governorship and both legislative chambers. Arizona was also positioned to join that group, pending final results.
The National Conference of State Legislatures confirmed significant Democratic gains while cautioning that several races remained unofficial. These victories matter for reasons extending far beyond the usual legislative arguments over taxes, education, abortion and spending.
State legislatures possess constitutional authority over the appointment of presidential electors. That is the opening The New Republic recognized almost immediately.
The Number Is 270
Consider Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada. Together, those four states possess 50 electoral votes. Add those votes to the 222 already committed to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, and the total reaches 272—two votes beyond the number required to activate the agreement.
Arizona, with another 11 electoral votes, would bring the possible total to 283. The compact would leave the formal Electoral College intact. But its participating states would pledge their electoral votes to the nationwide popular-vote winner, even when voters in an individual participating state preferred another candidate. It would fundamentally alter the practical operation of presidential elections.
No constitutional amendment would be required for the states to enact their compact legislation, although whether the arrangement could ultimately take effect without congressional approval remains an unresolved legal question. That distinction makes the 2026 election results particularly interesting.
For decades, opponents of the Electoral College have faced an intimidating constitutional barrier: amendments require two-thirds approval in both houses of Congress and ratification by 38 states. The interstate compact proposes another path. And suddenly, enough states may possess the political majorities to attempt it.
An Old Argument Meets a New Election
There has never been a shortage of arguments about the Electoral College. Its defenders point to federalism, the constitutional role of states and the importance of preventing presidential campaigns from concentrating exclusively on the country's largest population centers.
Its critics answer that the present system already concentrates campaign attention on a handful of competitive states, leaving millions of Republican voters in heavily Democratic states and Democratic voters in heavily Republican states with relatively little influence over the final electoral outcome.
The historical record supplies ammunition for the debate. In 2000, George W. Bush won the presidency while losing the national popular vote to Al Gore. Sixteen years later, Donald Trump won the Electoral College despite receiving nearly 2.9 million fewer votes than Hillary Clinton.
The present system permits that result. Its defenders consider the system constitutionally legitimate; its critics question whether it should remain the measure of presidential victory. And the American public has hardly been silent.
A Pew Research Center survey conducted in 2024 found that 63 percent of American adults preferred changing the system so that the candidate receiving the most votes nationwide wins the presidency.
Thirty-five percent favored retaining the Electoral College. Those are pre-election figures, not a measurement of the national mood following November 3. Nevertheless, they establish that the question has a substantial public constituency.
The Washington Question
What, then, should Congress do with the opening presented by the midterms? The answer will require something more substantial than congratulations, victory speeches or the customary promises of national renewal. A new congressional majority does not automatically create a constitutional consensus. Nor does Democratic control of a state government guarantee that its legislators will support the compact.
Michigan failed to enact the proposal during an earlier period of unified Democratic government. Nevada's Democratic governor vetoed compact legislation in 2019, citing concerns about diminishing the state's influence in presidential elections.
The constitutional questions are formidable as well. Legal scholars disagree about whether the compact requires congressional consent under the Constitution's Compact Clause.
There are additional questions about nationwide recounts, differing state election procedures and possible disputes over the allocation of electoral votes. Those objections deserve serious public examination. Yet there is a distinction between acknowledging those obstacles and assuming that they will keep electoral reform outside the national conversation.
The midterms have changed the political possibilities. Congress can examine the compact, consider the constitutional questions and hear from governors, state legislators, election administrators and scholars on both sides. And the press can perform its own essential function: establish what has changed, what remains uncertain and what the public deserves to know.
One Day, Folks
There is something encouraging about how quickly this story appeared. On November 4, while much of the country was still absorbing the scale of the election results, The New Republic magazine's media universe had already moved beyond the familiar winners-and-losers coverage.
Axios, too published its own examination of the Electoral College opportunity that same day. By November 5, the broader story of Democratic statehouse gains was coming into sharper focus, with reporting from Reuters, the National Conference of State Legislatures and other national outlets. That is how an important public discussion begins. An election creates new circumstances. A journalist recognizes their significance. Other reporters investigate. Constitutional scholars disagree. Legislators are asked where they stand.
The public begins paying attention.
Whether the Electoral College ultimately survives unchanged, is altered through the interstate compact or is replaced by constitutional amendment remains unsettled. But the question has acquired something it did not possess on November 2: a new political map and enough potential electoral votes to put a long-discussed proposal within reach.
The next presidential election is only two years away. For a system that has endured since the nation's founding, that is not much time. For a country that has just demonstrated how rapidly its political landscape can change, it may be time enough to begin a serious reckoning. The Electoral College has survived more than two centuries of American elections. The question now is whether it can survive what happened the day after this one.
Fifteen year old, daily bkog PillartoPost.org has an opinion simply asking the Electoral College to examine what it wrought. It gave us Donald Trump. He did not win the national vote. We do not need the Electoral College to open the door to a dictatorship possibility, again. Ever.
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