Cameroon: A Decisive Moment in Cameroon | allAfrica.com:

Public debates on the convening of the Electoral College for the 14 April 2013 election of senators in Cameroon are rife. Discussions have been on whether or not the time for such election is now, is the Electoral College legitimate and are all those who qualify to participate in the poll according to the Constitution of Cameroon going to take part? While hoping that legal minds clarify the population on what the best practice should be, the bottom line is that the decision to take part ought to be political since Cameroon has embarked on a democratic process and like in all democracies, the freedom of choice remains fundamental. Another crucial factor which cannot be overlooked is the fact that; Part III of Law N° 96-06 of 18 January 1996 to amend the Constitution of 2 June 1972 says in Article 14 (1) that; “Legislative power shall be exercised by the Parliament which shall comprise 2 (two) Houses: (a) The National Assembly; (b) The Senate.” Until now, only the National Assembly existed in the country, leaving a constitutional vacuum that many thought should be filled. Another Constitutional right is that of the Head of State who decides when to convene the Electoral College for any election in the country. Thus, any debate over the timeliness of the election must take into consideration all the legal arguments.

Michigan: GOP pushes on with electoral vote plan | The Detroit News

Republicans handed Bobby Schostak another two-year term as state chairman Saturday and overwhelmingly endorsed a plan to change Michigan presidential electoral vote rules in a way opponents charge is intended to distort election results in favor of GOP candidates. By a 1,370-132 margin at the party convention in Lansing, GOP members approved a resolution backing a proposal from Rep. Pete Lund, R-Shelby Township, to divvy-up 14 of the state’s 16 electoral votes according to which candidate got the most votes in each congressional district. The other two would go to the state-wide vote total winner. That switch from a winner-take-all formula that has been in effect 175 years could water down the dominance Democrats have had in Michigan in presidential elections for the last 24 years.

National: The GOP’s electoral vote gambit: Reasonably popular, but doomed | Washington Post

Many Americans support the way that Republicans want to adjust how some states award their electoral votes. But that doesn’t mean there’s going to be any new life breathed into the dying effort. A new poll from Quinnipiac University shows that neither awarding electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis to the winner of the statewide vote nor awarding them by congressional district gains majority support. Forty-six percent prefer the winner-take-all method, while 41 percent prefer to do it by congressional district, as Republicans in some key states are proposing. The rest are unsure. But that probably says more about people’s openness to Electoral College reform than it does about how much they like the GOP’s proposal.

Pennsylvania: Proposal To Split Pennsylvania’s Electoral Votes Causes Republican Party Rift | CBS Philly

There may be a change in direction on a politically explosive issue — the electoral vote in Pennsylvania. There is a quiet conflict going on, but it is not the usual fight — Republican vs. Democrat. Republican insiders say that there is a rift between the Republican leadership in the Keystone state about powerful Senate President Dominic Pillegi’s plan to enact proportional voting instead of winner take all in Presidential elections.

Pennsylvania: State to explore voter registration | New Castle News

Tinkering with the way Electoral College votes are allocated is not the only way that lawmakers are considering reforming the electoral process. While the state still has to navigate how it will implement controversial photo identification rules, there are two separate pieces of legislation that would make it easier for voters to register. One measure would allow voters to register online but retain requirement that they do so 30 days before the election. That idea has been supported by Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi and other Republican leaders. Sen. John Gordner, a Republican from Columbia County, was among the co-sponsors of the legislation in previous sessions. Another measure would allow voters to register on the day of the election.

National: The Other GOP Plan To Rearrange The Electoral Vote | TPM

GOP efforts to rig the Electoral College in favor of GOP presidential candidates may be close to dead, but a group of Republicans are hard at work at another plot to blow up the system: switch to the popular vote. Although more closely associated with progressive circles in recent years, the idea has a number of conservative activists behind it as well. And there are signs it’s gaining momentum. “I think there’s a growing consensus that the winner-take-all system we’re currently under is a problem, that it’s not representative, that only a small number of states benefit, and that it needs to be changed,” Saul Anuzis, a Republican national committeeman from Michigan who advocates on behalf of the nonpartisan National Popular Vote group, told TPM. The plan, as espoused by groups like NPV, is to lobby states to pass binding legislation pledging their entire slate of electors to whichever candidate wins the most votes nationwide. The bills would only take effect once enough states join in to provide a guaranteed majority in the Electoral College — 270 votes — in order to prevent individual legislatures from trying to game the system unilaterally.

Editorials: The GOP’s bad fixes to the electoral college | The Washington Post

Republicans aren’t alone in manipulating election rules or drawing districts to favor their candidates, but lately they’ve been in the vanguard. Their latest proposals, to fiddle with presidential vote-tallying, are particularly egregious. Following through on them not only would damage the GOP’s reputation but also could drain all legitimacy from the electoral college system. Virginia Republicans, thankfully, killed such a reform plan Tuesday. Republicans elsewhere should stay away, too. State-level GOP leaders around the country have been considering ways to split up their states’ electoral college votes, and one idea is to do it according to congressional district maps. A presidential candidate who wins a congressional district, say, would win one electoral college vote.

National: Why the GOP’s electoral vote gambit won’t work | Washington Post

A Republican-backed plan to change the way certain states allocate electoral votes has fizzled as quickly as it sprung onto the national consciousness. The slate of upcoming 2014 governor’s races is a major reason why that happened. Last month, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus voiced some support for the effort to award electoral votes in a handful of battleground states by congressional district. Since many of those congressional districts lean Republican, the plan, if passed in several swing states, would give future GOP presidential nominees a leg up. But for the Republican governors in these states, endorsing the idea — which Democrats can easily cast as a partisan power grab — would carry immense political risk on the eve of reelection campaigns that already promise to be challenging. So, the governors have mostly distanced themselves from such proposals.

Editorials: Republican Redistricting in Virginia: The Three-Fifths Compromise | The Root

GOP leaders in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania — all blue states with Republican governors — have expressed interest in the electoral changes. But as Bloomberg columnist Albert Hunt writes, “If this sort of political coup had been pulled off earlier, instead of celebrations on the streets of Washington during last week’s presidential inauguration, there would have been violent protests.” Indeed. And African Americans may well have led the fight. This kind of disenfranchisement isn’t new to the black community, and its long, dark history has left too many scars to go unnoticed. Republicans were equally bold in their attempts to undermine minority votes ahead of the 2012 elections. Pennsylvania’s House Republican leader Mike Turzai declared that a voter-ID law would “help Mitt Romney win” — ostensibly by disenfranchising African Americans, college students and the elderly. In Ohio, a senior Republican official fought against extensions to voting hours, writing in an email that such a move would only serve the “urban — read African-American — voter turnout machine.”

National: GOP electoral vote changes going nowhere | Politico.com

Republican proposals in swing states to change how electoral votes are allocated have set off alarms that the party is trying to rig future presidential elections. But the plans are going nowhere fast. In the majority of states where such measures are being considered – Virginia, Florida, Ohio and Michigan, all states that voted for President Obama in 2012 but have Republican-controlled legislatures – proposals to split Electoral College votes proportionally have either been defeated or are strongly opposed by officials in those states. The only remaining states are Pennsylvania, where an electoral vote change was unsuccessful in 2011, and Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker has expressed hesitance about any changes to the system. “I just said I hadn’t ruled it out. I’m not embracing it because it’s a double-edged sword,” Walker said in a recent interview with POLITICO. “What may look appealing right now depending on who your candidate was might, four or eight years from now, look like just the reverse. And the most important thing to me long term as a governor is what makes your voters be in play. One of our advantages as a swing state is that candidates come here … that’s good for voters. If we change that that would take that away and would largely make us irrelevant.”

National: Republicans In Key States Drop Plans To Alter How Electoral College Votes Are Awarded | TPM

Four states down, and just two remain. Key Republican officials in Virginia, Ohio, Florida, and Michigan are coming out against a RNC-backed scheme to rig the electoral vote in Democratic-leaning states in order to boost Republican presidential candidates. That leaves just Pennsylvania and Wisconsin as the remaining blue states with Republican statehouses actively considering the idea. Virginia was the first state to move on the idea in 2013, advancing a bill out of a state Senate subcommittee that would apportion its electoral votes by Congressional district rather than the winner-take-all method used in 48 of the 50 states. Had it been in place the year before, Mitt Romney would have won 9 of the state’s electoral votes to President Obama’s 4 despite losing the state’s popular vote. But after Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) and key Republican lawmakers came out against it, the bill was defeated in committee Tuesday on an 11-4 vote.

Ohio: Secretary of State Jon Husted and other Republicans say Electoral College changes not in store for Ohio | cleveland.com

Count Ohio’s Republican leaders out of a GOP-backed effort to end the Electoral College’s winner-take-all format in the Buckeye State and other presidential battlegrounds. Spokesmen for Gov. John Kasich, State Senate President Keith Faber and House Speaker William G. Batchelder told The Plain Dealer this week that they are not pursuing plans to award electoral votes proportionally by congressional district. Batchelder went a step further, saying through his communications director that he “is not supportive of such a move.” And Republican Secretary of State Jon Husted, the state’s chief elections administrator, emphasized that he does not favor the plan either, despite Democratic suspicions based on reported comments that he said were taken out of context. “Nobody in Ohio is advocating this,” Husted said in a telephone interview.

National: Republicans hit obstacles to altering electoral college | latimes.com

A concerted Republican effort to alter the balance of power in presidential elections by changing the rules for the electoral college is facing significant hurdles — including from some GOP officials in the affected states. All but two states currently award electoral votes under a winner-take-all system. Plans to replace that with a proportional system are under consideration in half a dozen states, including Pennsylvania, Virginia and Michigan. All were presidential battlegrounds that President Obama carried last fall. But their state governments remain under Republican control, and some GOP lawmakers are pushing changes that would make it harder for Democrats to prevail in future contests. It is too early to say whether any of the proposals will become law this year, but the idea has attracted support on the national level. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, reelected to a new term on Friday, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel recently that the change was something that Republicans in blue states “ought to be looking at.” Democrats say the proposals are merely the latest in a series of GOP efforts to rig the rules of a game they are losing. And at least some Republicans seem to agree.

Wisconsin: Gov. Walker voices concerns about GOP Electoral College plan | Journal Sentinel

Gov. Scott Walker says he has a ”real concern” about a Republican idea to change the way the state awards its electoral votes, conceding the move could make Wisconsin irrelevant in presidential campaigns. A proposal now percolating in the GOP is to allocate most electoral votes by congressional district, instead of giving them all to the statewide winner. “One of our advantages is, as a swing state, candidates come here. We get to hear from the candidates,” said Walker in an interview Saturday at a conservative conference in Washington, D.C. “That’s good for voters. If we change that, that would take that away, it would largely make us irrelevant.” Walker says he has not yet taken a position on the issue. Republicans have suggested making the change in a handful of states such as Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, which have been voting Democratic for president but are now controlled by the GOP at the state level.

National: Republicans push for electoral college changes | HeraldNet.com

Republicans in Virginia and a handful of other battleground states are pushing for far-reaching changes to the electoral college in an attempt to thwart recent success by Democrats. In the vast majority of states, the presidential candidate who wins receives all of that state’s electoral votes. The proposed changes would instead apportion electoral votes by congressional district, a setup far more favorable to Republicans. Under such a system in Virginia, for instance, President Barack Obama would have claimed four of the state’s 13 electoral votes in the 2012 election, rather than all of them. Other states considering similar changes include Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, which share a common dynamic with Virginia: They went for Obama in the past two elections but are controlled by Republicans at the state level.

Editorials: Republican plans for Electoral College reform: Democrats shouldn’t worry about the GOP’s ideas for changing voting rules in Virginia, Wisconsin, or Pennsylvania | Slate Magazine

Sound the alarm! Democrats are on high alert! Josh Marshall calls it a big, big deal. Eric Kleefeld says if the blueprint were in place last November, the GOP would have “stolen 2012 for Mitt Romney.” Steve Benen of the Maddow Blog calls it a “democracy-crushing scheme” showing that “the will of the voters and the consent of the governed are now antiquated concepts that Republicans no longer value.” They’re all talking about potential plans to change the method for electing the president in states like Virginia, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania—states that have Republican legislatures and governors but voted for Obama in 2012. Instead of awarding all of the state’s Electoral College votes to the presidential candidate getting the most votes in each of these states, under the proposed plans most of the Electoral College votes would be awarded to the winner in each congressional district—and thanks to Republican gerrymandering of those districts, such a scheme would be a windfall for Republicans. This plan would be deeply concerning if Republicans were really going to enact it. But the same self-interest that is leading Republicans to consider this move is also going to lead most of them to abandon it almost everywhere. The Great Democratic Freak-out is unjustified. But it is not without its usefulness, because it reminds wavering Republicans what they will face if they go down the road of unilateral Electoral College reform.

Editorials: The long past and perilous future of gaming the Electoral College system | The Week

Following another bitter presidential loss, Republicans in several states are pushing for rule changes that would boost their odds in future races — essentially, switching the Electoral College allocation method in Democratic-leaning swing states from the current winner-take-all system to one that would help Republicans capture at least some electoral votes in those battlegrounds. In the short run, of course, such changes would probably help Republicans siphon off electoral votes in states like Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. But these rule changes would also make a mockery of the concept of fair elections, and harm the twin Republican principles of conservativism and federalism. Currently, all but two states award Electoral College votes using a winner-take-all system (called the Unit Rule). The Unit Rule is not mandatory. Other methods have been used in the past, including having the state legislature hand out the electoral votes however it sees fit. Another popular alternative method, one that is currently used by Maine and Nebraska, is giving one electoral vote to the winner of each congressional district.

Virginia: GOP’s electoral vote scheme likely illegal in Virginia | MSNBC

A scheme under consideration in Virginia to rig the Electoral College in Republicans’ favor could well violate a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, experts on the law say. But that very provision is itself under challenge by the GOP, and could be struck down by the Supreme Court later this year. A Republican bill that would allocate Virginia’s electoral votes based on the popular vote in each congressional district cleared its first hurdle in the state legislature Wednesday. Had the bill been in effect in the last election, Mitt Romney would have won 9 of Virginia’s 13 electoral votes, despite losing the popular vote in the state to President Obama by nearly 5 percentage points. Republicans have raised versions of the idea in several other blue states where they currently have state-level control, including Wisconsin, Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. If all four states approved the plan, future GOP presidential candidates would get a major—and anti-democratic—leg up.

Virginia: Governor signals opposition to GOP lawmaker’s Electoral College scheme | The Hill

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) will not support a bill that would have reapportioned how his state awards presidential electors, a move that will effectively kill the effort in the state Senate to replace the winner-take-all system currently in place. “The governor does not support this legislation,” McDonnell spokesman J. Tucker Martin said in a statement. “He believes Virginia’s existing system works just fine as it is. He does not believe there is any need for a change.” If the bill were to have succeeded, presidential candidates would have been awarded electoral votes by how they performed in each of the state’s congressional districts, with the winner of the most congressional districts receiving two additional votes. Under such a system, President Obama would have won only four of the state’s 13 electoral votes in the 2012 election, despite winning the state 51-47 percent.

Editorials: Electoral College Gerrymander: This is a Big, Big Deal | TPM

A week ago I noted a new Republican push to gerrymander the electoral college to make it almost impossible for Democrats to win the presidency in 2016 and 2020, even if they match or exceed Barack Obama’s vote margin in 2012. Is something like that really possible? Yes, very possible. To review, here’s how it works. The US electoral college system is based on winner take all delegate allocation in all but two states. If you get just one more vote than the other candidate you get all the electoral votes. One way to change the system is go to proportional allocation. That would still give some advantage to the overall winner. But not much. The key to the Republican plan is to do this but only in Democratic leaning swing states — not in any of the states where Republicans win. That means you take away all the advantage Dems win by winning states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and so forth. But the Republican plan goes a step further.

Florida: House Speaker Weatherford opposed to GOP Electoral College plans | Tampa Bay Times

Republicans in five states, notably Virginia, have discussed changing the way they award Electoral College votes in presidential races by apportioning them on each congressional district, rather than thestate’s popular vote. The reason: Republican Mitt Romney would have won the presidency despite losing the popular vote in states where the GOP controls the legislatures: Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Florida. But Florida, the largest swing state, won’t go along with changing the Electoral College if Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford has any say (and he has a major say).

Virginia: Group Working To End Electoral College Condemns GOP’s ‘Indefensible’ Virginia Scheme | TPM

FairVote, a non-partisan advocacy group, wants to radically transform the Electoral College through state legislation. So do Virginia Republicans pushing a scheme to reapportion their electoral votes by Congressional district. But the similarities end there as FairVote is condemning the Virginia bill as a partisan perversion of their own mission. FairVote executive director Rob Richie described the Virginia plan as “an incredibly unfair and indefensible proposal” to TPM and said he was drafting a message to supporters rallying against its passage. He testified against a similar proposal in Pennsylvania, whose lawmakers briefly considered splitting its electoral votes for the 2012 election before backing down amid a public outcry against the maneuver.

Editorials: Virginia Republicans Move Forward with Mass Disenfranchisement | American Prospect

This morning, I wrote on an emerging Republican plan—in swing states won by President Obama—to rig presidential elections by awarding electoral votes to the winner of the most congressional districts. Because Democratic voters tend to cluster in highly-populated urban areas, and Republican voters tend to reside in more sparsely populated regions, this makes land the key variable in elections—to win the majority of a state’s electoral votes, your voters will have to occupy the most geographic space. In addition to disenfranchising voters in dense areas, this would end the principle of “one person, one vote.” If Ohio operated under this scheme, for example, Obama would have received just 22 percent of the electoral votes, despite winning 52 percent of the popular vote in the state. For this reason, I didn’t expect Republicans to go forward with the plan—the risk of blowback is just too high. My skepticism, however, was misplaced. In Virginia, a local news station reports that just this afternoon, a state Senate subcommittee recommended a bill end Virginia’s winner-take-all system and apportion its 13 electoral votes by congressional district.

Editorials: Voting Requires Vigilance. Popular Isn’t Always Prudent | CT News Junkie

One third of Americans vote on machines, without the paper ballots we use in Connecticut. Our president is chosen based on faith in those unverifiable machines, vote accounting, and unequal enfranchisement in 50 independent states and the District of Columbia. In 2000, we witnessed the precarious underpinnings of this state-by-state voting system combined with the flawed mechanism of the 12th Amendment and the Electoral Accounting Act. The Supreme Court ruled votes could not be recounted in Florida, because even that single state did not have uniform recount procedures. What could possibly make this system riskier? The National Popular Vote Compact now being considered in states, including Connecticut, would have such states award their electoral votes to a purported national popular vote winner. The Compact would take effect once enough states signed on, equaling more than one-half the Electoral College. Then the President elected would be the one with the most purported popular votes. Sounds good and fair at first glance. Looking at the touted benefits and none of the risks many legislators, advocates, and media influence the public to make the Compact popular in some polls. Popular is not always prudent. Voting requires vigilance.

Voting Blogs: Tying Presidential Electors to Gerrymandered Congressional Districts will Sabotage Elections | Brennan Center for Justice

Recently Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Virginia introduced legislation to make the distribution of electoral votes for president dependent on the votes in each congressional districts instead of statewide results. Legislation to that effect has been introduced in Michigan, Wisconsin, andVirginia, and there are serious discussions in Pennsylvania. Legislators in states like Florida and Ohio also may introduce similar legislation. Currently, only Maine and Nebraska (a state with a unicameral, bipartisan legislature) allocate their electoral votes in a similar fashion. Most critics of this plan identify it as a scheme by the GOP to rig the election to improve its chances to elect a president. But there are a number of reasons to object to this proposal beyond its partisan intent or impact. Significantly, it would import into the presidential election process the dysfunction that plagues the congressional districting process. The problems with redistricting include not only partisan gerrymandering but also citizen exclusion from the redistricting process, imbalanced districts based on prison-based gerrymandering, and chronic problems with Census undercounts.

National: GOP eyes new election laws | Washington Times

After back-to-back presidential losses, Republicans in key states want to change the rules to make it easier for them to win. From Wisconsin to Pennsylvania, GOP officials who control legislatures in states that supported President Barack Obama are considering changing state laws that give the winner of a state’s popular vote all of its Electoral College votes, too. Instead, these officials want Electoral College votes to be divided proportionally, a move that could transform the way the country elects its president. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus endorsed the idea this week, and other Republican leaders support it, too, suggesting that the effort may be gaining momentum. There are other signs that Republican state legislators, governors and veteran political strategists are seriously considering making the shift as the GOP looks to rebound from presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s Electoral College shellacking and the demographic changes that threaten the party’s long-term political prospects.

Editorials: Rigging Democracy | In These Times

Many center-left political analysts tout Barack Obama’s re-election as affirmation that the unfolding demographic changes in the United States will inevitably vanquish the Republican Party as we know it. But before progressives sit back on their heels and wait for history’s just rewards, a deeper look at the 2012 election results is in order. Obama’s victory overshadowed the fact that Republicans maintain control of the House of Representatives and won dramatic victories at the state level that seem almost mathematically miraculous in how they flout majority rule. Most strikingly, Republican congressional candidates were able to convert their national 49 percent of the major-party House vote into 54 percent of seats. (Democrats received 51 percent of the major-party House vote and 46 percent of seats.) Republicans also increased the number of states over which they have monopoly control, securing the governorship and both legislative bodies of 26 states. This has national implications. The fact that Republicans have firm control over 13 Southern legislatures that make up more than one-quarter of states gives them veto power over any proposed constitutional amendment. Consequently, those seeking to overturn Citizens United by amending the constitution will need the support of at least one Republican-run legislature in the South.

Editorials: GOP Embraces Nuclear Gerrymandering | TPM

It wasn’t so long ago, coming off a bruising presidential election, that Republicans were looking at ways to increase vote percentages among younger and minority voters to remain a contender in national elections. But it appears professional Republicans have decided that’s either impossible, unnecessary or perhaps just too hard. Because now they’re going for another possibility: rig the electoral college to insure Republican presidential victories with a decreasing voter base. In other words, nuclear gerrymandering. The plan is to game the electoral college to rig the system for Republicans. It works like this. Because of big victories in the 2010 midterm — and defending majorities in 2012 — Republicans now enjoy complete control of a number of midwestern states that usually vote Democratic in national (and increasingly in senatorial) elections. It may be temporary control but for now it’s total. Use that unified control in states like Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania to change the system of electoral vote allocation from winner-take-all to proportional allotment. So if you win Ohio by one percent you get about half the electoral votes and just a smidge more as opposed to winning everything.

Editorials: National Popular Vote foes coalesce | The Orange County Register

It looks like Republicans may keep the Electoral College alive and well. I wrote in November about the momentum of the National Popular Vote movement, which aims to sidestep the Electoral College by having states agree to give all their electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the popular vote nationwide. The intent is to make sure the Electoral College can no longer seat presidents who haven’t won the popular vote, a phenomenon that’s occurred four times. So far, eight states – including California – and the District of Columbia have signed the compact, which would kick in when states with a combined total of 270 electoral votes have agreed to the plan.

National: Obama’s re-election official: 332 electoral votes, 51.1 percent of popular vote | Pentagraph

President Barack Obama was declared the winner of the 2012 presidential election Friday in a special joint session of Congress, finally closing the book on the tumultuous and expensive campaign. Vice President Joe Biden, serving as president of the Senate, presided over the counting of Electoral College votes from the 50 states and the District of Columbia in the sparsely attended session. The vote count lacked the history of 2009, when Obama became the first black president, or the controversies of 2001 and 2005, when some lawmakers protested contested votes in Florida and Ohio, respectively. As expected, the Obama-Biden ticket received 332 votes for president and vice president, well in excess of the 270 needed to win. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Rep. Paul D. Ryan, R-Wis., received 206 votes. There were no “faithless electors,” or members of the Electoral College who cast votes for a different candidate than the one who had won in his or her state.