I know what the electoral college is. However it doesn't change the fact that the MAJORITY voted for Clinton.
And it just validated why the electoral college exists. The metropolitan areas of NY and LA don't represent the entire country! And Trump was not the ONLY one. Keep reading some more. I don't think you understand how it all works
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unite...ons_in_which_the_winner_lost_the_popular_vote
Elections[edit]
1824: John Quincy Adams[edit]
Andrew Jackson (left) won 10.5% more of the popular vote than elected President
John Quincy Adams (right) in 1824.
The
1824 presidential election was the first election in American history in which the popular vote mattered, as 18
states chose presidential electors by popular vote in 1824 (six states still left the choice up to their state legislatures). When the final votes were tallied in those 18 states,
Andrew Jackson polled 152,901 popular votes to
John Quincy Adams's 114,023;
Henry Clay won 47,217, and
William H. Crawford won 46,979. The electoral college returns, however, gave Jackson only 99 votes, 32 fewer than he needed for a majority of the total votes cast. Adams won 84 electoral votes followed by 41 for Crawford, and 37 for Clay.
[9] All four candidates in the election identified with the
Democratic-Republican Party.
As no candidate secured the required number of votes (131 total) from the Electoral College, the election was decided by the
House of Representatives under the provisions of the
Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Only the top three candidates in the electoral vote were admitted as candidates in this
contingent election. Henry Clay, as the candidate with the fewest electoral votes, was eliminated from the deliberation. As
Speaker of the House, however, Clay was still the most important player in determining the outcome of the election. The election was held on February 9, 1825, with each state having one vote, as determined by the wishes of the majority of each state's congressional representatives. Adams narrowly emerged as the winner, with majorities of the Representatives from 13 out of 25 states voting in his favor. Most of Clay's supporters, joined by several old
Federalists, switched their votes to Adams in enough states to give him the election. Soon after his inauguration as President, Adams appointed Henry Clay as his
secretary of state.
[9] This result became a source of great bitterness for Jackson and his supporters, who proclaimed the election of Adams a "
corrupt bargain," and were inspired to create the
Democratic Party.
[10][11]
1876: Rutherford B. Hayes[edit]
Samuel J. Tilden (left) won 0.9% more of the popular vote and still had to concede to elected President
Rutherford B. Hayes (right) in 1876.
The
1876 presidential election was one of the most contentious and controversial
presidential elections in American history. The result of the election remains among the most disputed ever, although there is no question that
Democrat Samuel J. Tilden of New York outpolled Ohio's
Republican Rutherford B. Hayes in the popular vote, with Tilden winning 4,288,546 votes and Hayes winning 4,034,311. Tilden was, and remains, the only candidate in American history who lost a presidential election despite receiving a majority (not just a plurality) of the popular vote.
[12]
After a first count of votes, Tilden won 184
electoral votes to Hayes' 165, with 20 votes unresolved. These 20 electoral votes were in dispute in four states: in the case of Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina, each party reported its candidate had won the state, while in Oregon one elector was declared illegal (as an "elected or appointed official") and replaced. The question of who should have been awarded these electoral votes is at the heart of the ongoing debate about the election of 1876.
The
Electoral Commission was formed on January 29, 1877 to debate about the 20 electoral votes that were in dispute. At the beginning of March, an informal deal was struck to resolve the dispute: the
Compromise of 1877, which awarded all 20 of the disputed electoral votes to Hayes. In return for the Democrats' acquiescence in Hayes' election (who agreed to serve only one four-year term as President without seeking re-election), the Republicans agreed to withdraw federal troops from the South, ending
Reconstruction. The Compromise effectively ceded power in the Southern states to the Democratic
Redeemers, who went on to pursue their agenda of returning the South to a political economy resembling that of its pre-war condition, including the disenfranchisement of black voters.
[13][14]
1888: Benjamin Harrison[edit]
Grover Cleveland (left) won 0.8% more of the popular vote than elected President
Benjamin Harrison (right) in 1888.
In the
1888 election,
Grover Cleveland of
New York, the incumbent president and a Democrat, tried to secure a second term against the Republican nominee
Benjamin Harrison, a former
U.S. Senator from
Indiana. The economy was prosperous and the nation was at peace, but although Cleveland received 90,596 more votes than Harrison, he lost in the
Electoral College. Harrison won 233 electoral votes, Cleveland only 168.
Tariff policy was the principal issue in the election. Harrison took the side of industrialists and factory workers who wanted to keep tariffs high, while Cleveland strenuously denounced high tariffs as unfair to consumers. His opposition to
Civil War pensions and inflated currency also made enemies among veterans and farmers. On the other hand, he held a strong hand in the South and border states, and appealed to former Republican
Mugwumps.
Harrison swept almost the entire North and Midwest (losing only Connecticut and New Jersey), and narrowly carried the swing states of New York and Indiana (Harrison's home state) by a margin of 1% or less to achieve a majority of the
electoral vote. Unlike the election of 1884, the power of the
Tammany Hall political machine in
New York City helped deny Cleveland the electoral votes of his home state.
[15][16]
2000: George W. Bush[edit]
Al Gore (left) won 0.5% more of the popular vote than elected President
George W. Bush (right) in 2000.
The
2000 presidential election pitted Republican candidate
George W. Bush (the incumbent
governor of Texas and son of former president
George H. W. Bush) against Democratic candidate
Al Gore (the incumbent
vice president of the United States under
Bill Clinton). Despite Gore receiving 543,895 more votes (0.51% of all votes cast), the Electoral College chose Bush as president by a vote of 271 to 266.
[17]
Vice President Gore secured the Democratic nomination with relative ease. Bush was seen as the early favorite for the Republican nomination, and despite a contentious primary battle with Senator
John McCain and other candidates, secured the nomination by
Super Tuesday. Many third-party candidates also ran, most prominently
Ralph Nader. Bush chose former
Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney as his running mate, and Gore chose Senator
Joe Lieberman as his. Both major-party candidates focused primarily on domestic issues, such as the budget, tax relief, and reforms for federal
social-insurance programs, though foreign policy was not ignored.
[18]
The result of the election hinged on
voting in Florida, where Bush's narrow margin of victory of just 537 votes out of almost 6 million votes cast on
election night triggered a mandatory recount. Litigation in select counties started additional recounts, and this litigation ultimately reached the
United States Supreme Court. The Court's contentious decision in
Bush v. Gore, announced on December 12, 2000, ended the recounts, effectively awarding Florida's votes to Bush and granting him the victory. Later studies have reached conflicting opinions on who would have won the recount had it been allowed to proceed.
[19] Nationwide, George Bush received 50,456,002 votes (47.87%) and Gore received 50,999,897 (48.38%).
[17]
2016: Donald Trump[edit]
Hillary Clinton (left) won 2.1% more of the popular vote than elected President
Donald Trump (right) in 2016.
The
2016 presidential election featured Democratic nominee
Hillary Clinton (former
U.S. Senator from New York,
Secretary of State, and
First Lady to President
Bill Clinton) and Republican nominee
Donald Trump, a businessman (owner of the
Trump Organization)
[20][21] from
New York City. Both nominees had turbulent journeys in primary races,
[22][23] and were seen unfavorably by the general public.
[24] The election saw multiple third-party candidates,
[25] and there were over a million
write-in votes cast.
[26]
During the 2016 election, "pre-election polls fueled high-profile predictions that Hillary Clinton's likelihood of winning the presidency was about 90 percent, with estimates ranging from 71 to over 99 percent."
[27] National polls were generally accurate, showing a Clinton lead of about 3% in the national popular vote (she ultimately won the national popular vote by 2.1%).
[27] State-level polls "showed a competitive, uncertain contest...but clearly under-estimated Trump's support in the
Upper Midwest."
[27] Trump exceeded expectations on Election Day by winning the traditionally Democratic
Rust Belt states of
Michigan,
Pennsylvania, and
Wisconsin by narrow margins.
[28] Clinton recorded large margins in large states such as
California,
Illinois, and
New York, winning California by a margin of nearly 4.3 million votes, while coming closer to winning
Texas,
Arizona, and
Georgia than any Democratic nominee since the turn of the millennium, but still losing by a significant margin.
[29] Clinton also won the Democratic medium-sized states such as
Maryland,
Massachusetts,
New Jersey, and
Washington with vast margins. Clinton managed to edge out Trump in Virginia, a swing state where her running mate
Tim Kaine had served as Governor. Trump also won the traditional bellwether state of
Florida along with the recent battleground state of
North Carolina, further contributing to the electoral flip of the popular vote. Trump won by a large margin in
Indiana,
Missouri,
Ohio, and
Tennessee.
When the
Electoral College cast its votes on December 19, 2016,
[30] Trump received 304 votes to Clinton's 227 with seven electors defecting to other choices, the most
faithless electors (2 from Trump, 5 from Clinton) in any presidential election in over a hundred years. Clinton had nonetheless received almost three million more votes (65,853,514 to 62,984,828) in the
general election than Trump, giving Clinton a popular vote lead of 2.1% over Trump.
[29][31]
After the election, Trump falsely claimed that "millions of people" voted illegally and robbed him of a majority of the popular vote.
[32][33] Trump repeated this debunked claim in a meeting with members of Congress in 2017,
[32] and in a speech in April 2018.
[34] In June 2019, Trump referenced a settlement that
Judicial Watch had recently reached with California "where California admitted to a million votes...there was much illegal voting." The Judicial Watch settlement actually related to purging 1.5 million inactive individuals from voter registration rolls.
[35]