Walz says Electoral College 'needs to go,' but Harris campaign says that's not its position

WASHINGTON — Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz endorsed abolishing the Electoral College during a Tuesday fundraiser, prompting his own campaign to distance itself from the position.

Walz, the two-term governor of Minnesota, brought up the Electoral College – the system used to elect presidents since the nation's founding – while speaking to supporters at a Kamala Harris campaign fundraiser at the Sacramento home of California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

"I think all of us know, the Electoral College needs to go. We need a national popular vote," Walz said to applause from donors. "But that's not the world we live in.

"So we need to win Beaver County, Pennsylvania. We need to be able to go into York, Pennsylvania and win. We need to be in western Wisconsin and win. We need to be in Reno, Nevada and win. And the help that you give here today helps make that happen," Walz said.

Getting rid of the Electoral College is not an official position of the Harris campaign, a campaign official told USA TODAY.

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The Electoral College system – which awards electors based on a state's congressional representation – has skewed toward Republicans in recent elections because of the influence it places on smaller rural states.

Democrats have won seven of the last eight popular votes in presidential elections dating back to 1992. And in two cases, Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Al Gore in 2000, Democrats won the popular vote but still lost the Electoral College.

Most polls have Harris leading former President Donald Trump nationally in next month's election, but it's a much tighter contest in the race to 270 electoral votes. The outcome will likely be decided by seven top battleground states.

"Governor Walz believes that every vote matters in the Electoral College and he is honored to be traveling the country and battleground states working to earn support for the Harris-Walz ticket," a Harris campaign spokesperson said in a statement. "He was commenting to a crowd of strong supporters about how the campaign is built to win 270 electoral votes. And, he was thanking them for their support that is helping fund those efforts."

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The Trump campaign seized on Walz's remarks. "Is Tampon Tim laying the groundwork to claim President Trump’s victory is illegitimate?" Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. “Tampon Tim” is the Trump campaign’s nickname for Walz tied to a Minnesota policy he backed as governor to provide menstrual products to students in fourth though 12th grade in public schools.

Since being tapped as Harris' running-mate in August, Walz has faced scrutiny for a trail of past misstatements and gaffes. During his debate last week against Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance, Walz called himself "a knucklehead" when he was asked about discrepancies over the dates he previously said he traveled to China during the spring of 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests.

Supporters of the Electoral College argue the system forces campaigns to pay attention to voters in areas that would otherwise be ignored under a popular vote system. But critics counter that the Electoral College system has boiled elections down to only a handful of swing states, making voters in solidly blue or red states obsolete.

One method to abolish the Electoral College would be through a constitutional amendment. However, doing so would require support from two-thirds of the House and Senate and ratification from three-fourths of states – thresholds that make it a long-shot.

An alternative could be through the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which started in the mid-2000s in an effort to override the Electoral College. The compact requires states that sign the agreement to pass laws awarding its electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the national popular vote. Under the plan, the compact is not activated until enough states have joined to total 270 electoral votes.

The Democratic-controlled Minnesota legislature passed legislation in 2023 to join the compact, bringing the total to 205 electoral votes. As governor of Minnesota, Walz signed the measure.

Reach Joey Garrison on X, formerly Twitter, @joeygarrison.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Tim Walz says Electoral College 'needs to go' at fundraiser