National Popular Vote Puts Rural Voters at Parity with Urban Voters
Claim: The National Popular Vote would give complete control to voters in just a handful of heavily populated states.
Reality: The current state-based winner-take-all method assigns inordinate amounts of importance to the handful of battleground states. National Popular vote would make every vote equal – putting rural voters at parity with urban voters.
National Popular Vote puts rural voters at parity with urban voters.
In 2012, 73 of the 253 post-convention campaign events took place in Ohio.(1) Obama won Ohio by just 3%, taking home all of its electoral votes as a result.(2) Romney’s dozens of campaign events in Ohio did nothing to affect the results, as he averaged 47% in polls the month prior to the election.(3) Instead, he could have attracted many voters by energizing his base in red states and appealing to swing-voters in blue. But, the state-based winner-take-all method makes those kinds of tactics irrelevant.
Meanwhile, our country’s most rural states are not considered battlegrounds and, as a result, receive no attention from candidates. These rural states are also largely and increasingly conservative, as evidenced by 87% of rural districts voting Republican in the 2018 midterm elections.(4) They’re not a small chunk of the pie, either; rural areas account for almost exactly the same population as the country’s 100 most populated cities.(5)(6)
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact would significantly amplify the voice of every voter, including conservative voters in flyover states, in choosing the president. Anyone who values the power of individuals and who advocates for individual rights should support the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact — it represents the ultimate devolution of power from a central government authority to the people.
References
(1) Koza, John R., et al. Every Vote Equal: A State Based Plan for Electing the President by National Popular Vote, 4th ed., National Popular Vote Press, 2013, pp. 33. http://www.every-vote-equal.com/
(2) Federal Elections 2000: Presidential General Election Results by State. Washington, D.C.:Federal Election Commission. https://transition.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2012/2012pres.pdf
(3) “2012 - Ohio: Romney vs. Obama.” RealClearPolitics. https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/oh/ohio_romney_vs_obama-1860.html
(4) Greenblatt, Alan. “Why Rural America Is Increasingly Red.” Governing, July 2016. https://www.governing.com/topics/politics/gov-rural-voters-governors-races.html
(5) “Largest Cities in the United States by Population.” Ballotpedia,https://ballotpedia.org/Largest_cities_in_the_United_States_by_population
(6) "United States Summary: 2010" 2010 Census of Population and Housing, United States Census Bureau, September 2012, https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/cph-2-1.pdf