As this recently updated article discusses, while extremely unlikely, given the way this timeline is going it’s possible the electoral college ends in a tie. Nate Silver projects this as a .3% possibility.
Things to think about:
-
Only about half of the states require their electors to vote for the person that won their state. Who are the electors? Generally no one you know.
-
If there’s a tie, the House elects a president and the Senate elects a VP. Sub-consideration: it is the composition of the House and Senate after the November election that makes those determinations.
-
This would all technically be decided on January 6th. And you remember how that went last time.
Regardless, it’s highly unlikely this will happen. Still, this would be utter and complete madness. There is literally a non-zero chance we have a Trump/Harris administration. 🤣
Republicans have shown, you don’t need to amend the Constitution. You just need to appoint the people who “interprete” it.
Takes 50 years and multiple appointments.
Right now the court is 6-3. The two oldest judges are on the 6 side, Thomas and Alito.
If we’re super lucky, Harris will win in 2024 and get to replace 1 or both of them before 2028.
I feel safe in saying, neither one will voluntarily step down knowing a Democrat will replace them, so it’s VITAL to get Harris in in BOTH '24 AND '28.
Thomas was born in '48, Alito in '50. So in '28 we’re looking at an 80 year old and 78 year old. 84 and 82 in 2032. 88 and 86 in 2036.
These ages are not unheard of. Ginsburg was 87 when she died.
So we might not have a chance to reverse the 6-3 court until 2036/37/38?
All it will take is ONE Republican President between now and then to go “You know what, why don’t you step down so I can nominate somebody younger and lock in the conservative majority for another 50 years…”
Like Trump did with Justice Kennedy and Kavanaugh.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/04/trump-family-anthony-kennedy-brett-kavanaugh-dark-towers
Even if they die and Harris or another Democrat replaces them, that flips the court from 6-3 ® to 4-5 (D) and the next two oldest judges are Sotomayor (born 1954), appointed by Obama, and Roberts (born 1955), who has been more moderate on most issues than the other conservative judges.
So to undo the current makeup of the court, the Democrats have to keep the Presidency starting in 2024 and running through at least 2040. 16 years.
FDR/Truman was 1933 to 1953 so there is precedent, but that was before the 2 term limit. Since then, no single party has been able to hold for more than 12 years, Reagan, Reagan, Bush.
Eisenhower ® - 8 Years
Kennedy/Johnson (D) - 8 Years
Nixon/Ford ® - 8 Years
Carter (D) - 4 Years
Reagan/Bush ® - 12 Years
Clinton (D) - 8 Years
Bush II ® - 8 Years
Obama (D) - 8 Years
Trump ® - 4 Years
Biden (D) - 4 Years
Or they could expand the court and have one Supreme seat for each appellate court.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/democrats-introduce-bill-expand-supreme-court-9-13-justices-n1264132
Doing it through any method other than an amendment would just enter into a war of increased sizes. “Oh? You increased the size to 13? We’re doing 17, removed!”
Eventually, we’re all judges.
There’s ways to… speed things up a bit.
If we can’t change the court, why not force them into an ideological corner? Challenge the law that artificially limits the size of the house on Constitutional grounds. By going originalist thinking, the house should have 1 rep per lowest population state. This would allow higher population states to massively increase the number of representatives. The electoral collage number is Constitutionally based on the number of senators (2) per state, plus the number of representatives. This allows all votes to be equal.
The OG plan was 1 Congressman per 30,000 population, which right now would mean 11,000 congressmen. 😳 You think 435 is dysfunctional…