What is the timeline of events of the US Presidential elections?

The US Presidential election starts gaining pace when the two major political parties -Democrats and Republicans- pick their President and Vice President nominees at the National Convention. The voting takes place on Election Day, scheduled for the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. All citizens who are registered to vote can vote on this date, which happens to be on November 5 this year. While counting commences the same day, it could take a few days before the next US president can be ascertained. But media houses and pollsters typically “call” elections in favour of a particular candidate by the next day based on the voting trends.

Does citizen vote decide the President? Why have the Electoral College system in that case?

Despite being the largest democracy, the US does not elect its President and Vice president directly on the basis of citizens’ vote. The US Constitution has defined an Electoral College system wherein each state has a fixed number of electors equal to the number of members in Congress. The political parties in each state choose a group of potential electors before the election. Other than in the case of Maine and Nebraska, the winner of the popular vote of a state gets all electoral votes of that state. For instance, if Trump wins a majority of the citizens’ vote in Texas, then the Republican party gets all the 40 electoral votes of the state.

A candidate needs the vote of at least 270 electors out of 538 total electors to win the presidential election. The electors typically vote for the candidate representing their party. Some states even require them to compulsorily follow the popular vote. So once the popular voting result is known, the number of electoral college seats of the Democrats and Republicans is also revealed, thus making the result a foregone conclusion. However, the meeting of the electors to vote and counting by Congress takes place in December.

How and where can citizens vote?

While the General elections is scheduled on November 5, more than 76 million people have already voted under the US early voting system, as per University of Florida’s election lab’s recent estimates. 47 out of 50 states (except Mississippi, New Hampshire, and Alabama) offer voters the opportunity to cast a ballot in person at a polling place ahead of election day, called early voting. Some states also offer ‘in-person absentee’ voting, which is also referred to as vote-by-mail. In this, a voter can request an absentee ballot, which is sent to them in the mail to fill out and return by either mail or drop off in a secured dropbox.

Have there been instances where a candidate won popular vote but was not elected President?

In just five elections in US history -1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016 – the candidate who became the president did not win the popular vote. In the 2000 elections, George W. Bush received fewer popular votes than Al Gore but received a majority of electoral votes, and in the 2016 elections, Donald Trump received fewer popular votes than Hillary Clinton but received a majority of electoral votes.

What happens if no candidate gets the majority of 270 electoral college votes?

If no candidate receives a majority of electoral votes, the Presidential election then moves to Congress. The House of Representatives elects the President from the three candidates who received the most electoral votes. Each state has one vote, and a candidate must receive at least 26 votes (majority of the 50 states) to be elected. The Vice president is elected by the Senate from out of the two candidates with the most electoral votes. Each Senator casts one vote for Vice President and a candidate must receive at least 51 votes (majority) to be elected. If the House of Representatives also fails to elect a President by Inauguration Day, the Vice-President Elect serves as acting President until the deadlock is resolved.

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