Beto doubles down on call to abolish Electoral College

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Beto O'Rourke: Let's abolish the Electoral College

The Electoral College is one of the 'bad compromises' that the nation's founders made on 'day one,' Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke says at the We The People summit.

Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke reiterated his call on Monday to abolish the Electoral College.

Answering a question from the audience at the We The People summit in Washington, the former Texas congressman argued that doing away with the Electoral College would restore the trust of voters, impinge on the practice of gerrymandering and allow for fairer elections.

“Let’s abolish the electoral college,” O’Rourke said. “If we get rid of the Electoral College, we’d get a little closer to one person, one vote.”

He added: “Our democracy…it is warped, it is corrupted right now. It we don’t fix it, it’s never going to get better.”

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O’Rourke, who rose to national prominence during his failed campaign to unseat Republican Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas last fall, has spoken before about moving to abolish the Electoral College.

During an event at Penn State University last month, O’Rourke questioned how former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 presidential election despite receiving more votes overall than President Trump.

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“I think there’s a lot to that. Because you had an election in 2016 where the loser got 3 million more votes than the victor,” O’Rourke said in a video posted online.

He added: “It puts some states out of play altogether, they don’t feel like their votes really count.

“If we really want everyone to vote, to give them every reason to vote, we have to make sure their votes count and go to the candidate of their choosing,” O’Rourke said. “So I think there’s a lot of wisdom in that.”

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O’Rourke’s call echoes that of his fellow Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who also has advocated abolishing the Electoral College.

“Every vote matters and the way we can make that happen is that we can have national voting, and that means get rid of the Electoral College,” Warren said.

If the move is ever brought to fruition, it would almost certainly face a court challenge.

It has gained renewed attention amid Democrats grumbling about the Electoral College in the wake of President Trump's 2016 win. While he defeated Hillary Clinton in the electoral vote, he lost the popular vote by 2.9 million ballots.

Fox News’ Liam Quinn contributed to this report.