Texas' 'faithless electors' unlikely to affect outcome of 2016 race
Normally a footnote to the campaign, Electoral College gains attention this year because of a handful of defectors.
Texas' 'faithless electors' unlikely to affect outcome of 2016 race Normally a footnote to the campaign, Electoral College gains attention this year because of a handful of defectors. Check out this story on caller.com: http://callertim.es/2i22pI0
John C Moritz, USA Today Network Published 11:11 p.m. CT Dec. 17, 2016
President-elect Donald Trump gives his acceptance speech during his election night rally, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016, in New York. Texas electors will meet Monday at the state Capitol in Austin, as will their counterparts in other states and the District of Columbia, to cast electoral votes, which officially will make Trump president-elect.(Photo: John Locher/Associated Press)
AUSTIN – Like a lot of Texas Republicans, Donald Trump wasn't Scott Mann's first choice for president this year. That honor went to U.S. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky. When Paul's candidacy fizzled, Mann backed his fellow Texan Ted Cruz.
But once Trump won his party's nomination, Mann pledged to vote for him twice, and that's what he intends to do.
Mann is among the 38 members of the Electoral College from Texas who, because the Republican ticket carried the state in November, will be in Austin on Monday to help officially make Donald Trump the 45th president of the United States.
Ordinarily, the meeting of the presidential electors of the 50 states and the District of Columbia on the third Monday of December is the least covered event of the long election cycle. But this year, the process will likely be front and center because handful of electors from around the nation — including two from Texas — have said they won't vote for Trump.
But even though Mann joined the Trump bandwagon only after his first options were eliminated, he plans to vote for the candidate who won Texas on Election Day.
"When Texas electors were chosen last May 14 it was clear that Donald Trump was the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party," Mann, a political operative from Lubbock, wrote on his blog, Standstorm Scholar. "Every person who asked to be an elector did so fully informed of who was to be the nominee.
"Each of us signed a pledge that, as electors, we will support the nominee when called to Austin on December 19."
The item was posted on the blog after Texas elector Christopher Suprun of Dallas wrote in New York Times opinion piece that he plans to vote for another as-yet-to-be-named Republican, citing Trump's rhetorical excesses and saying he "lacks the foreign policy experience and demeanor needed to be commander in chief."
FILE - In this Nov. 10, 2016 file photo, President-elect Donald Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wis., pose for photographers after a meeting in the Speaker's office on Capitol Hill in Washington. President-elect Donald Trump's relationship with House Speaker Paul Ryan, once rocky, smooth for now, is just the latest in a series of recent pairings between the White House occupant and the speaker. They are often the most important and defining relationships in a presidency. (Photo: Alex Brandon/Associated Press)
That came after Houston area elector Art Sisneros resigned saying religious objections would not allow him to cast his vote for Trump.
Both Sisneros and Suprun, each dubbed "faithless electors" because of their refusal to follow the state's popular vote, have noted that the Electoral College was something of a fail-safe that the framers included in the U.S. Constitution. In article titled "Federalist No. 68," Alexander Hamilton wrote that electors could in effect nullify the will of the voters in the event they were to choose a presidential candidate with "talents for low intrigue" and other shortcomings.
David Thackston, an elector from El Paso, said those who cite that 18th century writing as a justification for turning their back on the majority of Texas voters are misguided. Like Mann, Thackston said he's received hundreds of letters and emails urging him vote against Trump, but found them unpersuasive.
"The voters of the state of Texas think Donald Trump is fit candidate," Thackston said. "So do I."
Thomas Knight, an elector from Corpus Christi, agreed. "I intend to honor my oath," he said.
Electors in Texas, as in other states, are chosen by the state's political parties. Republicans and Democrats each field a slate of electors, but only those from the party that carries the state actually cast electoral votes.
Texas does not bind its electors to back the candidate who wins the state's popular vote, but 29 others and the District of Columbia do.
President-elect Donald Trump (left) walks with his son Barron (center) and wife Melania, to speak at an election night rally, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016, in New York. Texas electors will meet Monday at the state Capitol in Austin, as will their counterparts in other states and the District of Columbia, to cast electoral votes, which officially will make Trump president-elect. (Photo: Evan Vucci/Associated Press)
A Texas-based organization calling itself the Hamilton Defenders has promised to provide legal counsel to electors who might face fines or other repercussions for casting their vote against Trump. The organization, which did not respond to an interview request, set up an online fundraising effort to offset its expenses. It was about half way to its goal of collecting $45,000 last week.
After Suprun went public with his decision not to follow the Texas popular vote, both Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who chaired Trump's campaign effort in Texas, said it might be time to change Texas law to compel its electors to back the state's popular vote winner.
Patrick called Suprun's move "a slap across the face" of the nearly 4.7 million Texans who cast their votes for Trump. Abbott took to Twitter to express his dismay.
"Rogue Texas elector could lead to binding law," the governor tweeted. "This must be done as part of our election integrity plan."
Michael Joyce, spokesman for the Texas Republican Party, said that party activists who seek to become electors sign an affidavit pledging support for the GOP nominee. The Republicans are on a 10 presidential-election-cycle winning streak in Texas and the party has never had to worry about electors defecting until this year.
"We expect them to do what they say they're going to do," Joyce said, adding that Sisneros will be replaced during Monday's meeting of the Texas electors. "And that is honor their oath. That's what everyone else has done. To me, (electors defecting) is just a publicity stunt."
Brandon Rottinghaus, a University of Houston political science professor, predicted that once the dust settles, the electoral votes on Monday will neatly track the outcome on Election Day when according to the state-by-state returns, Trump collected 306 to Democrat Hillary Clinton's 232. It takes 270 votes to claim the presidency.
"Going forward, you might see electors in future elections to go their own way regardless of how their states voted," Rottinghaus said. "But I don't think the process will unravel."
He agreed, however, that the founders did "intend for the electors to the sane voice in a chaotic process."
But the lesson for this cycle, Rottinghaus said, might be that the state parties around the nation should be more mindful when deciding who gets chosen for the Electoral College.
"In the past, so little attention is paid because there's never a surprise," he said.
Mann, the Lubbock elector, said there might come a time when the college should sidestep the will of the people so the Texas process should not be changed. El Paso's Thackston and Knight of Corpus Christi agreed that tinkering with the process is not necessary.
"As far as I'm concerned," he said, "the oath is sufficient."
El Paso Times staff writer Marty Schladen contributed to this report.
John C. Moritz covers Texas government and politics for the USA Today Network in Austin. Contact him at John.Moritz@caller.com and follow him on Twitter @JohnnieMo.
Texas' role in the Electoral College
Under the "Meeting of the Electors" provision of the Texas Election Code, Texas Secretary of State Carlos Cascos will convene the electors in the Capitol at 2 p.m. Monday. Once convened, the electors will choose a chairperson from their own ranks to preside over the voting. Texas will join the other states and the District of Columbia in submitting its electoral votes to Congress where they will be ratified on Jan. 6 to finally settle the outcome of the presidential election.
The Texas Electors
MARTHA RHYMES
Congressional District 1 (East Texas)
THOMAS MOON
Congressional District 2 (Houston area)
CAROL SEWELL
Congressional District 3 (Colin County/Plano area)
Congressional District 4 (Northeast Texas)
SHERRILL LENZ
Congressional District 5 (Dallas area)
NICHOLAS CIGGELAKIS
Congressional District 6 (Arlington, counties to the southeast)
WILLIAM HICKMAN
Congressional District 7 (Houston and eastern suburbs)
LANDON ESTAY
Congressional District 8 (Houston and counties to the northeast)
REX LAMB
Congressional District 9 (Houston and suburbs south and east)
ROSEMARY EDWARDS
Congressional District 10 (Stretches from Austin to eastern Houston)
MATT STRINGER
Congressional District 11 (West Texas; includes San Angelo and Midland)
SHELLIE D. SURLES
Congressional Disrtrict 12 (Fort Worth and counties to the west)
MELISSA JUETT KALKA
Congressional District 13 (Wichita Falls to Amarillo and the Panhandle)
(Congressional District 14 (Gulf Coast northeast of Houston to Galveston)
SANDRA A. CARARAS
(Congressional District 15 (Fron San Antonio to Edinburg)
DAVID THACKSTON
Congressional District 16 (El Paso)
(Congressional District 17 (Waco and counties east and south)
MARJORIE MARTHA FORSTER
Congressional District 18 (Central Houston and nearby areas)
Congressional District 19 (From north and west of Lubbock to Abilene)
MARIAN STANKO
Congressional District 20 (San Antonio and communities to the west)
CURTIS NELSON
Congressional District 21 (Includes much of the Hill County and parts of Austin and San Antonio)
Congressional District 22 (Sugar Land and communities south and east of Houston)
KENDELL MUENZLER
Congressional District 23 (From San Antonio to El Paso and the Big Bend)
ALEXANDER H. KIM
Congressional District 24 (Dallas-Forth Worth area)
VIRGINIA ABEL
Congressional Disrtrict 25 (South of Dallas-Fort Worth to Austin)
JOHN DILLARD
Congressional District 26 (Fort Worth and suburbs to the north)
Congressional District 27 (Corpus Christi and areas to the north and west)
MARIAN KNOWLTON
Congressional District 28 (From San Antonio to Laredo)
REX TETER
Congressional District 29 (Houston area)
STEPHEN SUPRUN JR.
Congressional District 30 (Dallas area)
JON JEWETT
(Congressional District 31 (North and west of Austin)
SUSAN FISCHER
LOREN BYERS
Congressional District 33 (Fort Worth area)
WILLIAM LAWRENCE GREENE
(Congressional District 34 (West of San Antonio to Brownsville)
MARY LOU ERBEN
Congressional District 35 (Austin to San Antonio)
ART SISNEROS (Resigned; will be replaced)
Congressional District 36 (Southeast Texas)
FRED FARIAS
Statewide elector
CANDACE NOBLE
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