In just a few days, the Electoral College will vote to decide the winner of the 2016 election and who will sit in The White House for the next four years. Many voters, who were shocked by the turnout of the election result, immediately turned their energy to the Electoral College as a last gasp way to prevent Donald Trump from taking control of the Oval Office come January 2017.
And while part of our angst might be out of partisan desire to keep The White House in Democratic hands, another reason that many Democrats (as well as some Republicans and Independents) are concerned is simply due to the sheer evidence that Trump might be a disaster for our country for the next four years.
Over the course of the campaign, while Donald Trump proved that he was a master at getting free media attention for his campaign and connecting with a segment of the population that felt they had been left behind by the 21st century economy, he also proved that he knew very little about how to conduct himself as a President and that he was unwilling to learn once elected.
During the campaign he mocked the disabled, claimed he knew more than the generals (because he has “a very good brain”), said he would get soldiers to murder terrorists’ families (a war crime) and speculated that we could default on our national debt because he could easily renegotiate it afterwards.
Since the election ended, Trump has walked back a number of his biggest campaign promises, delayed a press conference to discuss how he’ll separate himself from his business empire while President, and has forgone reading his daily security briefings, all the while taking the time to lash out at private citizens, the show Hamilton, and SNL on Twitter.
Finally, the bombshell revelation that Russia directly interfered with our election with the sole purpose of getting Donald Trump elected should give everyone pause. While no evidence has come out that Trump coordinated with Russia to get himself elected, he has all but vowed to give Russia everything that they want over the next four years. Trump has vowed to stay out of Syria despite the carnage being wrought on the people of Aleppo, he’s played coy on whether or not he would come to the aide of NATO countries if they were attacked, and by nominating Rex Tillerson to Secretary of State, he’s given the sign that oil sanctions could soon be removed from their country.
Each of these examples, according to our founding father Alexander Hamilton, could be reason enough for the Electoral College to deny Trump the Presidency and give it to Hillary Clinton.
But they won’t.
Although Trump is secretly despised by many in the GOP, Hillary Clinton is openly despised by them and many of their voters. Also, at last count Trump has 306 electoral votes to Clinton’s 232. In order for Clinton to win The White House, 38 or more Republican electors would have to change their vote from Trump to Clinton. While 10 or 15 Republican electors could possibly vote their conscious and not vote for Trump, the idea that 38 electors would switch their votes at this time is highly unlikely.
But what if Hillary Clinton were to make a statement promising to immediately step down as President if elected by the Electoral College? This action could give those Republican electors the cover that they need to vote for her and clear the way for Tim Kaine to become the next POTUS. Although Tim Kaine is also a Democrat, he highly respected on both sides of the aisle and is not nearly the lightning rod that either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump are. Kaine could then serve as the moderate, unifying President that we need in this time of great division in our country.
Hillary Clinton, who has served our country in one aspect or another for the last four decades, likely won’t be President after the Electoral College convenes next week. And while that will surely dismay the nearly 66 million people who voted for her, Clinton, in one last act of servitude to our country, could vow to step aside and prevent an unprepared and possibly dangerous Donald Trump from sitting in the Oval Office for the next four years.