[scarface74]

You realize the President won the election while losing the popular vote and more voters vote Democratic than Republican in both the House and the Senate bit because of both gerrymandering and the 2 Senators per state regardless of the population, Republicans have a disproportionate number of seats?

This isn’t meant to be a partisan statement, more to the point of how the voting system works in the US.

Besides that, people aren’t going to vote based on privacy. All a politician has to do is tell “terrorism” or “think about the children” and they can pass anything they want.

Not to mention that most regulations come via agencies run by unelected officials and judges are unelected and have a lifetime appointment.

[toast0]

No US president has won the popular vote, because no popular vote has been held. The rules of the contest influence the number of people who vote.

I do agree though, health care data handling is probably too niche to get people diselected, most voters are going to be more woried about other issues.

[scarface74]

A popular vote has been held. People who don’t vote are by definition not part of the popular vote.

[toast0]

Which US President was elected by the population? As far as I know, they were all elected by the results submited by the electors of each state, or the selection of the house of representatives (or through succession after a vacancy of the office).

Pretending there was a popular vote when there wasn't is like claiming whichever team scored the most points during a series of games won the series dispite the fact that the series is decided based on which team won the most individual games (although some tournaments do include total points scored as a tiebreaker).

[dialamac]

You are being overly obtuse. The term popular vote has a clear definition in US presidential politics and the meaning of “won” the popular vote has a clearly defined meaning. That this has no bearing on the outcome of the election is a separate issue but doesn’t diminish in the slightest the meaning of winning the popular vote.

[toast0]

The term may have a clear definition, but the value doesn't mean anything.

Without arguing if it's a good or a bad thing, we do not have a popular vote, and summing the votes of the individual contests is not a meaningful estimation of what the results would be if we did. If someone wants to take the time to make a nuanced estimate, with consideration of how turnout might change and what results we might see, that would make for an interesting discussion, and I'm sure we'd all have fun arguing over the details of the assumptions and the results.

[scarface74]

There was a “popular vote”. We know the exact count of who voted, whether the popular vote decided the outcome is completely orthogonal to whether it had an impact doesn’t say that it didn’t exist.

The fact that the popular vote is ignored because of how the system is designed is the entire point.