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The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact Federalism at Its Best

​People arrive at a polling location on the first day of early voting in Texas

Early voting records should scare GOP

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How Border Policies Are Reshaping South Texas Politics

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Congressional Inaction Raises Constitutional Change Alternative

Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico

Are Independent Voters About to Flip Texas?

Our Elections 'region' last dance features 2 princesses

Our Elections 'region' last dance features 2 princesses
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The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumApr 29, 2020
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
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Not one but two Cinderella teams have made it to the championship round of the Elections bracket in our reader-driven Democracy Madness contest.

Our No. 9 seed, the proposal to have fewer House seats but with several members elected from each congressional district, is taking on an even bigger underdog— No. 11, getting states to award their electoral votes to the national (not their own) winner of the presidential popular vote.

But which will be the belle of the ball?

Multimember districts had its biggest win of the tournament, over instituting term limits for Supreme Court justices. Meanwhile, the National Popular Vote Compact snuck past the No. 2 seed, creating independent commissions to draw legislative districts — the biggest upset of the tournament.

The finals last through Thursday, so press the Vote Now button to take your pick. (For more on the proposals, click the matchup, then each label.)

Sixteen proposals for reforming money in politics will get contested starting Monday. By the middle of May you will have chosen the single best of 64 ideas for fixing our democratic system.




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An opinion piece argues that America must revisit Reconstruction after the Trump era, starting with the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

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Radical Reconstruction: Looking to the Past To Move Forward

The last 11 years of electoral politics have plunged our nation into new lows: withdrawal and reentry into Middle Eastern conflicts, a politicized public health response during a pandemic, an attempted coup of the American government, and continual police brutality against people of color. Donald Trump’s existence on the political stage, in office or out, has held our nation hostage through repeated crises, leading us to the most divided time in our nation since the Civil War. The path forward for our young country doesn’t just require new ideas: we need to finally follow through on Reconstruction.

A blip in American history, Abraham Lincoln’s post-Civil War vision, called Reconstruction, was the proposed path forward for Southern reentry into American life. In exchange for loyalty to the Union and some guarantees of black civil protection, Lincoln prepared to readmit secessionist states into the Union, albeit with political restraints on numerous Confederate leaders.

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The Two-Party System or What?

The evidence continues to come in -- lately from USA Facts and the Unpopulist-- that the majority of American voters don't like our two-party political system. Yet there is no consensus on what we want to replace it with.

There does seem to be an assumption that if you don't like the two-party system, then you want a political system which supports more than two parties, namely a multi-party system.

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Brenda Núñez, voter registration supervisor for Nueces County, shows the home screen of the state's voter registration system in 2024. Election officials say they're still struggling to use the system, known as TEAM, to complete essential tasks.

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Election Officials Are Scrambling To Process Voter Registration Backlog Using a System They Say Does Not Work

At 6 p.m. a few days after the state sent Randall County election administrator Shannon Lackey a backlog of 3,388 of voter registration records, she was still at her desk, processing them after a full day of work.

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Presidents who lost the popular vote often faced economic turmoil. See the pattern from Harrison to Trump and how a 50-state strategy could change it.

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Path Forward from Economic Consequences of Non-Popular Vote Presidents

While losing the popular vote does not inherently cause economic ruin, the structural political weakness of entering office without a democratic majority mandate often compounded the economic challenges their administrations faced. These terms were marked by distinct economic hardships, structural imbalances, or severe financial crises.

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