The Electoral College is at the heart of Democrats' problem, as I discuss below. This has been an endless debate for 4 years. A few thoughts:

If Democrats claim EC results are "illegitimate" without the popular vote, this is fundamentally undemocratic 1/

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/09/democrats-may-not-be-able-concede/616321/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_medium=social&utm_term=2020-09-13T14%3A30%3A06&utm_source=twitter

The Electoral College is itself the product of the democratic process. These are the rules of the game. As recently as 2012, there was no mass movement to abolish the EC, in part because Democrats believed (correctly) they could win through it 2/

Unless it violates the constitution, what the democratic process produces in a democracy is legitimate, regardless of whether we think it’s bad, and this applies more broadly. Badness has no bearing on the question 3/

If the Electoral College is a product of the democratic process (one that was widely accepted until recently), the democratic process is the one thing that can undo it. So Democrats should try to change it, but there's a strong likelihood they'll fail 4/

So what happens if we can't change the Electoral College? Does that mean every single election the Republicans win with the EC but not the popular vote for, say, the next 20 years will be considered illegitimate? How exactly would our democracy survive that? 5/

It's interesting how this new "movement" from prominent journalists to consider presidents who lose the popular vote as illegitimate started only after losing in 2016 and potentially losing again in 2020. Strange how their principles directly align with their electoral aims 6/