As President Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden campaign in the closing days of the 2020 election, they are focused on a few key states, the states that have the Electoral College votes that will help them win the presidency.
They are doing this because a person running for president of the United States does not win the election with a majority of the votes cast on Election Day. Instead, he or she wins the presidency by winning at least 270 Electoral College votes.
The Electoral College is not a building, but a process that counts votes in states to assign “electors” to elect a U.S. president.
The Electoral College consists of 538 electors. The number of electors from each state equals the number of members in that state’s Congressional delegation – one for each House of Representatives member and one for each senator.
Currently, that number is 535, the Congressional delegations plus three delegates from the District of Columbia.
In the list below, you can see the states that have the most votes and the ones candidates place the most emphasis on and why some states get more visits by candidates than others.
Here are the number of delegates each state has in the Electoral College process:
- Alabama - 9
- Alaska - 3
- Arizona - 11
- Arkansas - 6
- California - 55
- Colorado - 9
- Connecticut - 7
- Delaware - 3
- District of Columbia - 3
- Florida - 29
- Georgia - 16
- Hawaii - 4
- Idaho - 4
- Illinois - 20
- Indiana - 11
- Iowa - 6
- Kansas - 6
- Kentucky - 8
- Louisiana - 8
- Maine - 4
- Maryland - 10
- Massachusetts - 11
- Michigan - 16
- Minnesota - 10
- Mississippi - 6
- Missouri - 10
- Montana - 3
- Nebraska - 5
- Nevada - 6
- New Hampshire - 4
- New Jersey - 14
- New Mexico - 5
- New York - 29
- North Carolina - 15
- North Dakota - 3
- Ohio - 18
- Oklahoma - 7
- Oregon - 7
- Pennsylvania - 20
- Rhode Island - 4
- South Carolina - 9
- South Dakota - 3
- Tennessee - 11
- Texas - 38
- Utah - 6
- Vermont - 3
- Virginia - 13
- Washington - 12
- West Virginia - 5
- Wisconsin - 10
- Wyoming - 3
Real Clear Politics has a tool that allows you to view maps of various Electoral College scenarios, as well as the ability to build your own.
Click here to use RCP’s tool to make your own map.
Cox Media Group
