National Popular Vote Compact Needs Pennsylvania and Michigan to Reach 270

The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is 48 electoral votes short of taking effect, and on Nov. 3 Democrats won full control of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Wisconsin and Nevada.

Each of the five will be a trifecta when the new legislatures and governors are seated, meaning one party holds the governor's office and both legislative chambers.

In the week since, one governor and one governor-elect have spoken in favor of an agreement that would change how the Electoral College is filled: Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, on a podcast over the weekend of Nov. 7–8, and Wisconsin Governor-elect David Crowley.

Whether the compact applies in 2028 turns on a date: it governs a presidential election only if it is in effect on July 20 of that year in states holding 270 electoral votes. As of Wednesday, Nov. 11, that date is 617 days away, and the count lets supporters lose one of Arizona, Wisconsin or Nevada and nothing more.

"I think that the national popular vote makes sense. My views on that have not changed."

Josh Shapiro, Governor of Pennsylvania, as reported by the Associated Press

Crowley told the Associated Press: We can do away with it.

The other three held back. Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs declined in a television interview on Monday, Nov. 9 to say whether she favored joining, AP reported.

On Tuesday, Nov. 10, the office of Michigan Governor-elect Jocelyn Benson would not comment, AP reported, and a spokesman for Nevada Governor-elect Aaron Ford said, There will be a time to talk about presidential elections, but right now Ford's focus is lowering costs for working families.

Patrick Rosenstiel, a senior consultant to National Popular Vote, told Fox News Digital the group has sponsors in each of the five states and expects bills to be pre-filed or introduced early in the 2027 sessions.

The mechanism is short. Under Article III of the compact's 888-word text, election officials in member states add up the votes cast in every state and the District of Columbia, then certify the elector slate tied to the national winner. The Electoral College still meets and votes; what changes is who the member states send to it.

So far the compact is law in 19 jurisdictions possessing 222 electoral votes, by National Popular Vote's count: 18 states and the District of Columbia. The newest is Virginia, one of the states with odd-year elections, where Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed the legislation in April 2026.

The members' 222 votes will not be reapportioned before 2028, because the National Archives' allocation from the 2020 census covers that election too.

Four combinations, no spare

The five states hold 61 electoral votes between them. If all five joined, the compact would stand at 283, more than it needs.

The margin is thinner than that suggests. Pennsylvania and Michigan together make 34, leaving 14 to find.

No single one of Arizona, Wisconsin and Nevada closes that gap. Any two do.

Take Michigan out and the other four total 46, two short. Take Pennsylvania out and they fall shorter still.

Only four combinations reach 270, and every one contains both Pennsylvania and Michigan.

In practice the bill has to become law in four of the five states. The two largest are not optional.

State	Electoral votes	Governor's position, Nov. 7–10	Can a petition hold the law for a public vote?
Pennsylvania	19	Shapiro: "makes sense"	No statewide veto referendum
Michigan	15	Benson's office: no comment	Yes: 5%, within 90 days of adjournment; not effective unless voters approve
Arizona	11	Hobbs: declined to say	Yes: 5%, within 90 days of adjournment; law only if voters approve
Wisconsin	10	Crowley: "We can do away with it"	No statewide veto referendum
Nevada	6	Ford spokesman: "There will be a time"	Petition allowed (10%); law is void only if voters reject it

Five states, 61 electoral votes, 48 needed. Sources: National Archives; Associated Press; state constitutions; Ballotpedia.

A petition can stop the clock

Passing the bill is not the same as counting toward 270. Article IV counts a state only once its enactment has "taken effect," which National Popular Vote's own explanation ties to each state's constitutional schedule.

Three of the five states allow a veto referendum, a petition that puts a law the legislature just passed to a public vote. Ballotpedia lists Arizona, Michigan and Nevada among the states that provide for one.

Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are not on the list, so there the only question is whether the legislature passes the bill and the governor signs it.

Michigan's constitution says no act takes effect until 90 days after the session ends unless two-thirds of each house votes for immediate effect.

Two-thirds means 26 senators and 74 representatives. Democrats were on course for 23 Senate seats and had at least 60 in the House, with several races still outstanding, Bridge Michigan reported on Nov. 4.

During those same 90 days, Michigan's constitution lets opponents file a referendum petition signed by 5% of the last vote for governor. A law so challenged is not effective "unless approved by a majority of the electors voting thereon at the next general election."

The next general election is Nov. 7, 2028, which is 110 days after the compact's cut-off.

The petition power does not reach "acts making appropriations for state institutions."

Arizona's constitution has the same structure, with the same threshold and the same deadline: a petition sends the act to the next regular general election, and it becomes law only if a majority approves.

Nevada's rule is milder. A petition there puts a statute on the ballot, but the text voids it only if voters disapprove.

Colorado shows how a hold works. Gov. Jared Polis signed that state's compact bill on March 15, 2019, opponents filed a petition, and the law stayed suspended until voters upheld it on Nov. 3, 2020 by 52.33% to 47.67%, according to Ballotpedia.

That was nearly 20 months. A hold of that kind in Michigan would cost the compact the 2028 election even if voters later said yes.

Then there is appetite. Wisconsin state Rep. Clinton Anderson, who plans to reintroduce a bill, told The New York Times: I want to make it a priority, but it's not the thing I heard on the doors I knocked.

In 2019 Nevada's then-Gov. Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, vetoed a compact bill that both Democratic-led chambers had passed, saying it would diminish the influence of smaller states, AP reported.

Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, made a similar point about all five to the Washington Examiner: Each one of them, currently today, is a presidential battleground state.

Rosenstiel, a Minnesota Republican, told AP a national vote forces campaigns to focus on every persuadable voter in every precinct across the nation.

What the courts will be asked

Supporters rest on Article II, which says each state shall appoint its electors "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct." The Supreme Court called that power "plenary" in McPherson v. Blacker in 1892, the Congressional Research Service has noted.

Any clean read of Article II, Section 1 makes it clear that states have the exclusive power to award electors, Rosenstiel told Fox News Digital. The only credible legal question is whether this compact requires congressional consent.

Opponents start with that question. Article I, Section 10 bars a state from entering "any Agreement or Compact with another State" without the consent of Congress, and the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty has pledged to sue, WLUK reported.

"It's an attempt to effectively amend the Constitution without actually amending the Constitution."

Lucas Vebber, deputy counsel, Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, to WLUK

The governing test dates from 1893. In Virginia v. Tennessee, the research service wrote, the court required consent only for compacts "tending to the increase of political power in the States" in ways that encroach on federal supremacy.

Wisconsin state Sen. Kelda Roys, a Madison Democrat whose session opens Jan. 4, 2027, told WLUK she thinks the compact would be in effect once the states approve it. Hans von Spakovsky of the conservative group Advancing American Freedom told Fox News Digital that Congress could consent by simple majorities.

Derek Muller, a Notre Dame law professor skeptical of the compact, raised a third issue with AP: differing state ballots could pose equal-protection problems under the 14th Amendment.

I think the Supreme Court will be interested, he said.

A state that changes its mind faces the same date. Any member may withdraw, but under Article IV a withdrawal on or after July 20, 2028 would not bind until the next president is qualified.

What remains is a request that four battleground states vote to stop being battlegrounds.

And in Michigan, the one the arithmetic cannot spare, the answer may turn on a signature count before any judge is asked.