text: The Electoral College is a system that allots a certain amount of electoral votes to each state. Each state is given 2 electoral votes plus another amount of votes which depends on that state's population. The amount of votes ranges from 3 to 55 (source 3). A candidate must recieve 270 out of 538 possible votes. The candidate the electoral votes of a state go to is decided by the majority vote of each individual state. In all states but Maine and Nebraska give a candidate the entirety of their votes if the majority of its citizen votes for them (source 1). Some people don't even bother voting due to the fact that their vote will not contribute to their favored candidate's election. This happens often when a democratic voter lives in a republican state, and vice versa (source 3)