text: There are currently 538 electors in the Electoral College (Source 1). And in order to win the presidency you need to have at least 270 electoral votes. But why is it like that? In the 2000 U.S. election Al Gore had more popular votes than George W. Bush did nationwide. But he lost the election because Bush had 271 electoral votes compared to Gore's 266 (Source 2). The Electoral College is widely known for being unfair but, there is a reason for that. Number 1 is the Certainty of Outcome. It's less likely to dispute over the popular vote than it is than the electoral vote. The reason is because of the winning candidate's share of the Electoral College invariably exceeds his share of the popular vote. (Source 3).