Question: Why don't the candidates get a proportion of the electoral vote?
Answer: In other words, why don't the candidates get votes equivalent to the amount of the popular vote they won for each state? It is up to the state legislatures to decide how electors are chosen. However, only Maine and Nebraska have chosen to split their electoral vote. All other states use what is known as the 'winner-take-all' system whereby the electors of the candidate who gains a plurality of the popular vote casts all the votes for that state.
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