Catherine Hensley (OU)
OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. (Nov. 13, 2020). – The 2020 election year brought back conversations and debate about the electoral college. Sen. Cooper from Oklahoma State University presented Senate bill OSU-011, which is also known as the “Winner Takes Deserved Act,” to the Senate proposing to split Oklahoma’s electoral votes based on the percentage of the state’s popular vote a presidential candidate receives. States have complete control as to how they allocate their electoral votes. The way Maine and Nebraska allocate their votes inspired Sen. Cooper to write similar legislation for Oklahoma.
“Oklahoma is among the states with the lowest turnout out,” Sen. Cooper said. “I believe this is due to how our state leans politically and how it is always guaranteed to lean one way, discouraging voters within the minority to turnout [to vote].”
Sen. Cooper said he believes this bill would help increase voter turnout among all political ideologies and help encourage presidential candidates to pay more attention to Oklahoma while campaigning.
The way Oklahoma allocates electoral votes right now allows the presidential candidate to receive all of the votes, even if they received half of the popular vote in the state.
One senator expressed some concerns that the bill would undermine the electoral college process.
“The electoral college was put in place for very good reason, and we must take care to safeguard our election system,” Sen. Shaw from Tulsa University said. “It preserves power to the states and every community, and this bill would be detrimental to the electoral weight of Oklahoma’s vote.”
Another senator said they support the bill because they also believe this would help increase voter turnout.
“As someone who grew up on the suburbs of Oklahoma City but is still technically a member of the same district as the panhandle, it can be very disheartening when voting because my political party is the minority in Oklahoma,” Sen. Fenderson from Oklahoma State University said.
Another concern from some senators was the type of bill it is. They said they believe it should be an amendatory bill; however, the author clarified that the way the current wording in the statute is, his proposed legislation can stand as a new-law bill.
After discussing and debating during caucussing, the bill was passed 14-4 with 8 senators abstaining from the vote.
