Eliminating winner-take-all statuses would prevent candidates from winning the presidency without winning the nationwide popular vote, a phenomenon that occurred in four of the country’s 57 presidential elections.

In 2004, John Kerry would have won the election with a shift of 59,393 votes in Ohio, despite President Bush’s 3,000,000 vote lead nationwide.  In 2012, Mitt Romney would have been elected with a

shift of 214,393 votes, despite President Obama’s nationwide lead of almost 5 million votes.

“It’s the larger states that are the battleground states,” said Koza. “That’s one of the most persistent myths of the current system. People believe smaller states have an advantage, but they don’t.”

The 12 smallest states in the country have about the same population and have 40 electoral votes over Ohio’s 18, but Ohio hosted 73 of 253 post-convention campaign events.

“Ohio received a quarter of presidential candidate visits with only a population of 11 million,” said Koza. “Of the 13 smallest states in the country, [candidates] only campaign in one — New Hampshire.”