This is the system cobbled together at the last minute at the 1787 constitutional convention to address the needs of a country vastly different from ours. It is rotting American democracy from the inside out.

The rot spreads in two ways. First, by potentially awarding the presidency to the candidate who earns fewer votes among the people as a whole — which violates the fundamental premise of majority rule. (Before it vaulted him into the White House, Donald Trump saw how corrosive this feature was: “The Electoral College is a disaster for a democracy,” he tweeted on election night 2012, when he believed that his candidate, Mitt Romney, would defeat President Barack Obama in the popular vote and yet lose the election.)

Second, by violating the constitutional mandate of “one person, one vote.” In the presidential election, the value of your vote depends on where you live. If you live in one of the half-dozen or so “battleground” states, it matters hugely. If you happen to live in a “safe state,” as a vast majority of Americans do, it’s effectively irrelevant.