Bernie Sanders Gets At Least One Faithless Elector

On Monday, as electors gathered in their respective states to cast their ballots for president and vice president, there have been a few instance of faithless elector attempts. One Maine Democratic elector voted for Bernie Sanders rather than his party's nominee, Hillary Clinton. David Bright stated a few hours before the meeting of electors in Augusta, Maine that he was planning to vote for the Vermont senator. Bright posted on Facebook:

If my vote today could have helped Secretary Clinton win the presidency, I would have voted for her. But as the Electoral College meets all across this nation on this day, I see no likelihood of 38 Republican electors defecting from their party and casting their ballots for Secretary Clinton.

So Hillary Clinton will not become President, and there is nothing I can do about that. Knowing this, I was left to find a positive statement I could make with my vote.

However, as WLBZ 2, the NBC affiliate in Bangor, Maine reported, that vote was invalidated, and when there was a revote, the rogue elector cast his ballot for Clinton. The vote was then finalized. Ultimately, Clinton will take three of Maine's Electoral College votes, and President-elect Donald Trump will claim one.

You can read Bright's Facebook post in full below:

In Minnesota, there was also an incident of a Democratic elector refusing to vote for Clinton, but he was quickly replaced.

At the time of writing, it appears that significantly more Democratic electors voted (or tried to vote) for someone other than the party's nominee than Republican ones. NPR reported that seven Democratic electors attempted to defect, compared to two Republican ones.

While Bright attempted to vote for Sanders, the Vermont senator does not appear to have been the most popular choice among Democratic faithless electors. Three of the four Washington state faithless electors voted for Colin Powell, who somewhat ironically, is a Republican and served as George W. Bush's secretary of state.