Donald Trump won the US Presidential elections in a shock result Tuesday night, defeating huge favourite Hillary Clinton in a near landslide victory.
Trump’s victory shocked the world, from Ghana all the way to any other country you could think of, as people hell bent on a Clinton win discovered the US wanted otherwise.
Anyway, whilst at this point its highly unlikely that anyone but Trump would win, there is a sliver of hope for all the crying Hillary fans, albeit just a very small one. It’s not exactly realistic but it’s still a possibility.
US democracy works under the electoral college system, meaning even though people have voted, it’s not their votes that directly elects the President. The winner of each state gets a certain number of electoral college votes, and at a later date, the electors in the college choose the President.
Those in the college system usually vote alongside the lines of the votes in their state, but there is nothing binding them to vote exactly that way. This means that any of the 279 electors (so far) pledged to Trump could decide not to vote for him and would face nothing more than a little fine in some states, or no consequences in others.
Trump’s candidature raised so much controversy that it’s entirely possible that some electors might feel reluctant to vote for him, and some even raised the possibility to Politico before voting day – but it’s highly unlikely that it could happen in enough numbers to swing the election to Mrs Clinton.
So hold on, Trump is still 99.99999% likely to become the 45th President of the United States. The electoral college meets in their respective states on December 19 to choose the next President of the United States.