In Pennsylvania, pending legislation would convert the presidential election process from a winner-take-all approach to a proportional one. If the proposed system had been in place in 2008, Obama would have had a net gain of just one electoral vote, as opposed to the 21 he did earn.
I recently interviewed the president and asked him about the contemplated change here and the other efforts across the country.
"With respect to Pennsylvania, the people of Pennsylvania will ultimately decide how they want to allocate their electoral votes, and I'll leave that to them," he said.
"I will say that my big priority is making sure that as many people are participating in our democracy as possible. Some of these moves in some of the other states that we've seen - trying to make it tougher to vote, restricting ballot access, making it hard on seniors, making it hard on young people - I think that's a big mistake."
The nonpartisan Brennan Center for Justice at New York University's School of Law has calculated how big that mistake could be. In a report issued last month, the center found that in states that have chosen to require IDs or proof of citizenship, restricted voter-registration efforts and reduced early voting will account for 171 electoral votes - 63 percent of the total 270 needed to win the White House.
Taken together, the center has estimated that more than five million voters could be affected. How significant is that? In 2000, the popular-vote margin between George W. Bush and Al Gore was 543,895, while Bush won over John Kerry by 3,012,166 votes four years later.
