Trevor Noah explains how 'faithless electors' could legally hand Trump the presidency, but won't

Trevor Noah explains faithless electors — (Image credit: Screenshot/YouTube/The Daily Show)

"Joe Biden was declared the winner of the 2020 presidential election, but outgoing President Donald Jigglypuff Trump is still looking for ways to overturn the results," Trevor Noah said on Tuesday's Daily Show. "Recounts haven't worked for him, legal challenges haven't worked for him, and he even tried signing an executive order that Nov. 3 was opposite day, but somehow that didn't work. But it turns out there is one more thing that Trump could try."

"Even though Trump lost the election, some of his people are hoping that he could pull out a win by using 'faithless electors,'" Noah explained. This is a long shot, on par with "Mitch McConnell being on the cover of Men's Health, but theoretically, faithless electors could give Trump the presidency."

The framers of the Constitution decided that a slate of elite electors would choose the president, and while it's now expected that those electors will vote for the candidate their state chose, that's not required by the Constitution or any federal law, Noah said. "A lot of people do realize that this system is a problem. In fact, states were recently given the power to require electors to follow the will of the people. Unfortunately, very few of them actually do." (Fourteen, in fact.)

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"Now the good news is, Trump is down so many electors that it's unlikely that he can convince enough of them to to turn against their state's voters and vote for him," Noah said. "But the bad news is, it's easy to see how a future election could be close enough that the losing candidate could convince enough electors to make them the winning candidate, and it would be totally legal." Watch his suggestion for states, and his warning, below. Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.