If Gov. Jared Polis had his way, Donald Trump would have won Colorado’s electoral votes even though Coloradans in 2024 voted against Donald Trump by a 350,000-vote margin, an 11-point spread.

Under the “National Popular Vote” scheme enacted into law in Colorado in 2020, the state’s 10 electoral votes would have gone to President Trump. Yes, you can thank Polis and the Democrats who control the Colorado Legislature for trying to make sure our votes didn’t count.

All that has prevented this bizarre outcome was that only 18 states have joined the “National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.” The terms of the agreement say that it becomes policy as soon as a handful of other states join, enough to total 270 electoral votes.

Colorado’s legislators should make sure that never happens by withdrawing our state’s participation from the compact — now that it has become clear what it might mean for Colorado.

In 2019 the Colorado Legislature agreed — by strictly party-line votes in both Houses — to support New York, California and Illinois, the states pushing the measure to abolish the electoral college. Eight other medium-sized states and six very small ones have also joined, all of which would be essentially disenfranchised if the change becomes reality. In fact, if the election were decided by the popular vote rather than the Electoral College, voters in only nine large states would be enough to elect a president, even if the other 41 states voted differently.

Colorado voters had a chance to override the ill-advised state legislation on the 2020 ballot but failed to do so. Many clearly misunderstood the intent, and that is understandable. Supporters outspent opponents $5.2 million to $1.8 million (almost $1M of the supporter’s funds came from one individual). No wonder the message was confusing to many.

Some editorial writers confused the issue purposefully. The Denver Post wrote that, “It’s impossible to say who would have won in past elections had candidates been vying for the national popular vote instead of focusing on swing states, but we can say definitively that outcomes would not have been based on the decision of a handful of voters in a handful of states.” As we know, the exact opposite is true — voters in only nine states would decide the election.

Ballotpedia explained it simply at the time: “If the compact goes into effect, Colorado will give all of its electoral votes to the presidential candidate winning the most votes nationwide (often referred to as the national popular vote). With the compact not being in effect, Colorado’s electoral votes go to the presidential candidate receiving the most votes in Colorado.” The latter being the law and tradition in every state, and the only reason candidates must pay attention to small and medium states such as Colorado.

As the Gazette correctly pointed out at the time, “Compact members pledge to sacrifice their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote, even if the state’s voters chose the other candidate.”

So why would Colorado politicians have agreed to that?

Some of them were angry that George W. Bush defeated Al Gore in 2000, and that Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in 2016, both without winning the popular vote. But personal grievances and grudges make for bad policy, as we’ll see. The truth is that neither Gore nor Clinton won a majority of the popular vote either. Popular vote advocates like to pretend they support a “majority rule” approach, but their scheme would not require a majority — only that the candidate who received more votes would win, even if it wasn’t a majority. Thus, third party candidates who syphon off a few votes could easily sway the outcome.

The fact is that of the 51 presidential elections held in America since 1824, when most states began allowing the public to choose electors, 19 elections failed to give the winner a majority of the popular vote. Only once has the Electoral College reversed a popular vote majority, in the notoriously fraudulent 1876 election. America’s founders provided that when no candidate gets a majority of electoral votes, the House of Representatives decides who is president.

Had they based that process on the popular vote instead, a third of elections would have gone to the House — and in 2000 and 2016 that body, controlled by Republicans, would have chosen Bush and Trump, just as the Electoral College system did.

The existing system more than protects states like Colorado, it makes them relevant. It makes presidents pay attention to issues like water in the West, rather than simply giving California whatever it wants. And the 2024 election has proven, yet again, the even more important point: that without the Electoral College, Colorado’s votes would have been irrelevant to the process. A candidate who lost the popular vote here would have won Colorado’s electoral votes anyway.

I’m thrilled that Trump not only won the national popular vote in 2024, but he scored an impressive and important mandate. That doesn’t mean I think Colorado voters should be disenfranchised by bad state policy.

Surely the Legislature can now look at that prospect with 20-20 hindsight and agree that joining the National Popular Vote Compact was a bad idea for Colorado.

The compact explicitly allows for a state to rescind its participation (at least 6 months before the next inauguration) — that would help Colorado Democrats avoid the headline none of them want to see. They ought to do so right away.

Wil Armstrong is an entrepreneur and investor in Denver. He is the chairman of the Board of Trustees at Colorado Christian University and was Co-Chairman of Protect Colorado’s Vote in 2020.