A mock Senate hearing will be the format for an event next week in Macomb County where the case will be made for and against abolishing the Electoral College in presidential elections.
Hosted by the Macomb County Bar Foundation, lawyers, judges and elected officials will face off, with one team arguing for the Electoral College and the other taking the opposing viewpoint. In the end, the audience will take a vote to decide which side won.
The event, which is free and open to the public, will take place at 11 a.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 21, at the Macomb Center for the Performing Arts, located on the Macomb Community College center campus at Hall Road and Garfield in Clinton Township.
The hearing participants will be: State Sen. Steve Bieda; Roseville Treasurer Mickey Switalski; District Judges Michael Chupa, John Chmura and
Matthew Sabaugh; Circuit Judges Matthew Switalski and Carl Marlinga; Casandra Ulbrich, an MCC vice president; county Sheriff Anthony Wickersham; and attorneys Laura Polizzi and William Barnwell.
The constitutionally mandated Electoral College has faced intense criticism since the November 2016 presidential election, when Democrat Hillary Clinton was the top vote-getter but Republican Donald Trump won the presidency by receiving a majority of Electoral College votes.
That marked the second time in the past five presidential election cycles that the state-by-state, winner-take-all system awarded the White House to the candidate who lost the nation popular vote. In 2000, Democrat Al Gore topped the raw vote total but lost the Electoral College to Republican George Bush.
