Electoral College: Minnesota Awards Clinton Votes; One Elector Refuses

Electors in all 50 states and the District of Columbia gathered Monday to officially seal the 2016 presidential election. Minnesota electors met in Saint Paul to give Hillary Clinton the state's 10 electoral votes after she won Minnesota by 44,765 votes.

Demonstrators came together for an anti-Trump rally outside the state's Senate office building where the meeting was held, according to the Star Tribune.

One elector had his ballot invalidated after he declined to vote for Clinton, thereby becoming a faithless elector, or someone who does not vote the same way their respective state went during the election. Muhammad Abdurrahman, representing the state's Fourth Congressional District, was dismissed and replaced by an alternate elector, reports Minnesota Public Radio's Brian Bakst.

Abdurrahman was a Bernie Sanders delegate to the DNC this summer.

Technically, electors are not constitutionally bound to vote according to popular vote results in the state they represent. However, Minnesota law binds electors to vote according to the popular vote tally.

In any other election year, this process would have gone along smoothly, but the Electoral College has come under the spotlight this year, with electors facing pressure to switch their votes from President-elect Donald Trump, who won 306 of the 538 electoral votes, safely above the margin of 270 needed to clinch the election.

Feroze Dhanoa contributed to this report.

Image via Keith Kissel, Flickr, used under Creative Commons