Bush and Trump were able to win the electoral vote while losing the popular vote due to the way the electoral college system works. The electoral college system is a system of electing the president of the United States in which each state has a certain number of electors, equal to the number of seats it has in the U.S. House of Representatives plus its two senators. To win the presidency, a candidate must win a majority of the electoral votes (270).
In the electoral college system, it is possible to win the presidency without winning the popular vote because the electoral votes are not distributed proportionately to the popular vote. For example, in the 2000 election, George W. Bush won the electoral college by winning the state of Florida by a very narrow margin. However, he lost the popular vote to Al Gore by over 500,000 votes.
In the 2016 election, Donald Trump won the electoral college by winning several key swing states by narrow margins. He lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million votes.
The electoral college system was created by the Founding Fathers of the United States as a compromise between those who wanted the president to be elected by the popular vote and those who wanted the president to be elected by Congress. The Founding Fathers believed that the electoral college system would protect the interests of smaller states and prevent a candidate from winning the presidency by winning only a few large states.
The electoral college system has been criticized for being undemocratic, as it allows a candidate to win the presidency without winning the popular vote. However, the electoral college is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, and it is unlikely to be abolished anytime soon.
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