Members of North Carolina’s Electoral College ceremoniously cast their 15 votes for Republicans Donald Trump and Mike Pence as some 100 protesters stood outside the Capitol in hopes of changing electors’ minds.
The electors said they got thousands of emails and letters asking them to vote against Trump, the president-elect, and Pence, the vice president-elect.
Elector Glenn Pinckney of Hickory, who was elected secretary of North Carolina’s Electoral College delegation, wasn’t about to acquiesce.
“How could we vote otherwise?” Pinckney said. “How can we even be concerned about voting otherwise unless we’re truly unprincipled people? … The Bible says let your yea be yea and your nay be nay.”
Pinckney said the letters and emails asked him to vote for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who won the popular vote. “I would vote for her conviction,” he said. “I would vote for her imprisonment.”
Linda Harper of Goldsboro said she, too, received a lot of correspondence.
“I had over 1,200 letters, including some who offered to pay all my expenses and my legal fees and everything if I would change my vote to anybody but Donald Trump.”
Harper said she got more than 2,400 emails. “It took me hours every day to filter through them,” she added.”
She also received about 200 letters asking her to “stand strong and vote for Trump.”
Mark Delk, of the Buncombe County community of Arden, was elected the delegation’s president, and he took the protestors’ effort in stride. The emails and letters, he said, are a part of the freedoms enshrined in the nation’s Constitution.
“That’s every American’s right,” Delk said. “We have the right to petition for the redress of grievances, and it’s hard to say you’re not in the government when your position is specifically listed in Article II of the Constitution.”
Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, a Democrat, convened the 57th Electoral College into session.
“No matter our political stripes, we will want the United States of America to remain the greatest nation in the world today.”
Marshall alluded to the recent passing of John Glenn, a “fighter pilot, astronaut, senator and real American hero.”
At times, protesters outside the Capitol could be heard chanting, although the noise wasn’t loud enough to drown out the proceedings inside the old House chamber. Before the ceremony, protesters repeatedly chanted, “Dump Trump!”
An email announcing Monday’s protest said similar demonstrations were planned across the nation.
The last-ditch effort to deny Trump the presidency appeared to be faltering, as reports of Electoral College gatherings in all 50 states and the District of Columbia found electors were faithful to the wishes of voters.
Clinton did, however, lose some votes. Late Monday afternoon, the Associated Press reported four electors in Washington state voted for someone other than Clinton.