Who Breaks an Electoral College Tie?

If no candidate wins a majority of the Electoral College (270 of 538 votes), the House of Representatives chooses the president and the Senate chooses the vice president. That can happen after a 269-269 tie, or if a third-party candidate wins enough electoral votes to keep either major candidate from a majority.

How a contingent election works

Under the 12th Amendment:

• The House picks the president from the top three electoral vote-getters. Each state delegation casts one vote, so Wyoming counts as much as California, and the winner needs a majority of states, 26. A quorum requires members from two-thirds of the states. D.C. has electoral votes but no vote in the House.
• The Senate picks the vice president from the top two. Each senator votes individually, and the winner needs a majority of the whole Senate, 51.

The vote would fall to the newly elected Congress, which is sworn in on Jan. 3, before the electoral votes are counted on Jan. 6. A state delegation that splits evenly casts no vote, so what matters is which party controls the most delegations, not the most seats. And because the chambers vote separately, the president and vice president could come from different parties.

What if the House deadlocks?

Under the 20th Amendment, if no president has been chosen by Jan. 20, the vice president-elect acts as president until the House decides. If there’s no vice president-elect either, the Presidential Succession Act puts the speaker of the House next in line. (The 12th Amendment originally set a March 4 deadline; the 20th Amendment moved it to Jan. 20.)

Could it really happen?

Yes. In 2024, Kamala Harris won Nebraska’s 2nd District. Had she also carried Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, she’d have finished with exactly 270 electoral votes. That’s why Nebraska Republicans pushed before the election to switch the state to winner-take-all: without that single electoral vote, the same map would have produced a 269-269 tie.

Try your own combinations on our interactive electoral map.

A tie on election night isn’t final

A tie in November could still be broken in December if an elector breaks ranks. Most states now require electors to vote as pledged, and many automatically replace an elector who doesn’t, but not all do. See faithless electors.

It’s happened before

• 1800: Thomas Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, each got 73 electoral votes, because under the original rules electors couldn’t distinguish between president and vice president. The House took 36 ballots to elect Jefferson, and the 12th Amendment followed.
• 1824: Four candidates split the vote. Andrew Jackson led with 99 electoral votes, short of the 131 needed. The House chose John Quincy Adams, who had 84, on its first ballot.
• 1837: The Senate chose the vice president, Richard Mentor Johnson, after Virginia’s electors refused to vote for him.

Two other disputed elections were resolved outside this process: 1876, settled by a congressional Electoral Commission, and 2000, effectively decided by the Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore.