Thanks to the decision of one man, Nebraska will not be making an eleventh-hour change to the way they apportion their Electoral College votes. This is a very obscure sort of thing, but in one particular scenario it could be key to the entire presidential election. This makes the news that one Republican in Nebraska's state government has decided not to go along with the last-minute change rather important.

Nebraska has a quirky sort of state government to begin with. It is the only state in the Union with only one house in their legislature. It used to have two chambers like all the other states, but it decided to get rid of the lower one back in the 1930s. Also quirky is the fact that their unicameral legislature recognizes no party affiliation -- they all run in a single "top-two" primary and are not listed by party on the ballots.

But the quirk we're concerned with here is that Nebraska is one of only two states (Maine being the other) which currently do not allocate their Electoral College votes as a "winner takes all" bloc. The overall winner of the state wins two of their five Electoral College votes, but the other three depend on the winner in each of the state's congressional districts (Nebraska has three seats in the House of Representatives). So a split result is possible, and one of the districts leans more Democratic than the rest of the state, meaning Democrats can pick up a single vote here even while losing the state. This is precisely what the Republicans wanted to prevent, obviously.

The other state with proportional allocation of their electors is Maine, where the situation is reversed. Maine has four Electoral College votes, and three of them reliably go for the Democrat. But one of their congressional districts is a lot more rural than the other, so the whole thing can wind up being a draw in the Electoral College -- a Democrat can win one vote in Nebraska, only to lose one vote in Maine to balance it out.

Earlier in the year, the concept of changing Nebraska's election law came up, but it didn't gain enough support to overcome a filibuster (which requires a whopping two-thirds vote to overcome). While the subject was in the news, legislators in Maine warned that if Nebraska went ahead with its change, Maine was likely to follow, just to keep the balance intact. But the subject has come up again and it is now too late for Maine to act. Maine's state laws only take effect after a 90-day period, which locks in their system for the 2024 election. So if Nebraska moved now, it would unbalance the situation with Maine, at least for this year's election.

Fortunately, they don't have the votes to do so. If every single Republican in the legislature voted for the change, they could beat the filibuster and pass the bill (which the governor supports and would sign). But there are three holdouts.

Two of these seem dependent on the third, from all reports. So it all came down to how state Senator Mike McDonnell was going to vote. McDonnell is somewhat unique, since up until this year he used to be a Democrat. But the Nebraska Democrats pretty much kicked him out of the party for supporting anti-abortion and anti-trans legislation. The Nebraska Democratic Party censured him last year, so this year he went ahead and switched parties.

Another complication in this mix is that McDonnell is term-limited out of his seat in this election. He is reportedly considering running for mayor of Omaha next year, and Omaha is a part of the congressional district that would lose their independent presidential vote in the Electoral College if the change happened. So it wouldn't be too popular a position to take just before a mayoral run, one assumes.

All this means is that McDonnell is not exactly a pure-hearted profile in courage. His own political best interest is at stake here, to put this another way. And he has suggested bringing the concept up for a direct vote as a constitutional amendment, so the system in Nebraska may still change -- but not until the next presidential election, in 2028.

From the statement McConnell just released:

In recent weeks, a conversation around whether to change how we allocate our Electoral College votes has returned to the forefront. I respect the desire of some of my colleagues to have this discussion, and I have taken time to listen carefully to Nebraskans and national leaders on both sides of the issue. After deep consideration, it is clear to me that right now, 43 days from Election Day, is not the moment to make this change.

As mentioned, this could be critical for Democrats, in one particular scenario. Let's say that Kamala Harris wins in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, successfully reconstructing the "Big Blue Wall." Donald Trump, however, wins in all the other battleground states -- Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and North Carolina. Without either of the split districts in Maine or Nebraska, this would leave Harris with 269 votes and Trump with 267. Here's a map of what this would look like:

[Click on the image to see a bigger map at the 270ToWin.com site.]

If (as expected) Trump then wins the district in Maine while Harris wins the district in Nebraska, this would put Harris over the top, at 270-268. But if Maine's vote went to Trump and Nebraska's was part of a new winner-takes-all system, then the two would wind up perfectly tied at 269-269.

This would throw the presidential election to the House of Representatives. And due to the quirky rules there, this would pretty much guarantee Trump the victory. This is what Democrats are scared of, and this is why Trump and the rest of the Republican Party have been engaged in a full-court press to twist McDonnell's arm into supporting the change.

Today, McConnell gave his final answer: he will not be a party to making this drastic change so close to an election. His stance kills the chances of the change passing the legislature. This means Harris could now win the thinnest of Electoral College margins: 270-268.

Personally, I am kind of doubtful that it'll wind up being that close. Maybe this is just a gut feeling, but if Harris manages to win all three of the Big Blue Wall states, she seems very likely to win at least one more of the other battlegrounds (probably Nevada). This would provide enough of a buffer to overcome any last-minute changes in Nebraska. But I do admit I'm not really basing that on any data, it's just what seems likeliest to me.

Whatever winds up happening, this means the chances for an Electoral College tie will be somewhere between incredibly low and non-existent. If Harris does win the three Big Blue Wall states and the Omaha district in Nebraska (or she holds onto the rural district in Maine, no matter which way Omaha goes), then she will be our next president. It won't matter how the other battleground states vote at that point -- it'll just be a question of how big a margin Harris will win by. So chalk it all up as one less thing for Democrats to worry about, heading into the final stretch before the election.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant