Six electors have signed an agreement to try to block Donald Trump from securing the 270 Electoral College votes needed to become president.

At least six Democratic electors have signed an agreement to try to block Donald Trump from securing the presidency with 270 Electoral College votes. 

While it would be unlikely to convince 37 Republican electors to change their votes, an unusually large number of 'faithless electors' who refuse to vote for Trump could undermine the institution itself.

In the U.S., presidents are elected by the Electoral College - not by popular vote. In most states, electors must cast a vote for the winner of their state's popular vote. 

But some states like Arizona, Idaho, Michigan and Georgia don't have a rule against electors going rogue, and phone calls from across the country have been pouring in to try to sway them against voting for Trump.

There have been 157 faithless electors over 228 years, 71 of whom changed their votes because a candidate died, according to Fairvote.org.

Even if the electors manage to block Trump from receiving 270 of the 538 votes, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives would likely vote Trump into the White House anyway.

 

Michael Baca is one member of the Electoral College from Colorado trying to convince others to band together to avoid a Trump presidency when electors cast their votes on December 19.

Baca said: 'I'm a former U.S. Marine and the core values are honor, courage, commitment. I don't believe Donald Trump has that.'

While Baca is a registered Democrat and supported Bernie Sanders, he is considering rallying behind Mitt Romney or John Kasich if that means garnering more support from other electors.

Even if he is unsuccessful in his efforts, Baca said: 'I do think that a byproduct would be a serious look into Electoral College reform.'

Another elector who did not want to be identified said: 'If it gets into the House, the controversy and the uncertainty that would immediately blow up into a political firestorm in the U.S. would cause enough people — my hope is — to look at the whole concept of the Electoral College.'

It remains unclear just how many faithless electors there will be, but political science professor George Edwards III told Politico: 'If you could get eight or 10 Trump electors to vote for someone else ... then that would probably get people's attention.'

While a faithless elector's vote is void in Michigan, elector Mike Banerian disagreed and told the Detroit News: 'Even if I could, I wouldn't be remotely interested in changing my vote.