Could 2 electors in Washington State throw the election to Donald Trump?

It could all come down to the Electoral College. Two Washington State electors are now signaling that they’ll refuse to vote for Hillary Clinton, even if the voters hand her the state.

Robert Satiacum, a former Bernie Sanders supporter, is telling the Seattle Times that he will refuse to support Clinton no matter what. A second elector from Washington State, Bret Chiafalo, is saying that he may or may not follow his state’s results.

“No, no, no on Hillary. Absolutely not. No way,” said Satiacum in an interview with the Seattle Times from protests at the Dakota Access Pipeline. “I hope it comes down to a swing vote and it’s me ... Good. She ain’t getting it. Maybe it’ll wake this country up.”

Santiacum and Chiafalo are Democratic elector candidates, meaning they’ll be responsible for casting two Electoral College votes for Washington State if Clinton wins it. While they could face criminal charges for defying the state’s election results, Santiacum and Chiafalo can still technically use their Electoral College votes to support whomever they personally choose.

Of course, if Clinton or Donald Trump winds up with a big lead in the Electoral College, what Satiacum and Chiafalo will do won’t make a bit of difference. But if the candidates run evenly and split the Electoral College map 269 to 269 — as some projections suggest they might — the rogue electors just could tip the balance in the presidential election.

A lot of crazy things have happened this election. But having two previously unheard of Sanders supporters from Washington State decide the next US president would, undoubtedly, be the craziest.

What happens if electors break with their pledges

If either Santiacum or Chiafalo does break with how his state votes, they would face a $1,000 fine and arrest for violating a state law binding electors.

Santiacum told the Seattle Times neither bother him. "(Clinton) will not get my vote, period," he said in a phone interview with The Associated Press. "She doesn't care about my land or my air or my fire or my water.”

Washington State could also bring troopers into the state capitol to arrest Santiacum as soon as he violates the law and signs a certificate giving his elector’s vote to someone other than Clinton, according to Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institute.

Washington State is one of 30 states with a mixture of penalties for electors who refuse to follow the election results. (The punishments range from North Carolina’s $500 fee to New Mexico’s felony-level charges, according to the National Archives and Records Administration.) The other 20 states do not have penalties, and the electors are essentially freed to vote their conscience.

Beyond the criminal penalties, the state parties could try bringing down a lot of pressure on anyone who tries defying the vote totals. Between Election Day and when the Electoral College vote is scheduled, the state parties will do all they can to lobby and threaten their electors to adhere to the results, according to Kamarck.

“This guy is going to a shaft of shit, frankly,” Kamarck said of Santiacum. “His friends and colleagues will be fucking outraged.”

How the Electoral College works

On Tuesday, voters across America will march to the polls to support one of the presidential candidates. But neither the popular vote nor state-wide results is technically the mechanism that elects the US president.

Instead, when they go to their polling stations, the public is actually deciding the electors who make up the Electoral College. The Electoral College then officially picks the president in a vote on Dec. 19.

Historically, this process has just been a formality — the electors are pledged to support the candidates chosen by their state’s voters, and have done so throughout American history with a few exceptions of no real-world consequences.

There’s a good reason for that. Kamarck notes that the electors pledged to Clinton are chosen by state Democratic parties, and the electors pledged to Trump are chosen by state Republican parties. Of course, the state parties are going to try to pick people who also like their party’s presidential nominee. In other words, to have defections among the electors, you’d need is people — like Satiacum — who refuse to vote for their own party’s presidential candidate. And that seems extremely unlikely.

Nobody seems to have an exact headcount on how many other electors might threaten to do the same. (Initially, a Republican elector candidate from Georgia also said he would not be supporting Trump regardless of how his state voted. But he ended up stepping down as an elector.)

But while Kamarck acknowledged Santiacum’s vote could matter in a deadlocked contest, it’s very unlikely many more electors will follow his lead.

“This is almost certainly not going to be an issue this year,” she says. “I could be wrong, but I’d be shocked it if was more than just this guy.”

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