A state senator has thwarted a GOP effort to lock down all of Nebraska's electoral votes for Trump

A Republican effort to lock down all of Nebraska's electoral votes for former President Donald Trump appeared doomed Monday when a state lawmaker denied backers his crucial support for the move.

GOP Sen. Mike McDonnell of Omaha said in a statement that he opposes awarding Nebraska's five electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis, like 48 other states do. Nebraska and Maine give two electoral votes to the candidate who wins statewide and one vote to the winner in each congressional district.

McDonnell's position means Republicans don't have the two-thirds majority they'd need in Nebraska's unique, one-chamber Legislature to pull off a change ahead of the Nov. 5 election.

Here's a look at why Trump's allies were pushing for the change, what it would have taken to succeed and why a single state lawmaker is in the national spotlight.

Why one of Nebraska's electoral votes matters this year

Nebraska is one of nine states that Republican candidates have carried in every presidential election since 1964, but it hasn’t had a winner-take-all rule since 1991. And most times since 1991, Republican candidates still have captured all of the state's votes.

But in 2020, Democrat Joe Biden captured the vote for the 2nd Congressional District in the Omaha area. President Barack Obama also did it in 2008.

A presidential candidate needs 270 of 538 electoral votes to win. One scenario is that Democrat Kamala Harris, the vice president, wins the battlegrounds of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, while Trump wins the other four — North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada. Harris would have 269 electoral votes to Trump's 268, which would include four from Nebraska.

In that scenario, a Trump victory in Nebraska's 2nd District would...