/whispers
They don't vote in Washington. They vote in their own state capital and then the results are sent to Washington.
/ends whispers
ETA:
That said, in some places they are required to vote the way the state told them to. In other states, the electors are chosen by the party of the candidate who won the state. So in Missouri, where I live, if McCain wins, the MO Republicans pick the electors. There's no way they'd change their votes to Obama.
There are 'faithless electors' who break with what they're supposed to do, but it has never affected the election outcome. In... 2000? one of the electors didn't vote for VP as a protest over DC not having representation in Congress*. I think that's what it was - something along those lines.
Incidentally, Washington was the one president to have a unanimous electoral vote. Someone else would have but one elector didn't vote because he believed only Washington should hold that distinction. [Okay - it's been like 7 years since I read that and I could be wrong on that one - a quick google shows that's the case for Washington - not a clue who the other guy was... and my computer hates wikis...]
*DC is not represented in Congress. They do, however, have 3 votes in the Electoral College.
Carol
National Archives and Records Administration Electoral College FAQs NARA Electoral Scorecard - couldn't find the second election I mentioned, but Washington was unanimous in both elections - it only goes through 1996, but I know Bush wasn't close to unanimous
.
