President-elect Donald Trump's 2012 tweet criticizing the electoral college appears to be full of irony following Tuesday's election results.

Getty/Jeff Kowalsky - gettyimages.com

Trump, who won the electoral college while Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton is on pace to snag the popular vote, wrote the "electoral college is a disaster for democracy" on Nov. 7, 2012, when former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney lost the presidential election. Romney lost both the electoral college and the popular vote to President Barack Obama:

The U.S. electoral college is made up of people from each state who vote for the next U.S. president and vice president. According to the National Archives and Records Administration, the electoral college has 538 electors and 270 votes are necessary to elect the president. The number of electors in each state depends on the size of the state and how many state representatives are in Congress with political parties in each state having the ability to choose their electors.

Here's a Snapchat video from The New York Times that breaks down the electoral college process:

This story has been updated on November 9, 2016 12:26 p.m. PT.