python - Return is always giving me the same value -

my return value printing out total of 20 regardless of cards in user_hand. reason why?

suits = ["heart", "diamond", "spade", "club"] ranks = ['a', '2', '3', '4', '5', '6', '7', '8', '9', '10', 'j', 'q', 'k']  deck = [(suit, rank) rank in ranks suit in suits]  random.shuffle(deck,random.random)  user_hand = [] dealer_hand = []  user_hand.append(deck.pop())  dealer_hand.append(deck.pop())  user_hand.append(deck.pop())  dealer_hand.append(deck.pop())  def handtotal (hand):      total = 0      rank in hand:          if rank == "j" or "q" or "k":              total += 10          elif rank == 'a' , total < 11:              total += 11          elif rank == 'a' , total >= 11:              total += 1          elif rank == '2':              total += 2          elif rank == '3':              total += 3          elif rank == '4':              total += 4          elif rank == '5':              total += 5          elif rank == '6':              total += 6          elif rank == '7':              total += 7          elif rank == '8':              total += 8          elif rank == '9':              total += 9      return total   print ("your current hand {}".format(user_hand))  print ("this provides total of:")  print (handtotal(user_hand)) 

one of problems line:

if rank == "j" or "q" or "k" 

as stands, always evaluate true (well, technically "q"). should comparing rank of variables:

if rank == "j" or rank == "q" or rank == "k" 

or more pythonic way:

if rank in ["j", "q", "k"]  

in addition, you're passing user_hand handtotal(). since each element of user_hand tuple, you'll need compare against second element of each element (e.g. rank[1]) of user_hand.