Experts dismiss Trump’s claim that it could take “years” to declare winner

President TrumpDonald John Trump Governor Approval Rates Drop As COVID-19 Cases Rise Gohmert Says He Will Take Hydroxychloroquine As Treatment For Virginia Governor COVID-19, Senators Seek CDC Help With Coronavirus Outbreak In Center immigration detention MORE He suggested Thursday that it could take “years” to determine the winner of the next presidential race, marking the latest in a series of election-related statements that experts dismissed as a legal or practical impossibility.

Trump’s comment came at a White House briefing on Thursday afternoon, just a few hours after he went to Twitter to suggest that the Nov. 3 contest be delayed and insist that final results be available by election night.

“For so many years, I’ve been watching elections and they say the intended winner or the winner of the election,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “I don’t want to see it take place in a week after November 3, or a month, or frankly, with litigation and everything else that can happen, years.”

But none of Trump’s claims Thursday about the election schedule stand up to scrutiny, electoral law experts told The Hill.

While it may take longer than normal to determine this year’s result given the higher volume of absentee ballots expected, the process should take no more than a month, according to Edward Foley, a professor of law at Ohio State University.

“Any state should be able to count ballots by mail and verify it within a month unless something derails the system,” Foley said.

Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Law School, said Americans are unlikely to know the winner of the presidential race on Election Night. But the procedures codified in federal law and the Constitution prevent any lingering uncertainty about the election results from stopping the government.

Under current law, members of the electoral college are scheduled to meet and vote on December 14. After that, Congress will meet on January 6 to count the votes. The Constitution also clearly states that the term of the acting president ends on January 20.

“We should prepare for the fact that we may not know who won on election night,” said Levitt. “But there is a process to count, and there is a process to fight for the count, and the Constitution says that all that ended, full stop, long before noon on January 20.”