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2020 U.S. elections
You may have reasonably expected to have some kind of clue on the results of the US presidential election by now.
Okay, so who will be the next president?
We don’t know, because not enough votes have yet been counted for Donald Trump or Joe Biden to secure victory.
image copyrightReuters
In fact, due to the time it will take to count the large number of mail-in ballots cast during this pandemic election, it could take days.
And if there are legal challenges to the results, it could even take weeks. This could get complicated.
Not even a clue?
To become president, you don’t really need to win the popular vote. Instead, a candidate has to win a majority in a system called an electoral college, where each state gets a certain number of votes or “electors” roughly in proportion to its population.
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So if that state wins, it wins its votes (except Nebraska and Maine, but that’s tricky). There are 538 of these state votes in total – whoever gets 270 will become president.
So despite near-record turnout this time around, as usual, it’s just a few key states on the battlefield whose voters will decide the elections.
- Biden and Trump are projected to win the states expected to win comfortably
- The race is still tight in some crucial competitive states.
- In some of those close races, officials haven’t even started counting mail-in votes, and that could change everything.
So how could we arrive at a result?
With Ohio and Florida projected for Trump, the focus is now on a few critical states where votes are still being counted. They offer a number of paths for either candidate to win.
Wisconsin, Pennsylvania Y Michigan: These states are in the spotlight and while some Wisconsin counties are making their way through the ballots, the other states have a way to go in counting mail-in votes. It could take several days.
Arizona: The state hasn’t voted Democrats since 1996, but it seems like a potential win for Biden, who went after the young progressive Latinos who live there.
Nevada, Georgia, and North Carolina: These runs are too tight or too early in your counting process to call.
image copyrightReutersThe story in one line?
Donald Trump is doing better than expected and Joe Biden hasn’t been able to win those battle states that count votes quickly, which means more uncertainty as we wait for some key states.
And in his own words …
Joe Biden addressed supporters saying, “We’re going to win this,” but also urged patience. Donald Trump said Republicans won and falsely claimed fraud; as we know the votes are still being counted and there is no evidence of fraud.
Should I have stayed awake?
There were some important moments, but especially in the other elections that are taking place, where the control of the Senate still hangs by a thread:
- The Florida and Ohio projections were important to the Trump campaign, meaning that attention turned to the American Midwest.
- Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, is set to beat his Democratic challenger Jaime Harrison in South Carolina, a race that at one point looked like he could lose.
- Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, the first outspoken defender of the QAnon conspiracy theory, won a seat in Congress; it remained unopposed.
- Also in the race for control of the Senate, the Democrats lost Alabama, their most vulnerable seat, but Colorado won over the Republicans.
- Arizona, New Jersey, and South Dakota appear to have voted to legalize marijuana for personal use.
- The United States has its highest-ranking openly transgender elected official after Sarah McBride was elected to a seat in the Delaware state legislature.
And now that?
Lawyers could get involved. Donald Trump, who previously said he would raise legal challenges if the outcome is near, promised to launch a challenge to the Supreme Court. Biden’s campaign team said they had lawyers waiting.
Will uncertainty lead to riots? There will definitely be uncertainty, but while many Americans have spoken out about their concerns, it is too early to say if there will be any significant unrest.
