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That’s a confident posture that will be tested if Trump loses Florida, closing his already narrow path to reelection. Helpers said they expected him to declare victory if Florida won, but it’s unclear what that would mean even if he did. A victory in Florida would keep him in the race, but attention will immediately turn to the battlefields of northern Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan.
Like the election itself, Trump’s plans for Tuesday night are still changing. The White House has invited 400 people to the East Room and was planning for all attendees to be tested for the coronavirus. No official invitation was sent to many guests: the president’s secretary called them to extend the invitation personally. But officials said they expected heavy attrition and weren’t sure how many people would show up.
Some of the president’s closest allies in the Senate, such as Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Majority Leader, will be back in their home states to see their own election results. Several Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill have declined invitations to fly aboard Air Force One or visit the White House grounds since it became clear that the president and his staff were not following CDC health guidelines.
And then there’s this: Many people in the president’s circle think he’s likely to lose. A brief burst of optimism a few weeks ago has turned into concern for their own careers, after Trump. Coupled with expectations of major protests at the White House and the coronavirus, not all guests saw it as the see-and-be-seen event of the year.
For Biden, it’s a wait-and-see day.
Tuesday is the day Biden has been waiting for since he began thinking about running for president in the early 1980s, and it won’t be anything like what he envisioned. There will be no game, no noisy venues on election night, no grand speech to a room of cheering fans, win or lose.
Biden never expected the climax of his political career to fall during a pandemic, or against an opponent already making noise about declaring victory before all the votes are counted.
Election 2020 ›
How to follow the election results
Here’s a guide to election night coverage from The Times, no matter when, how, or how often you want to consume it.
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- If you just want results … There will be a results map on The Times home page, and yes, the infamous needle will return, but only for Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina, the only states that provide detailed enough information for our experts to make informed projections of votes not counted.
- If you want constant updates … Times reporters blog live all day and night. This will be your one-stop-shop for minute-by-minute updates: race calls, on-the-ground reports of transition states, news on any voting issues or interruptions, and more.
- If you want to register from time to time … Times reporters are also producing a live briefing from about 5 p.m. to 3 a.m. ET, with an overview of what’s going on in the presidential race, Senate and House races, and the voting process. per se.
In a final push to win Pennsylvania, where early voting has been delayed, the former vice president will make stops on Election Day in Scranton, where he was born, and Philadelphia, where the turnout of blacks four years ago was lower than expected. Biden is expected to deliver his comments sometime Tuesday night or Wednesday morning from Wilmington, Delaware, but if the outcome keeps changing, it can wait.
