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From: TT
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Photograph: Matt Slocum / AP / TT
Poströster i Pennsylvania.
More than 94 million people have voted early in the US presidential elections. This corresponds to about two-thirds of the total number of votes in the last elections, and increases the risk that the bill will be ruined, according to a political scientist.
There is great interest in the US presidential election, where Democrat Joe Biden challenges Republican Donald Trump. Due to the corona pandemic, many have chosen to vote early and turnout appears to be higher than in a long time.
In Texas, for example, more people voted early than in the state in the 2016 presidential election.
But the record influx of early voters, both in letter form and in the special polling stations that have been opened for that purpose, poses a major challenge for local poll workers.
Different rules
Democrats are expected to vote by mail to a greater extent than Republicans, in part because Trump warned of voter fraud in vote-by-mail.
And different states handle early voting differently. The rules differ when it comes to sorting, counting, and when a vote by mail must have been received to be valid. Some will start by counting votes on Election Day, which means that it may be to Trump’s advantage on Election Night to turn to Biden later when mail-in votes are added to the result.
This means that it can take several days or weeks before a result is ready, especially if the choice is made even in important states of the main wave.
One of the places where counting is expected to take time is Pennsylvania. As recently as last year, the state decided to allow voting by mail and it will likely take time to resolve.
– The primary elections this summer were difficult. There were far more mail-in ballots than expected and it took two weeks to finish counting, says Robert Speel, a political scientist at Pennsylvania State University.
– And according to state rules, mail-in ballots can’t begin processing until 7 a.m. on Election Day.
“Bed to mess up”
This means that poll workers are only allowed to open the envelopes, unfold the ballots, verify the signatures, and enter the millions of ballots that have been placed in the voting machines. And according to a recent HD decision, ballots that arrive up to three days after the election must also be counted, provided they are postmarked from Election Day.
– Given that Democrats are expected to vote by mail to a greater extent than Republicans, it is possible that Trump will lead when the polls are counted, but that Biden will compete later. It’s like a messy bed, Speel says.
This is especially true if the entire election outcome is determined by how things go in Pennsylvania, as it was in 2000, when it depended on the uniform outcome in Florida. On that occasion, the Supreme Court stepped in and named Republican George W Bush the winner over Democrat Al Gore.
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