EXPLANER
U.S. states determine ballot counting procedures in federal elections, with varying counting deadlines fueling misinformation.
When will we know how many votes were cast for Republican candidate Donald Trump and Democratic candidate Kamala Harris in the November 5 US presidential election?
It depends – and that’s okay.
In the United States, there is no federal vote counting process. Instead, counting procedures are left up to states, and releasing a final official count can potentially take weeks.
However, a clear presidential winner usually emerges within hours or days after polls close on Election Day.
The lag between when the media “triggers” an election and the official certification process can be confusing for voters.
It can also provide fertile ground for election misinformation, including the false claims of election fraud that Trump has made. continued to spread since 2020.
How do I know the winner before all the votes are counted?
News organizations have developed complex methodologies to estimate when a presidential candidate no longer has a path to victory in the Electoral College.
The Electoral College is the system that decides presidential elections: a candidate must obtain at least 270 Electoral College votes – which are awarded by state based on the outcome of their respective vote – to win the White House.
The media “calls” each state for a presidential candidate based on their methodologies, and these projections predict the overall winner.
Al Jazeera relies on the Associated Press, a news organization that has called elections for more than 170 years in the United States, for this process.
Depending on how close a race is, AP can sometimes determine a winner quickly, while other times it can take days.
For example, he didn’t declare Democrat Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 vote until four days after Election Day. It took another 16 days to determine that Biden was the winner in the state of Georgia.
OK, but how does the official count work?
All states allow voting in one form or another, either in the before election day or on election day itself.
In some states, mail-in ballots can be verified in advance and then quickly tabulated on Election Day, often through automated systems.
But others prohibit processing until Election Day, which can cause a considerable delay.
States then have varying deadlines to self-audit the results. A recount can also be requested in most states based on vote margin, while others give voters time to correct an error – or “cure” a ballot.
Ultimately, state leaders must issue so-called certificates of verification showing the official, final vote count as of a specific date. This year the deadline is December 11.
The president-elect’s victory is then officially certified by Congress in January.
Why is this controversial?
Tight races in key battleground states in 2020 — as well as increased mail-in voting amid the COVID pandemic — saw vote counting particularly slow.
This helped fuel unfounded allegations of election malfeasance pushed by Trump and his allies.
These false claims were reinforced by the fact that Democrats generally vote by mail more than Republicans.
As a result, in states where there are delays in counting mail-in ballots, people may feel like there was a late surge in Democratic votes — also known as a “lag.” towards the blue.
To counter misinformation, election experts have called on states to strengthen their vote counting processes.
While some key battleground states have done so, others — like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Georgia — have done little to ensure a faster process this year.
Georgia’s Board of Elections even moved to require a hand count of votes on Election Day, which experts say could lead to even greater delays.
