Looking back at extreme historical situations, when will the results of the US election be announced at the latest?

オリジナル | Odaily Planet Daily ( ＠OdailyChina )

著者：東（ ゆーすけ )

The US election will officially begin tomorrow, but it seems that many readers still have some doubts about when they can know the final election results.

• Odaily Note: For an introduction to some basic concepts of the US election, you can first read Must-Read Before the US Election: Everything You Need to Know Is Here .

Generally, preliminary results can be obtained that night.

According to data compiled by Yahoo Finance, voting will end in succession in each state from November 5th Eastern Time (7:00 a.m. Beijing Time November 6th) to November 6th at 1:00 a.m. (14:00 Beijing Time), after which each state will announce the results of the popular vote after completing the vote count. However, due to differences in election methods, ballot processing, and counting rules among states, there will be certain differences in the time when each state announces the results.  

However, considering the reality of the election, the actual direction of the election basically depends on the battle situation in the seven swing states of Georgia, North Carolina, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Wisconsin, and Nevada. Among them, Georgia will complete the state voting at 8:00 Beijing time on November 6, the earliest, Pennsylvania, the battleground state with the most electoral votes among the swing states, will complete the state voting at 9:00 Beijing time on November 6, and Nevada will complete the state voting at the latest at 11:00 Beijing time on November 6.  

Based on the above situation, CNN and many other mainstream American media have predicted that, generally speaking, the election results can be preliminarily determined as early as the night of the election, which is expected to be noon or afternoon of November 6 Beijing time.

Will there be any unusual situations?

Where there are general situations, there will naturally be extraordinary situations.  

Looking back at the real history of the US election over the past 236 years, there have indeed been some cases of delayed results. The reasons for the delay vary, such as votes being too close or even tied, multiple candidates not getting the minimum number of electoral votes, unexpectedly longer counting time, or a key state having to recount because the distribution of votes was too close…

In 1800, there was an extreme situation in the US presidential election where the candidates had a tie, which forced the United States to amend the election rules (but there is still a very low probability of a tie, which will be explained in detail below); in the 1824 election, no candidate received enough electoral votes. This was the first and only time in history that the president was elected by a vote of the House of Representatives.  

Even if we ignore the American almanac of more than 200 years, there have been delays of varying lengths in the results of many general elections since the 21st century . These include the 2020 election in which Trump personally participated, and the 2000 election whose results were not announced until 36 days after Election Day.

2020 Election (“delayed” 4 days)

The 2020 election day is November 3rd local time (the US election is held on the first Tuesday of November every four years), but due to the impact of the epidemic, the number of voters who choose to vote by mail has greatly increased, which has also increased the time required for ballot counting.  

It was not until November 7 that the election results were preliminarily determined after Biden won the two swing states of Pennsylvania and Nevada in succession and obtained more than 270 electoral votes.

It is worth mentioning that in this election, Trump had declared himself the winner early on, and after the preliminary results came out, he repeatedly criticized the Democratic Party for election fraud, but in the end it did not change the election results – If Harris wins this time, it is not ruled out that Trump will cause a second election…

2000 election (“delayed” 36 days)

The 2000 election day was November 7. Everything went smoothly at first. By the morning of November 8, as states announced their vote counts, Democratic candidate Al Gore had won 250 electoral votes, followed by Republican candidate George W. Bush with 246. Both parties were just one step away from the 270 votes needed to win.

At this time, Florida, which has 25 electoral votes, was about to open the votes. Whoever won Florida would directly cross the 270-vote threshold and ascend to the presidency. In the end, Florida announced that Bush won the state by a very narrow margin, but the vote count showed that Bush only had 1,700 more popular votes than Gore, a difference of only 0.03% of the total votes in the state. According to local Florida law, when the difference between the two candidates is less than 0.5%, a recount must be conducted.

On November 10, Florida completed the machine recount, but Bushs lead was greatly reduced to 327 votes. Gore immediately applied to the local court for a manual recount. Subsequently, the two sides launched a fierce legal battle over whether to conduct a manual recount, the scope of the counting area, and the deadline for the counting. It was not until December 9 that the Federal Supreme Court stopped the manual recount in Florida, and on December 11, it ruled that no manual recount would be conducted, and the voting results signed by the Secretary of State would be retained. Gore finally announced his defeat on December 13.

At this point, 36 days have passed since the election day.

In the most extreme case, will it be 269:269?

Back to this election, although the probability is extremely low, a tie of 269:269 is still possible.  

For example, if Harris wins Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona and Nevada, and wins one electoral vote in Nebraska (Biden won these states in 2020), but loses Pennsylvania and Georgia, the vote count for both parties will be 269-269.

As shown in the figure below, election website 270 to Win also listed some other potential ties.

If this happens, how should the president decide?

Under the 12th Amendment , enacted after the 1800 election, if no candidate receives enough electoral votes (today there are 270), the new Congress, sworn in on January 3, will choose the president and the Senate will choose the vice president, a process known as a contingent election.

According to the analysis of the Congressional Research Service , if such an extreme situation occurs, Congress is expected to hold a contingent election on January 6. Considering that each of the 50 states has one vote in the contingent election mode and the Republican Party currently controls more House delegations, this means that Trump is more likely to be elected president in this case.

Wait, there is an even more extreme scenario – if the state delegations in the House of Representatives fail to elect a president before Inauguration Day on January 20, the new vice president elected by the Senate will become interim president…but obviously the probability of this happening is so low that it is almost impossible.

Waiting for the results

In summary, the above introductions to various unexpected events including the 1800, 1824, 2000, and 2020 elections only illustrate that there is a certain degree of uncertainty in the timing of the release of the results of the US election, but in general, the market still expects that the new owner of the White House will be preliminarily determined on November 6.  

You still need to wait for another day or two to witness the final result. By then, the confusing market trend may become clearer.

This article is sourced from the internet: Looking back at extreme historical situations, when will the results of the US election be announced at the latest?

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