Washington: The hard-fought presidential contest between Donald Trump and Joe Biden now depends on the outcomes of a handful of states, each with varying rules on counting votes and contesting results — potentially postponing the declaration of a winner.
Wisconsin is heading for a recount, while six other states have yet to be called by at least some major networks — Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. Excluding these seven, Biden has 253 electoral votes of the 270 required for victory, while Trump has 217.
The following shows the state of play and potential outlook for these seven states, two days after voters flocked to the polls nationwide in a surge in turnout.
Arizona (11 Votes)
The Associated Press has called the race for Biden.
Where it stands:
Biden led Trump by more than 68,000 votes as of Thursday morning, according to the AP.
Disputes:
The vote will be outside the possibility of a recount if Biden maintains his roughly 51% to 48% lead over Trump, Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs said Wednesday. Republicans “don’t have a legal pathway to challenge” the votes being counted now, she said. Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller has called on the AP and Fox News to withdraw their calls for Biden. “This was erroneous. It was a mistake,” Miller said.
What’s next:
All eyes will be on Maricopa County, which has 300,000 of the state’s total 450,000 outstanding ballots yet to count. Hobbs said she would provide an update Thursday about how long it will take to complete the counting.
Bottom line:
Both the Trump and Biden campaigns are expressing confidence they’ll win the battleground state.
Wisconsin (10 Votes)
The AP has called the race for Biden.
Where it stands:
Election commission administrator Meagan Wolfe said Wednesday that ballot counting was complete. The state doesn’t provide an official count until one is certified on Dec. 1. Unofficial counts showed Biden with 20,535 more votes than Trump. The AP, CNN and Fox News are among those that have called the state.
Disputes:
Trump’s campaign plans to exercise its right to demand a recount, as the unofficial margin of 0.7 percentage point was within the 1% that allows for such a move. Campaign manager Bill Stepien said in a statement Wednesday that “there have been reports of irregularities in several Wisconsin counties which raise serious doubts about the validity of the results.” He also charged that public polling had been used as a “voter suppression” tactic.
What’s next:
Election clerks are working through the steps in Wisconsin’s certification process, including an audit of voting equipment. Once Trump’s campaign formally calls for a recount, it may take several days to process. In a recount of the 2016 presidential election, counties completed the process within 10 days.
Bottom line:
Overturning a lead of more than 20,000 is a “high hurdle,” said Scott Walker, a Republican former governor of Wisconsin.
Michigan (16 Votes)
The AP has called the race for Biden.
Where it stands:
Biden led the state by more than 150,000 votes — or about 2.7 percentage points — as of 9:10 a.m. Thursday with about 94% of ballots counted.
Disputes:
Trump’s campaign said before the networks projected Biden to win Michigan that it was suing to stop vote counts in the state — claiming its representatives haven’t been given meaningful access to counting locations to observe the process.
What’s next:
The state has a diminishing number of ballots to count, with the focus now shifting to the legal field.
Bottom line:
If Biden’s lead gets certified, it would flip a state Trump won in 2016 into Biden’s column and bring him to the brink of victory.
Nevada (6 Votes)
The state has yet to be called.
Where it stands:
Biden has retained a narrow lead of less than 8,000 votes as ballots continue to be counted. With tens of thousands of votes outstanding, the final tally may not be imminent.
Disputes:
Trump’s lawyers plans to announce Thursday a lawsuit alleging that 10,000 people voted in the state who no longer live there, Fox News reported. The Trump campaign also has a pending lawsuit challenging the accuracy of the state’s signature-matching technology and public access for election observers. Nevada’s highest court rejected a request to halt the ballot counting, saying the state GOP failed to produce evidence of wrongdoing. But the lawsuit remains pending.
What’s next:
The state allows mail-in ballots that were postmarked as late as Election Day, and received by as late as Nov. 10, drawing out the potential timeline. It also allows ballots with errors to be “cured” as late as Nov. 12 and certified as late as Nov. 16.
Bottom line:
With Biden leading and mail-in ballots expected to skew Democratic, prospects look promising for him. Yet with a narrow margin and an estimated tens of thousands of mail-in ballots, the timing of a final count remains uncertain.
Pennsylvania (20 Votes)
The state has yet to be called.
Where it stands:
Trump was leading Biden by less than 165,000 votes as of 10 a.m. Thursday Eastern Time, according to the AP, but hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots remain to be counted. Biden is winning 77% of the mail-in votes for president so far, Department of State data show.
Disputes:
Trump had long predicted without evidence that massive fraud would be committed in Pennsylvania, especially in heavily Democratic Philadelphia. The Trump campaign said it was suing to halt what it portrayed as ballot-counting abuses.
What’s next:
“The overwhelming majority of ballots will be counted by Friday, and at this point it looks like significantly sooner than that,” Kathy Boockvar, the secretary of the Commonwealth, said on CNN Wednesday.
Bottom line:
As expected, Pennsylvania has become a central focus of political — and now legal — warfare over the election outcome.
Georgia (16 Votes)
The state has yet to be called.
Where it stands:
Trump led Biden by about 18,000 votes as of Thursday morning, according to the AP. Atlanta’s Fulton County, the state’s by population, had about 3,600 ballots yet to count as of Thursday morning, according to the county’s director of registration Richard Barron.
Disputes:
The Trump campaign filed a lawsuit Wednesday alleging that Chatham County is improperly counting absentee ballots that were received after the state’s deadline. A poll watcher claims that a poll worker was storing and counting ballots improperly.
What’s Next:
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger will give an update Thursday.
Bottom line:
While many of the remaining ballots would appear to favor Biden’s chances, it’s unclear whether the former vice president can make up the deficit in this traditionally red state.
North Carolina (15 Votes)
The state has yet to be called.
Where it stands:
Trump led Biden by about 77,000 votes as of 9:30 a.m. New York time, according to the AP. A number of absentee ballots and provisional ballots remain outstanding. Absentee ballots can be counted up to Nov. 12, as long as they were postmarked by Election Day. Some 116,200 requested absentee ballots remain outstanding.
Disputes:
No major lawsuits have yet been filed in North Carolina, but provisional ballots could be an area where tension erupts. The state is planning to release numbers on provisional ballots midday Thursday. In 2016, less than half of the 61,000 provisional ballots cast were counted.
What’s next:
Counties have scheduled meetings for Nov. 12 and Nov. 13 to tally the results from their outstanding absentee and provisional ballots after they conduct audits and other procedural checks. Due to public notice requirements under state law, those meetings can’t be moved earlier. The state Board of Elections will provide a final and official count that will be certified at a Nov. 24 meeting.
Bottom line:
It could take a week to final results, but Trump appears to be more likely to win the state.
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