# Election Day \[Week\]\[Month\[s\]\] \[Year\] 2020 follow-along thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 3, 2020, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618 "2020-11-03T05:36:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 98
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1943 "2020-11-05T00:49:30Z")
Big tranche of Delaware County came in and now Trump is only up 212k in PA. 87% is in and the “per percent” margin is now 35k for Biden. Still tracking to a 150-200k Biden victory. The “crossover” point should happen around 6% from now, so at 93% reported if you want another number to track towards. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1944 "2020-11-05T00:51:05Z")
I’m getting ready to sing, ding dong the witch is dead. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1945 "2020-11-05T00:51:09Z")
That’s about what I’m seeing too. But keep in mind, this all depends on the 87% number being accurate. There is a lot of uncertainty there. If there are a lot fewer ballots than they think, there won’t be enough for Biden to make up that 212K. ---
**Author:** ![Jungian\_Camisole1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jungian_camisole1/32/3646_2.png) [@Jungian\_Camisole1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jungian_Camisole1)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1946 "2020-11-05T00:52:31Z")
> [@Fretful\_Porpentine](#): > > Not 270-268 specifically, but the infamous Hayes-Tilden election of 1876 ended with a 185-184 electoral college vote. Thank you! This will give me an interesting history lesson for tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1947 "2020-11-05T00:53:18Z")
How can Nevada not track absentee ballots? If they don’t track receipt of absentee ballots, what stops someone from voting twice—by absentee ballot as well as by voting in person? ---
**Author:** ![Mike\_Mabes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mike_mabes/32/1782_2.png) [@Mike\_Mabes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mike_Mabes)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1948 "2020-11-05T00:53:31Z")
> [@Jungian\_Camisole1](#): > > This will give me an interesting history lesson for tomorrow. Do you like historical novels? Gore Vidal’s 1876 is partially about that election ---
**Author:** ![Jungian\_Camisole1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jungian_camisole1/32/3646_2.png) [@Jungian\_Camisole1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jungian_Camisole1)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1949 "2020-11-05T00:53:59Z")
> [@Bullitt](#): > > I’m getting ready to sing, ding dong the witch is dead. Can we watch his toes curl up and go under Dorothy’s house? ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1950 "2020-11-05T00:55:28Z")
Maybe I was a bit loose in my phrasing. What I meant was they don’t seem to have any way to know for sure how many possible absentee votes are outstanding. I mean, they could easily dig into their database and figure it out, but the guy being interviewed seemed to think that was a crazy request. His more cogent point was that you don’t really know who might have decided to return it at the last minute. And since they can still accept ballots for awhile, the basic question “how many votes are left to count?” is unanswerable. ---
**Author:** ![Jungian\_Camisole1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jungian_camisole1/32/3646_2.png) [@Jungian\_Camisole1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jungian_Camisole1)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1951 "2020-11-05T00:55:32Z")
> [@Mike\_Mabes](#): > > Do you like historical novels? Gore Vidal’s 1876 is partially about that election Great! I will check at the library. ---
**Author:** ![Mike\_Mabes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mike_mabes/32/1782_2.png) [@Mike\_Mabes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mike_Mabes)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1952 "2020-11-05T00:56:18Z")
He has 7 in all, I’ve read 4, all very good > **[Narratives of Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narratives_of_Empire)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > The Narratives of Empire series is a heptalogy of historical novels by Gore Vidal, published between 1967 and 2000, which chronicle the dawn-to-decadence history of the "American Empire"; the narratives interweave the personal stories of two families with the personages and events of U.S. history. Despite the publisher's preference for the politically neutral series-title "American Chronicles", Vidal preferred the series title "Narratives of Empir... ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1953 "2020-11-05T00:57:50Z")
Well, maybe they only had access to a few machines? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1954 "2020-11-05T00:58:17Z")
Crossing? That might be his _drowning_ in the Rubicon moment. Of course, it would be just the latest such moment. Remember when going after those Gold Star parents was supposed to sink his chances? I think Trump’s empty head must be acting as a flotation device. ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1955 "2020-11-05T00:58:22Z")
Absolutely true. I think I sort of validated the numbers a bit earlier today when the AG of PA was on CNN (or maybe it was someone else) saying they were about 50% done with the mail-ins. At that point the numbers all seemed to check out. That said, it could certainly be off. The second-level check, IMO, is the county cross-check against 2016. Fully reported counties are almost uniformly running at least 2% worse for Trump than in 2016. That should be enough, unless there are some really nasty surprises in the mail-ins. ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1956 "2020-11-05T00:58:35Z")
After looking this up, I’ll answer my own question. They do in fact keep track of absentee ballots, at least in Clark County, Nevada. > **[Clark County, NV](https://www.clarkcountynv.gov/government/departments/elections/reports_data_maps/mail_absentee_ballot_data.php)** Something must have gotten lost in translation during that interview. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1957 "2020-11-05T00:58:50Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > On a related note, [Harold Stassen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Stassen) ran 9 times without a whiff of success. > 1944, 1948, 1952, 1964, 1968, 1980, 1984, 1988, and 1992 I voted for him a number of times. ---
**Author:** ![eschrodinger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschrodinger/32/122_2.png) [@eschrodinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschrodinger)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1958 "2020-11-05T01:05:26Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > Why? Do the fuckers in NV and PA just get a kick out of holding the country hostage? Being at the center of the news? Here’s what 538 had to say in their piece on [when to expect results in each state](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/election-results-timing/). (Linked a couple of times already.) > [@](#): > > ### Timing of results > > Hard to say. Nevada is one of a handful of states that is mailing a ballot to every active registered voter for the first time, and it is only requiring that ballots be mailed back by Nov. 3, not received by then. In other states, that’s been a recipe for slow results; indeed, a spokeswoman for the secretary of state [told Politico](https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/12/biden-trump-2020-election-night-428856) not to wait up for a call on election night. However, the ability to count mail ballots early has put [Clark County](https://lasvegassun.com/news/2020/oct/24/how-mail-ballots-are-counted-in-clark-county/) (home to 71 percent of the state’s voters) in position to report tallies of in-person votes and any mail ballots received by Nov. 2 on election night. If that happens, we might get most results on election night, though we’ll still have to wait until at least Nov. 10, when the state stops accepting mailed ballots, for full results. You can look in the same place to see what they say about PA. It’s a very big state, and had lots of mail-in ballots, which they were not allowed to start processing until election day. Processing means verifying signatures and stripping off the outer envelopes, then stripping off secrecy envelopes and preparing for counting, plus, then, counting. They also now have a court order allowing ballots to be received until the 6th, and those ballots and counts have to be segregated. 538 has said for a while that it might be a week before there’s a result there. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1959 "2020-11-05T01:09:26Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > They basically said they were following the SoS lead when they said nothing was due until tomorrow so I guess they just sent folks home. Because, fuck, who cares about the election of the leader of the free world amirite? It’s frustrating, to be certain, but that kind of local autonomy is what has kept meddlers, (including a president like Trump himself), from having the ability to broadly manipulate things. Imagine if Trump had the power to dictate to all county/state election systems how they work. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1960 "2020-11-05T01:11:20Z")
> [@Jungian\_Camisole1](#): > > > [@Bullitt](#): > > > > I’m getting ready to sing, ding dong the witch is dead. > > Can we watch his toes curl up and go under Dorothy’s house? - The house refused to do the scene. So did the stunt double. And the computer seized up rather than do the CGI. ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1961 "2020-11-05T01:11:38Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > Yes, they are updating all along this evening. I have been keeping a running total of the margin and the percent returned: > > | Trump Margin | | Percent In | | Reduction Per Percent | | > | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | > | 458915 | | 80 | | | | > | 356423 | | 83 | | 34164 | | > | 319876 | | 84 | | 34759.75 | | > | 292412 | | 85 | | 33300.6 | | > | 265676 | | 86 | | 32206.5 | | > > With 14% yet to report, and a conservative 30k per percent margin for Biden, that would be a net of 420k and a final Biden advantage of about 150k. Thanks for this. It helps explain why James Carville has seemed so certain that Biden was going to win PA by 100K votes. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2020, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618/1962 "2020-11-05T01:12:27Z")
> [@Bullitt](#): > > CNN has it 253-213 > FOX has it 264-214 > WSJ has it 264-214 Meanwhile RealClearPolitics has it still 227-214, not adjudicating AZ, WI or MI. Hmm, seems CNN is denying Donnie the loose Maine district? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618.md?page=97) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/election-day-week-month-s-year-2020-follow-along-thread/924618.md?page=99)