Here’s what to watch as Election Day approaches in the US

WASHINGTON – Election Day is just around the corner. Within hours, the final votes for the 2024 presidential election will be cast.

In a deeply divided nation, the election is a real battle between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.

We know there are seven battlegrounds that will determine the outcome, barring a major surprise. But big questions remain about the timing of the results, the composition of the electorate, the influx of misinformation – even the possibility of political violence. At the same time, both sides are prepared for a lengthy legal battle that could further complicate matters.

Here’s what you can see on the eve of Election Day 2024:

Either way, history will be made

Given all the twists and turns of the past few months, it’s easy to overlook the historical significance of this election.

Harris would become the first female president in the 248-year history of the United States. She would also be the first Black woman and person of South Asian descent to hold the office. Harris and her campaign have largely downplayed gender and race, fearing they would alienate some supporters. But the significance of a Harris victory would not be lost on historians.

A Trump victory would represent a different kind of historic achievement. He would become the first person to be convicted of a crime and elected president of the US, after being convicted of 34 crimes in a New York hush-money case just over five months ago.

Trump, who continues to face felony charges in at least two separate criminal cases, argued that he is the victim of a politicized justice system. And tens of millions of voters apparently believe him – or they are willing to overlook his extraordinary legal baggage.

How long will it take before the winner is announced?

Election Day in the United States is now often considered election week, as each state follows its own rules and practices for counting ballots — not to mention legal challenges — that can delay the outcome. But the truth is, no one knows how long it will take before the winner is announced this time.

In 2020, The Associated Press declared President Joe Biden the winner on Saturday afternoon – four days after polls closed. But even then, the AP called North Carolina for Trump 10 days after Election Day and Georgia for Biden 16 days later after manual recounts.

Four years earlier, the 2016 election was decided just hours after most polling stations closed. The AP declared Trump the winner at 2:29 a.m. on election night (it was technically Wednesday morning on the East Coast).

This time, both campaigns believe the race is extremely close among the seven swing states expected to decide the election, barring a major surprise: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

The size of the card and the tightness of the race make it difficult to predict when a winner can be declared.

Where can I find early clues as to how the match might unfold?

Look at the two battleground states on the East Coast, North Carolina and Georgia, where results could come in relatively quickly. That doesn’t mean we’ll get final results in those states anytime soon when returns are close, but they are the first swing states that could give an idea of ​​what kind of night awaits us.

To dig deeper, look at urban and suburban areas in the industrial North and Southeast, where Democrats have made gains since 2020.

In North Carolina, Harris’ margins in Wake and Mecklenburg counties, home to the capital, Raleigh, and the state’s largest city, Charlotte, respectively, will reveal how much Trump will need to squeeze out of the less-populated rural areas he has dominated . .

In Pennsylvania, Harris needs big turnout in deep-blue Philadelphia, but she also wants to widen Democrats’ lead in suburban counties north and west of the city. She has campaigned aggressively in Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery counties, where Biden improved on Clinton’s 2016 victory margins. The Philadelphia metro area, including the four collar counties, accounts for 43 percent of Pennsylvania’s votes.

Elsewhere in the Blue Wall, Trump must slow Democratic growth in key suburban Michigan counties outside Detroit, especially Oakland County. He faces the same challenge in Waukesha County, Wisconsin, just outside Milwaukee.

Where are the candidates?

Trump will likely spend the early hours of Election Day in Michigan, where, as has become his tradition, he will hold a final evening rally in Grand Rapids.

The Republican candidate plans to spend the rest of the day in Florida, where he is expected to vote in person — despite previously saying he would vote early. He will hold a campaign watch party in Palm Beach on Tuesday evening.

Harris plans to attend an election night party at Howard University in Washington, a historically black university from which she graduated in 1986 with a degree in economics and political science and was an active member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.

Aside from Howard, she has not publicly announced a schedule for Election Day.

Harris said Sunday that she had “just filled out” her ballot and that it was “on its way to California.”

Who still needs to show up on Election Day?

On the eve of Election Day, it is unclear which voters will show up to cast their ballots on Tuesday.

More than 77 million people participated in early voting – in person or by mail. So many people have already voted that some officials say the polls in states like Georgia could be a “ghost town” on Election Day.

A key reason for the increase is that Trump has generally encouraged his supporters to vote early this time, a reversal from 2020, when he called on Republicans to vote only in person on Election Day. Early voting numbers confirm that millions of Republicans have heeded Trump’s call in recent weeks.

The key question, however, is whether the wave of Republicans who voted early this time will ultimately cannibalize the number of Republicans who show up on Tuesday.

There are also shifts on the Democratic side. Four years ago, as the pandemic raged on, Democrats overwhelmingly cast their votes early. But this time, without risk to public health, it’s likely that more Democrats will show up in person on Election Day.

That balance on both sides is critical as we try to understand early returns. And the onus is on the campaigns to know which electors they still need to turn out on Tuesday. On that front, Democrats may have an advantage.

Trump’s campaign and the Republican National Committee have outsourced much of their voting operation to outside groups, including one largely funded by billionaire Trump ally Elon Musk, which is facing new questions about its practices. Harris’ campaign, by contrast, is running a more traditional operation, with more than 2,500 paid staffers and 357 offices in battleground states alone.

Could there be unrest?

Trump has aggressively promoted baseless claims in recent days questioning the integrity of the election. He falsely claims that he can only lose if the Democrats cheat, even though polls show the race to be a real flop.

Trump could claim victory again on election night regardless of the results, just as he did in 2020.

Such rhetoric can have serious consequences, as the nation saw when Trump loyalists stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, in one of the darkest days in modern American history. And unfortunately, there is still the potential for further violence this election season.

The Republican National Committee will deploy thousands of “election integrity” poll workers on Tuesday to look for signs of fraud, which critics fear could lead to intimidation of voters or election workers. At some key voting locations, officials have requested the presence of sheriff’s deputies, in addition to bulletproof glass and panic buttons that connect poll managers to a local 911 dispatcher.

At the same time, Trump allies note that he has faced two assassination attempts in recent months that raise the possibility of further threats against him. And police in Washington and other cities are preparing for the possibility of serious unrest on Election Day.

As always, it’s worth noting that a broad coalition of top government and industry officials, including many Republicans, concluded that the 2020 election was the “most secure” election in American history.