Red and blue ‘mirages’: How election night vote counts make it hard to tell who will win
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Once the last voter casts their ballot in a state and the polls close, the process of revealing the winner begins. That’s when Election Day turns into election night, and each state starts reporting its vote totals.
Some states — like Florida, Georgia and North Carolina — report their vote quickly, while others like Arizona, Nevada and California typically take longer, upward of a week or two to tabulate most of their ballots. Within many states, the patterns of how votes are reported can make it difficult to tell in the middle of election night who the winner is going to be in the end.
What we’ve learned from the consistent poll numbers shaping the 2024 election
Let’s get one thing straight: The polls can’t tell us who is going to win the presidential election. Or which party will control Congress. Or who will win a particular state.
They don’t tell us who’s going to win — but we’ll know that soon enough. What the polls can do already is help explain the forces that shaped this election and how either former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris could emerge victorious.
Inside NBC News’ Decision Desk: When will we know who won the presidential race?
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Americans have two big questions as they head into another election with a deeply divided electorate: who will win, and when will they know it?
In 2020, election week replaced election night: Joe Biden wasn’t declared the winner until Saturday. This year, it could go either way. It may take as long as a week for the NBC News Decision Desk to project a presidential winner, or it could happen as early as Wednesday, even by Wednesday morning.Â
