This year’s election will be like none other. Already, groups like the Transition Integrity Project are war-gaming out what sort of chaos might follow Election Day. The acting president is setting expectations among his followers that whoever leads the unofficial electoral vote count at the end of the day on November 3rd is the real winner for Real Americans™, knowing mailed ballots arriving later (or counted later) could flip early results. He has urged his partisans to vote on Election Day and avoid voting by mail even as RNC chapters around the country promote absentee ballots as they always do.
Here in North Carolina, local boards are already working overtime to prepare for the expected flood of absentee ballots. The goal is to have as many as possible returned and processed by Election Day. When the State Board of Elections loads early vote totals on its web site after 7:30 p.m. November 3, those absentee-by-mail votes will appear there along with the totals from 2-1/2 weeks of early voting. Election Day numbers will update through the evening. Sadly, many states do not allow processing/counting of absentee ballots before Election Day. There will be chaos. Trump will scream fraud whatever happens.
So , it is a good thing some Democrats are already setting counter-expectations that Election Day this year could be Election Week (Politico):
Michigan’s secretary of state said on Sunday her state’s full results of the Nov. 3 elections won’t be available on Election Day, advising voters it could take a week for a final tally.
“We should be prepared for this to be closer to an election week as opposed to an election day,” Jocelyn Benson said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The bottom line is we are not going to have the full results and a counting of all of our ballots on election night. We already know that. We’ve asked the legislature to make changes to the laws to give us more ability to be prepared and count those ballots more efficiently.”
Michigan is one of the states that does not allow processing of absentee ballots until Election Day itself.
“If it takes a few extra days to ensure we have a full and accurate counting as a result of every race, that’s what it’s going to take,” Benson said. “We’re going to be transparent throughout that whole process to make sure every citizen knows exactly where we are in the counting process and how many more ballots we have to get through.”
She said yes when asked by NBC host Chuck Todd whether she was concerned over candidates being falsely declared as the winner on election night.
“To me, that’s just going to be another example of the type of misinformation and disinformation that we’re seeing multiple ways from multiple platforms and voices in this election cycle,” Benson said. “So, we are going to counter that misinformation with truth and accuracy.”
That starts by Democrats and ballot access advocates loudly and regularly proclaiming that Election Day falls during Election Week this year. Hell, Election Day might even fall in the last weeks of Election Quarter. One of the 643,000 absentee ballots North Carolina began mailing out on Friday was mine.
My ballot arrived in my mailbox on Saturday. I have no idea how they made that happen, since a letter mailed here in the Cesspool of Sin first has to go to South Carolina for sorting. (Long story.) I’m told the local Board may have staff members in the parking lot accepting absentee ballots today. Guess what I’m doing later?
Happy Election Quarter!
Update (2:30 EDT): Staff is working at Election Services today, but their ballot drop off drive-thru will not open until Tuesday at 8 a.m. A couple of dozen people have already tried to return ballots today.
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