Presidential Election Results May Not Be Known Tonight

There’s a good chance Americans won’t know the winner of Tuesday’s presidential election before they head off to bed Tuesday according to WIVB-TV.  The official results may not be known for days or possibly longer.

Many states have made it easier to request a mail-in ballot amid the pandemic amid concerns about the risk of possible infection in crowded polling places. But, the problem is that mail-in ballots generally require more time to process than ballots cast in person.

Some states with extensive experience in using mail-in ballots have adjusted for those extra steps such as Florida and North Carolina.

But other states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, all of them swing states, made a conscious decision to wait. There will be no counting of mail-in ballots prior to Election Day and it could take days to tally the ballots, resulting in a wait to determine the winner.

The use of mail-in ballots has resulted in President Donald Trump's claims that mail-in voting is ripe for fraud.

In some states, mail-in ballots come in several days after Election Day and can still be counted, as long as they are postmarked by Election Day.

The Trump campaign’s legal team is expected to challenge the validity of many mail-in ballots cast in critical battleground states such as Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

“We will have a sizable contingent of lawyers who will be ready to fend off any of the shenanigans that Democrats are trying,” Tim Murtaugh, the Trump campaign’s communications director, told reporters this week.

So it’s unlikely the election outcome will be known Tuesday night, putting the results of a contentious election season in doubt for possibly days to come.