US Election Watch
Bournbrook’s live-feed response to the 2020 US election.
Posted 4.28pm UK time
CNN has projected that Joe Biden will be the 46th president of the United States, one day after Peter Tutykhin wrote ‘it’s over’.
It’s over
Posted 14.15pm UK time
Joe Biden has taken the lead in the key swing state of Pennsylvania. With the remainder of the vote coming almost exclusively from absentee ballots in Democratic strongholds, that lead will soon expand. This means that Donald Trump no longer has a path to 270 electoral college votes, or even towards an electoral college tie. Joe Biden will be the forty-sixth President of the United States. Kamala Harris will be the forty-ninth vice president. It’s over.
The polls might not have been that wrong
Posted 1pm UK time
As we watched initial results come in on election night, pundit after pundit declared this year’s polls to be the worst in recent history. Such proclamations were likely premature. We will have to wait until counting is completed in all battleground states before we make any concrete judgement, but it is already looking far from the industry-wide disaster some have gleefully portrayed it as.
In the state of Florida, the final count is likely to be within five points of the FiveThirtyEight average. That’s not great, but it’s also not exactly terrible. Whatever the result in Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina, the averages there were easily within the standard margin of error. We will have to wait on Pennsylvania, but the error there will also not be as bad as initially feared. The biggest miss so far appears to be in Wisconsin, where the polls still predicted a Joe Biden win. Don’t get me wrong, I firmly believe that polling success should be judged on the margins, not the predicted winner, but unfortunately that’s not how narratives are often formed.
Once counting is complete, expect a more detailed breakdown on the subject (hopefully next week). For now, I will leave you with this.
To me, the point of bringing up Joe Biden’s massive polling lead was never to predict that he was going to win big. Instead, it was to say that he could withstand even a major polling error in Donald Trump’s direction. It would seem he did.
Posted noon UK time
When might we expect the next round of results? Maricopa County (Arizona) should report again at 4pm GMT (11am Eastern). That should give us a good indication of whether Donald Trump can still catch up in the Grand Canyon State. An hour later, at 5pm GMT (or noon Eastern), we should finally see another batch from Clark County (Nevada), and whether Joe Biden will indeed extend his lead there as expected. In the meantime, none of this will matter if we get a call in Pennsylvania, where votes will continue to be counted throughout the day. No concrete information on the timing of reports though.
Patience. We’re almost there.
Posted 10.50am UK time
A little under forty-eight hours ago, I wrote that Joe Biden is clearly favored to win the presidential election. This still remains the case, with Donald Trump’s remaining hopes of victory slipping by the hour. Here is where the race stands as of Friday morning.
Biden has just taken the lead in Georgia, a crucial piece in the president’s red wall. With a current margin of under one tenth of one per cent (or just over one thousand votes), that race is likely heading for a recount. For now, the Democrat is ahead in enough states to win 286 electoral college votes.
Trump has been making up ground in Arizona, albeit not quite at the rate he needs. Meanwhile, Biden has expanded his lead in Nevada, where the outstanding vote appears likely to break in favor of the Democrat. However, neither Arizona, Georgia or Nevada will even matter if Biden can win in Pennsylvania, where Trump’s lead has now fallen to under twenty thousand votes. About a quarter of a million ballots remain to be counted in that state, the vast majority of which are absentee votes from Democratic areas.
Let’s wait and see what happens, but it looks increasingly clear that Donald Trump needs nothing short of a miracle to stay in office.
Posted 9.50am UK time
Thus far, we’ve focused primary on the presidential race, so here’s where things stand in down the ballot contests. Democratic hopes of taking back the Senate are looking slim after they failed to win key races in Iowa, Maine and Montana, and are on track to lose in Alaska and North Carolina. As expected, Democrat Doug Jones has also lost his seat in Alabama. Democrat John Hickenlooper has won the Senate race in Colorado, while Mark Kelly appears set to defeat incumbent Republican Martha McSally in Arizona. So far, this puts the party on forty-eight seats (including two independents who caucus with the Democrats), two short of a majority assuming that Kamala Harris ends up elected as vice president.
As a result, Senate control will likely be decided by two runoffs in the state of Georgia, where the Republican candidates remain favored. These elections will take place in January, so, if you thought the 2020 elections will be over in, well, 2020, think again! Meanwhile, Democrats are set to lose ground in the House of Representatives, with the Republicans currently having gained a net six seats. That said, the former are still very likely to maintain an overall majority, albeit a narrower one than they secured in the 2018 midterms.
Posted 7.40am UK time
Did the riots and civil unrest help Trump? Not in the places where they happened. Joe Biden has overperformed Hillary Clinton in Multnomah County, which includes the city of Portland, Oregon, and in Kenosha County, Wisconsin. The same is true for Hennepin County, which covers the city of Minneapolis and saw many of the initial protests and street violence following the killing of George Floyd. We are still waiting on complete reports from Philadelphia, but it appears likely that Biden will outperform Clinton there as well.
It is certainly plausible that these events aided Republican fundraising and get out the vote efforts elsewhere, but it looks like the people most directly impacted had other ideas.
Posted 10.05pm UK time
The New York Times has declared the vital swing states of Wisconsin and Michigan for Biden. This puts him on 253 electoral votes, only 17 away from the magic number of 270.
Victory now appears imminent for the Biden camp. Clinching both Arizona and Nevada, which he is likely to accomplish, or Pennsylvania, will put him in the White House.
Posted 3pm UK time
With over ninety-eight per cent of the vote in, Joe Biden has won the state of Arizona and its eleven electoral votes. Unless Donald Trump can win the outstanding mail-in vote in neighboring Nevada (which is likely to lean Democratic), it is very difficult to see how he has a path to re-election.
Afternoon update: Biden clearly favored
Posted 14.15pm UK time
Remember when we talked about the blue shift? Well, it’s happening. As expected, Trump established an initial lead in the blue wall states which Biden desperately needs to win. And as expected, his lead in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin has narrowed in the early hours of the morning. The Democrat now leads the count in Wisconsin by about half a point. He has also taken the lead in Michigan, with approximately half a million (likely Democratic absentee votes) waiting to report. This means that, for the first time since polls closed last night, Joe Biden is ahead in enough states to win 270 electoral college votes.
Things could change of course. However, based on what we know about the outstanding vote, Biden is more likely than not to extend his lead. The president still has a shot, albeit an increasingly narrow one.
Morning update: Race too close to call. Biden favored.
Posted 10.10am UK time
Good morning, here’s what happened while you slept.
Donald Trump has prematurely declared victory and has even suggested seeking intervention from the Supreme Court. Let’s be very clear, this election is not over. A number of key states remain too close to call. In fact, at this point in time, you would rather be Joe Biden.
The Democratic nominee has likely made one crucial breakthrough in Trump’s red wall, as he currently leads in the state of Arizona. He is also on track to win neighboring Nevada and has secured one electoral vote in Nebraska’s second congressional district. That leaves him twenty six electoral votes short of the magic number.
The election will now likely come down to the three blue wall states which Trump flipped four years ago: Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the latter of which now shows a narrow Biden lead (with a slither of likely Democratic mail-in votes left to be reported). If Biden flips Wisconsin, he needs sixteen more electoral college votes. These could come from any one of Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania or North Carolina, which all remain too close too call. Trump can still win re-election, but his early lead in the Northern battlegrounds is narrowing.
As expected, turnout is through the roof. Indeed, it is currently projected to be the highest in over one hundred years, with both parties already having surpassed their total 2016 vote.
I’ll keep you posted as more results come in. Stay tuned!
Back at 10am!
Posted at 4.20am UK time
Given Peter’s recent comment that ‘it seems unlikely that we’ll get a very clear picture before daylight’, we will be taking a break on this feed, and will return will a full update at 10am. Thanks for sticking with us!
Posted at 4.05am UK time
Polls have closed on the West Coast, with California, Oregon and Washington immediately called for Joe Biden. Obviously no surprises there. Current tally: Biden 205 and Trump 112.
Posted 4am UK time
Here is where we stand. Trump is still very likely to win Florida and is clearly favored in Georgia and North Carolina. So far, not a single state has changed hands from 2016. At the moment, it seems unlikely that we’ll get a very clear picture before daylight. Biden is looking good in Arizona, which substantially complicates Trump’s path. Trump has taken a clear lead in Ohio, but there is still a lot of Democratic vote left to count there. Again, if you’re expecting to know the winner tonight you will be sorely disappointed.
Jonah Goldberg: Conservatives are becoming too tribal
Posted 3.37am UK time
Columnist Guy Denton’s recent interview with Jonah Goldberg, the Editor-in-Chief of The Dispatch and the host of the Remnant Podcast.
Ramesh Ponnuru, Why personality matters
Posted at 3.20am UK time
From columnist Guy Denton’s recent interview with Ramesh Ponnuru, senior editor for National Review:
Big bucks on the ballot
Posted 3.10am UK time
With significant bets having been placed for this election, from Farage's £10k on Trump to the £1million placed on Biden by a mystery gambler, odds at the bookies are now starting to favour the incumbent, President Donald J. Trump, for the first time since May.
First flip of the evening
Posted 3am UK time
The Democrats have won in Colorado, this being the first Democratic flip of a Senate seat in the 2020 election.