Biden Is Projected To Be The President-Elect. Here’s How It All Went Down.
As we keep watching Pennsylvania, it’s worth noting that in addition to the fact that the vote totals we’re seeing there now are without the late-arriving ballots — the ones that might have been contested at the U.S. Supreme Court — there’s no evidence at this point that the Trump campaign’s other lawsuits in Pennsylvania are going to make a difference to the outcome. The lawsuits that don’t have to do with observation of the counting process (which is increasingly a moot point as counting wraps up) are mostly about the process of allowing voters to fix problems with ballots or the timeline for verifying absentee voters’ identification. Those issues don’t appear to be affecting many ballots — and that’s assuming the lawsuits are successful at all.
Sarah, the outstanding vote in Pennsylvania is likely very Democratic because there are around 120,000 mail ballots remaining, and Democrats were more likely to vote by mail, so those ballots have a strong Democratic lean. What’s more, a majority of those ballots come from Democratic-leaning counties (Bucks and Lehigh) or heavily Democratic areas (Philadelphia and Allegheny counties). Additionally, we’ve heard that there might be around 100,000 provisional ballots to count as well. Now, provisional ballots tend to be somewhat Democratic-leaning in normal times because groups that lean Democratic are more likely to cast provisional ballots, such as young people or voters of color. But because of the surge in mail voting this year, some voters who requested a mail ballot may have never gotten one or had some other problem with it, so they went to the polls to vote in person but had to vote provisionally so election officials could make sure they didn’t actually vote by mail. This is just one of the many checks that election officials do to ensure the integrity of the vote. But because we know that those voting by mail were more likely to be Democrats, there’s a good chance that those mail-voters-turned-provisional voters are likely to be disproportionately Democratic, too. So that would likely help Biden’s margin in Pennsylvania.
As we wait for more results, let’s talk more about why all eyes are on Pennsylvania. The margin there is tight, but Biden has taken the lead. What can we say about the outstanding vote there? Do we have a sense of whether they are Democratic-leaning or Republican-leaning? And are there specific parts of the state we should be paying close attention to?