Joyce White Vance: Do not be alarmed if the election night count is slow...

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.al.com/opinion/2020/09/joyce-white-vance-do-not-be-alarmed-if-the-election-night-count-is-slow.html

This year, unlike any election year in memory, it’s possible that Election Night will end without us having the final results. But while it’s different, it isn’t anything to worry about. This year, voters in Alabama, like in most other states, can vote absentee if they’re concerned about Covid-19. With many more Americans likely using mail-in voting because of the pandemic, the count will be slower. Ballots will have to be opened, verified, sorted and counted, and that process can’t begin, in Alabama, until election day. At the same time, there may be fewer poll workers available, both here in Alabama and across the country, and that could make the count slower as well.

A slower count has nothing to do with accuracy or legitimacy of the process, it simply reflects the unusual moment we are living in. President Trump has claimed that mail-in voting will produce “the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history,” but there is no evidence this is true. Whether a state calls it mail-in or absentee voting, many people, including Alabama military members and their families stationed overseas and college students attending school away from home, have used it for many years without problems. Voters get to complete their ballot at home and, depending on state rules, return it by mail or in person on or before Election Day.

Voting by mail is common. In 2016, roughly one out of every four votes was mailed. President Trump has often voted by mail, as have members of his family, Vice President Pence, and other Cabinet members. Every member of the U.S. military stationed overseas votes by mail. Some states, such as California, send a mail-in ballot to every registered voter. Five states — including Utah, hardly a progressive stronghold —conduct their elections entirely by mail without the type of fraud the president claims will occur.

Those states do so because voting by mail is proven safe. States have extra security protocols for mail-in ballots — such as bar codes, signature verification, and statistical audits — making them as secure as in-person ballots if not more so, because they are paper ballots, not electronic ones. Ballots are delivered through the U.S. Postal Service, which we trust to deliver Social Security checks, tax refunds, credit cards, passports, and life-saving prescription medications.

*snip*

[Laelth]

1. But what will the networks do?

They want to air a good show on election night, and they’re in competition with one another to “call” a given state first. Ordinarily, they rely on a state’s recent voting history and make their projections based upon exit polling and early-reporting “bellwether” counties in a given state.

Contrary to popular opinion, I suspect that the networks will be confident calling the election for Biden/Harris at around 11:30 Eastern time.

-Laelth

[2naSalit]

2. K&R