2020 Presidential Election Results & Exit Polls commentary thread

[BlueSwan]

How much vote is outstanding in PA now? Did Philly report? Is PA pretty much a done thing for Biden like we thought 8 hours ago when I went to bed?

What about Arizona. Any way that that is slipping from Biden?

175k ballots left in PA, 58k from Philly and 36k from Allegheny (those will be counted tomorrow)

OK, so basically PA should be safe for Biden by now?

[BlueSwan]

blue lines

Good Massive Attack album, but I prefer Mezzanine

What about Protection though?

[BlueSwan]

What is the status in the house? Is the majority secure for democrats?

[BlueSwan]

Clayton just reported another 268 ballots. Went for Biden 249-19. Biden 92% in this batch.

Trump lead in GA now +1,479

I went to bed about 8 hours ago. How does it look in GA, will Biden pull the upset?

He's on track to overtake him, but there's still the military ballots and it's likely headed for a recount regardless.

My assumption is Biden ends up winning it.

What was the deadline for military ballots again? It’s today (friday), right?

[BlueSwan]

I just noticed that Hickenlooper smashed Cory Gardner by 9%.

This when Mark Kelly is only up by 3.4%.  The two candidates were both considered about equally safe.

So much for the "Hickenlooper was a bad candidate" takes.  Looks like he's the only Senate candidate in a competitive race to match his polling.

Hickenlooper still underperformed Biden. Those results just reflect that Colorado is now a safe D state.

[BlueSwan]

Biden's GA deficit is now 1267

Given that, do we know how many ballots are still out there?

There's approx 9k of early votes left in GA plus provisionals and any late arriving mail. Vast majority is in Gwinett, which has gone home for the night, and Clayton which said they are trying to finish.

But late arriving mail won't count in GA, right?

[BlueSwan]

So, it is 8am here in Europe. Are we even expecting any more results until much much later today?

[BlueSwan]

I've woken up and beyond a raving Trump press conference nothing seems to have happened. From a quick skim PA is still taking years & Georgia is going to come down to about a 1000 votes either way right?

Also in Europe, but from what I can gather:

- PA should definitely go to Biden, but everybody is too afraid to call it.
- Same with NV
- AZ probably goes Biden but the call was premature.
- GA is gonna be the closest election since FL in 2000, but Biden is probably slightly favoured.
- NC is still likely Trump.
- No real evidence of voter fraud.
- No major legal rulings

[BlueSwan]

Put me at ease: I fear Biden will come up short in the remaining states.

Does it appear to be likely that will happen?

No. Biden wins PA EASILY at this point!

[BlueSwan]

Can anybody reasonably explain why Nevada and Arizona are counting this slowly? My students ask this all of the time and I feel that I pretty much BS myself through a very generalized answer. Are there any particularly reasons why these two states are THIS slow right now?

[BlueSwan]

Do we know what the outstanding vote in Georgia looks like? Is it still mainly from democratic areas?

[BlueSwan]

CNN says PA has 163K ballots left to count.

15-20K provisionals just in Philly as well.

If Biden wins ~75% of the 163K, that is 122K to 41K. 80K net gain. Would put Biden up about ~62K in PA.

163k?? The github page says 275k? Still shouldn't be a problem for Biden, but it is really frustrating with these varying numbers.

[BlueSwan]

Can anybody reasonably explain why Nevada and Arizona are counting this slowly? My students ask this all of the time and I feel that I pretty much BS myself through a very generalized answer. Are there any particularly reasons why these two states are THIS slow right now?

It's nothing new for Arizona, anyway.  A big part of the slowdown comes from the tedious and time-consuming signature verification process.  Literally every signature needs to be checked against the corresponding signature that one used when he/she registered to vote.  

If something's off, then the voting office attempts to get in touch with the voter.  That's not the whole answer, but the simple response is "because Arizona's voting check system is extremely meticulous".  

Source:  https://www.kold.com/2020/11/05/why-is-vote-counting-so-slow/

Thank you. Luckily that is pretty much in line with what I told my students. Do you have any ideas on Nevada?

[BlueSwan]

CNN says PA has 163K ballots left to count.

15-20K provisionals just in Philly as well.

If Biden wins ~75% of the 163K, that is 122K to 41K. 80K net gain. Would put Biden up about ~62K in PA.

163k?? The github page says 275k? Still shouldn't be a problem for Biden, but it is really frustrating with these varying numbers.

Given that they've been counting for the past 12 hours and reported next to nothing, I'm guessing that it's a discrepancy between votes counted and votes reported.

Let's hope so.

[BlueSwan]

Can anybody reasonably explain why Nevada and Arizona are counting this slowly? My students ask this all of the time and I feel that I pretty much BS myself through a very generalized answer. Are there any particularly reasons why these two states are THIS slow right now?

It's nothing new for Arizona, anyway.  A big part of the slowdown comes from the tedious and time-consuming signature verification process.  Literally every signature needs to be checked against the corresponding signature that one used when he/she registered to vote.  

If something's off, then the voting office attempts to get in touch with the voter.  That's not the whole answer, but the simple response is "because Arizona's voting check system is extremely meticulous".  

Source:  https://www.kold.com/2020/11/05/why-is-vote-counting-so-slow/

Thank you. Luckily that is pretty much in line with what I told my students. Do you have any ideas on Nevada?

Because Nevada's a freak state full of monster people and YE. 

Makes sense!

[BlueSwan]

That all said, I THINK we can all agree that Florida should never again be considered part of a Democrat's path to 270. It should just be written off as a state we hope to win in a landslide at best. There genuinely are brighter hopes for the likes of GA and NC as far as states we can truly flip D permanently.

A state that is always close and awards 29 electoral votes should absolutely not be written off. Trump is a unique candidate with a unique kind of appeal. It is far from certain that Florida would vote similarly in say a Kamala Harris vs Mike Pence election or whatever.

[BlueSwan]

Does anyone know if we'll get enough votes counted in either PA and/or NV today, so that networks can finally call this race for Biden?

I have a feeling that the networks are only waiting for Biden to overtake Trump in the official PA count. There really should be plenty of evidence for calling it already, but the optics of calling it while Trump is "ahead" are really bad, especially with all of his supporters claiming a rigged election.

[BlueSwan]

People saying that the Democrats should abandon Florida:

1) How are you going to get control of the senate back and keep it without at least one FL seat?
2) What's your backup plan for when razor-thin majorities in AZ and GA go the other way in a presidential election?

1. Theoretically at least we could get it within weeks with GA alone.

2. The hope I guess is that they continue to trend D.

Ultimately, I truly think at this point that even TX is the safer long-run bet than FL. Biden got more votes than any Democrat in history, more votes than Trump in 2016, flipped Tarrant County. It wasn't enough this year, but within the next decade it should be, especially without Trump voters coming out in force to vote for their idol.

Florida is a cursed state where every time it seems we make gains, we sustain greater losses elsewhere in the state. It truly is fool's gold more than anything else.

Obama still won Florida twice.

TX looks fairly good long term, but even a decade is a loooong time in politics.

There's no such thing as a cursed state. Republicans have just been more effective in Florida. It is not at all like they are winning it with ease.

Trump has unique appeal to a certain set of latinos.

[BlueSwan]

Does anyone know if we'll get enough votes counted in either PA and/or NV today, so that networks can finally call this race for Biden?

I have a feeling that the networks are only waiting for Biden to overtake Trump in the official PA count. There really should be plenty of evidence for calling it already, but the optics of calling it while Trump is "ahead" are really bad, especially with all of his supporters claiming a rigged election.

I agree.  I just wonder if there's enough PA vote coming in today to put Biden over the top?

There very probably is.

It's not probably, there is. Biden just needs Philly alone to put him over the top, and that will likely put him like 20K over the top.

I don't think they are questioning that. I think tey are questioning whether this is coming TODAY. I believe it is, but with the snails pace we are moving at, the question is reasonable.

[BlueSwan]

Something interesting:

Trump Picks off NV + AZ and just holds on to PA

Biden gets GA

That would be a 269-269 tie. Unlikely, but it’s still a possibility.

No.

Trump is not winning PA or NV.

[BlueSwan]

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1324698927136997377

As he should. Nate Silver has plenty of times proved that he is a sublime data analyst, but a terrible pundit. Most notably when he completely wrote off Trump's chances in the 2016 republican primaries. Keep talking those numbers Nate, but don't make baseless gut feeling calls.

[BlueSwan]

I am closer to truly believing in god than I have been in years.

I'm starting to believe Georgia flipping was divine intervention intended to reward Jimmy Carter for all his goodness and kindness throughout these decades.

LOL as long as dems don't get Senate Biden has no chance in 2024. They won't be able to change electoral college.

I kinda doubt Biden will even run in 2024.

Besides being very old in 2024, Mitch McConnell is going to make his life as president pretty miserable, so I agree.

[BlueSwan]

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1324698927136997377

Silver needs to go away forever and stop talking about politics. He is a freaking joke.

And you are...?

My prediction was 10000x closer to the result than Silver. He said Trump would lose Florida by 2 and he won by 4. He said Ohio was a tie and Trump won by 8. Silver can shut the f*** up

No, he didn't. His model, which is based on data from other companies' polls, did.

[BlueSwan]

Huh, the last couple of PA updates ook very weird indeed: https://alex.github.io/nyt-2020-election-scraper/battleground-state-changes.html

[BlueSwan]

It's tough to say because we don't know what Biden's popular vote win will look like, but it seems like the electoral college advantage for Republicans did not expand by much if at all this year like many predicted. Though given how close many states are that isn't too comforting on its own.

Oh, it did. I believe Biden is on track to win the popular vote by something like 4.5 points.