Expert predicts late announcement of U.S. presidential election result

Dr Mark J. Rozell, an expert on United States (U.S.) elections and federalism, on Wednesday, predicted late announcement of final result of the country’s November 3, presidential election.
Rozell made the prediction while answering questions from journalists selected from across the globe by the U.S. Department of State – Bureau of Global Public Affairs – to cover the election.
Speaking during a webinar, Rozell said that the electorate and observers of the presidential election would have to wait for several days before a winner would be announced.
The expert said that the mail-in voting system which was being highly used by voters because of the coronavirus pandemic would not change the role of the Electoral College.
He, however, said that the early voting system has a possibility of producing uncertain results on election night as it would take a longer time to count.
“Because of the pandemic, we are having much more voting by mail this year and also early voting so that voting in person can be staggered to minimise the risk to people.
“In Virginia where I teach, they just started voting last week even before the first presidential debate and there were hours of long lines of people lining up already to vote.
“So what is going to happen on election night, results will be coming in based on people who voted in person the traditional way on November 3, Election Day.
“But counting of the mail-in ballot will take a few days perhaps several days or even longer.
”We are not sure. We have not done this before.
“Therefore, we are most likely not to know the result of the election on election night as had always been the case.
“We may have to wait for the mail votes to be counted and this has raised some concerns,” he said.
He said those living outside the U.S. would use the absentee ballot system which “allows those absent and cannot return for a good reason, to vote using proper identification.”
The November 3 U.S. presidential election will see two major contestants – the incumbent President and candidate of the Republican Party, Donald Trump, challenge former Vice President Joe Biden of the Democratic Party.