Summary
Donald Trump is likely to claim victory on election night, despite the vote count possibly extending over several days.
Early tallies may lean Republican, reflecting in-person votes, while absentee ballots counted later may shift toward Democrats, creating a “blue shift.”
Key states like Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan, and Nevada may take extra time to declare results due to laws and ballot processing delays.
Trump might exploit early Republican leads to allege fraud.
Trump can declare whatever he wants. No one is going to listen to him.
They will. This is the entire reason for the attempted coup last time. Trump was up early, declared victory, then absentee ballots were counted and …. It must be fraud
His fans will listen, and that’s the plan. He did this in 2016 and 2020 - declare victory during the “red mirage” portion of the evening, when he’ll probably be ahead, because Republicans tend to live in low-population areas that finish their counting early because they have fewer ballots. This is a well known phenomenon on national election nights. Democratic votes tend to come in later, because more democrats live in larger urban areas that take longer to count. After Trump declares victory based on these early returns, his fans will go to bed happy. Then when all the votes are in and it turns out he lost, they’ll “know” the election was stolen because in their minds they already “saw” him win.
Early voting in the blue wall states is blocked for count until after precinct counts. So you will see early in the night, a mirage where perhaps Trump is up. This is when he’ll say he won, but by early morning, and the early vote count, the story might change. However Florida does count its early vote first.
I declare him a loser here and now.
I really hope that Harris wins Iowa since that would be a big damper to Trump declaring victory.
It would be pretty cool if gen Z women who never answer when pollsters call their phones turn up in droves and flip many red states that were assumed to be automatic Trump wins. Especially Texas and Florida.
Absentee ballots are one reason for “red mirage” that usually gives early leads to Republican candidates. The other reason is simply that Repubs tend to live in smaller counties with fewer people in them, which means their vote counts get finished earlier than larger urban areas where Democrats tend to live. The “red mirage” is followed by a “blue shift” when the democratic votes come in.
