Since the beginning of the year, the world had been witnessing exceptional developments as the pandemic casted its shadow on every aspect of human life, be it the transition to working from home, the closure of restaurants, cafes, or the lack of travelling and mobility across borders. In the United States, the retreat of normalcy is historic even in a political sense, as the presidential elections is taking place amid the pandemic.
In the lines below we unpack the key five exceptional aspects of the US 2020 elections:
- Millions increase in the use of ‘mail-in’ ballots: It is a method of using the mail to vote, rather than having to vote in-person. This method is not new, in fact it started during the Civil War, allowing soldiers to cast their ballots in their home states. Over time, more states began expanding the use of absentee ballots to make voting more accessible to more people, including those who have a disability, or are facing emergency situations such hospitalization. Of course, the pandemic pushed millions to use this voting method.
- Record high turnout in early voting: Pre-election voting has surpassed two-thirds of all ballots cast during the 2016 presidential elections. More than 91.6 million Americans have voted before election day, as a majority of states are reporting record early voting turnout in the 2020 election. Of course, this intensity speaks to the high polarization.
- Delayed results: Mail ballots tend to take longer to process than in-person votes, and because millions more people are voting by mail this year than ever before due to the pandemic results in key states are delayed more than usual. President Donald Trump have been laying groundwork to challenge the results of the election if he loses, on the basis that longer time of processing and counting could mean manipulation of results. In the final days of the campaign, his closing argument is that the votes in a fair election should not be counted past election night. “The Election should end on November 3rd, not weeks later!” he tweeted. In reality, the scenario Trump is outlining is not possible and never has been. Traditionally, Americans know who won on election night because news outlets project or “call” winners based on partial counts, not because the counting is actually completed that quickly. These race calls mean Candidate A is far enough ahead that, given the number of outstanding ballots and the regions those ballots are coming from, Candidate B would realistically be unable to close the gap. However, in some states, Colorado or Florida for example, which has been conducting elections by mail for years, it may still be possible to call winners on election night, depending on how close the races are. But in many other states, including the all-important Pennsylvania, some counties will not begin counting mail-in ballots until 4 November because of limited resources.
- Virtual and smaller national conventions: Both the Republican and the Democratic Parties hosted extra-ordinary national conventions to officially nominate their presidential and vice presidential candidates. The Democratic Party held the country’s first all-virtual convention, while the Republicans chose a mixture of both live and taped events.
- The presidential debates: This year’s presidential debates were exceptional for more than one reason. Other than the chaotic and incomprehensible first debate between Trump and Biden, the visual of the debate was also markedly different. (1) The candidates did not shake hands when they took to the stage. (2) The audience was sparse compared to previous debates, and there was no media “spin” room, where campaigns would otherwise send their supporters to make the case for their candidates after the debate.
