Want to follow election results like a pro? Here’s what to see in key states

This fall, the State Board of Elections approved a new rule that requires poll workers to manually count the number of ballots cast, rather than the actual votes, after voting closes. Critics, including GOP Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, are concerned that the rule will delay the reporting of election results.

In the 2022 Ohio Senate race, Rep. Tim Ryan started with an early lead when Franklin County, home to the state capital of Columbus, reported its first batch of overnight ballots in which Ryan received 74% to 26% of the vote. Republican. J.D. Vance, now Trump’s running mate. This was Ryan’s finest hour. He ultimately defeated Franklin with just under two-thirds of the vote and lost the statewide race.

So why was his lead so much greater earlier in the evening?

Again, it’s all about mail-in ballots. Ohio releases election results first thing on election night, including mail-in votes. As in other races starting in 2022, mail-in votes have tended to lean Democratic. As the number of votes increased on Election Day, Republican J.D. Vance took the lead and ultimately won by 6 points.

In the 2022 Senate race, about a half hour after polls closed in North Carolina, Democrat Sheri Beasley led by nearly 200,000 votes. By midnight, Republican Ted Budd had a lead of more than 150,000 votes.

North Carolina counts nearly all of its ballots on election night. The first reports of the evening in most North Carolina counties will be mail-in voting results, followed by early in-person voting. Later updates will include results of votes cast on Election Day. North Carolina has a history of counting votes fairly quickly on Election Day, so if a blue mirage does emerge from these early reports, it may not last long.

It is unclear how this might affect the vote count. emergency changes was put into effect after Hurricane Helen devastated the western parts of the state. Among other changes, the Legislature decided that voters in the 25 counties affected by Helen can drop off their absentee ballots at open early in-person voting sites and at county election offices anywhere in the state. These ballots still must be returned by 7:30 pm on Election Day to be counted.

Pennsylvania followed the same pattern as Georgia and Ohio in 2022.

Initial vote updates that included most mail-in ballots gave Democrat John Fetterman a lopsided lead before Republican votes began to close the gap in the Senate race. Even before voting closed, the state reported that more than 7 in 10 mail-in ballots returned before Election Day were from registered Democrats.

Republican Mehmet Oz began to catch up as more votes were counted in rural areas and on Election Day. But those votes were not enough to surpass Fetterman’s lead.

When the AP called Fetterman the winner, he led by 2 percentage points. The AP estimated there were more than 800,000 votes left to be counted, but most of them were in counties where Fetterman won by wide margins: Philadelphia and nearby Delaware, Bucks and Montgomery counties. But the way votes are counted in Pennsylvania could result in a blue mirage, a red mirage or both — at different times of the evening. Pennsylvania does not require counties to first report their mail-in votes, and they are not allowed to begin processing those votes until Election Day.

In the 2020 presidential election, Biden took a huge lead as votes were counted before Election Day, then Trump took a huge lead as votes were counted on Election Day, and then Biden eventually regained his narrow lead as votes were counted more votes by mail.

In Wisconsin, municipalities report vote totals to counties, and each city can choose how to report its results. Most combine mail-in ballots with Election Day votes, but some, including Milwaukee, publish them separately. This reduces the chance of mirage, but also adds an element of unpredictability.

The City of Milwaukee reports election results on Election Day ahead of mail-in voting. That could make it difficult to know how many votes remain to be counted until election officials provide specific information about how many mail ballots remain or confirm they have already been counted.

In Wisconsin, the latest votes coming out of Milwaukee, usually reported in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, are often needed to determine the winner in competitive races.

Like Wisconsin, Michigan does not have a universal model for counties reporting their mail-in ballots. This often makes geography a better indicator of the direction of a race than voting type.

The key to a close race in Michigan is waiting for Wayne, Oakland and Washtenaw counties to win significant votes before jumping to conclusions. Wayne includes Detroit, and Oakland includes the city’s northern suburbs. Washtenaw County is home to Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan.

Michigan does not allow absentee ballots to be counted until the morning of Election Day and warns on its election website that large numbers of absentee ballots typically delay the counting process by hours, if not days.

Under state law, Arizona will not report election results until one hour after polls close. But this means that when the first update comes out, it will be quite large. Historically, the first update reports about half of the state’s total votes.

This update, like many other states, has tended to heavily favor Democrats in recent elections because it includes mail-in ballots cast well before Election Day. This gap typically narrows as votes are counted on Election Day. But after that, things take a more complicated turn in Arizona than in other states.

Ballots counted after Election Day include “late early,” the last mail-in ballots that include ballots mailed on Election Day. Those ballots largely favored Trump in 2020.

But in the 2022 Senate race, Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly led in the first update when Maricopa County, the state’s most populous county and home to Phoenix, released 837,000 ballots in its first report. He maintained that initial lead, although it dwindled as Election Day results came in. The votes counted after election night did not work in his favor.

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Find out more about how elections work in the United States on the website 2024 Elections Explainedan Associated Press series designed to help make sense of American democracy. The AP receives support from several private foundations to improve its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. Learn more about the AP Democracy Initiative Here. AP is solely responsible for all content.