2022-11-12 08:00:00
Three days ago, Americans elected a new Congress. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 seats in the Senate were up for election. To date, it is not known whether the Republicans have managed to take the majority from the Democrats in one of the two chambers or even in both. The decision has not yet been made because in a few states races are too close to be considered decided until all ballots are counted.
After the Democrats’ victory in Arizona, which has been confirmed since Friday (local time), they, like the Republicans, currently have 49 seats in the Senate. Both parties might still control the smaller chamber of the American Congress. 50 senators would be enough for the Democrats because then Vice President Kamala Harris might cast the deciding vote in deadlock situations. The Republicans need 51 seats for the majority. Senate seats are still open in two states: Nevada and Georgia.
Nevada still counts
In Nevada, Republican challenger Adam Laxalt is around one percent ahead of Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto. Less than 9,000 votes separate the two, with around 88 percent of ballots counted, according to CNN. On Thursday, the election authority said that helpers were busy counting 12,000 ballot papers that were delivered by mail on Wednesday and 57,000 ballot papers that were placed in the appropriate boxes on election day. According to a CNN estimate, a total of around 120,000 ballots were still uncounted. According to the current electoral law, ballot papers that arrive by Saturday will also be taken into account if they have a postmark of Tuesday at the latest. The areas around the largest cities, Las Vegas and Reno, were particularly affected.
If the Republicans win the race in Nevada, it would come down to Georgia. No candidate there won more than 50 percent of the vote. And if that happens, the rule in Georgia is always that a runoff election must bring the decision. It is scheduled for December 6th between Democrat Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker.
The situation in the House of Representatives
The Senate showdown isn’t the only election still outstanding. Nevada and Arizona, for example, also still have elections for the House of Representatives pending. There are three races in Arizona that have not yet been counted and are too close to predict a decision. A decision is still pending in Nevada. In the larger chamber of Congress, the Republicans currently have 211 seats and the Democrats 198. The Republicans are therefore well on their way to achieving the 218 seats necessary for a majority. However, the state with the most outstanding House elections is California. There are still 16 races that have not been completely counted.
There are also state-level elections that are of national interest. In Arizona, Republican Kari Lake wants to become governor. She is currently trailing Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs by just over one percentage point (almost 27,000 votes). The Republican Mark Finchem is a little more clearly behind his Democratic opponent for the post of “Secretary of State” – a kind of Interior Minister – Adrian Fontes: He has a lead of almost 110,000 votes. In Nevada, Republican Jim Marchant is just over 5,000 votes behind Democrat Cisco Aguilar.
Reasons for the delays
But why does it take so long to count all these results? On the one hand, it has to do with the sheer volume of decisions that voters have to make on election day. It’s not just regarding the seats in Washington, but also regarding parliaments and state governments, regarding referendums and also positions in the districts.
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On the other hand, more and more people are voting by mail and not going to the polling station on election day. In Nevada and California, ballots are sent to all citizens who are registered to vote; in Arizona, they must be requested once. However, counting these postal votes is complex. First, the signature on each individual envelope must be compared with the signature stored in the voter file. Only when this has been completed satisfactorily can the ballot paper be removed and counted. If there are complaints, voters usually have several days to resolve them personally on site. If there is then a glitch like in Arizona, where ballot papers were issued that might not be read by machines because the pressure was too weak, this delays the process even further.
Furthermore, officials in their respective districts are aware that the entire nation is watching them. They will not rush into anything and will try to do everything very precisely according to the instructions so as to leave no room for disputes. So it might take at least until next week, if not longer, for all the races to be decided.
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