Certifying this year’s presidential results begins quietly, in contrast to the 2020 election
ATLANTA– Local officials are beginning to certify this year’s results presidential elections in a process that has thus far unfolded quietly, in stark contrast to the tumultuous certification period four years ago that followed the loss of then-President Donald Trump.
Georgia was the first of the presidential battleground states to begin certification, with local election boards voting all day Tuesday. As counties certified their results without controversy, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger praised Georgia’s elections as “free, fair and fast.”
Trump won Georgia and the six other presidential battleground states after that to lose six of them to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. District certification meetings are planned later this week in several other swing states — Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin.
The lack of certification drama so far this week is a return to how the usually routine process worked before Trump lost his bid for re-election four years ago. While he then tried to overturn the will of the voters, he and his allies Republican members pressured of certification boards in Michigan to slow down or stop the process. They tried that too postpone certifications in Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania.
The boards ultimately voted for certification, but Trump focused on certification caught on among Republicans. Some local Republican officials have done so refused to certify results in the elections since then, voicing concerns of a broader movement to reject the certification this year, Trump would have lost to Vice President Kamala Harris.
Some of that feeling was present on Tuesday. Michael Heekin, a Republican member of the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections, said he disagreed that certifying election results “is a purely ministerial duty.”
“We must be the first line of defense, at least one of the lines of defense, in investigating the goodness and accuracy of the election,” he said.
An attorney for the county, which includes heavily Democratic Atlanta, explained at the meeting that certification was a necessary step before any election challenges could take place. The county election board announced the results late Tuesday.
Unlike Trump four years ago, Harris acknowledged her loss and gave in. Trump also won the popular vote for the first time during his three runs for the White House and touted the election results. Instead of angrily heading to polling stations across the province, his supporters cheered.
“This time four years ago, I was constantly getting annoying phone calls at my office,” said Lisa Tollefson, elections secretary in Rock County, Wisconsin. This year, she said, “it has been very quiet.”
That doesn’t mean everyone is happy. Conspiracy theories surrounding this year’s elections are circulating within both parties.
After Election Day, left-wing conspiracy theories spread on TikTok,
Some right-wing narratives twisted the story, falsely claiming that the vote difference was instead evidence that Biden’s 2020 count must have included fake votes.
The claims did not take into account the fact that Preparing the table would take several daysalso in Arizona and California, the country’s most populous state. With votes still being counted this week, Harris has caught up, and now he has done so almost 72 million votesa number that will continue to grow.
Counties and other local jurisdictions across the country will conduct post-election audits of the vote in the coming weeks. Typically, this involves counting a certain number of ballots by hand and comparing the results to machine counts to ensure accuracy.
Before local results are certified, the top election official typically provides vote totals by candidate in each race, along with how many voters cast ballots and how many ballots were cast in total. Any deviations are reported and explained.
“The whole point of this period is to find these kinds of errors,” said Kim Wyman, the former Washington state elections official. “They make sure that the results were accurate, that the election was accurate.”
Every state will undergo the process, including presidential battlegrounds.
Election certification rallies begin Wednesday in Nevada, where a Republican was endorsed in the presidential race for the first time in two decades. The state’s 17 counties have until Friday to make their declarations, while Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, a Democrat, and the Nevada Supreme Court must meet on Nov. 26 to finalize the statewide results .
Arizona’s 15 counties must certify their results by Nov. 21 and forward the results to the governor and secretary of state — both Democrats — for statewide certification four days later.
In North Carolina, where election officials quickly recovered after Hurricane Helene devastated the western part of the state, election boards in all 100 counties were scheduled to meet Friday to certify the results.
Pennsylvania counties have until November 25 to certify. Some larger counties were still reviewing and counting provisional ballots on Tuesday, the deadline for them to report unofficial results to the state. Litigation was possible because a U.S. Senate race hovered close to the threshold for an automatic statewide recount.
Michigan’s 83 county canvassers have until Nov. 19 to review local results before forwarding them to the Board of State Canvassers. The four-member board, made up of two Democrats and two Republicans, is expected to announce the results on November 25.
In Wisconsin, counties started the hiring process on Tuesday and have until Nov. 19 to get certified. The Wisconsin Elections Commission will review the county reports and the chairman – currently a Democrat – will certify the results by December 1.
The biggest potential problem in the state was identified and corrected on Election Day. The vote tabulating machines used for mail-in ballots in Milwaukee were not properly sealed. A decision was made by both parties to restart counting ballots once the problem was resolved.
Meagan Wolfe, the state’s top nonpartisan elections administrator, said the election had been a success without major problems. She attributed that to years of training and preparation by local election workers.
“Well-run elections don’t happen by accident,” she said.
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Swenson reported from New York. Associated Press writers Scott Bauer in Madison, Wis.; Jacques Billeaud in Phoenix; Joey Cappelletti in Lansing, Michigan; Christine Fernando in Chicago; Marc Levy in Harrisburg, PA; Gary D. Robertson in Raleigh, North Carolina; and Rio Yamat in Las Vegas contributed to this report.
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