Four years ago, the Associated Press was unable to call several states until weeks after the presidential election, but in the 2024 race, the outlet called every state by the end of the week.
The speed of results being projected for several of the key swing states was noticeably faster than in 2020, allowing President-elect Donald Trump to be projected the winner of the race less than 11 hours after the states fully closed their polls. In 2020, President Joe Biden was not projected the winner of the presidential race until the Saturday after the Tuesday election. Here are some of the reasons for why the race was called sooner.
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State law changes
After slow returns in 2020, some states changed their vote counting processes to speed up the tabulation of ballots and to avoid similar delays in knowing who the winner of the presidential race was.
In Georgia, a law was passed in 2021 to allow mail-in ballots to be scanned and processed up to two weeks prior to Election Day, as a way of speeding up counting the early ballots. Previously the law had only permitted mail-in ballots to begin to be scanned and processed the morning of Election Day.
“Counting absentee ballots in 2020 took an incredibly long time in some counties. Creating processes for early processing and scanning of absentee ballots will promote elector confidence by ensuring that results are reported quickly,” the 2021 law said.
Georgia was the final state to be called by the Associated Press in the 2020 presidential election, 16 days after Election Day, on Nov. 19, 2020, but in 2024, it was called by the outlet at 12:58 a.m. EST on the Wednesday after Election Day.
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In Michigan, a new law passed by the state legislature ahead of the 2024 election allowed cities and townships in the Great Lakes State to begin processing and tabulating votes up to eight days before Election Day. The state also changed other election laws, including adding more early voting days, among other modifications.
In 2020, Michigan was called for Biden at 5:58 p.m. EST on the Wednesday after the election, but in 2024, it was called for Trump by the Associated Press at 12:54 p.m. EST on the Wednesday after the election. The difference in when the race was called for Michigan was an improvement in speed, but not as dramatic as it was for Georgia.
Fewer mail-in ballots than 2020
Another factor in results coming faster this year when compared to the last presidential election was less reliance on mail-in ballots by voters. The 2020 election occurred in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic and vote-by-mail was encouraged over in person voting, resulting in a spike in its usage.
An estimated 13 million voters cast their ballot absentee in the battleground states in the 2020 election, according to TargetSmart, whereas in the 2024 election, only roughly 8 million voters in the battleground states cast their ballot absentee.
Early in-person voting was still widely used across the country, after the Trump campaign changed its tune on the method and encouraged their voters to utilize it.
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Wider margin of victory
Another key factor in the why the states were able to be called faster was the wider margin of victory for Trump in swing states.
Biden won several of the key states by slim margins over Trump in 2020. Four years later, while still relatively tight, the margins Trump won by in multiple states were larger and made the contests easier to project.
In 2020, Biden won Pennsylvania by roughly 80,000 votes, but in 2024, Trump won the commonwealth by more than 126,000 votes. In Wisconsin, Biden won in 2020 by a margin of more than 20,000 votes, while in 2024, Trump won the Badger State by roughly 30,000 votes.
In the Grand Canyon State, Biden won in 2020 by just over 10,000 votes, but in 2024, Trump won Arizona by more than 185,000 votes. In the Peach State, Biden defeated Trump in 2020 by just over 11,000 votes, but in 2024, Trump won the state by just over 115,000 votes.
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In one battleground state, Michigan, the margins were tighter than in 2020. Biden won the state in 2020 by roughly 154,000, but in 2024, Trump only won it by more than 80,000.
Trump’s wider margins in the key battleground states, along with ground he gained in heavily Democratic and Republican states across the country, also made it possible for him to be the first Republican since George W. Bush in 2004 to win the popular vote.
