Two words to sum up the morning after Election Day 2020.
Most unsatisfying.
Neither side can claim victory. Neither side can even start processing the idea of losing. At this writing, at least five states are still being characterized by the media as “too close to call.”
Fox News called Arizona for Joe Biden late last night. Until just before we came to air, Fox was alone in that call. The other networks are now calling the state as well. That’s a net pickup for Joe Biden. Donald Trump carried Arizona by 91,000 in 2016. Arizona hasn’t voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since Bill Clinton carried the state in 1996.
Here’s a quick roundup of where things stand in the rest of the races that are not yet called.
Trump is leading in North Carolina by 77,000 votes with 95 percent of precincts in. He holds a narrow 27,000 vote lead in Michigan with 86 percent of the vote in.
Joe Biden has a razor-thin lead of 11,000 votes in Wisconsin with 91 percent of the vote counted. With 86 percent of the vote counted in Nevada, Biden holds a microscopic lead of only 8,000 votes. Nevada was an expected win for Biden.
The nail-biters for both camps lie in Georgia and Pennsylvania. Georgia is do-or-die for Joe Biden. Pennsylvania is do-or-die for Donald Trump.
In Georgia, which hasn’t voted for a Democrat since 1992, Trump currently leads by 104,000 with 92 percent of votes counted.
He is in much better shape at this hour in Pennsylvania. He leads by 619,000 with 75 percent of the vote in. Biden will have to do disproportionately well with the remaining outstanding vote to win Pennsylvania. (Yet the state remains uncalled by all of the national media.)
If one sits and plays “what if” with the Electoral College map, one can still find multiple paths to victory for both candidates. All of them, however, pass through what was once called the “Blue Wall” of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
The big takeaway
No matter which candidate emerges victorious, it can be correctly said that the media and the pollsters blew it – again.
All of the major polls had Biden winning handily. As September melted into October, all three of the legacy networks were speaking confidently of a “blue wave.” Almost everyone in the New York-Washington media enclave was talking about Democrats re-taking control of the Senate.
None of that happened.
If Biden hangs on to win, he will have the narrowest Electoral College win since George W. Bush squeaked by with 271 against Al Gore in 2000. The same is pretty much true for President Trump.
In either case, that’s not what the media – talking down to us from their lofty perch – told us was going to happen.
Biden can lose. Trump can lose.
Either way, the media has already lost.