WEBVTT - 2020 Election is a Legal Logjam 0:00:00.480 --> 0:00:05.720 You're listening to Bloomberg Law with June Grasso from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:06.440 --> 0:00:09.080 It's a high stakes election and it's on track to 0:00:09.119 --> 0:00:12.360 be one of the most litigated in US history. It's 0:00:12.360 --> 0:00:16.840 been complicated by changes to balloting prompted by the coronavirus 0:00:16.920 --> 0:00:21.000 and President Trump repeating misinformation about voting by mail. But 0:00:21.120 --> 0:00:25.159 the mail in voting with a mail indiscriminately millions and 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:27.840 millions of ballots to people you're never gonna know who 0:00:27.840 --> 0:00:30.160 one day election. You can't have that. There are a 0:00:30.160 --> 0:00:33.080 flood of lawsuits in forty two states and d C 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:36.239 that will determine how easy or hard it will be 0:00:36.320 --> 0:00:39.400 to cast your ballot. Joining me is election law expert 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:43.160 Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Law School. So, Justin, 0:00:43.200 --> 0:00:46.280 you've actually been tracking the cases, and at last count, 0:00:46.320 --> 0:00:49.880 there were one nine cases. I want to be clear, 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:55.320 that's not just election law cases. There are more than that. 0:00:55.320 --> 0:01:00.400 That's only election law cases that say the pandemic change things. 0:01:00.720 --> 0:01:03.440 If you add up the disputes that were still pending 0:01:03.480 --> 0:01:07.160 before COVID nineteen were those that don't depend on the pandemic. 0:01:07.240 --> 0:01:10.160 There are quite a few more. It's a very ligitious season. 0:01:10.680 --> 0:01:13.320 It certainly is. I see your list grows all the time. 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:16.720 Briefly or broadly described what the cases are that are 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:20.320 non pandemic related. There's something that are still lingering from 0:01:20.400 --> 0:01:23.240 before March. If your listeners remember there was a time 0:01:23.280 --> 0:01:26.120 before March, and I know it's hard, It's really hard 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:28.399 to get back there now. There were disputes over the 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:32.399 rules of elections in and apart from the pandemic, about whether, 0:01:32.760 --> 0:01:36.360 for example, absentee balloting rules were too strict, about whether 0:01:36.400 --> 0:01:40.360 there were processes for notifying people about mistakes, about whether 0:01:40.680 --> 0:01:44.679 people with convictions were entitled to vote or not, or 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:46.679 whether the state knew whether they were entitled to vote 0:01:46.720 --> 0:01:49.120 or not. There's an ongoing to spudent Florida that boils 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:52.480 down to can the state restrict your right to vote 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:55.880 until you've paid off fines and fees for a conviction 0:01:56.160 --> 0:01:58.720 when the state can't tell you how much you owe. 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:01.160 A horrible state of affairs. But it has nothing to 0:02:01.160 --> 0:02:05.080 do with the pandemic. So let's turn to the pandemic cases. 0:02:05.360 --> 0:02:08.480 They also cover a broad range of issues, and most 0:02:08.520 --> 0:02:12.680 of them seem to relate to mail in balloting. Yeah, 0:02:12.760 --> 0:02:15.560 I'd say there are three or four big blocks of cases, 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:18.040 and mail in balloting is a super big one. The 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:20.919 first thing easiest to understand maybe cases that have to 0:02:20.960 --> 0:02:24.880 do with the primaries or petitioning on to the general election, 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:27.919 where you have to get signatures. So lots of minor 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:32.840 party candidates, some major party candidates, um some initiatives and 0:02:32.919 --> 0:02:35.720 citizens initiatives want to know if they can get onto 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:38.079 the ballot or not. The main way we do that 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:41.760 is by getting signatures and having people stand out and 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:44.760 collect people's innatures as they walk by into large gatherings. 0:02:44.880 --> 0:02:47.760 We're have any large gatherings anymore, and so it's really 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:50.000 hard to collect those signatures, and there's been a lot 0:02:50.040 --> 0:02:53.160 of litigation about that. There's been a lot of litigation about, 0:02:53.200 --> 0:02:56.400 as you say, the mail in ballot system about well, 0:02:56.440 --> 0:02:59.880 on one end, whether it is as available as it 0:03:00.040 --> 0:03:02.919 needs to be in a pandemic, things like they need 0:03:03.000 --> 0:03:06.919 to get notaries or witness signatures, Things like deadlines for 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.160 when to request or when to submit, things like whether 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:11.560 you need to submit with postage, things like whether you 0:03:11.600 --> 0:03:15.440 need an excuse. Those are all under contest. There are 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:20.519 also a few pieces of litigation about emergency steps that 0:03:20.720 --> 0:03:24.760 executives have taken public health officials, governors or secretaries of 0:03:24.800 --> 0:03:30.000 state expanding access to mail balance and litigation over whether 0:03:30.120 --> 0:03:32.959 those officials had the right to do that either in 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:35.840 the seeral constitution of the state constitution. And then there's 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:39.080 a fourth set of issues around the in person process, 0:03:39.120 --> 0:03:42.200 because we will still have any in person process even 0:03:42.200 --> 0:03:44.480 with all of these mail ballots. The goal is not 0:03:44.560 --> 0:03:48.360 to shut out or shut down any in person baloting. 0:03:48.680 --> 0:03:51.880 It's to leave space for in person balloting for those 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:54.080 who need it most. So there will still be people 0:03:54.120 --> 0:03:57.320 at the polls, and there's still some litigations over the 0:03:57.400 --> 0:04:00.760 conditions for actually going to the polls. This notever, election 0:04:00.800 --> 0:04:06.400 officials in many places want to consolidate the polling places 0:04:06.440 --> 0:04:10.400 to reduce in person voting, which would lead to more 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:13.640 lines and perhaps less people voting. Well, I want to 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:15.960 put back on that a little bit. The consolidation is right, 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:20.440 So I think many, many, many, many many officials want 0:04:20.520 --> 0:04:24.719 there to be fewer locations, but that's not necessarily a 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:28.760 bad thing. So just take two examples. One is a 0:04:28.839 --> 0:04:32.760 jurisdiction where there are lots of pulling places, but you 0:04:32.880 --> 0:04:37.119 have to vote at your neighborhood polling place, and that 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:40.640 means that they have to spread out resources all over 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:45.000 the place, which means maybe, um, your poll workers are 0:04:45.120 --> 0:04:47.800 the best trained. Maybe you're pulling place doesn't have the 0:04:47.839 --> 0:04:52.240 best disability access. Maybe you're pulling place doesn't have language access. 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:54.839 If something breaks, it can be difficult to get to 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.760 your polling place to fix it because it's decentralized. Maybe 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:01.200 they run out of ballots right there. There are lots 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:04.359 of pros to lots of neighborhood polling places, but also 0:05:04.480 --> 0:05:07.840 some downside. Compare that to a jurisdiction that has fewer 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:12.280 locations that are a little more centralized, but where you 0:05:12.320 --> 0:05:14.960 can choose to go to any of them, where they're 0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:20.799 better staffed, more accessible, better resources, easier to fix. Because 0:05:20.800 --> 0:05:24.080 there are fewer locations that are bigger, they may be 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:28.200 that may actually be a better voting experience. UM. So, 0:05:28.400 --> 0:05:30.359 I don't want to suggest that the sheer number of 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:36.720 locations alone is despositive. Sometimes less is more, sometimes less 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:39.680 is less, and sometimes more is more. It all depends 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:41.760 on how you actually design these things. I mean, we 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:45.120 saw in Milwaukee in the primary, Um, they all of 0:05:45.160 --> 0:05:48.240 a sudden, I had a whole bunch of pole workers 0:05:48.360 --> 0:05:51.440 quit and a whole bunch of locations they couldn't offer, 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:55.039 and going from more to less without planning for it 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:59.239 is a disaster. There's absolutely no question Milwaukee was a nightmare. 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.479 Louisville is an interesting alternative. In June, Louisville had an 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:08.600 election and they had one pulling place because they couldn't 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:11.359 get enough pull workers. It's really hard to be a 0:06:11.360 --> 0:06:14.880 pull worker right now. Um. Because they couldn't get enough 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:17.960 pull workers, they decided to consolidate resources as best they 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:21.479 could in the convention center, and so it was this 0:06:21.800 --> 0:06:25.400 cavernous space where everybody could be socially distant, where they 0:06:25.400 --> 0:06:28.640 could have a relatively lean staff serving an awful lot 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:31.640 of people, and it seemed to go really well with 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:35.599 one point in place. So the sheer number isn't the 0:06:35.640 --> 0:06:39.200 important thing. The planning for the number is the important thing. 0:06:39.279 --> 0:06:41.440 And I think an awful lot of election officials are 0:06:41.480 --> 0:06:45.560 now yes trying to consolidate because they know they're going 0:06:45.600 --> 0:06:49.640 to have fewer people volunteering and fewer spaces that are open, 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:52.520 and they're trying to plan how best to serve the 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:57.440 voters in those circumstances. And this is a broad generalization 0:06:57.600 --> 0:07:01.039 but as I look through these different lines of lawsuits 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:06.520 and the challenges to election procedures, it seems as if 0:07:07.040 --> 0:07:10.280 the main ground is that it would lead to voter fraud. 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:14.800 So there are two different types of election cases out there. 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:18.000 Some are trying to open the system up a bit 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:22.000 because the current system we have wasn't designed for a pandemic, 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:25.840 and so they're trying to create flexibility based on the pandemic. 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:28.800 And those are based on burdens to the voters. There 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:30.600 are another set of cases that are trying to close 0:07:30.640 --> 0:07:33.560 things down a bit. Let's say that the steps the 0:07:33.640 --> 0:07:36.960 states have taken are going too far. There are fewer 0:07:37.000 --> 0:07:39.880 of those cases. It's by no means the majority. I 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:43.600 would say there are roughly ten eleven twelve are trying 0:07:43.640 --> 0:07:46.680 to shut things down. But you do see in the 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:50.880 litigation over opening things up, you see people opposing that 0:07:51.320 --> 0:07:54.320 also making the same arguments, and that is, either you 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:58.400 state official don't have the power under state law to 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:00.200 do what you're doing. It's got to be an other 0:08:00.520 --> 0:08:03.840 body like the legislature or whoever has got the power 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:06.560 to do it. This is going to create the conditions 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:10.800 for lack of security, for fraud in the process. I 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:14.160 will say the courts have not been kind to that 0:08:14.280 --> 0:08:18.040 argument without proof. Again, it's one thing to stand up 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:21.600 in the public and assert that there will be more 0:08:21.600 --> 0:08:24.480 fraud if X or Y, or assert that things are 0:08:24.560 --> 0:08:27.560 less to effects or why. It's quite another thing to 0:08:27.680 --> 0:08:31.120 have to prove to a court that this method is 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:34.080 that you're contesting is so problematic that the election now 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:36.400 come is going to be and the courts so far 0:08:36.720 --> 0:08:39.200 really haven't thought it. You mentioned. It's one thing to 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:43.200 a certain public. President Trump has repeatedly said that mail 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:47.120 in ballots except in Florida are subject to massive fraud 0:08:47.200 --> 0:08:50.440 in his campaign, issuing the state of Nevada is mail 0:08:50.480 --> 0:08:55.720 in balloting subject to more fraud than in person balloting. Yeah, 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:59.920 these kinds are one of the President's less charming characteristics. 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:03.480 I would say there is a nugget of truth, but 0:09:03.600 --> 0:09:05.800 I think it's a nugget that has been wrapped in 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:11.280 a pile of horse maneur. So the sorts of massive 0:09:11.440 --> 0:09:15.440 national scale rigging that the President is talking about, there's 0:09:15.480 --> 0:09:19.559 absolutely no evidence to support that. I would say there 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:23.439 is incremental risk in the mail in balloting process that 0:09:23.640 --> 0:09:27.560 something will go awry, but that's more like if the 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:30.920 in person voting process is a one, then the mail 0:09:30.960 --> 0:09:34.240 in balloting process maybe a three on a scale of 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:37.440 a hundred or five. Things do go wrong from time 0:09:37.480 --> 0:09:40.120 to time, and they are more likely to go wrong 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:43.479 in the mail in process than in the in person process, 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:47.520 but not by much, and not on this is really important, 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:50.520 not on the scale that the presidents are. Certainly on 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:52.960 the rare occasions that you do see things go wrong 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:57.400 in the absolute process. There either individual ballots, people casting 0:09:57.440 --> 0:10:00.560 a ballot for a dearly departed relative because they know 0:10:00.800 --> 0:10:03.800 that's how they would have wanted to vote, or in 0:10:03.880 --> 0:10:07.200 some way coercing a family member. But those are really 0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:10.840 one off things. When on the very rare occasions where 0:10:10.840 --> 0:10:13.599 there's any sort of conspiracy to rig an election of 0:10:13.720 --> 0:10:18.840 steal an election, it's invariably a local election, of municipal elections, 0:10:18.920 --> 0:10:23.199 a county election. That's not forgivable, but it's more understandable 0:10:23.480 --> 0:10:26.120 because there are simply fewer ballots that you would have 0:10:26.200 --> 0:10:30.439 to steal, and that means a less expansive conspiracy. It happens, 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:33.800 everyone's in a bloo moon. It happened in North Carolina 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:35.640 a few years ago. There was a big scandal in 0:10:35.679 --> 0:10:39.520 north sellin is Bladen County about taking absidency ballots and 0:10:39.559 --> 0:10:43.640 either ripping them up or rewriting them. But it didn't 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:47.560 really affect matters statewide, and it sure wouldn't have affected 0:10:47.600 --> 0:10:50.760 matters in the national. It's incredibly hard. I mean, we 0:10:50.800 --> 0:10:53.640 have a very resilient election system. There's a good thing. 0:10:53.679 --> 0:10:55.760 The president seems to be doing his best to break it. 0:10:55.960 --> 0:10:59.120 But we have an election system that is very resilient, 0:10:59.280 --> 0:11:03.320 particularly eight four statewide races and national races, and is 0:11:03.720 --> 0:11:06.000 really quite resilient the vast majority of the time for 0:11:06.280 --> 0:11:10.360 races that are more local than that. Pennsylvania has drop 0:11:10.400 --> 0:11:13.600 off boxes for ballots, and it's being sued over them. 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.160 Tell us about that. So I think most people can 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:21.040 think of ballot drop boxes as just like a postal 0:11:21.120 --> 0:11:23.960 box a mailbox when you go down to the corner 0:11:24.160 --> 0:11:26.120 and you open up the spot and you drop your 0:11:26.120 --> 0:11:31.800 mail in. UM. They are sort of semi permanent, secure 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:36.839 locations where people can put important stuff that they want 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:39.120 to get delivered. Most of the time it's mail, and 0:11:39.160 --> 0:11:43.560 then for elections, election officials will occasionally put up separate 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:48.200 ballot drop boxes. Just as you describe UM. They are 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:51.880 ways to drop off an absent key ballot if you 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:54.240 don't have to stamp. UM. They're ways to drop off 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:55.719 and aps and key ballot. If you can't find a 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:58.760 post office, there are ways to drop off and absent 0:11:58.800 --> 0:12:01.680 key ballot if a post office doesn't happen to be 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:04.440 very accessible in your neighborhood. So there are ways for 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:10.280 very rural, we're very urban populations to find a place 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:14.800 to drop off a ballot, where finding a po box 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:18.880 or finding a mailbox maybe actually harder. Um. It's a 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:22.720 way of giving people a little added security that your 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:25.760 ballot is going to get there, because election workers go 0:12:25.800 --> 0:12:29.200 around and pick up everything that's dropped in these drop 0:12:29.240 --> 0:12:32.040 boxes at the end of the day, actually several times 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:34.640 a day in some jurisdictions. UM. So it's a way 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:36.319 of giving people insurance that your ballot is going to 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:39.120 get there without having to stand in line at a 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:41.480 pollony place. If you've got a ballot that you can 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:44.280 still out and drop off ahead of time, how will 0:12:44.320 --> 0:12:49.680 the court decide that kind of a case? I think so. 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:53.440 So this is a case that's been brought in Pennsylvania. UM. 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:55.679 And the keys that's been brought is by the Trump 0:12:55.720 --> 0:13:00.040 campaigns and it's attempting to stop the state from putting 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:03.720 out these drop boxes. I don't think there's very good 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:08.440 um legal support for that attempt, and so I suspect 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:13.160 that the challenge will fail. The ostensible concern is that 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:17.160 these drop boxes aren't secure, but there's very little proof 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:19.880 of that. I think it's unlikely that some of the 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:23.120 arguments that are made in the public sphere are going 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:25.760 to fly with judges who are going to demand some evidence. 0:13:26.080 --> 0:13:27.960 Do you think the Supreme Court will have a role 0:13:27.960 --> 0:13:31.120 in the upcoming election. There will certainly be more things 0:13:31.160 --> 0:13:33.960 presented to the Supreme Court. And yet the thing that 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:37.200 they've done is actually one of the more aggravating parts 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:41.160 of this process. They haven't actually ruled on much. The 0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:43.760 one case was they issued a ruling and it was 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:46.920 really just a modification of an order. Below was in Wisconsin. 0:13:47.080 --> 0:13:52.000 In the flurry of last minute pandemic caused adjustments or 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:56.000 lack of adjustment to Wisconsin's primary election, which was a disaster. 0:13:56.320 --> 0:13:58.640 An awful lot of things went wrong because people didn't 0:13:58.679 --> 0:14:01.440 plan for the flexibility early in US. Of course, those 0:14:01.480 --> 0:14:03.760 were still in the early days. That primary was in 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:07.160 the first week of April, and things were moving very quickly. 0:14:07.160 --> 0:14:09.480 At that point, much of the country had just entered 0:14:09.480 --> 0:14:12.880 the shutdown pays. The Supreme Court stepped into that decision 0:14:13.080 --> 0:14:16.440 in a relatively modest way. They have weighed in in 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.080 other cases, but what they've done hasn't been a ruler. 0:14:19.360 --> 0:14:22.840 What they've done has largely been either a stay of 0:14:22.880 --> 0:14:26.800 an injunction below or a refusal to vacate a stay 0:14:26.800 --> 0:14:28.960 that was put in place by an apelate court. That is, 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:32.520 it's really been pressing the pause button or failing to 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:36.920 unpress the pause button, rather than issuing rulings on cases. 0:14:37.520 --> 0:14:40.480 Most of the cases have been resolved at lower courts. 0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:43.280 That will continue to be the case. Occasionally, the Supreme 0:14:43.280 --> 0:14:46.600 Court may step into press pause, but when they've done so, 0:14:47.040 --> 0:14:50.360 they've done so without issuing an opinion telling anybody why, 0:14:50.720 --> 0:14:55.000 and that is increasingly looking like power rather than law. 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:57.840 When there's a real dispute over whether to press pause 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:01.200 and the Supreme Court just says stop because I said so, 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:04.920 without explaining why. There will probably be a number of 0:15:04.920 --> 0:15:07.880 other opportunities for the Supreme Court to press pause in 0:15:07.920 --> 0:15:10.400 the months ahead. I don't have a sense for its 0:15:10.480 --> 0:15:12.880 appetite for doing so. When it will decide to do so. 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:16.880 Wedding won't. There's relatively little that will sort of go 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:19.720 up for resolution by the Supreme Court rather than this 0:15:19.840 --> 0:15:24.320 procedural pause before November. I suspect does the increased number 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:26.120 of mail and ballots we're going to see in the 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:31.160 presidential election necessarily mean there'll be a delay in reporting 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:34.600 the results. There may well be a delay in reporting 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:39.320 the result. Is not a break in the system. That's 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:44.960 the system working. So we actually have procedures for counting 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:47.640 the vote, procedures for counting the vote on election day. 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:50.080 We have procedures for counting the apps and key ballot 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:54.000 of the mail ballot that arrives beforehand. Um It is 0:15:55.320 --> 0:16:00.040 some jurisdictions allow local offices to get started counting the 0:16:00.120 --> 0:16:05.800 mail ballots before election day, but inevitably, just like my 0:16:05.840 --> 0:16:08.280 students wait until the day before an exam to start, 0:16:08.800 --> 0:16:11.120 just like we all wait to file our taxes on 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:14.320 the last day, people will wait to file their absent 0:16:14.360 --> 0:16:16.800 key ballots until the end of the process. That's inevitable, 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:18.520 and so there'll be a lot of absence of ballots 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:22.120 coming in at the end of the cycle. Um PS, 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:25.760 check the rules in your states. Different states have different 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:27.880 deadlines for when those absent key ballots have to be 0:16:27.920 --> 0:16:30.760 in UM. That's one of the things that there's a 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:33.480 lot of litigation over right now, and so in some 0:16:33.520 --> 0:16:35.960 states you actually have to have your ballot in by 0:16:36.000 --> 0:16:38.440 election day. If you really wait until the last minute, 0:16:38.440 --> 0:16:41.760 you might be out of luck. But under anything anail 0:16:42.000 --> 0:16:44.560 that means will be an awful lot of mail in 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:49.200 ballots arriving late in the process, and they're harder to count. 0:16:49.480 --> 0:16:51.760 They're just more conversome account and more timely to account 0:16:52.320 --> 0:16:56.160 um than the votes on election day. And what that 0:16:56.200 --> 0:16:58.960 means is, yes, we may be waiting a little bit 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:03.200 to find out who one if a state is particularly close, 0:17:03.360 --> 0:17:05.720 and there will likely be a few states where things 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:10.359 are particularly close. But it's really important to remember that 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.679 that delay in the results doesn't mean the system is broken. 0:17:13.720 --> 0:17:17.919 It means the system is working. It means nonpartisan people 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:21.600 are behind the scenes trying to figure out who cast 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:25.600 ballots for whom, and that's something where we the American 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:28.439 people are going to have to learn a great degree 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:32.040 of patients. We're used to seeing the countdown clock to win, 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:34.560 the polls closed, and we're used to getting an answer 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:38.640 about who won instantly. Those answers have never been official. 0:17:39.200 --> 0:17:42.199 When CNN says we announced that X has one the 0:17:42.240 --> 0:17:45.760 great state of Wherever states, that's never official. That's a 0:17:45.880 --> 0:17:49.520 projection and an estimate. The official numbers come in a 0:17:49.560 --> 0:17:53.560 couple of weeks later, after the nonpartisan be encounters have 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:55.679 had their time in the back room sorting out what 0:17:55.760 --> 0:18:00.080 the actual results were. We may have fewer projections this 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:04.399 time because there will be fewer votes cast in person, 0:18:04.520 --> 0:18:09.119 because the modeling for figuring out who probably won won't 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:13.119 be quite as robust. And if that's true, that just 0:18:13.240 --> 0:18:15.400 means that we're all going to have to be more 0:18:15.440 --> 0:18:18.600 patients in relying on the real process to work rather 0:18:18.640 --> 0:18:23.280 than getting the advanced sneak estimate answer. Thanks Justin. That's 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:26.800 Justin Levitt, Professor, Loyola Law School. And that's it for 0:18:26.840 --> 0:18:29.960 the sedition of Bloomberg Law. I'm June Grosso. Thanks so 0:18:30.040 --> 0:18:32.840 much for listening, and remember to change the Bloomberg Law 0:18:32.880 --> 0:18:34.639 Show every week not at ten p m. E s 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:36.680 journey right here on Bloomberg Radio.