2024 presidential election: US early voting system explained

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00:00I'm joined in the studio now by our International Affairs Editor, Ketavan Gordastani. Hi, Ketavan.

00:04Would you take us through this famously complicated system?

00:08Well, there is what is called early voting, and it's something that really got the spotlight in

00:142020 because of the COVID pandemic. And the numbers really show how that early voting

00:19has expanded over the years. In 2000, 40% of US voters had access to some form of early voting.

00:26In 2024, that number is now to 97%. And we're going to go through this map that you see there,

00:34the voting option by state. Basically, you have 36 states that offer both early in-person,

00:41meaning you go to a polling station, you cast your ballot, or mail-in options that are known

00:46as no-excuse mail-in ballots, meaning that anybody can vote by mail, no excuses needed.

00:53States like California or Hawaii, for example, even send those mail-in ballots automatically.

00:58You don't even have to request them, you get them, and then you make your choice

01:02in person or by mail. Then you have the 11 states in orange, states like Texas,

01:09like Louisiana, Tennessee. These are states that offer also that early in-person voting to everyone,

01:16but they have certain eligibility criteria for those who want to vote by mail. For example,

01:22you can have an age criteria, those older than 65, the people who are disabled, people who might

01:29be traveling during the election period, but you have to give an actual excuse. And then finally,

01:35you have those three states in red, Alabama, Mississippi, and New Hampshire. These are the

01:41three states where you don't have any form of in-person early voting, and the mail-in ballots

01:48also have some requirements in order to be doing that, so they mostly vote in person on election day.

01:57But you're going to see really something that we saw in 2020 happen very likely, because if you

02:03look at the numbers in 2020, it's pretty incredible. There were 158 million Americans who cast their

02:09ballot. More than 100 million of those did it early in some way or another. You see there only 27

02:17percent of people voted in person on election day, and nearly two-thirds of U.S. voters voted early.

02:2727 percent decided to do it early in person. 46 percent decided to vote by mail. And of course,

02:35this has a little bit of an impact on the results of the election, because there is a political

02:40split between those who vote early, those who vote by mail, and those who vote on election day.

02:46Traditionally, and generally speaking, Trump voters are more likely to vote either early in

02:52person, but even more likely to vote on election day. And Democratic voters, so the Biden voters

02:58in 2020, and likely the Kamala Harris voters this time, are more likely to vote early in person

03:05or by mail, and less likely to vote on election day. So it is a very complicated system, but that

03:12is to say that not everybody is going to wait until November 5th to actually cast their ballot.

03:17Now, of course, Trump and Harris had their first, and possibly, it's important to say, their last

03:23televised debate on Tuesday. We've had the first polls since then on voting intentions.

03:30What can you tell us about where the race stands at this moment in time?

03:34Look, it's always hard to predict the impact of a debate on the final result, but what we know is

03:40that the first polling, post-debate polling that we see, seems to be indicating that Kamala Harris

03:48got a little bit of a bump, at least for now, from that debate that an overwhelming number of viewers

03:54thought she actually won. And several national polls show that she's maybe gotten a bump of one

04:00or maybe two points, better than what was the situation right before the debate, which was

04:07this talk of that her momentum had sort of stalled. But we know that national polls are not

04:12really anything of importance in U.S. elections. It's the battleground states that are important,

04:19and we're looking there at what the situation is. You have basically seven states, those states in

04:24yellow, that are the battleground states. The picture right now is that Harris is a little

04:29bit ahead in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Trump is a little bit ahead in Georgia and Arizona,

04:36and Nevada and North Carolina are tied. The important part is you have to get to 270 electoral

04:43college vote, and for Kamala Harris, that 270 goes through the blue wall, Michigan, Wisconsin,

04:50and Pennsylvania. Ketavan Gordastani, thank you very much.

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