Biden leads in US election polls, but there is more to it

Democratic candidate Joe Biden is leading in the latest national polls for the US presidential election, reports the Guardian. 

That, however, does not guarantee Biden’s victory — what happens on the final voting day decides the winner. Hillary Clinton also had a clear lead over Trump in the polls for almost the entire 2016 campaign, but she ended up losing in what is called the electoral college. 

In the US, the electoral college is a group of presidential electors required by the US Constitution to form every four years for the sole purpose of the election. Each US state gets a certain number of votes. The number of electors is determined by the number of representatives a state has, plus its two senators. Combined, there is a total of 538 electors.

Citizens actually decide state-level contests rather than an overall single national one in the US election. Winning in a state means the candidate gets all of its electoral votes. To be elected as a president, a candidate must win at least 270 votes in the electoral college. 

This system explains why it is possible for a candidate to win despite not getting the most votes.

According to a BBC report, more than 94 million people have already cast their ballots in early voting, putting the country on course for its highest voter turnout in a century.

After Tuesday’s vote, it can take several days for every vote to be counted. But it usually becomes clear who the winner is by the early hours of the next morning. 

In 2016, Donald Trump took to the stage in New York around 3am local time to give his victory speech in front of a crowd. 

However, in the year 2000, the winner was not confirmed until a Supreme Court ruling a month after the election. 

Officials are already warning that counting votes may take more time, possibly days, or even weeks, considering the surge in postal ballots. 

With every state having different rules for how and when to count postal ballots, there can be a large gap between them in terms of reporting results.