US Presidential Elections 2024: How Does Each State Manage Its Voting? Changes In Law Explained

Last Updated:October 24, 2024, 17:13 IST

US Election 2024: In California and Washington, all candidates compete on the same ballot and the top two vote-getters move on to the general election regardless of the party

During the Covid-19 pandemic, a number of US states, especially those that had elections in spring 2020, had to support mail balloting because a lot of people wanted it. (File Photo: Getty)

The US Presidential Elections will begin on November 5, but not all states vote in the same manner. The 50 states and the District of Columbia run their own elections, but each does it differently.

According to Marc Meredith, professor of political science in the School of Arts & Sciences, the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that counties could decide whether to offer early in-person voting on Saturdays.

Let us look at the key differentiations in voting in different states.

Maine and Nebraska

In Maine and Nebraska, the candidate who receives the most votes in each congressional district wins one electoral vote from that district. The candidate who wins the statewide vote receives another two.

Democrat Joe Biden received three of Maine’s four electoral votes because he won the popular vote in the state in 2020, and its 1st Congressional District. Republican Donald Trump received one electoral vote from the 2nd Congressional District. Trump won four of Nebraska’s five votes for winning the popular vote in the state as well as its 1st and 3rd Congressional Districts; Biden received one electoral vote for winning the 2nd Congressional District.

Alaska and Maine

Voters rank candidates for office on the ballot as per their preferences in ranked choice voting. The candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated if no contender receives over 50% of the vote in the first place.

Voters who chose that candidate as their top pick have their votes redistributed to their next choice. This continues, with the candidate with the fewest votes getting eliminated, until someone emerges with a majority of votes.

As Maine uses ranked choice-voting in state-level primaries and for federal offices in the general election, its voters can rank presidential, Senate and House candidates on ballots that include the Democrat and the Republican who advanced out of their respective party primaries, plus third-party and independent candidates who qualify.

In the six years since implementing ranked choice voting, the state has used it twice in races for Congress in its 2nd Congressional District. The 2020 presidential race did not advance to ranked choice voting, with the winners of the state and in each congressional district exceeding 52% of the vote.

Alaska holds open primaries for statewide offices and sends the top four candidates, regardless of party, to the general election, where the winner is decided using ranked choice voting. In all legislative and statewide executive offices, Alaskans can rank up to four names that can include multiple candidates from the same party.

This year, there will be eight presidential tickets on the ballot, and Alaskans can rank all candidates if they choose to. The last time the winner of the presidential contest in Alaska failed to surpass 50% of the vote was in 1992, when third-party candidate Ross Perot won almost 20% of the national popular vote.

Another shift this year? In Alaska where ranked choice voting was implemented by ballot measure in 2020, there is voter initiative on the ballot this fall to repeal it.

California and Washington Face-Off

In California and Washington, all candidates compete on the same ballot and the top two vote-getters move on to the general election regardless of the party.

This year, there are two House races in Washington that include candidates of the same party, one with two Republicans and one with two Democrats. There are four in California: three with only Democrats and one with only Republicans.

Louisiana’s Open Primaries on November 5

All candidates run on the same open primary ballot in the state. Any candidate who earns over 50% of the vote in the primary wins the seat outright. If nobody wins the 50% majority, the top two candidates head to the run-off, which lead to two Republicans and two Democrats against each other. Louisiana refers to these contests as its “general election”.

Nebraska’s Abortion Measures on the Ballot

Any measure that receives more than 123,000 valid signature qualifies for the ballot. This year, the two measures relating to abortion met this threshold.

One would enshrine in the Nebraska Constitution the right to have an abortion until fetal viability or later, to protect the health of the pregnant woman. The other would include the present 12-week prohibition — with exceptions for rape, incest, and saving the pregnant woman’s life — into the constitution.

It is possible voters could end up approving both measures. But because they’re competing and therefore cannot both be enshrined in the constitution, the measure with the most “for” votes will be the one adopted, according to the Nebraska secretary of state.

Georgia’s Run-Off Elections

If candidates don’t receive at least 50% of the vote in the primary elections, states, including Georgia, go for run-offs. In races with more than two candidates, run-offs in those states are common. Several states held primary run-offs this year.

In the last three Senate races, Georgia went to run-offs because a third-party candidate won enough of the vote to prevent the Republican or Democratic nominee from exceeding 50% of the vote.

But this year, run-off possibilities may be confined to downballot races such as state legislature. There’s no Senate race there this year, and the US House races have only two candidates on the ballot.

Texas, Michigan, Florida Report A Lot Of Votes

This is common in states that span multiple time zones. In most states, polls close at the same time in each time zone.

Florida, Michigan, Texas, and Oregon are some of the largest states with split poll close times. Tennessee is an exception in that all counties coordinate their voting to end at the same time, despite the state falling within both the Eastern and Central time zones.

How Voting Rights Changed?

In Pennsylvania, the Democrats narrowly control the state House while Republicans run the state Senate, and there is a Democratic governor. Since the two parties couldn’t come on board with a compromise bill, mail ballots cannot be processed until the Election Day. This means, the counting of votes on the election night may take a little more time to come out in Pennsylvania.

Michigan, however, was able to implement early in-person voting because it had unified Democratic governance.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, a number of states, especially those that had elections in spring 2020, had to support mail balloting because a lot of people wanted to vote by mail. Oregon and Washington have been doing this for some time now, but, especially out in the western US, “more and more states send people mail ballots as the default and Election Day voting is the unusual thing”, as per Meredith for Penn Today.

How does courts’ role come into play? The Supreme Court has allowed partial enforcement of an Arizona law requiring proof of citizenship for voting. Arizona voters who want to cast ballots in state races can be required to show documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote. But the court also upheld a lower court ruling striking down the citizenship requirement for Arizonans who register using the federal form; those voters will be allowed to cast ballots only in federal elections, according to the US Conference of State Legislatures, created by state legislators and legislative staff in 1975.

(with inputs from The Associated Press)

News explainers US Presidential Elections 2024: How Does Each State Manage Its Voting? Changes In Law Explained