By Pam Fessler, The Elections Group and former NPR News correspondent

Election Day is Nov. 5, but we all know the election began weeks ago. More than 42 million voters had cast their ballots, either by mail or in person, as of Oct. 28. 

It also will be well after Election Day before the results are final. Counting delays, court challenges, mail-ballot issues and unforeseen glitches mean we might not know the outcome for days, possibly weeks. Even those results are unofficial until they are certified by local and state officials, usually in late November or early December.

Your challenge is to keep on top of these many election developments and be ready to explain them quickly and accurately to the American public.

To help, we have tips below on what to look for and questions to ask during the crunch period ahead. We also have something new this month — a template to help you produce stories before Election Day explaining when voters can expect results. Confusion over this topic fueled conspiracy theories and helped sow doubts about the legitimacy of the outcome in 2020. 

If you haven’t done so already (and hopefully you have), you should line up reliable sources now so you can get the information you need as soon as possible. Check out our earlier posts for links to the many resources available — from August, September, and October.

We highly recommend you also sign up for the Votebeat Expert Desk, a Slack channel where dozens of election experts are available to answer your questions on the record through mid December. These experts can provide national context and connect you to other sources. The service is free, but could prove invaluable.

Here are some crucial things journalists should be watching and reporting on in the days ahead:

 

PRE-ELECTION PREP

 

LEGAL. Last-minute legal challenges or court decisions might affect how people vote and which ballots are counted. Courts tend to avoid making changes close to an election, but lawsuits could be filed with the intention of causing confusion or setting the stage for a post-election challenge. Monitor the local and national political parties and legal groups, as well as the Election Law Blog for the latest developments. If you’re in a highly-contested state, you can learn more about your election laws here. 

 

IN PERSON VOTING. Last-minute preparations are still being made. Do local and state election officials have everything they need for Nov. 5? Are polling sites ready to open? Hurricanes in Florida and North Carolina necessitated changes in voting locations and rules. Have those been communicated to voters? Are there enough poll workers and have they been adequately trained? Have any problems emerged during in-person early voting that might indicate a problem for Election Day?

 

MAIL BALLOTS. Tens of millions of mail ballots have been delivered to voters and most are now being returned. Have ballots been delivered on time? Are voters failing to follow requirements, such as dating and signing the envelope, that might prevent their ballots from counting? Are they able to fix, or “cure”, those problems? If they are, political parties and others will likely try to help. That can be an interesting story that can also inform voters about this option. 

 

MISINFORMATION. The days right before an election usually see an explosion of misinformation, from both domestic and foreign sources.  Much of it is spread on social media platforms, which are doing less this year to identify false information. Voters can also receive misleading phone calls, emails or texts that tell them, for example, to vote on Nov. 6 or go to the wrong polling site. Local election and law enforcement officials, as well as the campaigns, are often the first to hear about such cases. But suspicious voters might contact you directly. One of the most helpful things you can do is report on and correct this misinformation. Make sure you have reliable sources lined up now to help you identify what is and isn’t true. The University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public can also help. 

 

ELECTION DAY 

 

IN PERSON VOTING. Tens of millions of voters are expected to cast their ballots in person on Election Day, and will likely have a good experience. But problems are inevitable. Your job is to distinguish the big problems from the small ones and innocent mistakes from intentional efforts to manipulate the system. You should report on the impact of any glitches (some might only affect a few voters) and what is being done to fix them. Are polling places opening on time? Are the voting machines working? Did enough poll workers show up with the right materials? Are voters running into any problems casting ballots? Are poll watchers obeying the rules and not interfering? Some individuals might try to challenge voters at the polls for not having the right ID or because they believe they are not eligible. Local election offices, campaigns and voter advocacy groups, such as Election Protection are good sources for determining if such challenges are legitimate. Make sure you also know your own legal rights and restrictions when covering Election Day voting.

 

THREATS AND VIOLENCE. It’s crucial to watch what’s going on both inside and outside polling places and election offices. Are protesters or others interfering with the voting process and the collection or counting of ballots? Has violence erupted — or been threatened — near polling sites and are you prepared to cover it? After the unrest of 2020, many election offices started to work more closely with local law enforcement to respond to such disruptions. Line up the appropriate contacts in law enforcement now. You can also touch base with the Committee for Safe and Secure Elections for a national perspective. Election SOS has a scenario planning guide for key questions and resources to help newsroom leadership and journalists prepare. 

 

MISINFORMATION/OTHER POSSIBLE DISRUPTIONS. Misinformation will likely pop up on Election Day that could discourage or disrupt voting. Be prepared to respond quickly to get out the correct information. Natural or manmade disasters, such as storms, fires or electric failures, are also possible. Many election offices have back-up plans for such occurrences. If nothing else, you should know now who to talk to in the event of any disruption. Cyberattacks on election websites or local infrastructure are also possible. You might want to check out the bipartisan National Task Force on Election Crises, which is keeping track of election threats by state. 

 

LEGAL ACTION. Expect legal challenges to the operation of polling sites on Election Day. If there are exceptionally long lines or machine malfunctions, groups could ask a judge to extend voting hours. Observers might claim they are not being allowed to do their jobs. Be prepared to know who to talk to and how to report these cases. There might also be legal challenges to procedures used to collect and secure ballots from drop boxes, or to the activities of activists monitoring the vote. Local attorneys, campaigns and election officials are your best contacts in these cases, but national legal experts and law firms will also be monitoring such activity, especially in swing states.  

 

ELECTION NIGHT

 

UNOFFICIAL RESULTS. As we mentioned above, it will likely be days, maybe weeks, before the results of the presidential and other close contests are known.  Maricopa County, AZ, officials have warned it could take them 10-13 days to count their exceptionally long ballots this year. Still, unofficial results will dribble out on Election Night and, at some point, news organizations will start projecting winners. It’s important to explain to your audience what these results do and do not show. No results are official until all ballots have been counted, checked and certified later in November or early December.

 

COUNTING. Ballots are usually tabulated at polling sites before those unofficial results are transferred to a central office for a more complete count. Election workers will also be counting mail ballots after they have been processed and verified. The timing of this varies by state and could extend the counting period. The media is usually allowed to observe the counting process, and there are a number of things to look out for. Is the counting going the way it should?  Are bipartisan teams overseeing the count? What, if any, glitches have emerged? Is anyone trying to disrupt the process?

 

LEGAL CHALLENGES. Lawsuits could be a major factor on election night and over the following days. Are campaigns or other interest groups going to court to challenge any part of the voting process or to try to halt the count?  It’s important to find out the motive behind those filing such cases. Is it to elicit an immediate ruling or to undermine public trust in the results and lay the groundwork for later challenges? 

 

MISINFORMATION. Again, expect election night rumors to be rampant if races are extremely close. In 2020, there were widespread reports — all false — of truckloads and even plane loads of fake ballots being delivered in the middle of the night to election offices to reverse the results.  Social media sites were filled with pictures of allegedly “suspicious” piles of ballots or election workers doctoring votes.  All of this fed post-election challenges and unrest.

 

POST ELECTION

 

VOTE COUNTING.  Election officials will continue counting ballots until they’re done. In some states, this will include tabulating mail ballots that are postmarked by Nov. 5, but arrive a few days later. Some states give voters a few days after Election Day to fix problems on their mail ballots so they can be counted. Tens of thousands of provisional ballots cast by voters who encounter a problem at the polls will also need to be adjudicated. Election offices will also double-check the initial tallies and audit the results to make sure the numbers are accurate. You should check with your local or state election offices now about the procedures in your area and how much of the process is open for the media and public to observe. 

 

CERTIFICATION. After all the votes have been counted and the results confirmed, election officials “certify” the outcome, making it official. This process usually occurs several weeks after Election Day, and differs from state to state. Until recently, certification was seen as purely ministerial.  But since 2020, a few right-wing officials have refused to certify local election results, citing concern about fraudulent voting. Some officials have threatened to hold up certification again this year, despite court rulings requiring them to do so. Find out now what the certification rules are in your area, who is responsible for certifying the vote, and what happens if they refuse to comply.  The nonpartisan Election Reformers Network has compiled the certification and other post-election requirements in the battleground states to help journalists covering close and contested races.

 

MISINFORMATION/THREATS/LEGAL CHALLENGES. As in every other stage of this election, keep an eye out for misinformation about the results, threats against election officials and legal challenges. It’s impossible to predict what will happen and where, but 2020 showed that these issues can pop up anywhere in the weeks following Election Day. Know what the laws are in your area and who you can rely on to get accurate information quickly.

 

ONE FINAL NOTE

Don’t forget to do some GOOD stories about voting. Despite everything written above, it’s not all doom and gloom. Voting in the U.S. is an incredible process, run by thousands of civil servants and close to a million volunteers. More than 160 million Americans will likely cast ballots this year to choose their future leaders. There are many stories to be done about the hard work, passion, patriotism and even fun that goes into making an election successful. 

Good luck. It’s a lot to cover. But remember, Americans are counting on you to keep them informed about one of the most consequential stories of our times.