Where we’re at  It’s hard to say from minute to minute (unless you’re continually refreshing your Twitter feed at 2 a.m., in which case nothing new is happening, so probably stop it). For the latest updates and highlights, you can also keep refreshing the live coverage at NBC News, which was putting it this way: “The United States remained in electoral purgatory on Wednesday afternoon as officials scrambled to count the millions of votes still outstanding after Tuesday’s presidential election.”
Meg Wagner and Melissa Mahtani at CNN are also working hard to give us the latest news on the Trump-Biden presidential race. At press time, CNN had yet to project a winner in Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. Mark Niesse of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that thousands of absentee ballots still need to be counted in Georgia. Most of these are concentrated in highly populated areas, led by Fulton County in Atlanta and Chatham County in Savannah. Brian Slodysko of AP News has a helpful explainer of the states still in play and what makes them that way. And Nate Cohn of The New York Times’ Upshot takes a state-by-state look and finds that Biden Appears to Hold Edge in the Key Votes Left to Be Counted. Alex Kane urges, “Read this. Clear explanation of where we're at.” Also from that piece, Chris Megerian highlights, “‘Nonetheless, the needle lives on internally here at The Times.’ The needle will never die.” Not so much  Trump voters either want the counting to stop or they don’t want the counting to stop. It’s complicated. But the lawsuits are already flying, and If Trump Tries to Sue His Way to Election Victory, Here’s What Happens, explains Ian MacDougall of ProPublica. Louise Kiernan suggests you read that piece for “Answers to the question we all have.”
The short version: “To sue (in elections) is easy, to win, not so much,” tweets Nicholas Varchaver. The quote making the rounds: “A lawsuit without provable facts showing a statutory or constitutional violation is just a tweet with a filing fee,” said Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. 100% primed to engage in shenanigans Annie Karni and Maggie Haberman of The New York Times take us back to 11:20 on Tuesday night when Fox News’ Arizona Call for Biden Flipped the Mood at Trump Headquarters. Frantic calls to the network and Rupert Murdoch ensued. Also, they note, “On Wednesday, the president’s family was heavily involved in efforts to question the validity of the vote tallies. Mr. Trump had joked at a rally that if he lost, he would never speak to any of his adult children again.” (“Someone enjoyed writing this perfect graf,” tweets George Zornick.) Matt Pearce says, “the story here is that the Trump campaign was 100% primed to engage in shenanigans and Fox News (and the voters of Arizona) wouldn’t let them.” And, Ryan Teague Beckwith points out, “Trump didn’t go to Arizona : 2020 :: Hillary didn’t go to Wisconsin : 2016.”  About that...apparently, Ronna McDaniel and Brad Parscale had tried to get him to spend more time in the state, but, according to the Times, “they said he had resisted in part because he did not like traveling west and spending the night on the road.” Cue Daniel Drezner: “PLEASE STAND BY: multiple additions to the #toddlerinchief thread are coming from this story.”
Checking for facts CNN’s Daniel Dale has your Fact check: Almost everything Trump has said after Election Day is wrong. Pretty straightforward.  Especially based on the above New York Times reporting, we’re assuming Eric Trump is pretty worried about the fallout of a potential loss by his dad, so he’s doing what he has to do. Nevertheless, the viral “ballot” burning video shared by Eric Trump is fake, as Konstantin Toropin, Donie O’Sullivan and Mallory Simon report at CNN.
And then there’s the story of the Wagons, Suitcases, and Coolers Rolling Into a Detroit Voting Center at 4 AM, which Brandon Waltens writes about at Texas Scorecard, with video! What on earth was that all about? Oh. “A conservative ‘news’ site reports catching a man wheeling in ‘suspicious’ equipment to the Detroit convention center, implying it was used to steal ballots. The ‘ballot thief’ was my photographer. He was bringing down equipment for our 12-hour shift,” Ross Jones explains.  For more on that, turn to WXYZ Detroit, Video falsely claims possible voter fraud in Detroit. It actually shows a WXYZ photographer loading camera gear. As WXYZ explains on Twitter, “This is a wagon. It is not ‘suspicious’ equipment that was used to steal ballots. Thanks for coming to our TED Talk.”
The reach of the disinformation “They breathed a sigh of relief as Election Day passed relatively unscathed... Yet 24 hours later, it appeared Facebook & Twitter might have overlooked the deluge of disinformation targeting Spanish-speaking Americans.” Jenny Medina links to the new piece by Patricia Mazzei and Nicole Perlroth of The New York Times on the false news targeting Latinos after the election. “Rampant falsehoods evolved online on Wednesday,” they report, “intended to make Spanish speakers question the unfolding election results and believe that President Trump was being robbed of victory.” Mazzei notes, “The reach of the disinformation is vast. In just 24 hours, Spanish-language disinformation was generating traffic that eclipsed even the interference campaign by the Kremlin-backed Russian Internet Research Agency four years ago.” “The failure of social media companies to curb misinformation is heightened when the posts are in another language,” notes Hamza Shaban. “There isn’t the same level of scrutiny from researchers & journalists, which has embarrassingly become a main source of social media vetting.” Where’s the fraud exactly AP News reports that Michael Georg Link, the head of an international delegation monitoring the U.S. election, says his team has no evidence to support Trump’s claims about alleged fraud involving mail-in absentee ballots. Jeryl Bier notes, “One of the perverse effects of @realDonaldTrump constantly harping on the dangers of vote fraud is the reversal of that hot take which was popular for a while: the US needs international election monitors!” Meanwhile, “Now THIS is ominous: Barr mobilizing DoJ to interfere in voting?” Jeff Stein links to Katie Benner’s reporting at The New York Times that the Justice Department told federal prosecutors that the law allowed them to send armed federal officers to ballot-counting locations around the country. “So basically @realDonaldTrump, if he can’t win a second term at the ballot box or even in ‘his’ courts, plans to steal it at gunpoint?” tweets David A. Andelman. “To paraphrase LBJ, this has the reek of ‘coup shit,’” says Steve Devol. Looking ahead Alex Scott Thompson shares that the “Biden transition website is now live. They are careful not to declare victory, however. ‘Votes are still being counted in several states around the country.’ Pretty bare bones so far.”  The scoop from Hans Nichols and Mike Allen of Axios is that GOP Senate wins will wreak havoc on Biden’s transition plans. “A source close to McConnell tells Axios a Republican Senate would work with Biden on centrist nominees but no ‘radical progressives’ or ones who are controversial with conservatives,” they write.
Not exactly a big surprise, though, is it? “Sorry but did anyone think Senate confirmations were gonna be easy? (Or that Biden would appoint ‘radical progressives’?) If anything this is the clearest sign yet McConnell isn’t up for legal challenges to the election results,” says Miriam Elder. Elsewhere From Oliver Holmes of The Guardian, according to the UN, Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank have razed a Palestinian village, leaving 73 people — including 41 children — homeless. Australia has almost eliminated the coronavirus — by putting faith in science. Now that’s a radical concept. A. Odysseus Patrick of The Washington Post writes about how Australia has become a pandemic success story, and what the rest of us can learn from it: “As North America, Europe, India, Brazil and other regions and countries struggle to bring tens of thousands of daily infections under control, Australia provides a real-time road map for democracies to manage the pandemic,” he notes. In the UK, BBC News reports that the furlough scheme is expected to be extended to the end of March, paying up to 80% of a person's wage up to £2,500 a month. Aaron Bastani thinks, “This should have been the case from the start, with no ‘end’ to lockdown but an easing accompanied by building effective test and trace over the Summer. Just an utterly shambolic way to run things.” We can only hope to improve to utterly shambolic over here. Whoops. In Australia, mining company Adani has changed its name to a Latin word that means “crooked,” “deformed,” “mercenary or assassin,” after mistakenly thinking that it meant “brave.” Naaman Zhou has that story at The Guardian, Crooked not courageous: Adani renames Australian group Bravus mistaking it for ‘brave.’ Alex Hern says there’s “So much to love in this story but I think my favourite is the extremely Australian assertion that of course they're not changing their name because the old one was tainted – if that was the case they'd have done it 18 months ago.” Taking a break As Matthew Dessem reported at Slate, D.C. and Oregon moved to decriminalize psilocybin mushrooms and other psychedelic drugs (“In other news, it looks like psychedelics had a pretty good night,” tweets Daniel Burke.) But let’s talk about some other kinds of mushrooms. In case you missed it, at The Walrus, Natalie Vineberg wrote about Foraging for Mushrooms on Zoom. “A lovely piece by @vandenba about foraging, crises, and planning for the future during hard times,” tweets Harley Rustad, who adds, “‘Mushzoom,’ @natvineberg, 2020. (We mention our fantastic writers a lot, but we also have the most brilliant art team that dreams up such creative illustrations like this one.)”  And if all else fails, there’s the Late-Night Anxiety Book Club, courtesy of Julia Edelman and Lars Kenseth at the New Yorker. “If you’re here, that means you’ve either finished scrolling through your Instagram feed for multiple consecutive hours, or the two edibles you took still haven’t kicked in,” Shouts & Murmurs guesses.
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