Jim Young/Reuters
VIRGINIA Cheers for a Mitt Romney visit on Monday in Fairfax.
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WISCONSIN A rally for President Obama on Monday in Madison.
For the third time in the last four presidential campaigns, the
Democratic and Republican presidential nominees went into Election Day
close in the national polls, with not one of the major opinion surveys
giving President Obama or Mitt Romney a lead of statistical significance.
But presidential races are decided in the states, and the nation will
get an answer to the opposing cases for victory that each candidate has
made for so many months. It will finally know, as one of Mr. Obama’s top
aides has put it, “which side is bluffing” and whether
battleground-state polls, which have given Mr. Obama a slim but
consistent edge where it matters most, accurately foretold the outcome.
As the night unfolds, clues to the outcome will spill out well before
the votes are counted.
If exit polling indicates that Mr. Romney is substantially exceeding the
share of the white vote that went to Senator John McCain four years
ago, that will be a sign that he is replicating the coalition that gave
President George W. Bush a second term. If Mr. Obama can win Virginia, a
battleground with an early poll-closing time, Mr. Romney’s options for
getting an Electoral College majority will be substantially reduced. And
in Ohio, the vote in Hamilton County, which Mr. Obama and Mr. Bush both
won, could signal who takes the state.
On Monday, Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama went on traditional last-day blitzes
across the most important swing states, overlapping in the place that
is expected to have the lead role in Tuesday’s drama, Ohio.
For Mr. Obama, it was the last day of campaigning in a career that took
him in a few short years from the Illinois State Senate to the United
States Senate and, finally, the White House. For Mr. Romney, it was to
be the end of his seven-year quest for the presidency. But late Monday,
his aides announced that he would make one last pass at Pennsylvania and
Ohio, with stops in Pittsburgh and Cleveland on Tuesday.
Some Republicans said they believed the final push was needed given that
Mr. Romney was going into Election Day without any of the top
competitive states definitively in his column. A senior party strategist
lamented that for all the optimistic signs, there was a preponderance
of evidence “cutting against us.”
Democrats will be on high alert on Tuesday for what they consider
attempts to suppress the vote, while Republicans make a case that strict
voter identification rules and counting procedures be followed to
guarantee the integrity of the outcome. Batteries of lawyers are
standing by for both sides in the swing states, especially Ohio, where
the skirmishing was already under way.
The rise of early voting across the country meant that even before
Election Day, more than 30 million Americans had cast their ballots.
Those results will be reported Tuesday night, providing a new element
for viewers at home: many states will report initial results that
encompass far more votes than ever before.
Now, as the campaigns say, it is all about turnout. But beyond the
cliché, the main question is not only how many but also who.
Mr. Romney’s campaign built its theory of winning around the idea that
turnout for Mr. Obama will fall well below his 2008 tally. The Obama
campaign did not entirely disagree, but believes it has rebuilt his
coalition of women, Hispanics, blacks and young voters just enough to
win.
Here is a guide to what to look for as the night progresses to know who
is up, who is down and whether, should there be delayed counts, recounts
and court challenges, Election Day becomes Election Week or — gasp! —
Month. (All times below are Eastern.)
At 7 p.m., when the voting ends in Virginia, an early clue to whether
the night will be a long one or a short one may emerge. Both sides
pursued the state’s 13 electoral votes tenaciously, but they are more
central to the strategy of Mr. Romney, who made two stops there on
Monday.
If Mr. Obama carries Virginia, the path to victory narrows considerably
for Mr. Romney, who will have to all but run the table of the remaining
contested states. A senior adviser to the Romney campaign said the
state’s importance is greater than its electoral votes because the
outcome there could set the tone for the rest of election night.
VIRGINIA Audience members in
Sterling showed their support for Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.,
who joined Tim Kaine, the Democratic candidate for the Senate, in a
rally on Monday.
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OHIO Romney posters lined the walls
in the Republican State Headquarters in Columbus. Mitt Romney’s
campaign announced that he would make one last stop in the state, in
Cleveland, on Tuesday.
Stephen Crowley/The New York Times
FLORIDA Mr. Romney greeted
supporters in Sanford on Monday. He expects to win Florida, which has 29
electoral votes, making it the biggest prize on the battleground map.
IOWA Ray Benter, an Obama
volunteer, canvassed on Monday in Des Moines. For six days he has opened
up his home for volunteers to use as a headquarters for the
get-out-the-vote efforts.
At 7:30, the polls close in Ohio, where the 18 electoral votes are
critical to both men. The county-by-county tallies will be carefully
scrutinized when the returns start rolling in. But a word of warning:
campaign officials do not expect an outcome for several hours at the
least. And if Mr. Obama appears to take a commanding lead right out of
the gate, Republicans can take heart in the knowledge that the early
vote an expected Obama strength is counted first, with the ballots
from Election Day coming in later.
If Mr. Romney carries Ohio, viewers should settle in for a long night. A
Romney victory there could signal that the vaunted ground organization
of the Obama campaign is faltering and that his Midwestern firewall is
cracking.
The television networks and their high-tech maps will spotlight the
three C’s of Ohio: Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati. The president is
looking for a strong performance in Cleveland, which Mr. Romney is
visiting Tuesday in the hope of shaving down Democratic margins. And
Republicans are looking for strength in Cincinnati and its surrounding
area of Hamilton County; when Mr. Obama won the county in 2008, he was
the first Democrat in a generation to do so.
But if Mr. Obama wins Ohio, history will be on his side (no Republican
has won the White House without Ohio), as will the landscape of swing
states. With Ohio in his column, he could lose Colorado, Virginia and
Florida and still defeat Mr. Romney by 281 to 257 electoral votes.
At 8, the voting ends in Florida, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania. If the
television networks are not able to call Pennsylvania quickly,
Democrats have reason to move to the edge of their seats. But with 29
electoral votes, Florida is the biggest prize on the battleground map.
The Obama campaign is not counting on victory there, but Mr. Romney
needs to win. Otherwise, his advisers in Boston believe that Mr. Obama
will be re-elected.
But keep this in mind about Florida: the ballot in many counties is
unusually long, running more than 10 pages in some areas of the state
because of judicial elections and initiatives, which means voting could
take longer. And long lines in Florida could mean a long night ahead for
Mr. Obama and Mr. Romney.
At 9, the voting ends in Colorado and Wisconsin. The states together
have 19 electoral votes — one more than Ohio and some strategists
believe that the states could be split by Mr. Romney (Colorado) and Mr.
Obama (Wisconsin). But if both states fall in one campaign’s favor, that
candidate is almost certainly heading to the White House.
At 10, the polls close in Iowa. Both campaigns carefully courted the
state, with its six electoral votes. The president selected Iowa as the
site of his final rally on Monday night, a decision that his advisers
said was rooted more in the symbolism of the place, where his victory in
the 2008 caucuses solidified his rise on the national stage.
The result will answer the question of whether the visit to Des Moines
was a moment of nostalgia or a last minute scramble for support or
both. more info
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