Republicans in the state Senate refused to change the law and allow mail-in votes to be counted ahead of Election Day, despite widespread calls for change.
When the polls closed on election night in 2020, President Donald Trump appeared to be winning Pennsylvania. But over the next several days, as officials counted mail-in ballots, his lead shrunk and then disappeared. By Saturday, Joe Biden was the clear winner of Pennsylvania — and with it, the presidency.
The protracted counting process left a days-long vacuum that Trump filled with demands to stop counting the ballots while he was still ahead, declaring victory in Pennsylvania and building the false narrative that the mail-in votes were fraudulent. It became a core part of the false narrative that helped propel Trump’s “Stop the Steal” crusade and spurred election denialism among his allies and supporters that has continued to this day.
The delay was caused by a quirk of Pennsylvania’s election law, which forbids the opening of mail-in ballots until 7 a.m. on the day of the election. The narrow Election Day vote margins in 2020 coupled with the unprecedented number of people voting by mail because of the pandemic created a massive backlog and left election officials racing to finish the count. Pennsylvania, one of the most hotly contested battleground states, is one of only seven states, including another battleground, Wisconsin, that doesn’t allow pre-canvassing — the act of opening and processing mail ballots ahead of Election Day. In 2020, 27 states allowed pre-canvassing. Since then, 16 more states have passed laws permitting it.