Dec 14th Electors vote

Timeline for those who do not know

December 8, 2020: The safe harbor deadline in the electoral college
Six days before the electoral colleges convene to vote is the "safe harbor" deadline. While states aren't legally required to certify their results by this date, if they so do, they can avoid Congress getting involved and resolving a potential dispute over which candidate won a particular state's electoral college votes.

The safe harbor deadline came into play during the court challenges over the disputed 2000 presidential election in Florida. It could be a factor this year too if there's any serious dispute over the 2020 results.

On the day of the 2000 safe harbor deadline, the US Supreme Court ruled that Florida's varying recount policies between counties violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment by arbitrarily valuing some votes over others.

The Court still ruled 5-4 to uphold Florida's certification of the state's electoral college votes for George W. Bush. The majority opinion was in line with the wishes of the Florida legislature, which wanted the state to certify the results and avoid leaving the winner of the state's electoral college votes to Congress.

December 14, 2020: Electors vote
On the second Monday after the second Wednesday in December, electors convene in all 50 states and the District of Columbia to formally cast their votes for president and vice president.

They then send certificates of their vote to their state's chief election official (in most but not all states, this is the secretary of state), the National Archives, and the current President of the US Senate.

January 6, 2021 at 1 p.m.: Vote count is finalized at the results are certified
The sitting Vice President, acting as the Senate president, presides over a joint session of Congress to read aloud the certificates cast by the electors representing all 50 states and D.C. in alphabetical order to finalize the vote count.

If no members of Congress object to any of the certificates in writing, the Senate president officially certifies the selection of the president-elect and vice president-elect.



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