A question for political junkies.

[Funtatlaguy]

As we all know, the tv networks wait until the polls close in each state before projecting a winner in those states.
My question is when has a Prez election winner been declared BEFORE polls close on the west coast.
In other words, who already had 270 electoral votes collected in the eastern, central and mountain time zones before 11pm eastern time/8pm pacific.

And, the second question is if and how could that happen this time?
Is Hillary leading in enuf places excluding California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii (and I think Nevada may also be Pacific time) for her to be declared the overall winner even without those states at 10:01 eastern time.

[beachbumbob]

1. It's possible...I guarantee that 1 min after polls close in

California...Hillary will be announced the winner...

[unblock]

2. i think the last time they called it before the west coast was closed was 1984.

there was a big controversy when they called it in 1980 before the west coast polls had closed, but 1984 was a blowout (reagan won 49 states) so there wasn't much controversy about calling the election early.

in this case, we'd have to have a very strong showing to not need oregon and washington, even if california is taken as a given.

but the real problem is that it takes time to call close states. in practice, Hillary's extremely unlikely to lose if she wins ohio or florida, for example, but they're not likely to be able to call those states before polls close on the west coast simply because they'll be close and they'll need to wait for more precincts to report in.

plus, once it gets close to 11pm eastern time, they're likely to just wait until then just to claim they were being ethical.

[lindysalsagal]

3. I'm expecting Steve Kornackie to be chained to his interactive map

where he doesn't have to "call it," he just has to keep showing "All the possible outcomes" in the case of each swing state going either way.

So, he will all-but-call it in little increments. When they finally oficiall call it, we'll have been hearing about if for a couple three hours, already. It won't come as any surprise.

[world wide wally]

4. If the polls on the west coast close at 11 PM Est, I would expect Trump's concession speech at about

Jan. 31, 2017

[sweetloukillbot]

5. I seem to remember this happened in 88

As to it being declared before the West Coast reports, I can see it before Hawaii, but unless it is a major blowout I don't think it will be called before California closes (maybe right after, though).

[FSogol]

6. They called Reagan's victory over Carter before the West Coast closed.

I think the networks agreed to wait until the polls closed from that point forward.

This election, it is over when the numbers from PA and FL come in. If HRC has won these 2, it is all over.

[Awsi Dooger]

9. Yes

I was in college at USC at the time. I spent the day on campus, listening to the radio while studying in a small park-like area. Reagan was considered the favorite but I retained a small degree of hope.

Before sundown Reagan was already declared the winner. I'll never forget how numb I felt, while listening to all the loud celebrations on campus. Fraternity and sorority members were riding their bikes back to the Row while shouting exuberance. Many of the guys removed their sweaters and were waving them in the air.

California was quite different then than now. And USC was hardly as liberal as other campuses. I had three roommates and all of them were for Reagan. They laughed out loud and staggered around our apartment when Carter mentioned reliance on his daughter Amy for advice on nuclear proliferation. That debate moment still doesn't receive enough attention in exploding Reagan's margin of victory.

The early call was said to depress Democratic turnout in the West. Networks agreed to delay from that point forth.

[sofa king]

7. It could be over real fast, but I expect the opposite.

There is an outside chance that Mrs. Clinton can pick up as many as 249 EVs east of the Mississippi, meaning that Colorado, New Mexico and Minnesota would make it a lock.

However, I don't expect that to happen, for several reasons. The most important reason is that television news is a circus industry now, beholden to ad revenue. I would not be surprised to learn after the fact that CNN agreed to keep the issue in doubt until after 9pm western in order to charge a higher ad rate in California.

Another reason is that Donald Trump is setting himself up to be the news networks' direct competitor, and he will be praying for a 2000-level fuck-up that he can use as his casus belli against the news networks. So they're going to take their time making projections--and projecting the enormity of Trump's defeat.

Still another reason is that, thanks to the fact that we have a naked micropenis Fascist in the race who has repeatedly alleged that the race is stacked against him, who has enlisted the help of unfriendly foreign governments, and who encourages a win-or-fight attitude among his hopelessly ignorant supporters, this election is even more of a national security issue than it normally is. It needs to be made clear that Trumpkins are a small and incompetent minority of voters, lest we face another 1860-type crisis.

[Bucky]

8. ayup

But the worst reason is I don't think it's gonna be the blowout we were expecting last week. The networks are hitting Clinton as hard as they are Trump. The Wikileaks business is going to suppress the vote, I fear. People not discouraged by the leaked/hacked emails are still enthusiastic; we're showing up in force. But the way they're being covered by the skittish news networks is making those voters more inclined to say "a pox on both your houses" more likely to not vote or at least to split their tickets.

The one that bothers me most is in New Hampshire, which has a strong tradition of ticket splitting. Kelly Ayotte is very much at risk of holding onto her seat--a seat that should be an easy pick up for us. Ohio, Indiana, & PA are looking good--all pick ups. Rubio in FL and McCain in AZ will almost certainly get new terms. And it's gonna be neck-&-neck in NC and Nevada. These are two places where we need every single vote to show up. If a Clinton sweep suppresses the vote turnout in Nevada especially, we'll end up losing that seat even if she wins the Electoral College votes.