The odds are increasing that the 2024 election may take longer to decide than the drawn-out drama of 2020.

In all seven battleground states, less than a single percentage point currently separates the major-party candidates. Each one of those states could involve recounts, extensive litigation, and the discovery of irregularities. Mail-in ballots, which represented over 40 percent of ballots in 2020, are notoriously slow to count, and the ballot-security measures (or lack thereof) surrounding them are controversial.