U.S. presidential election that just went up...What should I focus on?

■ Host: Lee Se-na Anchor, Park Seok-won Anchor
■ Starring: Yoon Hyun-sook, international reporter

* The text below may differ from the actual broadcast content, so please check the broadcast for more accurate information. Please specify [YTN New Square 2PM] when quoting.

[Anchor]
Voting for the 2024 U.S. presidential election, which the world is paying attention to, has begun. It is impossible to predict the result prematurely as the confrontation between U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and former U.S. President Donald Trump is very close. Let's look at the points to watch and last-minute variables of the U.S. presidential election. Let's talk with Yoon Hyun-sook, a reporter from the international department. Please come in.

[Anchor]
Voting started at 2 p.m. in our time, 20 minutes ago, and we saw what happened earlier.Voting began first in a small town called Dixville Notch.

[Reporter]
That's right. It's an American tradition, and it's the first thing in this town. It's a small mountain village with about 10 voters. Because of that tradition of voting early and going out to work early in the morning, when there was a mine here a very long time ago, voting takes place first in this area.

I just looked at the screen through the foreign media. Many of you have already voted and now it has been shown that the ballot box is about to open. Since the number of voters is small, I think the results can come out even while we are broadcasting.

[Anchor]
Voting has started in Dixville Notch, and the time when voting starts in different states and the closing times are different, right?

[Reporter]
That's right. The United States is so large that there is a time difference within the same country, so it takes a very different form from the Korean presidential election, which starts and ends at the same time. Following Dixville Notch, voting continues in turn across all 50 states with a lag. It starts from the east, goes through the central part, and ends in Hawaii and Alaska.

And the voting hours for each state vary slightly from 12 hours to 15 hours. From our perspective, voting will be closed for the last time in Alaska at 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. tomorrow. As voting begins with such a time lag, some areas are in full swing, but in some areas, the votes are counted or the results of exit polls are announced.

[Anchor]
As the voting closes sequentially, I'm curious about when the exit polls will come out, what do you expect now?

[Reporter]
First of all, I will tell you how to announce the exit poll in the United States. The exit survey in the United States will be conducted by four major broadcasters. It will not be conducted in all 50 states, but for about 20 states, including competing states. It will be conducted in the form of holding onto these voters who come out after voting on the spot and conducting a survey.

However, as I said earlier, there is a time difference between regions and the deadline for voting is different, so the results will not come out all at once, but will be updated in order by state. The results will begin to come out one by one tomorrow morning when voting in the eastern part of the country closes. In addition, some places, such as competing states, announce the results of exit polls in advance, which can affect the remaining voters, so some announce them with a time difference.

[Anchor]
Isn't the way the U.S. presidential election is quite different from ours? Can you explain it briefly?

[Reporter]
Two keywords explaining the characteristics of the U.S. election are indirect elections and the winner-take-all system. Today is the day of the U.S. presidential election, but we don't choose the president right away. The people vote for the electors. It is an indirect election in which the electors selected in that way finally elect the president next month.

And that doesn't mean that candidates with a lot of overall votes just follow the way I explained it. It's a way in which the candidate who secures the most electors in the state is elected president according to the results of the electors. The winner-take-all also explains the special characteristics of the U.S. presidential election. The candidate who gets even more votes will monopolize all the electors that are up for grabs in the state.

If you look at the distribution of electors by state in the U.S. presidential election, the total number of electors in the U.S. is 538. More than half of them are 270, so it's called the magic number. If you secure 270 people, the candidate will be able to declare victory. If you look at most states, the red mark is the dominant Republican area. It's the Democratic Party's dominant area where it's shown blue. These places have a clear political orientation, so they rarely change.

Seven gray-marked areas are now classified as contemporary stocks. The number of electors hanging in this neck-and-neck state is 93. It can be seen that the owner of the White House changes depending on who owns this place. Due to indirect elections and winner-take-all systems, sometimes the total number of votes is higher and then the election is dropped. Overall, there have been five times in history, most recently when Hillary dropped and Trump was first elected in 2016, and going back further, when El Gore lost to President George W. Bush in 2000.

[Anchor]
You said you would win if you secured 270 out of the electors, but can't we rule out the possibility of a tie like 269:269?

[Reporter]
It's possible. If 269:269 comes out, we can't declare victory in this case. In this case, Congress will decide. The final vote in the House of Representatives is to elect the president. The Senate will also decide on the vice president-elect. In this theory, the president is a Republican, but the vice president may be a Democrat, or it could be the opposite.

[Anchor]
Is there a case where electors change their minds and vote for other party candidates?

[Reporter]
I think many people are curious about this, but in theory, it's possible to vote for betrayal. In fact, when former President Trump disobeys the presidential election results in 2000, many Republican supporters switch to the Democratic electorate and vote for President Trump. I also conducted a campaign to persuade them like this. These cases have happened occasionally in history, but the results have never been reversed. Because each party assigns supporters who are very faithful to their party in advance when selecting electors, it is almost impossible to do so.

[Anchor]
Looking back after the U.S. presidential election process, it was very fierce, with a lot of talk and troubles. The results of the two candidates' extremely close polls came out until the end. How are you forecasting the situation now?

[Reporter]
It's really not easy to predict the situation. There are also expressions such as "It's a razor-sharp race." a sheet of paper, or a razor blade. The gap in approval ratings between the two candidates is not as large as the difference. In fact, the situation is still foggy until voting day.

And even if you look at the results of the poll, each institution makes different predictions. What you see is the national poll that came out the day before, the most immediate. Here, it turns out that Vice President Harris beats former President Trump by 4 percentage points. However, the results of the poll conducted just the day before and a day earlier are also national results. If you look at it, the two are tied. It is very close at
49%.

If you look at this NBC poll in a little more detail, Harris supporters, women and Black people, and younger people in their 30s and younger, the so-called Generation Z, have shown more support for Harris. In addition, male, white, and rural voters are relatively more supportive of former President Trump.

[Anchor]
You explained it nationwide, but in the end, doesn't the victory or defeat come from the neck-and-neck states? You said there were 7 stocks earlier, how is the situation of those competing stocks?

[Reporter]
The state of the neck-and-neck stock market is also unpredictable. In the case of Gyeongsangju, there are seven places. Can you show me the map? In the case of 7 places in Gyeonggi Province, I will explain that it is shown like this first. The results of the New York Times seven contending states show Vice President Harris beating former President Trump with four wins, two draws and one loss here.

I brought Nevada, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and Georgia. Pennsylvania and Michigan are tied. However, Pennsylvania is the biggest battleground and destination in this presidential election. This place looks like it came out in a tie. Arizona showed Trump's dominance.

However, yesterday's U.S. time shows that this is the opposite if you look at the results of a poll just before the election. It is the same as four wins, two draws and one loss, but it turns out that former President Trump is leading here. It's shown that they bring Pennsylvania, the most battleground.

Georgia and North Carolina also showed signs of winning, so in this case, 270 magic numbers are possible. So President Trump showed the exact opposite with the lead. However, as you can see if you look closely, the approval rating gap is only 1 percentage point. So, in fact, even the investigative agency is so close that it can be expressed as a tie.

[Anchor]
Even if you try to make it like this, there are situations where it's difficult. Doesn't the vote continue until tomorrow in our time? When will the outline of the victory come out?

[Reporter]
It's a very difficult situation to say exactly how many days it will come out and how long it will come out. In the past, it was usually outlined late on the night of the election, or the day after. In some cases, the winner declared it, but in the case of the 2020 presidential election, it took four days for President Biden to declare victory. It will take that long this time, too. Or it could take longer.

Because as you just saw, the situation is very close and it takes a long time to vote in advance. The number of such early votes has already exceeded 78 million, and it is expected that it will take a considerable amount of time for them to be counted and counted, which could actually take longer than the last presidential election, which took four days.

[Anchor]
In the midst of this, a breaking news came in. The results of the vote in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, were the first to be voted across the United States. There is news that CNN has now reported that Trump vs Harris 3:3 tie. Six voters voted for Dixville Notch, four of whom registered as Republicans. The two are said to have not revealed their political orientation.

Dixville Notch, even the first vote and the first vote count were tied. The future results seem to be more noticeable. So far, we have looked at the current status and prospects of the U.S. presidential election, which has risen with Yoon Hyun-sook, a reporter from the international department. Thank you for saying that.