quickly declared Virginia and Vermont for Anthony while giving Indiana, West Virginia, and Kentucky to Powers. Powers led 24-16 in the Electoral College.
Before 7:30 pm, Anthony was declared the winner of New Hampshire. Powers’ lead narrowed to 24-20.
At 7:30 pm, polls in Ohio and North Carolina closed. Nearing 8 pm, most networks declared Powers the winner in South Carolina. Powers now led 33-20.
Polls closing at 8 pm in Oklahoma, Missouri, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Illinois, Florida, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, District of Columbia, and Pennsylvania. Immediately, the networks declared Delaware, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia for Anthony, putting her into the lead for the first time that evening, 44-33.
About 8:20 pm, most networks had reviewed initial results compared to exit polls and made the following predictions of winners - Powers winning Mississippi, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Alabama, while Anthony winning Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, and Rhode Island. This put Anthony in the lead 92-66.
One former television network, CBS News, made a prediction at this time that Anthony won Georgia’s 16 Electoral College votes. However, the majority of networks’ data predicted a close race with Powers the winner, closing the Anthony gap to 92-82. This was the first state this evening that was a Powers upset over Anthony.
Arkansas’ polls closed at 8:30 pm, and almost all networks declared Powers the winner. The networks also declared Maine with all Congressional districts going for Anthony. The Electoral College vote totals tighten with Anthony leading 96-88.
At 9 pm, polls closed in the states of Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Louisiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, Kansas, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, South Dakota, and Texas. Within about ten minutes, networks awarded New Mexico and Colorado to Anthony, followed a few minutes later with Louisiana, South Dakota, and Wyoming to Powers. Minnesota was shortly declared to Anthony, making her lead 120-102.
At 10 pm, all polling stations closed in Utah, Arizona, and Iowa. Most networks immediately awarded Utah and Texas to Powers, with him now taking the lead 146-120. During the next half hour, most networks declared Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and New York to Anthony, while predicting Powers winning Missouri, Kansas, and Montana. Many networks also declared minor upset victories for Powers in Ohio and North Carolina. This put Powers in a very narrow lead of 198-195. Prior to 11 pm, Nevada and all Nebraska Congressional districts were declared for Powers, increasing his lead to 209-195.
At 11 pm, the polls closed in Washington, Oregon, California, Hawaii, Idaho, and North Dakota. Networks immediately awarded Washington to Anthony and Idaho and North Dakota to Powers. Powers led 216-207.
Around midnight, networks awarded California to Anthony and declared Powers the winner in Florida and Iowa, both minor upsets. Anthony resumed a narrow lead of 262-251 in the Electoral College. This is when CBS News announced that Diane Anthony had won the election, as they still considered that she had won in Georgia. The CBS News count had Anthony winning 278-235. Individuals at the Anthony national campaign headquarters in Columbus began to celebrate.
Other networks were considering their predictions and the possibility of declaring Anthony the winner. Alaska still had western polling stations still open until 1 am, and was considered a Powers victory. Likewise, Hawaii appeared closer in early returns, but was likely to fall to Anthony. Oregon was also close in early returns, causing a delay in predicting an Anthony victory by most networks. Arizona was considered a toss-up. Most networks internally had Anthony winning with 273-254 with Arizona’s 11 votes not having an effect on this victory.
Senior Anthony campaign officials were in contact with the various networks, asking when they would declare Anthony the winner with less than a handful of states undecided. Fox News declared Anthony the victor and immediately played Taps. At 1 am, the last Alaska poll station closed, and the state was declared for Powers, while all networks awarded Hawaii to Anthony. On many networks, the count was 266-254, while CBS and Fox had Anthony at 282 or 273.
At this point, the Powers campaign manager came into the ballroom to make a statement, with this being covered by all networks. She announced that their internal polling indicated that Powers winning in several states declared by various networks for Anthony, and demanding that the networks wait until more results come in before declaring an overall winner; and that they review current returns for each state to potentially reconsider their predictions.
She then surprised the media by opening up to questions. She explained when asked about Ohio that while Anthony had a 154 vote lead at the moment on Fox News, that most of the urban areas were already counted, but several counties in southeastern Ohio still to come in should go strongly for Powers. She continued on explaining her rationale for Georgia, Arizona, Oregon, Michigan, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Nevada, and the one conservative Congressional district in Maine. The final election returns had all these states won by Anthony or Powers by 1% or less of the total vote.
This press conference caused an uproar at each network. Fox News immediately rescinded their declaration of an Anthony victory. Ultimately, CBS News did the same, declaring Georgia as uncertain at this point around 2 am. Around 3:30 am, most networks had awarded Arizona to Powers and confirmed Georgia in his camp, making the Electoral College count, Anthony 266 - Powers 265. It would come down to Oregon deciding who would become the next President.
About 5 am, all networks declared Powers winning Oregon and the election, with a 272-266 victory. As states finalized returns through Wednesday, a total of 16 states were won by a margin of less than 1%, and another 10 states between that and 5%.
At 7 am, Diane Anthony gave her concession speech and congratulated Thayer Powers on his victory. President-elect Powers began his acceptance speech shortly after 8 am, thanking all the American people who voted for him, and promising those who supported him that he would make America powerful and wealthy again.
Thayer A. Powers won 29 states (Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, Georgia, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming). Compared to pre-election polling, Powers upset Anthony in Arizona, Oregon, Nevada, Ohio, Florida, Iowa, Georgia, and North Carolina. Exit polling showed about one third of white voters with college degrees voting for Powers had changed their minds in the last day.
There was a 15% reduction in voter turnout from the 2028 presidential election, with only 179.7 million Americans voting. Diane Anthony received 42% of the vote, while Thayer Powers had 39%, while the minor party candidates, Democrat Bill Smith and Republican Cindy Thomas, had 12% and 7%, respectively. There was much analysis conducted in the following year as to the effects that the two minor parties had on who won each state, but most concluded that the election would have not changed had one or the other minor party candidate not been in the race.
The Progressives won five seats and lost one in the United States Senate to make the split between the two parties at 50-50. Conservatives would still hold power due to the Vice President able to break tie votes. The Conservatives majority in the United States House of Representatives was reduced by more than two dozen seats, holding a 224-211 majority.
THE UN-TRANSITION PERIOD (November 2032 - January 2033)
The Presidential transition or interregnum began immediately after Powers’ acceptance speech. Initial planning had begun in April 2032 when representatives from seven Conservative presidential campaigns met in New York City with the Partnership for Public Service to receive four days of training on the transition planning. Powers’ campaign manager said that the campaign would begin to implement the recommendations from the meeting. On May 8th, the campaign announced that Idaho Governor Stephen Stevens had agreed to head the transition efforts.
The Agency Transition Directors Council, consisting of the leads of transition planning of the major executive departments, met at the White House on June 3rd to begin transition planning, without the attendance of the Powers or Anthony campaigns. Little was done until late July, when Stevens named his general counsel and Trump’s White House Chief of Staff had a conference call on transition with Stevens. The Powers transition team officially opened in early August, using government office space at 1717 Pennsylvania Avenue and started to receive government funding. There were reports of efforts to reach out to previous members of presidential transition teams for lessons learned, advice, and support.
The key responsibility of the transition team is to identify and internally vet candidates for about 4,000 non-civil service positions who serve at the pleasure of the President. Approximately 1,200 positions require the advice and consent of the United States Senate’s confirmation process. Due to the slowness of prior presidential transitions and the fact that several new administrations had faced major crisis shortly after taking office, transition planning had been accelerating to begin earlier and to be more thorough. For example, the Powers team was given a