The race is so close. Here’s what happens if there’s a 269-269 Electoral College tie

Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has written a lot about presidential elections and presidential nominations, said we “have a pretty good rulebook” for where things go if there is a tie.

Ultimately, she said, the election moves to the U.S. House of Representatives, where the newly elected members of Congress would have to be sworn in and then vote on who becomes president.

The way this would work is that each state — regardless of the size of the state’s delegation — gets one vote.

“I don’t know if they would deliberate or not or just take a poll,” Kamarck said. “In some cases, it’d be pretty easy. And they would cast their vote for one of the people who finished in the Electoral College.”

Because it is unlikely third-party candidates will win any electoral votes this year, each state would have to vote for either Trump or Harris.

“The Constitution says you need a majority of the House delegations,” Kamarck said. “So that would be 26 House delegations.”

Republicans currently have an edge if it were to come to this, because the party right now has control of 26 U.S. House delegations and Democrats control 22 delegations. Two states — Minnesota and North Carolina — have split delegations. This, of course, could all change depending on what happens in this year’s general election.

“What we’re really saying here is if the Electoral College was really in a tie, then the outcome of House races and Senate races would be absolutely critical to the outcome of the [presidential] election,” Kamarck said.