Electoral College: 04:30 – Expected States push Obama over 270

Between 04:15 and 04:30 UTC, three more states were called. Missouri for Romney, and Oregon and Ohio for Obama. All three of these were fully expected, but Ohio put Obama over 270.

CNN waited until they called Ohio at 04:18 UTC to call the election, even though based on the polls by the time we got to election day, Ohio wasn’t even close. Once Iowa was called 9 minutes earlier, Romney had no more ways to win.

At this point, the only question is the margin of Obama’s victory.

As of this update, the five poll average hasn’t missed a state yet. Four states and two congressional districts to go.

(Of the close ones… there is also Alaska and Nebraska’s 3rd, but those will certainly go to Romney.)

Edit 2012 Nov 7 05:13 to add that last parenthetical note.