Fox News was criticized in 2020 by those who thought it had been too quick to call the state of Arizona for President Joe Biden. However, one network official recently said this year's election results may not be known for days.

The revelation came even as some observers have warned that prolonging the uncertainty could cause some to see the election as a scam.  

Expert predicts it will be "a little harder" to call election this year

According to Breitbart, Fox News' "Decision Desk" head Arnon Mishkin laid out the extended time frame while participating in an interview with Politico.

While Mishkin indicated that he would like to see results declared as quickly as possible, the analyst went on to state that "[t]he over/under is Saturday."

Mishkin predicted that "it’s going to be a little harder" to accurately call the outcome's election this year given changes in how voters are behaving.

"I believe that Joe Biden won every state in the mail-in vote with the exception of Alabama — and that Trump won every state on Election Day with the exception of Vermont and maybe Connecticut," he recalled.

Mishkin says there has been no pressure to "make our audience happy"

"I can’t remember exactly, but there was a huge skew," Mishkin stressed before adding, "I think that skew is going to be less this time.

"I know it’s still going to be there, but the Republicans are doing a much better job of encouraging people to vote however they want," he pointed out.

Regardless, Mishkin insisted that he has not received any pressure from Fox News executives to "make our audience happy" with an early call.

Meanwhile, conservative commentator Ben Shapiro suggested this week that delaying the release of election results will be a "disaster" for the country.

"People are going to eat each other alive"

Shapiro's comments came during a segment of his podcast on Tuesday which saw him criticize Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson for saying that an unofficial vote total may not be known until November 6.

"The state of Florida, my home state, a well-governed state, can count all the votes the same day. In fact, almost instantaneously," Shapiro remarked.

"The longer it lasts, the worse it is," he continued. "If this thing takes days, and drags out, all the suspicions on all sides that everybody has--that's just going to exacerbate [them]."

"People are going to eat each other alive over this kind of stuff, and it is inexplicable why so many states have failed to shore up their balloting processes," Shapiro added.