WILMINGTON, Delaware, December 15, 2020 (ENS) – The U.S. Electoral College has formally elected the Democratic ticket of former vice president Joe Biden and incumbent U.S. senator from California Kamala Harris as president and vice president of the United States. Two of every three eligible citizens, over 159 million people voted, the highest number since 1900.
Of the 538 electors, an absolute majority of 270 or more votes is required to elect the president and vice president. Biden won 306 electoral votes to President Donald Trump’s 232. It’s the same margin by which Trump beat his Democratic opponent Hilary Clinton in 2016.
The results of the November 3 election in each state and the District of Columbia were certified by December 9. The presidential electors formally cast their votes on December 14, and their votes will be officially counted by Congress on January 6, 2021. Biden and Harris are scheduled to be inaugurated on January 20, 2021.
Trump’s dozens of lawsuits challenging the election results in a range of states have all been rejected in federal district courts, and the U.S. Supreme Court has twice denied Trump’s appeals of lower court rulings. In its second ruling last week, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected a challenge from 18 attorneys general and 126 Republican members of Congress led by Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton.
The “Washington Post” reviewed court documents and reported that 86 judges rejected at least one post-election lawsuit filed by Trump or his supporters. The judges served on the bench at many different levels, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
Still, however, Trump refuses to concede the election and is pursuing his false claims of election fraud without evidence.
After the Electoral College vote was announced, President-elect Joe Biden addressed the nation from the Queen Theater in Wilmington, Delaware, his home state. He called for healing, unity and the celebration of democracy while blasting Trump’s unprecedented attempts to overturn the results of the election.
“Once again in America, the rule of law, our Constitution, and the will of the people have prevailed,” Biden said. “Our democracy – pushed, tested, threatened – proved to be resilient, true, and strong.”
“The Electoral College votes which occurred today reflect the fact that even in the face of a public health crisis unlike anything we have experienced in our lifetimes, the people voted. They voted in record numbers. More Americans voted this year than have ever voted in the history of the United States of America. Over 155 million Americans were determined to have their voices heard and their votes counted,” Biden said.
Biden said the strong voter turnout is the best proof that democracy is alive and well in the USA. He said the numbers were “so big that this election now ranks as the clearest demonstration of the true will of the American people – one of the most amazing demonstrations of civic duty we’ve ever seen in our country. It should be celebrated, not attacked.”
More than 81 million were cast for President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Harris, more votes than any ticket has ever received, a winning margin of more than seven million votes over the number of votes cast for President Trump and Vice President Pence.
Altogether, Harris and Biden earned 306 electoral votes – the same number of electoral votes that Republicans Donald Trump and Mike Pence received in 2016.
“At that time, President Trump called his Electoral College tally a landslide. By his own standards, these numbers represented a clear victory then. And I respectfully suggest they do so now,” said Biden. “If anyone didn’t know it before, they know it now.”
Biden declared, “What beats deep in the hearts of the American people is this: Democracy. The right to be heard. To have your vote counted. To choose the leaders of this nation. To govern ourselves.”
“In America, politicians don’t take power – the people grant power to them,” Biden said. “The flame of democracy was lit in this nation a long time ago. And we now know that nothing, not even a pandemic or an abuse of power, can extinguish that flame. ”
“And as the people kept it aflame, so, too did courageous state and local officials and election workers. American democracy works because Americans make it work at the local level,” said Biden, complimenting the many officials – Democrats and Republicans – who worked around the clock, kept their elections fraud-free, and despite death threats, told the truth to the American people – that there was no widespread electoral fraud in the 2020 elections.
Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2020. All rights reserved.
