Democrat Joe Biden is elected new president of the United States

Democratic candidate Joe Biden was elected president of the United States on November 7, the number 46, after having far exceeded the magic figure of 270 electoral votes thanks to the 20 that the state of Pennsylvania granted him and to the 6 of Nevada . News agencies like the AP and US networks like “CNN”, “ABC” or “CBS” have raised the Democrat as the winner, who now gets a total of 290 electoral votes.

Reaching these numbers was no easy task. This week, the United States experienced historic days of early vote counting, labeled with no evidence as “fraudulent” by President Donald Trump, and which kept the country in suspense over who would be its next president and the possibility of violent events.

According to the results, Trump is the first incumbent president to lose re-election in more than a quarter of a century.

This is the story of how Biden managed to take the presidency of the United States, which he takes over on January 20, 2021.

Thus the balance was shifted to the democratic side

The ballot boxes closed and the polarization returned to the light. While Biden was optimistic about the results, Trump proclaimed himself the winner of the election, despite an entire electoral race pending.

And this was one of the most unusual elections of recent years in the United States. It took four days to know the final results of who the winner was, largely due to the amount of votes expected. While Americans were used to the mail order or early voting model, never before in the country’s history had so many people used it for presidential elections. But this time around, the pandemic has caused over 100 million citizens to choose to mail their ballots or deposit them before November 3. And it was that next tally that kept the United States on a tightrope.

Joe Biden’s victory in some states was tightly confirmed. A few hours after the polls closed, in most of the country all the votes had already been counted, both for those present on November 3 and for those who had sent it in advance. But seven states had not yet been permanently painted in any color.

The results were still incomplete in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada and Alaska. And, in almost all of them, Trump was way ahead of Biden. The numbers have made the re-election of the current president more possible than the Democrat’s arrival in the White House.

But in the afternoon of November 4, luck began to turn for Biden. The first of the states to paint blue was Wisconsin, bringing another 10 electoral votes closer to the target of the 270 delegates needed to be president-elect. Two hours later, US news agency AP said the Democrat had also won Michigan and his 16 votes at Electoral College.

The victories in both states changed the entire electoral landscape. First, because with them the Democrats had recovered two places in the region of the rust belt (the industrial belt) that they used to vote Democrat, but which Trump had taken away from them in the 2016 presidential election. Second, and above all, with those 26 With the Electoral College votes, Biden was one step away from grasping the majorities needed to occupy the White House. The Democrat would have the support of 264 delegates, against Trump’s 214.

And although the story seemed already settled, the Republican still had a chance of being re-elected. Trump had a strong lead in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alaska. If the trends materialized and the Republican retains all those states, he would be above Biden and only two votes from winning the election.

But, once again, the early voting accounts have changed the landscape. On November 6, Biden gave the final push when the results in Pennsylvania and Georgia were reversed. For the first time in the entire ballot, states were painted blue as, as trends showed, Democrats voted earlier. In practice, this means that Biden only needed to confirm victory in Pennsylvania to declare himself president of the United States, because with the 20 electoral votes the state gives, he would exceed the necessary 270.

A blue victory that was made a beggar

It was then that the spirits in the country were more tense. Although victory had already been announced, Donald Trump refused to call his opponent to acknowledge defeat as presidential candidates usually do. So at least Al Gore and John Kerry did with George Bush in 2000 and 2004; John McCain and Mitt Rommey with Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012; and Hillary Clinton with Donald Trump himself in 2016.

But this time Biden’s phone didn’t ring. Instead, the Republican gave a press conference from Washington DC in which he reiterated, without showing evidence, that there had been an election fraud against him. Trump asked not to count more votes, he explained several of the legal steps he was taking to request a recount in several states, including Michigan and Wisconsin where he had already lost. His attempts were rejected by justice.

Thus, his speech was not an acknowledgment of defeat, much less a declaration of victory. All his words were focused on attacking the early voting method and even calling it “corrupt”. The fact that he did not prove the irregularities he denounced generated a reaction from various media, which interrupted the live broadcast of the president’s speech.

While reporters explained that it was false and unfounded information, some Republicans such as Mitt Romney himself agreed with the criticisms and deviated from his partner’s words. Others, like the president’s own children, not only supported Trump, but asked to surround him with their allegations of alleged fraud.

And as the Republican sought a way to reverse the trends that were disadvantageous, Biden put forward his presidential plan. On the night of November 6, when the United States still did not know who the next president would be, the candidate announced a press conference and it was speculated that he would call himself the winner.

Finally, he asked for patience to calmly wait for all votes to be counted. However, he also explained that he and his vice presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, were already meeting with public health experts to discuss how the pandemic would be managed during his eventual term.

“While we wait for the final results, I want people to know that we are not waiting to get the job done,” explained the candidate, albeit the results for Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada and Alaska.

However, in practice his victory was almost irreversible, which partly explained the speeches of both candidates. And while each of them showed defeatist or victorious attitudes, tensions increased in the squares because of the voters who defended that the last vote was counted and those who asked to stop the count.

That vibe, no doubt, continued on November 7 until it was learned that the state of Pennsylvania will go down in history as the one that gave Joe Biden the final victory. After days of fighting, the Democratic candidate won Pennsylvania – with 99% of the votes counted – by less than a point.

Without ending the hour, the AP agency immediately granted the state of Nevada, which gave another 6 electoral votes in favor of Biden. This support confirmed the growing democratic weight in the country’s southwestern states, which was crucial for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016, even though the Latino population is 30%.

In this way Biden moved up from Trump by 290 delegates to 214 and, surpassing half of the 538 votes of the Electoral College plus one (the magic number of 270), established himself as the new elected president.

A campaign full of false information

The deep divisions that have been evident in the streets, at the polls and in the speeches of Trump and Biden have also marked the entire election campaign. When both were candidates, they faced off in a first debate where personal attacks prevailed. While the Democrat called the president a “clown” and called him “the worst in history”, Trump lashed out at the Democrat’s intelligence, claiming he was “the last of his kind”.

In the last meeting before the election, the insults diminished, but Trump focused on the aggression on Biden’s personal life by referring to alleged foreign funding that his son had received, funding not proven but which caused him more than a headlong pain. towards Biden.

Ultimately, the false information that occurred during the debates was a reflection of the lies that circulated during the campaign and that in recent years have contributed to the deep divisions that the United States faces today and that are the context in which Joe Biden will assume. The Presidency.