If you heard a rushing wind earlier today, that was the sound of almost the entire world all at once exhaling a sigh of relief when it began to look as if Donald Trump was going down to defeat. Late last night things did not look good at all and I for one feared the worst when I went to sleep.
It looks like Joe Biden will eke out at least a narrow win in the electoral college in addition to winning the national popular vote by almost three million. The states of Arizona and Nevada where he is leading now will give him the 270 votes he needs. The electoral vote margin may get larger depending on how Pennsylvania (20) goes, and could become quite large in the unlikely event that Georgia (16) and North Carolina (15) also go for him. So basically, depending on how these last three states go, Biden could be anywhere from 270 to 321, with Trump ranging from 217 to 268 since Alaska’s three votes will very likely go to Trump.
So now it is time for Donald Trump and his dead-enders to scream fraud and start throwing legal challenges all over the place and his supporters to start making lots of noise. Trump has declared victory in Pennsylvania based on an early lead in the counting though the final total with the mail in votes may not be known until Friday. They are demanding that the counting of votes in Pennsylvania be halted.
They have also demanded that the counting of votes be stopped in Michigan and his supporters are surrounding the counting centers in Detroit to demand that the counting be stopped there. I do not understand this logic since he is behind in the current count.
Election challengers halted outside of TCF Center by security and police chant “stop the vote,” referring to absentee ballot counting going on inside. pic.twitter.com/cNdC64y2qT
— Annalise Frank (@annalise_frank) November 4, 2020
Trump is also calling for a recount in Wisconsin, which he is entitled to do by the rules since the results were so close, though his margin of defeat of 20,000 votes is going to be difficult to overcome, even according to the former Republican governor of Wisconsin Scott Walker.
After recount in 2011 race for WI Supreme Court, there was a swing of 300 votes. After recount in 2016 Presidential race in WI, @realDonaldTrump numbers went up by 131.
As I said, 20,000 is a high hurdle. #Election2020 https://t.co/CEr82eiCWH
— Scott Walker (@ScottWalker) November 4, 2020
So even though the results for the Senate and the House of Representatives were nowhere near as good as I had hoped for, I am thankful that Trump is on the verge of being thrown into the dustbin of history.
Why are they delaying counting the rest of the votes in Nevada until tomorrow? Is this just a decision to dramatize the elections further and cause more suspense? It’s a state with a relatively small population and Biden’s lead there is razor-thin. I will keep holding my breath and not become hopeful until I see that Nevada has been called for Biden. If Nevada falls for Trump then he still has high chances of winning the election since Pennsylvania is still leaning red.
I will breathe more easily once The Orange One is fitted with a nice orange jumper by the state of New York. Only then, with at least one felony conviction, will I be satisfied that he can’t run again.
Politico has just put Arizona up as a win for Biden. Only Nevada left to get to the 270 required electors.
And he better get Pennsylvania or else Trump & Co. will go completely bananas to try and get even one elector removed from that and put onto their tally.
@Some Old Programmer(#1):
Do you think Trump will stop with that? He needs that spotlight (well at least he thinks it is more important then breathing). And do you think he won’t exploit the gullible fools, like the ones he and his family praised for trying to run the Biden election bus off the road. Or worse, he is an US ex-president, how much is that worth for a random strongman to give the illusion of endorsement by the US (seeing that previous ex-presidents have been used as neutral ambassadors). At least the security community isn’t to worried about Trump leaking sensitive or classified (being an ex president he can’t declassify it by stating it is so) information since he doesn’t pay attention when that kind of stuff shows up in briefings and PowerPoint bullet points he does pay attention to don’t contain enough information that anyone else doesn’t already have, if Trump bothers to remember them at all instead of what he watches on FoxNews. The Republicans are screwed though if that 80% that demands allegiance of the republicans to Trump above all won’t redirect that impulse since that would make Trump the republican kingmaker.
No Trump can (and will) do damage for years that the litigation takes and even after he gets convicted.
I am dismayed by the Democratic failure to take the Senate, and also their loss of ground in the House. I feel bad about the people with whom I share a country.
last I heard, the senate races aren’t over yet either, and the dems are only down by one senator right now.
has that changed again?
My news might be old. I hope so.
Trump isn’t demanding a recount, in Wisconsin or anywhere else. What he’s demanding is a stop to the first vote count and a route to get the case before the Supreme Court, where the Federalist Society-majority court can officially declare him the winner despite all the people who voted for the wrong person. The foundation was set in 2000, when the Supremes declared that they could determine a winner without setting precedent, i.e. only Republicans can appeal to the SCOTUS to overturn incorrect election results.
There’s a very good chance that we’re less than a month from an official Supreme Court ruling that unless a challenger has an arbitrary and undefined supermajority, the GOP candidate in any given election is entitled to victory.
First of all, he is demanding a recount in WI. He can’t stop that count, because they have completed it. He will get a recount because state law says you can always get a recount if the margin is below 1%. There is no way a recount will do anything significant to the current 20,000 vote lead. WI is over. Biden won.
He is trying to stop MI and PA. In MI, that wouldn’t help, because he is already too far behind. MI is over. Biden won. It’s not even remotely plausible that he’ll stop PA by Friday, which is when they’ll finish counting all the ballots they had on election day. It is plausible that he might get SCOTUS to toss late arriving mail in ballots, so we should pay close attention to Friday’s vote totals there. PA is not over, but Biden will probably win. That “probably” becomes “certainly” if Biden is winning by >10,000 votes on Friday.
For the senate, it’s very likely going to be a 48/52 Republican advantage. MI is at 98% reporting and Peters has held on, though it hasn’t been officially called. Ossoff (GA) and Cunningam (NC) are both doing worse than Biden, who is probably done in NC, and barely has a 50/50 shot in GA. It seems unlikely that the GA runoff will go Blue, but at least it’s another chance for a vote.
And the Mainers that actually want governance will see how they are complete and total idiots, once again, for reelecting a batshit crazy republican that hides by taking the democratic side only in votes that already have the safe republican margin.
Probably, they won’t. They’re not very bright.
@ 3 Who Cares
worse, he is an US ex-president, how much is that worth for a random strongman to give the illusion of endorsement by the US
You may not realize how toxic Trump is regarded outside the USA. Most heads of state/heads of government regard him as a malevolent buffoon. Having him on the roster would be incredibly damagingto a “strongman”‘s prestige.
Look at a photo of Angela Merkel with Trump. She usually looks like someone expecting to be savaged by a rabid dog.
@11 jrkrideau
Who would’ve thought Merkel (like many Americans) would be nostalgic for the days of GWB, when all she had to worry about with respect to the US president was getting a creepy shoulder massage. Come to think of it, she’s about to experience a serious case of deja vu.
@ 12 DrVanNostrand
I believe Ms Merkel is retiring soon. It may not be a function of dealing with Trump.
It’s funny, I was pretty depressed last night when trump made his speech declaring victory. What I didn’t get at the time, is that Trump obviously understood that he was in trouble.
@Bated Breath, #1,
While I don’t know for certain, I do know that Nevada has a large military population which often votes from overseas. From the way the state is handling the votes, I suspect this is a normal occurrence where Nevada will count all the votes they have on election day, then wait a couple days for all the military ballots to get through the APO and then the USPS transport system before counting another batch.
From the beginning Nevada has been saying they would make their second count on Thursday. Normally it wouldn’t matter.
Sportsbet Says It Will Pay Out Early on Biden as U.S. President
Wait what? Are you saying that it is legal to not count all the votes? How can this be possible?
Not counting all the votes would be unimaginable and illegal in every normal democratic country. (I have known for a long time that the USA isn’t normal, but not counting part of the votes is beyond ridiculous.)
Sorry, Some Old Programmer, but no ex-president is ever going to prison. That’s an optic too many people in power in the country would like to avoid.
Tabby Lavalamp, that kind of statement holds until it doesn’t anymore. People will give more allowances to ex-presidents, until someone will not, and then it won’t matter anymore.
Some Old Programmer, the problem isn’t Trump. It doesn’t matter if he can or cannot run again. The people who voted for him, and voted for him a second time, will vote for any horrible person that plays to their prejudices and their sense of entitlement.
Andreas Avester @17: Trump is filing lawsuits because that’s what he does. Nothing will come of it.
The particular issue in this case is that Trump is claiming that his observers weren’t allowed to observe the counting. In fact, both Democratic and Republican observers, properly vetted in accordance with the states’ laws, are observing just fine. I’m guessing that J. Random Trumpista wasn’t allowed to enter and make a scene. 😎
billseymour @21
That’s basically correct. His lawyers whined that the observers didn’t have good enough access, and demanded they stop the count. The court said they wouldn’t stop the vote, but asked what access they wanted. His lawyers said they wanted to observe from 6 feet rather than 20 feet. The court said fine (note that an equal number of Democrat, Republican, and independent observers are present, and all are subject to the same rules). Then his lawyers whined that they wanted more observers. The court said fine. Now the number of Democrat, Republican, and independent observers has all been increased. At no point did any judge seriously consider stopping the count. These are pointless lawsuits about trivia, that have zero impact on the counting of the vote.