Saturday, November 7, 2020

Joe Biden is the apparent President-elect as Pennsylvania and Nevada called for him

I concluded Colbert, Kimmel, and Corden react to Trump's speech last night with derision and outrage plus a bonus Closer Look by writing "The wait is getting to people, including me. I hope I have more definitive news tomorrow. Stay tuned." Well, the wait is over. Watch NBC News Projects Joe Biden Will Be The President-Elect from NBC News.

NBC News projects Joe Biden will win the state of Pennsylvania in the 2020 presidential election, and will have enough electoral votes to become the president-elect.
Whew! Yay! 273 electoral votes for Joe Biden thanks to the Keystone State!

I have more news. Just after I started composing this entry, NPR reported AP Calls Nevada For Joe Biden: "The Associated Press has called Nevada for President-elect Joe Biden, bringing his electoral vote total to 290." That total includes Arizona, which NBC News and ABC News have not yet called for Biden, but the AP and Fox News did two days ago. Add in Georgia, where Biden is also leading, and Biden's electoral vote total increases to 306. Even without those two states, Biden's total is 279, so he's won.*

I conclude today's brief post with analysis from FiveThirtyEight: How Joe Biden And Kamala Harris Won A Historic Election.

As multiple news outlets report that Joe Biden has won the presidency, managing editor Micah Cohen and politics editor Sarah Frostenson talk with Galen Druke about this historic election.
In addition to the thoughtful analysis by Druke and Frostenson, I'm glad Cohen brought up how ground-breaking the victory is for Kamala Harris, who will be the first woman, first African-American, and first Asian-American to be elected Vice President.** Congratulations to her and Biden!

*At least this stage. The real election is the Electoral College, which votes on December 14, 2020. That's followed by a joint session of the new Congress on January 6, 2021. Biden's and Harris's legal team will have to keep an eye on that to make sure there are no attempts to send a slate of electors who do not reflect their state's popular vote or defections by faithless electors. The good news is that competing slates of electors have not made a difference since the 1876 election and faithless electors haven't made a difference since 1836 and that was for Vice President, not President. Still, people are trying. When John Oliver told his viewers to expect an election month not just an election night, he was not kidding.

**She's not the first person of color to be Vice President. Herbert Hoover's Vice President Charles Curtis was Native American, an enrolled member of the Kaw Nation.

6 comments:

  1. Great start! The Turtle will block everything so you have to turn Congress blue next midterm.

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    1. We have a chance to turn the Senate purple in January with two runoff elections in Georgia. Harris will be very busy casting tie-breaking votes if that happens.

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    2. I am going around to my comments changing 'Congress' to 'Senate'. I am tired and am not even American!

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    3. LOL, good for you. I know you're a Canadian, so you're not doing bad at all. Imagine an American having something intelligent to say about Canadian politics!

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