United States of uncertainty after Donald Trump threatens to challenge result in Supreme Court
Donald Trump says he will go to the US Supreme Court to ensure that he is the winner of an epic knife-edge struggle for the presidency.
Donald Trump says he will go to the US Supreme Court to ensure that he is the winner of an epic knife-edge struggle for the presidency, after accusing Democrats of trying to steal the election.
Joe Biden improved his chances of winning overnight after winning the key state of Wisconsin and taking a narrow lead in Michigan. Last night he told supporters “we believe we are on track to win this election’’ as he banked on the counting of pre-poll votes districts that had yet to be tallied in undecided states to clinch the 270 electoral college votes needed to win the presidency. Mr Biden is leading Mr Trump by 248 to 214 electoral college votes.
If Mr Biden holds Michigan and also wins in Nevada, where he also holds a narrow lead, he will reach the 270 electoral college votes needed to become president.
But the result still remains uncertain with the Trump campaign flagging that they will demand a recount in Wisconsin and possible Supreme Court action over the voting process in Pennsylvania.
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The White House is worried that the majority of votes yet to be counted in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Georgia are mail-in votes which will heavily favour Democrats.
Mr Biden is now leading narrowly in Michigan by 49.7 per cent to 48.8 per cent with 96 per cent of the vote counted. Mr Biden also holds a narrow lead in Nevada by 49.2 per cent to 48.6 per cent with 67 per cent of the votes counted.
Mr Trump holds a solid lead in Pennsylvania by 53.5 per cent to 45.4 per cent with 64 per cent of the vote counted, but the rest of the count are mail-in votes that are tipped to strongly favour the former vice president.
Pennsylvania’s secretary of state said there were more than 1.4 million mail-in ballots still to be counted in the state.
Mr Biden also has an outside chance of winning Georgia, where he trails with 48.5 per cent to 50.3 per cent for the president with 95 per cent of the vote counted.
The president appeared to be frustrated by the trend against him overnight, doubling down on his complaints about the legality of the count. “Last night I was leading, often solidly, in many key States, in almost all instances Democrat run & controlled,” Mr Trump tweeted.
“Then, one by one, they started to magically disappear as surprise ballot dumps were counted. VERY STRANGE, and the ‘pollsters’ got it completely & historically wrong!”
In another tweet he said; “They are finding votes all over the place - in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. So bad for our country.’’
They are finding Biden votes all over the place — in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. So bad for our Country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 4, 2020
They are finding Biden votes all over the place — in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. So bad for our Country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 4, 2020
But the Trump campaign maintained that it could still win the election. Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien said the president remained in a “very, very, very good position.”
“We are confident in our pathway. We are confident in our math. We said all along we are viewing some of these races as math equations.”
“If we count all legal ballots, the president wins,” he said.
The Trump campaign said it would demand a recount in Wisconsin, which is permitted by law if the final certified margin is less than one percent. However final results cannot be certified until December 1, raising the prospect that the final election result will not be known for more than a month.
“There have been reports of irregularities in several Wisconsin counties which raise serious doubts about the validity of the results. The President is well within the threshold to request a recount and we will immediately do so,” Trump campaign manager Mr Stepien said.
The Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon said: “We are going to win Wisconsin, recount or no recount.”
Mr Trump declared himself the winner of the election prematurely on election night and said he will challenge the election in the Supreme Court.
However it is unclear on what legal grounds the president could seek to halt the counting of ballots that have been posted on or before the election date.
Republicans are targeting rules in Pennsylvania that allow mail ballots to be counted if they are postmarked by Election Day and arrive within three days of the November 3 poll.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court last week rejected a legal challenge to the law.
If Mr Biden wins Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada he can win the election even if he loses in Pennsylvania.
In a stunning postscript to a deadlocked election result, the President held a news conference to say a fraud was being committed on the American people with the continued counting of votes in undecided states.
“This is a fraud on the American public, this is an embarrassment to our country, we were getting ready to win this election, frankly we did win this election,” he said at the White House.
“This is a very big moment … we will be going to the US Supreme Court … we want all voting to stop … it’s a very sad moment.”
Mr Biden’s White House campaign attacked Mr Trump’s threat to try to stop the election vote count as “outrageous”, saying its legal team was ready to prevent such an “unprecedented” act.
“The President’s statement tonight about trying to shut down the counting of duly cast ballots was outrageous, unprecedented, and incorrect,” Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon said. “We have legal teams standing by ready to deploy to resist … and they will prevail.”
Mr Trump earlier tweeted: “We are up BIG, but they are trying to Steal the Election. We will never let them do it. Votes cannot be cast after the Polls are closed.”
LIVE: President Donald J Trump https://t.co/J7hhaUPUf0
— Team Trump (Text VOTE to 88022) (@TeamTrump) November 4, 2020
Speaking in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, after midnight (US time), Mr Biden insisted that he was on track to win.
“We feel good about where we are, we really do,” he said as supporters in cars honked horns.
“We believe we are on track to win this election. We knew because of the unprecedented early votes it was going to take awhile, we have to be patient. It ain’t over till every vote, ever ballot if counted. But we are feeling good about where we are.
“It’s not my place or Donald Trump’s place to declare who won this election, but I am optimistic about this outcome … keep the faith, guys, we’re going to win this.”
With counting still continuing into Thursday (AEDT), no clear result was available after a night of wildly changing fortunes for both candidates.
In the key state of Pennsylvania, with 20 electoral college votes, it may take days to learn the result.
The national polls that had forecast a Biden victory failed to predict the strength of support for Mr Trump around the country, just as they did in his 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton.
Mr Trump’s barnstorming series of rallies across the country in recent weeks helped him perform more strongly than expected although with smaller majorities in most states than in 2016.
Early in the night it was clear that Democrat hopes of a landslide win based on the polls were not going to be realised.
As in 2016, Mr Trump won the major prize of Florida with its 29 electoral college votes, on the back of a stronger-than-expected performance among Latinos in the heavily populated Democrat stronghold of Miami-Dade County. The Biden campaign says it believes the result reflects a strong pro-Trump vote by anti-Castro Cuban refugees in Miami who believed Mr Trump’s claim that Mr Biden would lead a socialist administration.
The President also appears to have a winning lead in Georgia and North Carolina, two traditional Republicans states that were considered possible wins for Mr Biden.
After an early scare in Texas, Mr Trump prevailed easily and he also won in Iowa, which was considered a possible Biden pick-up. However the 77-year-old former vice-president was able to remain competitive because he flipped Arizona, a state Mr Trump won in 2016 and that has not voted Democrat since Bill Clinton in 1996.
TV networks struggled to interpret the results due to the unusual mix of massive mail-in votes and in-person votes in states that often had different means of counting them.
In the upper midwest, Mr Biden looked as if he might win the key state of Ohio early in the night as well as the southern state of North Carolina, but Mr Trump clawed his way back in both. In Ohio, Mr Trump won many of the districts dominated by the same white blue-collar voters who turned to him in 2016 and who Mr Biden had been trying to win back.
In the Senate it was unclear if Democrats could win the four seats they needed to regain the majority, with Democrat senator Doug Jones losing in Alabama but Democrat John Hickenlooper picking up a seat in Colorado.
Republicans won two major Senator contests. Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell won his Senate contest against former fighter pilot Amy McGrath and Republican Lindsey Graham fended off a strong challenge to retain his seat in South Carolina.
The poll follows a bitterly fought election campaign in which Mr Trump and Mr Biden attacked each other’s records and integrity amid a deadly coronavirus pandemic and a crushed economy. Mr Biden campaigned heavily on the President’s mismanagement of the pandemic which has killed more than 230,000 Americans.
He also focused his campaign on Mr Trump’s divisive leadership style, in effect making the election a referendum on the President.
Mr Trump repeatedly warned that the election could be marred by fraud with the massive mail-in vote and court rulings that allowed mail ballots in some states to be counted several days after the election.
Cameron Stewart is also US contributor for Sky News Australia
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