Joe Biden has won the presidency by clinching Pennsylvania and its 20 electoral votes, the AP announced this afternoon.
I am honored and humbled by the trust the American people have placed in me and in Vice President-elect Harris,” Biden said in a first statement.
“In the face of unprecedented obstacles, a record number of Americans voted. Proving once again, that democracy beats deep in the heart of America. With the campaign over, it’s time to put the anger and the harsh rhetoric behind us and come together as a nation. It’s time for America to unite. And to heal,” he continued.
“We are the United States of America. And there’s nothing we can’t do, if we do it together.”
Kamala Harris will be the United States’ next vice president, becoming the first woman to hold the office. She will also be the nation’s first Black and South Asian vice president.
Harris, who has represented California in the Senate since 2017, is the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, and she grew up attending a Black Baptist church and a Hindu temple. She was the first Indian-American and second Black woman to serve as a senator.
For Biden, who got more than 74 million votes, a record, the triumph after a tense contest conducted during a global coronavirus pandemic was the crowning achievement of his half century in US politics, including eight years as deputy to the first Black US president Barack Obama.
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The president-elect is spending the morning with his family in Delaware, and is expected to address the nation tonight.
“We all know why Joe Biden is rushing to falsely pose as the winner, and why his media allies are trying so hard to help him: they don’t want the truth to be exposed. The simple fact is this election is far from over,” Trump said.
Despite the final vote count not being over, Biden has won Pennsylvania, and therefore passed the needed 270 electoral votes.
“Beginning Monday, our campaign will start prosecuting our case in court to ensure election laws are fully upheld and the rightful winner is seated, he continued.
Earlier today he tweeted this:
For Trump, the defeat and his exit from the White House at the transition on January 20 will above all be a story of personal humiliation. He shocked the country and the world when he stormed to victory in 2016 as a political newcomer taking down the seasoned Democrat Hillary Clinton in his first shot at public office.
Then for much of his administration he appeared invulnerable to the normal laws of politics. His showbiz style of running the government made him perhaps the most watched -- and controversial -- individual on the planet.
He survived impeachment, tore up diplomatic norms, and was so omnipresent in the media that he lodging himself in the consciousness of ordinary Americans in a way never previously experienced.
To crowds at rallies he loved to boast “we’re going to win so much, you’re going to be so sick and tired of winning.” And to people he didn’t like, his go-to insult was “loser.”
Yet now he’s a loser himself -- as perhaps he already feared on the morning of the election.
“Winning is easy,” he mused as polls opened. “Losing is never easy. Not for me.”
