WASHINGTON, Nov 4:
The race for the White House between Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden was poised for a photo-finish, even as the incumbent Republican President today claimed “fraud” in the counting of votes and said he would approach the Supreme Court to stop it.
With millions of votes still being counted and several swing states yet to declare results, both Trump and Biden say they are on course for victory in the 2020 Presidential election, one of the most divisive and bitter in American history.
Tuesday’s election saw tight races in many key battleground states with Biden winning 224 electoral college votes and Trump closely behind with 213. The winner of the 2020 Presidential election should have at least 270 electoral college votes out of the 538-member electoral college.
Fox News, considered to be the favourite news network of the president, gave him only 213 electrocal college votes while crediting 238 votes to Biden. It also gave 50 per cent of the popular vote to the Democratic challenger and 48.4 per cent to Trump.
No major US media has projected a clear winner in the election.
President Trump called the election “a fraud on the American public” and said, “Frankly, we did win this election.”
He also said he planned to take the battle to the Supreme Court to stop the counting of votes.
“All of a sudden everything just stopped. 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,” Trump said, without citing any evidence of a fraud in the electoral process.
“We will win this, and as far as I’m concerned, we already have won it,” Trump, 74, said in remarks to supporters in the White House East Room at 2 am.
“Our goal now is to ensure integrity, for the good of this nation. This is a very big moment. This is a major fraud on our nation. We want law to be used in a proper manner. So we’ll be going to the US Supreme Court.
“We want all voting to stop. We don’t want them to find any ballots at four o’clock in the morning and add them to the list,” Trump said, amidst applause from his supporters.
Reacting sharply, Biden’s campaign manager called Trump’s statement as “outrageous, unprecedented, and incorrect.”
“If the President makes good on his threat to go to court to try to prevent the proper tabulation of votes, we have legal teams standing by ready to deploy to resist that effort. And they will prevail,” Jen O’Malley Dillon said.
“The President’s statement tonight about trying to shut down the counting of duly cast ballots was outrageous, unprecedented, and incorrect. It was outrageous because it is a naked effort to take away the democratic rights of American citizens,” Dillon said in a statement. (PTI)
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