Joe Biden was yesterday in a position to proclaim himself the winner of the presidential election.
But Donald Trump accuses the Democrats of "
stealing the election
" in a
"massive fraud"
and disputes the results.
By casting suspicion on the whole ballot, the president opens a period fraught with uncertainties.
It places the United States in an unprecedented situation, where the outgoing president refuses to acknowledge his defeat.
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The counts that have continued since Tuesday in the still disputed states have inexorably placed Joe Biden in the lead.
The most important event took place on Friday morning, when the Democratic candidate passed Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, a state that alone would be enough to secure him victory.
Beating the outgoing president by a small 9,000 vote lead, Biden is now almost guaranteed to win this state, and the presidency.
In Georgia, he was also ahead of Trump by a narrow margin of 1,500 votes.
In Nevada and Arizona, his lead was a bit more comfortable.
Only North Carolina and Alaska were clearly leaning towards Trump, which is insufficient to allow him to catch up.
In a normal electoral context, the projections would have been sufficient for the loser to concede defeat by a courteous telephone call to his opponent, for the putative winner to deliver an acceptance speech saluting his opponent and American democracy, and for all TV channels display the name of the next President of the United States.
An unprecedented expectation
But the context is nothing normal.
Thursday evening, Donald Trump appeared at the White House to deny the results.
In a threatening speech, he accused Democrats of "
stealing the election
" and vowed to challenge the results in court.
“
If we count the votes, we win easily;
if you count the illegal votes, they can rob us of the election,
”Trump warned, sowing doubt and suspicion over the entire ballot.
“
We were winning overwhelmingly everywhere… when our scores mysteriously started to catch up,
” Trump explained.
"
In North Carolina, we were winning, but our lead was reduced, because they found mail-order ballots: unbelievable the number of votes in favor of Democrats appearing!"
"
Democratic officials never believed they could win this election on a regular basis,
" the president continued.
“
That's why they used these mail-order bulletins and this gigantic fraud.
That's why they sent tens of millions of newsletters to people who didn't ask for them… It's unprecedented in American history.
They refused all requests to verify signatures, or to verify that voters were eligible to vote. ”
The question is not who won, Republicans or Democrats, Joe or me
Donald trump
Trump said he had "
multiple examples of the Democrats' corrupt electoral machine… In Pennsylvania, they allowed ballots to be sent out three days after the election… We were denied access to the counts in many states. keys, where election night results were kept under wraps for hours, and ballots appeared with Biden's name on them, which is a little odd
. "
"
This postal vote, which I have been talking about for a long time, is destroying our system,
" he added.
“
I challenge Joe and the Democrats to clarify all of these votes.
We want all legal votes to be counted.
We want transparency, not mystery ballots cast after election day.
"
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The President of the United States has finally announced his intention to take the case to the judges, citing the Supreme Court.
"
We think we are going to win this election,
" Trump concluded, "
there will be many appeals, and it will undoubtedly end in the highest court in the land
."
“
We can't let this go for the United States: the question is not who won, the Republicans or the Democrats, Joe or me.
There will be a legal procedure, he says he won some states, I won others, but in the end the judges will have to decide
. ”
American elections: Donald Trump denounces a "major fraud" and ensures "seize the Supreme Court" - Watch on Figaro Live
This unprecedented situation risks prolonging the suspense over the outcome of the ballot for an indefinite period.
But it also places the United States in a situation which is all the more perilous because it is unprecedented, at least in the contemporary period.
"Democracy is sometimes a bit chaotic"
Adding to the deleterious climate of reciprocal mistrust between Democrats and Republicans that plagued the campaign, several television channels interrupted the broadcast of the president's speech, and Twitter deleted several of his messages where he claimed to have won the ballot.
CNN, denounced by a Trump who accuses the media of being hostile pharmacies spreading false news, broadcast his intervention in its entirety, but with a banner warning that the president's allegations were spurious.
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By sowing doubt on the regularity of the ballot, the American president is running the risk of seeing part of the Republican electorate consider his possible defeat as the result of fraud.
It also aggravates a little more the political climate in which the transfer of power will take place in the event of Joe Biden's victory.
Thursday evening, Joe Biden had appealed for calm and patience.
"
It is the will of the voters, and no one else, who chooses the President of the United States of America
."
"
I ask everyone to be calm, the process is working, the count is going on and we will find out very soon,
" Biden said.
“
I have no doubt that when it is finished we will be the winners.
""
Democracy is sometimes a bit chaotic, and sometimes requires a little patience.
But for over 240 years, this patience has paid off.
"
We lost battles in the House, but we won the war
Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Speaker of the House
The counting of the last ballots could continue for several more days.
“
We're counting every ballot,
” said the counting official in Philadelphia, Pa.
Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic Speaker of the House and nemesis of Donald Trump, almost proclaimed the victory of Joe Biden.
“
This morning it's clear that the Biden-Harris ticket is going to win the White House,
” Pelosi said.
"
We have lost battles in the House, but we have won the war,
" she added, despite the Democrats' disappointing results in Congress.
Republican Party officials remained evasive after Donald Trump's statements.
Mitch McConnell, the Republican Majority Leader in the Senate, who was reelected in his state of Kentucky, called for a count of all votes.
But other party figures have echoed the president's accusations of fraud.
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“
There are a lot of mysterious things that have happened,
” said Newt Gingrich, the former majority leader in the House of Representatives.
"
In one case in particular we saw 23,000 ballots, but none for Trump, we can have this kind of results in Zimbabwe or Venezuela or China, not in the United States ... We are watching this carefully, as Twitter deleted several messages from the president, something is happening.
"
You have to look at it all before saying that this election is over.
We have to recount the votes.
It will take several weeks.
"
Friday, the Secret Service, which ensures the protection of the elected candidate had already strengthened its device around the residence of Joe Biden in Wilmington.
But as the counting continues and as we get closer to the proclamation of the results in the last States, the uncertainty about what will follow grows.
Nancy Pelosi says she is "very proud" of the success of the Democrats in the House - Watch on Figaro Live