Joe Biden scored a narrow victory for the presidency and defeated President Donald Trump after reaching 273 Electoral College votes by winning Pennsylvania
At 11.25 am, as the president played golf at his Virginia course, TV networks almost simultaneously called the election for Biden. Biden will address the nation tonight
In Wilmington, DE, car horns honked in celebration and on CNN commentator Van Jones cried
The call was made as Donald Trump played golf at his course in Virginia and his campaign reacted with a statement saying he will not accept the results
He had tweeted claims of election fraud earlier in the morning and statement said: 'Legal counts decide the election not the news media.'
Biden will become the oldest president when he takes office at 78, the second Catholic and and is the third person to knock off an incumbent in 100 years, and the first since Clinton defeated George H.W. Bush in 1992
Trump is claiming that Philadelphia is corrupt and that the votes there cannot be trusted as his team announced it would file lawsuits in an effort to prevent counting of votes that could go against him
Key to Biden's effort was taking Pennsylvania and restoring the 'blue wall' that crumbled in 2016 – with an intensive focus on battleground states in the upper Midwest
Biden won the popular vote, with the count expected to hit 75 million, the most votes in a U.S. election, and his running mate Kamala Harris will be the first female and first black vice president
Biden often speaks of his struggles growing up in Scranton, Pennsylvania to a middle-class family, struggling with a stutter and losing his first wife and baby daughter in a car crash and son beau to brain cancer in 2015
Joe Biden was named the next president of the United States at 11.25 a.m. Saturday morning by television networks and the Associated Press as he passed a 30,000 lead in Philadelphia - as Donald Trump played golf.
CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, the AP and USA Today all made the call and Fox News followed suit 10 minutes later. Biden will address the nation at 8pm tonight.
Spontaneous celebrations broke out in major cities but Trump refused to accept the call, claiming Biden was trying to 'falsely pose' as the winner, vowing to keep challenging results he claims are a 'fraud' and creating the potential for weeks of chaos and constitutional crisis.
Trump has no immediate plans to invite Biden to an Oval Office meeting, a tradition between outgoing and incoming presidents, CNN reported. Then Barack Obama hosted Trump for such a meeting on Thursday, November 10, 2016, two days after that year’s presidential election.
Votes in Philadelphia pushed Biden's margin in must-win Pennsylvania to 34,558, more than 0.5%, just after 11am - putting the result in the state beyond doubt. That took him to 273 electoral votes - putting the 77-year-old on a clear path to the White House. Less than an hour later Nevada was called by networks, putting him
The states of Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina were still to be called. Biden was ahead in all but North Carolina, and if he stays that way he will have 302 electoral college votes, the same as Trump in 2016.
Kamala Harris, his running mate, becomes the first female vice president, and the first black and Asian-American vice president. She was out for a run when the call came.
Biden tweeted: 'America, I'm honored that you have chosen me to lead our great country. The work ahead of us will be hard, but I promise you this: I will be a President for all Americans — whether you voted for me or not. I will keep the faith that you have placed in me.'
He issued a statement saying '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. We are the United States of America. And there's nothing we can't do, if we do it together.'
But Trump's campaign issued a statement in Trump's name claiming Biden was not the winner and that it would fight on with legal efforts to challenge the votes - which so far have badly faltered.
As he golfed, Trump's campaign issues a lengthy statement:
'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. Joe Biden has not been certified as the winner of any states, let alone any of the highly contested states headed for mandatory recounts, or states where our campaign has valid and legitimate legal challenges that could determine the ultimate victor. In Pennsylvania, for example, our legal observers were not permitted meaningful access to watch the counting process. Legal votes decide who is president, not the news media.
'Beginning Monday, our campaign will start prosecuting our case in court to ensure election laws are fully upheld and the rightful winner is seated. The American People are entitled to an honest election: that means counting all legal ballots, and not counting any illegal ballots. This is the only way to ensure the public has full confidence in our election. It remains shocking that the Biden campaign refuses to agree with this basic principle and wants ballots counted even if they are fraudulent, manufactured, or cast by ineligible or deceased voters. Only a party engaged in wrongdoing would unlawfully keep observers out of the count room – and then fight in court to block their access.
'So what is Biden hiding? I will not rest until the American People have the honest vote count they deserve and that Democracy demands.'
'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 statement said.
'The simple fact is this election is far from over. Joe Biden has not been certified as the winner of any states, let alone any of the highly contested states headed for mandatory recounts, or states where our campaign has valid and legitimate legal challenges that could determine the ultimate victor. Legal votes decide who is president, not the news media.'
In Wilmington, Delaware, where Biden was watching the news at home, cars could be heard honking in celebration.
Biden's campaign manager, Jen O'Malley Dillon was spotted by reporters in the lobby of the Westin, adjacent to Biden's Wilmington headquarters, in a white BIDEN t-shirt. Her mother had called to tell her CNN had called the race. 'Ecstatic - a great day for this country,' she said.
The former vice president sealed victory - after capitalizing on the coronavirus and stark disapproval of the president among women and minorities - with a result that was dramatically closer than many experts had predicted, denying him what he hoped would a total rejection of Trumpism.
But on Friday night he had hailed rebuilding the 'blue wall,' winning thumping popular vote margins and said he was on his way to more than 300 Electoral College votes.
That added up to a 'mandate' he said, name-checking racial equality and climate change as where he will take action in a sign that the Democratic takeover of the White House will be unapologetic in pursuing the party's agenda.
He still faces an electoral battle to gaining total Democratic control, with two runoff races for both Georgia Senate seats on January, and if he loses it will have to deal with a Republican senate.
His promised legal challenges can be followed by trying to unseat the electors in the Electoral College, then challenging the certification of results on January 6.
The celebration among Biden's supporters and sudden blow to Trump's loyal base came as the U.S. was facing a dangerous uptick in the coronavirus – which had become a central issue but certainly not the only one of the campaign.
On Friday alone, there were 126,000 new coronavirus infections. It was the third successive day of record-breaking news, with more than 50,000 Americans hospitalized for the disease.
The state of the pandemic sets up challenging dynamic for the country, as the White House – which is now dealing again with an outbreak among its own staff – must grapple with the spreading coronavirus during a lame duck period.
Biden received a briefing this week on the virus, but has no authority to affect policy until January – although his allies in the Capitol can continue to push to revive a stalled relief package.
