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(CNN) –– US President-elect Joe Biden has already received enough electoral votes to secure the presidency, an important milestone he reached when California voters awarded him all 55 state electoral votes at their meeting Monday in Sacramento.
CNN projected five weeks ago that Biden would win the White House, but his victory was formalized Monday after presidential electors gathered in state halls across the country as part of the constitutional process to officially elect a president.
This development is a crushing blow to President Donald Trump’s controversial and unprecedented attempts to block Biden’s Electoral College victory by filing impromptu lawsuits and pressuring lawmakers in contested states to revoke millions of legal votes.
In California, Biden won more than 63% of the vote statewide, while Trump won about 34%.
Democrats have won California’s electoral votes in every cycle since 1992. The state voted Republican in the previous six presidential elections.
The voters’ meeting is the next important step in the Electoral College process to affirm the results of the general elections. Voters are required by law to vote for president and vice president on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December, which this year is December 14. 270 electoral votes of the 538 available are needed to become president.
Upon completion, the ballots will be sent to Washington, where they will be counted by Congress on January 6. When that happens, Biden will take office as the 46th president of the United States on January 20 at noon.
The electoral college vote is a procedural step that usually goes unnoticed. However, this year it assumed enormous significance as President Trump continues to attack the election results.
Biden will ask the country to “turn the page” after Electoral College vote
President-elect Joe Biden will assure that it is time to “turn the page, unite, heal” in a speech he will give this Monday night, after the Electoral College makes official his victory over President Donald Trump, according to excerpts from the comments prepared by the Biden transition team.
“In this battle for the soul of America, democracy prevailed,” Biden will say, according to the excerpts. «We, the people, vote. Faith was kept in our institutions. The integrity of our choices remains intact. So now is the time to turn the page. Join us. Heal”.
Biden is expected to speak at 7:30 p.m. Miami time this Monday from his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware.
The president-elect intends to expose the work that will be paramount during the first days of his administration. This is the battle against the coronavirus pandemic, including the distribution of vaccines and slowing its spread as those vaccines become available. Also the rebuilding of an economy hit by the pandemic.
With information from Marshall Cohen and Ethan Cohen
