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Joe Biden won the United States elections with a majority of 279 votes in the electoral college. However, scrutiny continues in several states with Biden and Trump facing very tight margins.
Biden is only 0.2 percent, or 9,1260 votes, ahead of Trump in Georgia, but with more than 99 percent of the votes counted, it seems likely that the president-elect will win the state.
Georgia state officials have indicated that a recount is likely to take place in late November. A candidate may request a recount if the margin is less than 0.5 percent of the votes cast in accordance with Georgia state law.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said: “Right now, Georgia remains too close to call. Out of approximately 5 million votes cast, we will have a margin of a few thousand. With such a small margin, there will be a count in Georgia. “
Fulton County, the largest in the state and home to Atlanta, tipped the state. Trump was leading on election night, but with 99 percent of the votes declared, Joe Biden is expected to reclaim this Democratic stronghold by a margin of more than 57,500 votes.
Fulton County Elections Director Richard Barron told CNN they were “close to completion,” and that taking into account provisional ballots, including overseas and military votes, meant that the overall count of unknown votes from the county was nearly 5,000.
Clayton County is also responsible for the Democrats’ recent lead. While several Georgia counties sent poll workers home overnight, accountants in Clayton worked until morning.
Typically blue-leaning Gwinnett County is expected to remain blue, reinforcing Biden’s leadership in the state.
Gabriel Sterling, an election official, said it would “take time” to process tens of thousands of remaining ballots. As many as 8,000 overseas ballots from service members could still arrive.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump prematurely claimed that he was leading to Georgia, and several other states that were too early to call.
“It’s … of course we’ve won Georgia. We are up 2.5 percent, or 117,000 (votes) with only seven percent (of the votes) left to count, “Trump said during a morning appearance at the White House.
On November 4, the Trump campaign and the Georgia Republican Party filed the complaint against the Chatham County Board of Elections in an attempt to stop voting.
Sean Pumphrey, a Republican poll watcher, alleged that he had witnessed the illegal addition of 53 unprocessed late absentee ballots to a pile of processed absentee ballots that would be tabulated in Chatham County.
Ballots must be received by 7 pm on Election Day to be counted in accordance with state law.
The Trump campaign argued: “Failing to ensure that absentee ballots received after the deadline are stored in a manner that ensures that such ballots are not inadvertently or intentionally counted, as required by Georgia law, hurts interests of the Trump Campaign and of President Trump because it could lead to the dilution of legal votes cast in support of President Trump. ”
Although this was alleged, Mr. Pumphrey presented no evidence of misconduct.
Pumphrey also admitted that he did not know if the raw ballots were late after 7 p.m. on Election Day.
Sabrina German, director of the Chatham County Voter Registration Office, backed up the board’s witness testimony that the votes were received on time.
On Thursday, November 5, Judge James Base dismissed the case by giving an explanation of his decision at the one-hour hearing.
What’s Happening in the Georgia Senate Race?
Both Senate races in Georgia will be decided in a special second round on January 5, 2021, which will determine whether Republicans or Democrats control the upper house of Congress.
No candidate for the two state seats was able to achieve 50% of the votes needed to win a Senate seat.
Nationally, both parties have won 48 seats and need 51 for a majority. Although Alaska and North Carolina have yet to be summoned, they are led by Republican candidates and are likely to win. This means that if Democrats win both seats in Georgia, 2021, the Senate will be tied 50-50.
In this circumstance, Vice President Kamala Harris effectively becomes Senator 101 and decides the playoffs, which would give Democrats complete legislative control of Congress. But if Republicans win just one of the seats in Georgia, Joe Biden faces an uphill battle to pass his legislative agenda through a Republican chamber.
The first race in Georgia took place between current Republican David Perdue, 70, a businessman first appointed to the Senate in 2014, and Democrat Jon Ossoff, 33, a former investigative journalist.
Senator Perdue won 48.9 percent and Mr. Ossoff 47.9 percent, with 99% of the votes counted.
Georgia’s second Republican senator Kelly Loeffler received 25.9 percent of the vote and her rival, Democrat Raphael Warnock, received 32.9 percent.
They are the top two finishers in a packed field that also included Republican Rep. Doug Collins. But no candidate was able to reach the 50 percent threshold necessary to win completely.
Ms. Loeffler, 49, a wealthy businesswoman, was appointed last year to replace retired Senator Johnny Isakson.
The candidate recently tweeted in support of Trump’s calls to “count all legal votes” and promised to introduce a bill that would “increase penalties for those who attempt to interfere with the will of the American people.”
Warnock, 51, is trying to become Georgia’s first black US senator. The reverend is pastor of the Atlanta church where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. preached.
Demographic changes
Georgia is not an obvious Democratic country. This is the deep south. No Democrat has taken over the state in a presidential election since Bill Clinton 28 years ago.
Georgia joined the Confederacy when it separated from the Union. He is deeply religious and deeply conservative. For decades it has been more red than red.
But now the cracks are showing. The polls had Biden and Trump side by side in the state, but Biden has gained the upper hand.
