Trump is the fraud, Biden will win
President Trump last night spewed falsehoods by claiming that the election was being stolen from him:
There is little true in this statement. The fraud he is claiming is fraudulent. The press has responded with appropriate opprobrium.
In the meanwhile, counting of absentee ballots in Georgia and Pennsylvania has put Joe Biden in the lead. There is no reason to believe those margins won’t increase, as Democrats voted absentee more than Republicans. Biden will be sworn in January 20.
The road between now and then still has some curves in it. Trump is filing multiple lawsuits in several states and hopes to get one or more of them to the Supreme Court. He may also ask for recounts in some states, which take time. But when the Electoral College meets in state capitals on December 14, the outcome in each of the 50 states should be clear. In some states, there is still a possibility of a few “faithless” electors who vote for someone other than the person who won in the state, but Biden will reach a majority in the Electoral College and Congress will certify him the winner. That much is beyond a reasonable doubt.
Unfortunately, it looks as if the Republicans will retain their majority in the Senate by a vote or two. This is important, because both higher-level Administration appointments and Federal judges require the “advice and consent” of the Senate. The Republicans will do everything they can to block Biden nominees they don’t like. This could slow the new Administration to a crawl and prevent Biden from correcting the mass of right-wing judges, including some grossly unqualified, confirmed during the Trump Administration. Two Georgia Senate seats may need to go to a runoff in January, because Georgia requires it if no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote. But the odds of the Democrats winning both of those are slim.
So the United States will continue with “divided” government, but divided this time in favor of the Democrats. The fate of the Republican party is unclear, but Trump’s desultory remarks last night suggest that he intends to leave the White House claiming that he lost to fraud and that he will pursue that line after he leaves office. He and his sons may try to continue to control the party. That would spell the end of Republicanism as a center-right party and condemn it to a future of xenophobia, racism, mendacity, and increasing irrelevance as demographic changes move the American majority in the other direction.
The Democrats have problems too. Its left backed Biden but isn’t wedded to him. The Republican Senate majority will force him to try to reach across the aisle and adopt a more moderate stance than many on the left want. If he can get even a couple of Republican Senators to vote with him, Biden would be greatly empowered. But a move to the center could incite a rebellion on the left. He’ll need all his vaunted Congressional experience to keep the Democrats united.
Biden is currently winning the popular vote by 4 million. But there are more than 69 million Americans who voted for Trump despite his incompetence and failures. They are an enormous challenge. Politics doesn’t stop after an election.
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