Trump’s uncertainty and belligerence cloud Biden’s victory, which may find Congress less favorable than he expected
The Democratic Party had the polls in its favor to close four years of Donald Trump. However, the slow counting of the presidential votes and the tight result in key states overshadows the advantage of Joe Biden, who has seen how traditionally Democratic groups have not supported him at the expected level and who fears that he will not have a majority related in the Senate.
In the absence of the recount, Biden is already considered the most voted candidate in the history of the United States, above the record obtained by his friend Barack Obama in 2008. If Obama then obtained almost 69.5 million of his fellow citizens, the Biden’s data already stands at over 71.6 million, according to CNN.
However, what seemed like it was going to be a walk has not been such, since Trump has also improved his 2016 data, when he achieved almost 63 million votes. Now it already exceeds 68 million, ahead of the 65.8 that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton achieved four years ago and the 65.9 that Obama obtained to reach the White House.
The data shows a growing social mobilization – the participation rate would be around 65 percent, the highest since 1908, according to the US Elections Project – but also that this drag has not only favored the Democratic candidate, since supporters of Trump have also turned out en masse to the polls.
Likewise, during the election night, there were fears that the polls would fail again, as happened in 2016 with Clinton and Trump would win again, after the current president prevailed in key states such as Florida and the delay in the ballot count , attributed to the massive early voting and by mail, left other areas such as Michigan, Wisconsin or Pennsylvania in the air, with narrow or even unfavorable margins for Biden.
The former vice president has also encountered a combative rival, who, far from acknowledging defeat or at least appealing to calm, came out on the same election night to denounce fraud without evidence and demand the paralysis of the vote count. Regardless of what happens in the next few hours, Biden’s victory will be forever marked by Trump’s belligerence.
THE LATINOS, EACH TIME MORE DISTRIBUTED
At the height of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement against police brutality, Biden seemed to have lost some of the Democratic momentum of the Obama era, although he has still swept through the African-American population, garnering a support level of 87 percent, according to polls. Exit published by ‘The Washington Post’. Among women, the figure shoots up even more, to 91 percent.
However, the Democratic electoral drag has not extended to the same extent among the Latino community, already considered the largest minority in the United States thanks to its around 32 million potential voters, where the margin between Biden and Trump is reduced to 34 percentage points, which would have taken its toll in states like Florida.
The data has not gone unnoticed by emerging figures such as Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, who on Tuesday revalidated her seat in the House of Representatives after obtaining almost 69 percent of the votes. On the same election night, Ocasio-Cortez “sounded the alarm” on Twitter and recriminated the “vulnerabilities” of her own party towards the Hispanic community: “We have work to do.”
Women, for their part, have overwhelmingly supported Biden –13 points more than Trump–, while the president has shown that he continues to be strong among whites –15 points more – and among those who have voted as main concerns the economy or insecurity, great emblems of the Republican campaign. The rural vote has also opted for the Republican side.
THE CAST OF THE CONGRESS
The delicate balance of powers in the United States will also leave the next president at the mercy of what happens in other parts of Washington, including the Supreme Court, a body dominated by the conservative side after Trump has managed to place in just four years to three judges who will hold their respective positions for life.
In Congress, the legislative power, the Democratic Party came to these elections with the challenge of maintaining control of the House of Representatives, something that ‘a priori’ has achieved ‘, and recovering the majority in the Senate, a hypothesis still in progress. the air.
With several seats yet to be determined and the possibility that the deal may not be finalized until January, Democrats and Republicans are tied at 47 senators, according to CNN. Without the control of the Senate, Biden would see his legislative margin very limited, contrary to what has happened to Trump these four years.
“If the mathematics do not fail me, we will win North Carolina and Maine and I will still be the offensive coordinator,” celebrated Mitch McConnell, majority leader in this last Republican stage, according to ‘The New York Times’ on Wednesday. If McConnell’s math is confirmed, the big loser would be Chuck Schumer, currently the leader of the Democratic minority.
In the House of Representatives, Democrats are guaranteed 199 seats, eleven more than Republicans, and need 19 more to reach the majority threshold. The president of this body, Nancy Pelosi, who holds the third most important position in the United States by succession rank, acknowledged on Wednesday in a letter to her colleagues that they had been a “complicated” election.
At least seven Democratic congressmen have lost their seats and the caucus is now even more plural than before, forcing Pelosi not to take for granted that there is a homogeneous bloc. In fact, the House of Representatives has become a loudspeaker for voices like Ocasio-Cortez, who demand a shift to the left of the party.
“A reduced majority complicates everything,” admitted Congressman Gerald Connolly, fearful among other issues that this reconfiguration “amplifies” the voices of certain subgroups and, by extension, reinforces their ability to “rewrite, change or reduce” proposals, according to the Bloomberg agency.
The House of Representatives may also become a battle arena for the leadership of the Democratic Party, as Pelosi, 80, faces her last stage in this legislative body and plans to leave the presidency in 2023.
