Wilmington, Tel. (AP) – President-elect Joe Biden on Monday openly criticized President Donald Trump for threatening the basic tenets of democracy, telling Americans that the form of their sovereignty had finally “prevailed.”
Speaking from his long-term residence in Wilmington, Delaware, voters across the country voted Biden was blunt in criticizing the damage caused by Trump’s baseless allegations that votes confirming his victory were rigged. Such arguments have been rejected by judges across the political spectrum, including those in the Supreme Court.
Democracy, Biden said, “has been pushed, tested, and threatened.” But it has proven to be “flexible, true and strong,” he said.
“Long ago the flame of democracy was burning in this country,” Biden said. “We now know that no epidemic or abuse of power can extinguish that flame.”
With a formal victory in the Electoral College, along with his record 81 million votes, Biden and his team hope to unite and accept his presidency. The challenge facing Biden became clear as several Congress Republicans, including some party leaders, refused to officially acknowledge his victory. Trump, meanwhile, showed no sign of acknowledging.
The president-elect admitted a contradiction in circumstances, winning with the same number of electoral votes as Trump did four years ago – 306. Trump hailed the victory as a “landslide.”
“By his own standards, these numbers represent a clear success and I respectfully recommend that they do so now,” Biden said.
A candidate for the presidency must receive 270 electoral votes.
Shortly after voters voted to make him president, Biden had to give even one such speech – a routine and banal move – showing how unusual the post-election period is, with Trump trying to block Biden at every turn.
Still, Biden attacked the familiar theme of his presidential campaign, promising “a president for all Americans” who said, “I will work hard for those of you who did not vote for me, for what I did.”
“It’s time to turn the page as we’ve done throughout our history,” he said. “Unity. Cure.”
He said this was the only way for the country to overcome the worst health crisis in more than a century, and in the face of the epidemic, “we must work together, give each other a chance and reduce the temperature.”
It remains to be seen whether his message will have any effect. Top Republicans have largely backed Trump and unsubstantiated claims for a bad election, and even if Biden takes office, he is unlikely to offer anything of a traditional honeymoon.
Biden recalled that one of his jobs as vice president four years ago was formally recognizing Trump’s election victory in the Senate after 2016, and he said he expects the same thing to happen this time around – salute to the small number of GOP senators who have acknowledged him. But there are many leading Republicans who have consistently sided with Trump.
After losing dozens of legal challenges At the state and federal levels, Trump is expected to file new lawsuits this week. Trump attorney Rudy Giulani says he expects five more cases at the state level.
Even after he takes over the White House, Biden faces a narrow split Senate. Elections in Georgia next month will determine which party controls. Since the GOP took the same seats as Trump did, there is a slim democratic majority in the House.
Meanwhile, Wisconsin Republican Sen. Ron Johnson is due to stand trial on Wednesday over election “irregularities”. Johnson questioned why Congress had not been notified that Pitton’s son Hunter’s tax was under federal investigation During Trump’s indictment Tested last year.
The president was acquitted during a Senate hearing It centered on Trump’s actions with the Ukrainian president And whether he had abused his office by demanding an investigation into the fitness. Hunter Biden served on the board of directors of a Ukrainian energy company.
In a statement last week, junior Biden said he had recently learned that he was under investigation. He said he had done nothing wrong.
Jen O’Malley Dillon, Biden’s vice president, underestimated the possibility that the trial might hinder Biden’s ability to pursue his agenda.
“The president-elect has said this is not about his family or Donald Trump’s family,” O’Malley Dillon said. “It simply came to our notice then. I think we are going to continue to focus on issues that affect their daily lives. ”
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Weissert reported from Washington.