Pennsylvania election results: Joe Biden declared president after winning tipping point state

Joe Biden wraps out sweep of Midwestern states with crucial Pennsylvania victory

(Independent)

Joe Biden has been declared the winner in the crucial tipping point state of Pennsylvania, and with it the presidential election. 

The former vice president managed to overcome an early deficit to flip the state blue, completing a sweep across Midwestern states that Donald Trump won four years ago.

The Associated Press called the race for Mr Biden on Friday. His victory in Pennsylvania takes him over the 270 electoral college votes needed to become president. He received more than 12,000 votes more than the president in the keystone state.

Pennsylvania was one of the most hotly contested states in the country, long seen as crucial to both candidates’ path to the White House. Mr Trump won here by a mere 44,292 votes out of more than six million cast in 2016. 

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The state was also one of the slowest in completing its count due to a record number of mail-in ballots used by voters as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.  

Mr Trump has frequently made baseless claims that mail-in ballots were being used to commit voter fraud in Pennsylvania, but there has been no evidence of any foul play.

He repeated those falsehoods from the White House podium on Thursday. “This is a case when they are trying to steal an election, they are trying to rig an election,” the president said.

On Wednesday afternoon, the president’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and son Eric Trump arrived in Philadelphia to announce that the campaign was suing Pennsylvania to stop counting ballots, citing a lack of “transparency” in the process.

Mr Biden also chalked up victories in Michigan and Wisconsin, both states where Mr Trump won narrow victories four years ago. 

With millions of ballots yet to be tabulated, Biden has already received more than 73 million votes nationally, a significant lead in the popular vote in the 2020 election and the most in history.