Biden wins White House, ending Trump presidency

Democrat Joe Biden has won the White House, US media said Saturday, defeating Donald Trump and ending a presidency that convulsed American politics, shocked the world and left the United States more divided than at any time in decades.

CBS, NBC and CNN news networks announced the result just before 11:30 am (1630 GMT) as an insurmountable lead in Pennsylvania took Biden, 77, over the top in the state-by-state count that decides the presidency.

"America, I'm honored that you have chosen me to lead our great country," Biden said in a statement. 

"The work ahead of us will be hard, but I promise you this: I will be a president for all Americans — whether you voted for me or not. I will keep the faith that you have placed in me."

Trump quickly responded to the announcement by accusing Biden of falsely declaring himself the next president.

"We all know why Joe Biden is rushing to falsely pose as the winner, and why his media allies are trying so hard to help him: they don't want the truth to be exposed," Trump said in a statement.

"The simple fact is this election is far from over."

For Biden, who got more than 74 million votes, a record, the triumph after a tense contest conducted during a global coronavirus pandemic was the crowning achievement of his half century in US politics, including eight years as deputy to the first Black US president Barack Obama.

The result condemned 74-year-old Trump -- who made frantic attempts to claim fraud and stop the vote count -- to becoming the first one-term president since George H. W. Bush at the start of the 1990s.

The Republican, whose marathon press conferences, tweeting and raucous campaign rallies have made him a perpetual, noisy presence at home and abroad over the last four years, had no immediate reaction.

But ever since the night after Tuesday's election, when he prematurely claimed victory, Trump has been inhabiting a world increasingly disconnected from the reality of his approaching downfall.

Earlier Saturday, he left the White House for the first time since Election Day to play golf, tweeting: "I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT!"

And in an extraordinary White House address to the nation on Thursday -- with Biden's lead in the partial results already consolidating rapidly -- he claimed "they are trying to steal the election."

Despite Trump's protests, the returns from vote counting offices around the country kept coming all week, with no credible reports of irregularities.

And when US television networks declared that Biden had taken an insurmountable lead in Pennsylvania, that put the Democrat over the magic number of 270 electoral college votes. Trump had no way back.

- Centrist in divided era -

The biggest ever turnout of voters -- some 160 million people, according to preliminary estimates -- poured out across the United States, ultimately favoring Biden's promise of calm to Trump's rollercoaster.

An old school centrist, Biden has fended off the energetic leftist wing of his party, while choosing Kamala Harris, the first Black woman on a major party presidential ticket, as his running mate.

Although a career politician -- a widely derided group today -- he is seen by many as a sympathetic character, humanized by having endured the loss of his wife and baby daughter in a car accident in 1972, then another son to cancer four decades later.

Yet despite his fervent promises to restore America's "soul," Biden will inherit a shaken, angry country.

Americans are bitterly split after an election campaign in which Trump deliberately stoked divisions over many of the country's most sensitive issues, including race, immigration and gun ownership.

And despite critics painting Trump as an aberration, he still won the votes of around 70 million people -- many of whom may not have liked Trump himself, yet consider Democrats as being out of touch with their traditional values.

That gulf in understanding between two Americas will likely continue to rage in Congress, threatening Biden's ability to govern at a time of economic upheaval and an accelerating coronavirus crisis.

- Humiliation -

For Trump, the defeat and his exit from the White House at the transition on January 20 will above all be a story of personal humiliation.

He shocked the country and the world when he stormed to victory in 2016 as a political newcomer taking down the seasoned Democrat Hillary Clinton in his first shot at public office.

Then for much of his administration he appeared invulnerable to the normal laws of politics.

His showbiz style of running the government made him perhaps the most watched -- and controversial -- individual on the planet.

He survived impeachment, tore up diplomatic norms, and was so omnipresent in the media that he lodging himself in the consciousness of ordinary Americans in a way never previously experienced.

A former reality TV star and celebrity real estate developer, he gave the impression of someone who always got his own way.

To crowds at rallies he loved to boast "we're going to win so much, you're going to be so sick and tired of winning." And to people he didn't like, his go-to insult was "loser." 

Yet now he's a loser himself -- as perhaps he already feared on the morning of the election.

"Winning is easy," he mused as polls opened. "Losing is never easy. Not for me."

- Pro-Biden or anti-Trump? -

Biden secured his win by recapturing the Midwestern states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin -- traditional Democratic territory that Trump had flipped in 2016 with his powerful appeal to white, working class voters.

The Democrat was also running slender majorities as vote counting approached an end in Arizona and Nevada, while the tally in Georgia was so close that the state declared it would hold a recount.

But it was the capture of Pennsylvania that sealed the deal, meaning that even if Trump somehow won all the other unannounced states he still wouldn't accumulate enough electoral college votes.

Biden built his campaign on driving inroads into Trump's working class base, while selling himself to the rest of the country as the responsible, steady leader needed to confront the Covid-19 crisis.

Rejecting Trump's erratic, often cavalier attitude to a virus that has killed more than 230,000 Americans, Biden promised to follow scientific advice and take the tough decisions needed to try and halt the pandemic.

He took a gamble, politically speaking, by not holding the traditional kind of mass rallies that Trump used to great effect, insisting that he wanted to set an example by following government guidelines on social distancing.

His campaign even held back from knocking on doors -- another basic, even essential tactic for rounding up supporters that Trump's team embraced to great effect.

And in a climate of ferocious political partisanship, where almost every aspect of life is now seen through Democratic or Republican lenses, Biden pledged repeatedly to "be a president for all Americans."

In many ways, though, the election was less about Biden, making his third presidential run, than a referendum on Trump -- a figure of hate for opponents and open adoration to his supporters.

Some Republicans pleaded for Trump to expand his coalition with a more moderate pitch aimed at independent voters. But this most polarizing of presidents took the opposite tack, focusing his energy on super-charging his core base.

In the last weeks before the election, Trump addressed rally after rally with extreme, often entirely fact-free speeches. He painted illegal immigrants as murderers and rapists, claimed that Biden opposed God, and said Democrats would strip Americans of their personal firearms and allow mobs to destroy suburbs.

"We love you!" the crowds chanted back.

Confronted with pre-election polls that pointed to his coming defeat, Trump appeared genuinely unable to comprehend what was happening.

"Running against the worst candidate in the history of presidential politics puts pressure on me," Trump said.

"Could you imagine if I lose?"

Agence France-Presse

Twitter flags 'president-elect Biden' posts as premature

Twitter on Friday flagged as premature posts referring to Joe Biden as "president-elect," as the vote count continued in the knife-edge US election with the Democrat leading Donald Trump in several key states.

Tweets referring to the former vice president with the victor's title and his running mate Kamala Harris as "vice president-elect" were tagged with messages saying counts were not yet final.

"Official sources may not have called the race when this was tweeted," read a message below a post from Democratic Coalition co-founder and podcaster Scott Dworkin using the two titles for Biden and Harris.

The notice came with a link to information about the status of the election.

Twitter and Facebook have been scrambling to flag, mask and limit the spread of premature claims of victory or false attacks on the voting process since the polls closed late Tuesday.

"As votes are still being counted across the country, our teams continue to take enforcement action on tweets that prematurely declare victory or contain misleading information about the election broadly," Twitter said.

"This is in line with our civic integrity policy and our recent guidance on labeling election results."

Unfounded claims by Trump regarding the voting process as well as premature claims of victory about either candidate in the race have been flagged or masked, with links provided to reliable sources of information.

Twitter's action made the comments less visible, and users seeking to read the posts were required to click through a warning.

'STRONG MANDATE TO LEAD'

Meanwhile, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the top Democrat in Congress, on Friday called Biden the "president-elect" of the United States after he pulled ahead in key election results.

"This morning it is clear that the Biden-Harris ticket will win the White House," Pelosi told reporters after Biden overtook President Donald Trump in the potentially decisive state of Pennsylvania.

"President-Elect Biden has a strong mandate to lead," she said.

It is "a happy day for our country. Joe Biden is a unifier, because he is determined to bring people together."

Pennsylvania would be enough to put Biden past the magic number of 270 votes in the state-by-state Electoral College, which determines the presidency.

Biden also took a razor-thin lead in votes counted from Georgia, which Trump until late in the campaign did not consider to be in play.

The Democrat has stopped short of declaring victory but said he expected that he and his vice presidential pick Harris would triumph.

Trump has angrily made unsubstantiated claims of fraud and sought to halt vote counting after prematurely declaring victory himself following the close of polls Tuesday.

Biden's performance came despite projections that Democrats will lose several seats in the House of Representatives, a major disappointment for the party which had hoped to expand its majority.

Pelosi played down the losses but said that the next House election in 2022 "will be a steeper climb" without Trump on the ballot.

The party of the president nearly always loses seats in Congress in the first midterm election.

Agence France-Presse

New York under curfew as looters hit luxury stores

NEW YORK, United States - New York was under a curfew that would last until early Tuesday morning, officials said, after looters raided stores in central Manhattan, targeting some of the city's top retailers.

Upmarket fashion store Michael Kors on Fifth Avenue was among the luxury outlets hit, along with Nike, Lego and electronics shops across Midtown, before the 11:00 pm to 5:00 am curfew came into effect, AFP journalists said.

Groups of young people moved from block to block around the district, usually bustling with tourists but deserted due to the coronavirus, with entire streets blocked by police.

Images from local NY1 television showed some young people running out of a Best Buy electronics store before being apprehended by the police.

Stores in the south of Manhattan suffered a similar fate, according to an AFP photographer.

The New York Times reported that the flagship Macy's department store had also been targeted by looters.

Police did not immediately confirm this, simply saying that "numerous stores were hit" and arrests made "in the hundreds" across the city.

Mayor Bill de Blasio said a lot of stores around Madison Avenue had been hit and the situation was "really not acceptable."

As a result, he said the curfew would start from 8:00 pm on Tuesday, instead of 11:00 pm.

"The city is fully under control, and overwhelmingly calm and peaceful," he nevertheless insisted on NY1.

- 'Time to go home' -

The imposition of the curfew had been announced a few hours earlier by the mayor and New York state governor Andrew Cuomo after protests and looting during the weekend -- notably in the trendy SoHo district.

The mayor tweeted late Monday that "protesters were overwhelmingly peaceful today" but that some people were out to damage property and steal.

"We support peaceful protest in this city. But right now it's time to go home," de Blasio said.

"Some people are out tonight not to protest but to destroy property and hurt others -— and those people are being arrested. Their actions are unacceptable and we won't allow them in our city."

New York, the economic capital of the United States, and around 40 other cities across the country have imposed curfews after violent protests against police brutality triggered by the death of African-American George Floyd in Minnesota.

Just after 11:00 pm, around a hundred people held a peaceful demonstration in front of the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, the scene of major protests in recent days, taking a knee in tribute to victims of police brutality, according to an AFP journalist.

Police observed them from a distance but did not arrest anyone despite the curfew.

While looters hit New York, in Washington, President Donald Trump said he was "dispatching thousands and thousands of heavily armed soldiers, military personnel and law enforcement officers to stop the rioting, looting, vandalism, assaults and the wanton destruction of property."

Mayor de Blasio, a Democrat, denounced Trump's "bellicose words" and "divisive rhetoric."

"I don't think it's a statement from the last few hours that has caused all this. I think it's what he's done for years that has contributed," he said. 

Agence France-Presse

As protests and violence spill over, Trump shrinks back

WASHINGTON — Inside the White House, the mood was bristling with tension. Hundreds of protesters were gathering outside the gates, shouting curses at President Donald Trump and in some cases throwing bricks and bottles. Nervous for his safety, Secret Service agents abruptly rushed the president to the underground bunker used in the past during terrorist attacks.

The scene Friday night, described by a person with firsthand knowledge, kicked off an uneasy weekend at the White House as demonstrations spread after the brutal death of a black man in police custody under a white officer’s knee. While in the end officials said they were never really in danger, Trump and his family have been rattled by protests near the Executive Mansion that turned violent for a third night Sunday.

After days in which the empathy he expressed for George Floyd, the man killed, was overshadowed by his combative threats to ramp up violence against looters and rioters, Trump spent Sunday out of sight, even as some of his campaign advisers were recommending that he deliver a nationally televised address before another night of possible violence. The building was even emptier than usual as some White House officials planning to work were told not to come in case of renewed unrest.

Thousands of protesters demonstrated peacefully near the White House during the day, but by nightfall, with hundreds still in the streets, the scene turned more volatile as crowds surged forward against lines of riot police with plastic shields as the two sides vied for control of Lafayette Square across from the White House. Protesters threw water bottles, set off fireworks and burned a pile of wood and at least one car.

One of the fires on H Street NW a block from the White House may have spread because soon afterward flames erupted in the basement of St. John’s Episcopal Church, the iconic “church of presidents” attended at least once by every chief executive going back to James Madison, but were soon doused by firefighters. Businesses far away from the White House boarded up to guard against vandalism, and Mayor Muriel E. Bowser ordered an 11 p.m. curfew. The White House turned off at least some of its exterior lights.

Trump remained cloistered inside, periodically sending out Twitter messages like “LAW & ORDER!” until the evening, when he went quiet. While some aides urged him to keep off Twitter, Trump could not resist blasting out a string of messages through the day berating Democrats for not being tough enough and attributing the turmoil to radical leftists.

“Get tough Democrat Mayors and Governors,” he wrote. Referring to his presumptive Democratic presidential opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, he added: “These people are ANARCHISTS. Call in our National Guard NOW. The World is watching and laughing at you and Sleepy Joe. Is this what America wants? NO!!!”

The president said his administration “will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization,” referring to the shorthand for “anti-fascist,” and scheduled a meeting with Attorney General William Barr for Monday morning. But antifa is a movement of activists who dress in black and have used tactics similar to those of anarchists, not an organization with a clear structure that can be penalized under law. Moreover, American law applies terrorist designations to foreign entities, not domestic groups.

By targeting antifa, however, Trump effectively paints all the protests with the brush of violent radicalism without addressing the underlying conditions that have driven many of the people who have taken to the streets. Demonstrations have broken out in at least 75 cities in recent days, with governors and mayors deploying the National Guard or imposing curfews on a scale not seen since the aftermath of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968.

While Trump has been a focus of anger, particularly among the crowds in Washington, aides repeatedly have tried to explain to him that the protests were not only about him, but about broader, systemic issues related to race, according to several people familiar with the discussions. Privately, Trump’s advisers complained about his tweets, acknowledging that they were pouring fuel on an already incendiary situation.

“Those are not constructive tweets, without any question,” Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only black Republican in the Senate, said in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.” “I’m thankful that we can have the conversation. We don’t always agree on any of his tweets beforehand, but we have the ability to sit down and dialogue on how we move this nation forward.”

Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and supporter of Trump, said the president, with election looming in five months, is focused on catering to his core supporters rather than the nation at large. “Trump is far more divisive than past presidents,” Eberhart said. “His strength is stirring up his base, not calming the waters.”

But Trump’s absence rankled the Democrats he was criticizing.

“What I’d like to hear from the president is leadership,” Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta said on “Meet the Press” on NBC. “And I would like to hear a genuine care and concern for our communities and where we are with race relations in America.”

Some campaign advisers were pressing for a formal address to the nation as early as Sunday. But White House officials, recalling Trump’s error-filled Oval Office address in March about the spread of the coronavirus, cautioned that it was not necessary. Trump quizzed advisers throughout the day Sunday about whether he should give an Oval Office address.

Trump already tried to recalibrate by ripping up his speech at the Kennedy Space Center on Saturday after the launch of the new crewed SpaceX rocket and adding a long passage about Floyd. In the speech, Trump repeated his calls for law and order, but in more measured terms and leavened by expressions of sympathy for Floyd’s family, whom he had called to offer condolences.

Aides were disappointed that the remarks, delivered late Saturday afternoon as part of a speech otherwise celebrating the triumph of the space program, did not get wider attention, but they said they hoped they would break through. Several administration officials said Trump was genuinely horrified by the video of Floyd’s last minutes, mentioning it several times in private conversations over the last few days.

After Trump returned to the White House from Florida on Saturday, he found a White House again under siege. This time, security was ready. Washington police blocked off roads for blocks around the building, while hundreds of police officers and National Guard troops ringed the exterior perimeter wearing helmets and riot gear and holding up plastic shields.

The scene was similar Sunday night as well. Protesters shouted “no justice, no peace,” and “black lives matter” as well as chanting expletives at Trump. Washington icons like the Hay-Adams Hotel and the Oval Room restaurant, damaged from the night before, were boarded up.

Graffiti was spray-painted for blocks, including on the historic Decatur House a block from the White House: “Why do we have to keep telling you black lives matter?”

-Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman, The New York Times-

Ex-NY mayor Bloomberg once again mulling White House bid

NEW YORK -- Billionaire ex-mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg is considering a presidential bid to oust Donald Trump, he told The New York Times in an interview published Monday -- but this time as a Democrat, and no longer an independent.

The 76-year-old owner and founder of his eponymous financial data and media company told the newspaper he is floating the idea of running for president in 2020, but not yet ready to decide.

For now, he's "working on this Nov. 6 election, and after that I’ll take a look at it," he said, referring to the upcoming midterm vote.

But one thing is certain: "It's impossible to conceive that I could run as a Republican -- things like choice, so many of the issues, I'm just way away from where the Republican Party is today," Bloomberg said.

"That's not to say I'm with the Democratic Party on everything, but I don't see how you could possibly run as a Republican," he said.

"So if you ran, yeah, you'd have to run as a Democrat."

As an independent he served as New York's mayor for 3 consecutive terms -- after obtaining a waiver to the two-term limit -- and has considered campaigning for the White House in 2008, 2012 and 2016, each time ultimately throwing in the towel.

But since the ascent of Trump, Bloomberg -- who has made the battle against climate change his primary cause -- has become a vocal critic of the Republicans.

In November's looming elections, he has opted to only financially back Democrats -- who hope to regain the majority in Congress -- despite having supported candidates across the spectrum in past votes.

It is not clear, however, that Democrats would see a Bloomberg ticket in a positive light.

Though their stances align on subjects including climate change and gun control, the billionaire might find little support among the activist left currently shaking up the party, who boast a strong anti-elite, anti-Wall Street line and are pushing for more women and minority candidates.

In his interview with the Times, Bloomberg also voiced doubts about some accusations that sprang from the #MeToo movement.

He cited the example of disgraced television anchor Charlie Rose, who for years broadcast his talk show from the Bloomberg offices before he was sacked from CBS at the end of 2017.

"The stuff I read about is disgraceful -- I don't know how true all of it is," Bloomberg said of the movement that has empowered women to expose endemic sexual abuse and harassment in the workplace.

"Let the court system decide," he said, though he acknowledged many claims might never be judged in a legal setting.

source: news.abs-cbn.com