US elections 2020: Claiming victory, Trump says we will go to Supreme Court
The Republican, who according to initial results is in a neck-and-neck race with Democrat Joe Biden, said he would go to court and "we want all voting to stop."
FollowWashington DC: US President Donald Trump claimed early Wednesday that he had won the US election and, accusing rival Joe Biden's Democrats of "fraud", declared that he would go to the Supreme Court to dispute the counting of votes. "We were just about to win, in fact, we have already won," Trump said in an extraordinary speech from the White House at 2.30 am.
"We were winning in many other states and we were just about to declare it and then suddenly this fraud happened there. A fraud on the American people. And we will not let this happen," said President Trump, asserting that he would go to court and "we want all voting to stop." He appeared to mean stopping the counting of mail-in ballots, which can be legally accepted by state election boards after Tuesday's election, provided they were sent in time.
"So, we are going to go to the US Supreme Court and ensure that suddenly new ballots are not mysteriously found at 4 am and added to their tally. Quite frankly this is a shame to America and to the millions of Americans," he said, speaking from the East Room of the White House with Vice President Mike Pence and First Lady Melania Trump by his side.
There is nothing in the law that calls for the results on election night or even the day after, and the counting process is largely the domain of states. It is not clear if Trump was serious about approaching the Supreme Court and if he did, on what basis it would stop counting of votes. In at least two cases, the US Supreme Court has deferred to the states.
Trump claimed victories in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, and North Carolina, all states where counting is still going on, claiming his leads were too big for the Democratic ticket to catch up. While he was clearly leading in all these states, Democrats, demanding a full and complete counting, maintained the final score would be reversed because in most instances mail-in ballots, which favor Democrats, are yet to be counted. In some states, votes from heavily Democratic cities are also yet to be counted, Democratic operatives said.
Vice President, Mike Pence said the Americans have cast their vote for four more years of Donald Trump. As the votes are being counted, we will remain vigilant, Pence also said. We are on the road to victory and we will make America great again, again, he also said.
Election results from some battleground states, including Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and Georgia, are still not clear and projections from major networks show Trump, 74, still short of the 270 electoral votes need to win re-election. Trump won the key states of Florida, Ohio and Texas, erasing Biden's hopes for a decisive early victory. Biden won Arizona, Virginia and New Hampshire among others.
