-US election 2020
DM Monitoring
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump has disclosed to his close aides that he may declare victory on election night if he is slightly ahead of his democratic challenger Joe Biden even before the last vote is counted, US media reported.
“Trump has privately talked through this scenario in some detail in the last few weeks, describing plans to walk up to a podium on election night and declare he has won,” said the report. It added that at least three sources close to the US president have confirmed to them that Trump had made the remarks privately.
However, the US president told reporters that he will not declare a victory prematurely but added that it was “terrible” that some states could collect ballots after November 3.
“I think it’s a terrible thing when states are allowed to tabulate ballots for a long period of time after the election is over,” said Trump. He added that his lawyers will be ready on election night.
“We don’t want to have Pennsylvania, where you have a political governor, a very partisan guy. … We don’t want to be in a position where he’s allowed, every day, to watch ballots come in. See if we can only find 10,000 more ballots,” claimed the US president. The move would cause headache for election authorities in the US as many states will not be done counting the mail in ballots by election night. While state such as Pennsylvania will have to hold back their results as the local laws bar election officials from counting mail-in ballots before Election Day.
The report comes as US presidential campaign enters its final day on Monday with a last-minute scramble for votes by Donald Trump and Joe Biden, drawing to a close an extraordinary race that has put a pandemic-stricken country on edge.
But while campaigning will halt and voters will have their say on Tuesday, many questions remain over how soon a result will be known due to a flood of mail-in ballots and possible legal challenges. Those factors, along with an unprecedented convergence of social justice protests, coronavirus precautions and President Trump´s fear-mongering campaign, have led to apprehension over whether unrest could erupt.
Taking no chances, businesses in some cities have boarded up windows, while across the country the harsh political climate has led to fierce debate, in some cases even dividing families.
Nationally, polls have consistently put Biden well ahead, and a RealClearPolitics average of surveys had him up 7.2 percentage points Sunday.
But there have been repeated warnings from both camps that the polls could be wrong like in 2016.
Trump has held an exhausting string of raucous rallies with crowds pressed together, many of them without masks.
Biden has held far fewer rallies with much more caution usually socially distanced drive-up gatherings and has taken care to wear a mask.
That decision has resulted in mockery from Trump, playing down the dangerousness of the virus even though he was hospitalized over it.
The former reality show star and real estate mogul have called for businesses and schools to reopen, talking up signs of an economic recovery though economists say underlying factors are tenuous.
Biden has embraced the criticism and doubled down, repeatedly hammering away at the president´s “almost criminal” handling of the pandemic, saying it had cost tens of thousands of lives.
The virus has been resurgent across the country, with more than 230,000 dead since the start of the pandemic.
