US election 2020: Biden edges to victory as count goes on

Joe Biden calls for calm as Donald Trump repeats unsubstantiated claims that that the Democrats are seeking to “steal” the election. Facing possible defeat, Trump said “If you count the legal votes, I easily win. If you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us.

Biden and his running mate, the California senator Kamala Harris, on the other hand had emerged in Biden’s home state of Delaware, telling the country that “each ballot must be counted.

“In America, the vote is sacred,” Biden said. “Democracy is sometimes messy. It sometimes requires a little patience, as well. But that patience has been rewarded now for 240 years with a system of governance that’s been the envy of the world.”

In a latest development, a federal judge has denied the Trump campaign’s motion to stop ballot counting in Philadelphia. This is the third campaign legal challenge to the vote count that has been dismissed.

The president’s chances of winning reelection appear to be shrinking as states continue to count ballots. His increasingly desperate campaign has launched a series of lawsuits that are unlikely to have any bearing on the election results, but have served as a means to sow doubt in the legitimacy of the whole elections system.

With Arizona included in his tally, Biden would only need six more electoral college votes to reach the 270 required for victory, so a win in any other state would be enough.

In the nationwide popular vote, Biden so far has a record 72.3m and about 3.5m more than Trump.