Electoral college voting to formally make Joe Biden the next US president
This is it. Nearly six weeks after the US election, the electoral college is finally meeting today to formally make Joe Biden the country's next president.
Before we go any further, I should probably explain what the electoral college actually is.
As you may have noticed, the United States has a rather convoluted system. Technically, when Americans went to the polls on November 3, they were not voting directly for a presidential candidate. Their votes were actually used to choose a group of electors, whose job is to pick the president on their behalf.
This is why, on election night and beyond, you heard so much talk about “electoral votes”, rather than the popular vote.
In presidential elections, the winner of each state earns its haul of electoral votes – i.e. the state’s electors are pledged to vote for that candidate in the electoral college. And it takes 270 electoral votes to win.
After the election, the states take a few weeks to certify their results, and then the electoral college meets to make everything official. That is what’s happening today. Electors are gathering in the capitals of their respective states to cast their ballots.
It is usually a mere formality. But things are a little different this year, as President Donald Trump has refused to concede defeat. He has spent recent weeks pressuring several key states Mr Biden won to send delegates to the electoral college who will pick him instead, in defiance of their states’ voters.
That effort is unlikely to yield any results for Mr Trump today, but we just don’t know for sure until it’s over.
If everything follows the election results, Mr Biden should end up with 306 electoral votes, with Mr Trump trailing behind on 232.
Read on for our live coverage.
https://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/us-politics/electoral-college-voting-to-formally-make-joe-biden-the-next-us-president/live-coverage/a9ef37eb453876b5c468a75129281663
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