2020 United States Presidential Election (Bennybop)

The 2020 United States presidential election was the 59th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. The Democratic ticket of former vice president Joe Biden and the junior U.S. senator from California Kamala Harris defeated the incumbent Republican president Donald Trump and incumbent vice president Mike Pence. The election took place against the backdrop of the global COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 recession. It was the first election since 1992, the first in the 21st century, and the fifth in the past 100 years, in which the incumbent president failed to win a second term. The election saw the highest voter turnout by percentage since 1900, with each of the two main tickets receiving more than 74 million votes, surpassing Barack Obama's record of 69.5 million votes from 2008. Biden received more than 81 million votes, the most votes ever cast for a candidate in a U.S. presidential election.

In a competitive primary that featured the most candidates for any political party in the modern era of American politics, Biden secured the Democratic nomination over his closest rival, Senator Bernie Sanders. Biden's running mate, Senator Kamala Harris from California, became the first African-American, first Asian-American, and third female vice presidential nominee on a major party ticket. Jo Jorgensen secured the Libertarian nomination with Spike Cohen as her running mate, and Howie Hawkins secured the Green nomination with Angela Nicole Walker as his running mate. The central issues of the election included the public health and economic impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic; civil unrest in reaction to the police murder of George Floyd and others; the U.S. Supreme Court following the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett; and the future of the Affordable Care Act.

Due to the ongoing pandemic, a record number of ballots were cast early and by mail. Many more Democrats voted by mail than Republicans. As a result of a large number of mail-in ballots, some swing states saw delays in vote counting and reporting; this led to major news outlets delaying their projection of Biden and Harris as the president-elect and vice president-elect until the morning of November 7, three and a half days after the election. Major media networks project a state for a candidate once there is high statistical confidence that the outstanding vote would be unlikely to prevent the projected winner from ultimately winning that state.

Before, during, and after Election Day, Trump and numerous Republicans attempted to subvert the election and overturn the results, falsely alleging widespread voter fraud and trying to influence the vote counting process in swing states. Attorney General William Barr and officials in each of the 50 states found no evidence of widespread fraud or irregularities in the election. Federal agencies overseeing election security said it was the most secure in American history. The Trump campaign and its allies, including Republican members of Congress, continued to engage in numerous attempts to overturn the results of the election by filing 63 lawsuits in several states (all of which were withdrawn or dismissed), spreading conspiracy theories alleging fraud, pressuring Republican state election officials and legislators to change results, pressuring the Department of Justice to declare the election "corrupt" and intervene, objecting to the Electoral College certification in Congress, and refusing to cooperate with the presidential transition of Joe Biden. This culminated in a mob of Trump supporters attacking the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, after Trump repeatedly said that he would never concede the election. However, on January 7, one day after the violent Capitol attack and two months after Biden's victory was declared, Trump acknowledged the incoming administration without mentioning Biden's name in a video posted to Twitter.

The election results in each state and the District of Columbia were certified by December 9. The presidential electors formally cast their votes for president and vice president on December 14, and their votes were officially counted by Congress from January 6–7, 2021, before and after the attack on the Capitol. Biden and Harris were inaugurated on January 20, 2021.

Procedure
Article Two of the United States Constitution states that for a person to serve as president, the individual must be a natural-born citizen of the United States, be at least 35 years old, and have been a United States resident for at least 14 years. Candidates for the presidency typically seek the nomination of one of the various political parties in the United States. Each party develops a method (such as a primary election) to choose the candidate the party deems best suited to run for the position. Primary elections are usually indirect elections where voters cast ballots for a slate of party delegates pledged to a particular candidate. The party's delegates then officially nominate a candidate to run on the party's behalf. The presidential nominee typically chooses a vice presidential running mate to form that party's ticket, which is then ratified by the delegates at the party's convention (except for the Libertarian Party, which nominates its vice-presidential candidate by delegate vote regardless of the presidential nominee's preference). The general election in November is also an indirect election, in which voters cast ballots for a slate of members of the Electoral College; these electors then directly elect the president and vice president. If no candidate receives the minimum 270 electoral votes needed to win the election, the United States House of Representatives will select the president from among the three candidates who received the most electoral votes, and the United States Senate will select the vice president from among the candidates who received the two highest totals. The presidential election occurred simultaneously alongside elections for the House of Representatives, the Senate, and various state and local-level elections.

The Maine Legislature passed a bill in August 2019 adopting ranked-choice voting (RCV) both for presidential primaries and for the general election. Governor Janet Mills allowed the bill to become law without her signature, which delayed its taking effect until after the 2020 Democratic primary in March and made Maine the first state to use RCV for a presidential general election. The Maine Republican Party filed signatures for a veto referendum to preclude the use of RCV for the 2020 election, but Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap found there were insufficient valid signatures to qualify for the ballot. A challenge in Maine Superior Court was successful for the Maine Republican Party, but the Maine Supreme Judicial Court stayed the ruling pending appeal on September 8, 2020. Nevertheless, ballots began being printed later that day without the veto referendum and including RCV for the presidential election, and the Court ruled in favor of the Secretary of State on September 22, allowing RCV to be used. An emergency appeal to the Supreme Court was denied on October 6. The use of RCV could cause the projection of the winner(s) of Maine's electoral votes to be delayed for several days after election day, complicating interpretation of the national popular vote. The law continues the use of the congressional district method for the allocation of Maine's electors (Nebraska is the only other state that apportions its electoral votes this way).

On December 14, 2020, pledged electors for each candidate, known collectively as the United States Electoral College, gathered in their states' capitols to cast their official votes. Pursuant to the processes laid out by the Electoral Count Act of 1887, certificates of ascertainment listing the names of the electors and separate certificates recording their votes are distributed to various officials across the branches of government. The newly elected Congress, with the Vice President in his role as Senate President presiding, met in a joint session to formally open the certificates and count the votes, which began on January 6, 2021, was interrupted by the storming of the Capitol building, and finished the following day.

Simultaneous elections
The presidential election occurred simultaneously with elections to the Senate and the House of Representatives. Gubernatorial and legislative elections were also held in several states. For the subsequent election, the United States House will redistribute the seats among the 50 states based on the results of the 2020 United States Census, and the states will conduct a redistricting of Congressional and state legislative districts. In most states, the governor and the state legislature conduct the redistricting, although some states have redistricting commissions. Often, a party that wins a presidential election experiences a coattail effect that also helps other candidates of that party win elections. Therefore, the party that wins the 2020 presidential election could also win a significant advantage in drawing new congressional and state legislative districts, which would stay in effect until 2032.

Democratic Party
Joe Biden became the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party on June 5, 2020, when he secured enough delegates to ensure his nomination at the national convention. He was formally nominated at the convention on August 18.