2020 election: Biden vs Trump

Republicans, progressives, and independents never thought very highly of Hillary Clinton in 2016. In 2020, they thought even less of Joe Biden. Although he had less baggage than Clinton, he was constantly besieged by his past mistakes, from opposing a means of desegregation, to voting for the Iraq war, to his son's business dealings in Ukraine. In addition, his gaffes were becoming increasingly frequent and obvious. Throughout 2018 and 2019, Biden consistently led the Democratic field in the polls, and he declared his candidacy in April of 2019.
Biden won a very narrow victory in the Iowa caucuses, but Bernie Sanders won the New Hampshire primaries comfortably. Biden rebounded with wins in Nevada and South Carolina, but Sanders won 7 states on Super Tuesday, including California. It continued to be a nip-and-tuck, back and forth battle between the 2 candidates up until the DNC convention. Despite Sanders being immensely popular, the DNC nominated Joe Biden. Sanders' supporters were enraged, as were many Republicans and moderates. It seemed that the 2020 nomination fight was like 2016 all over again. Although Bernie Sanders conceded and proclaimed his full support of Biden, people still were not able to move past what had happened.
After clinching the nomination, Biden nominated Senator Kamala Harris to be his running mate. He focused his campaign on the rust belt states that Trump won in 2016, as well as a few other swing states. Although Trump was not able to smear him with the dreaded "socialist" label, the president pounced on all of Biden's past mistakes and controversies. Biden was portrayed as an out-of-touch elitist who flip-flopped on many issues, whereas Biden and his allies portrayed Trump as a pathological liar and criminal who has no regard whatsoever for American principles or values. The two of them engaged in 3 presidential debates in October. Although Trump largely resorted to bragging, name-calling, and personal attacks rather than debating actual policies, Biden came across as distant and boring. Biden also made several more mistakes and gaffes during the debates, which Trump was quick to take advantage of. Kamala Harris and Mike Pence also engaged in 1 debate; more people thought that Harris won the debate because she was much more lively and animated and was not hesitant to viciously criticize Pence on a variety of issues.
As election day approached, CNN, MSNBC, and most other liberal and independent news outlets said that Biden would be the likely victor in the election, or that it would be too close to call. However, most Americans had heard such predictions about Hillary Clinton 4 years previously, and few people believed them- especially with the economy continuing to grow. As such, most people were not surprised on election night at 9:45 PM et, when Trump was projected to easily win reelection. Trump's victory in 2020 was even more impressive than that of 2016; he picked up several more states that remained blue in 2016 and won the popular vote by a sizable margin as well. Trump also had expanded on all his margins of victory and narrowed his margins of defeat from 2016 in every state except Delaware, Maryland, California, and New York. Not only that, Biden was only barely able to win New Jersey, Colorado, Connecticut, and Oregon; these states that were long thought to be safely Democratic territory were not declared to be incredibly narrow victories for Biden until 4 am EST, long after Trump had clinched reelection. Trump even legally could have called for a recounts in these states, but there was no need to because he already had won regardless. 2020 was the greatest and most humiliating defeat for a Democratic candidate since George H.W. Bush's 40 state romp of Michael Dukakis in 1988.
Popular vote results by State:
State 	Trump 	Biden
Alabama 	1,534,243	636,345
Alaska 	185,349 	100,218
Arizona 	1,308,990	1,108,283
Arkansas 	709,444 	350,394
California 	4,502,305	9,023,109
Colorado 	1,304,504	1,306,678
Connecticut 	777,203 	780,366
Delaware 	180,333 	259,528
District of Columbia	20,456 	270,948
Florida 	4,895,325	4,337,465
Georgia 	2,356,319	1,634,232
Hawaii 	165,304 	240,559
Idaho 	489,100 	150,353
Illinois 	2,354,294	3,019,691
Indiana 	1,849,395	1,001,839
Iowa 	910,214 	654,395
Kansas 	716,869 	390,405
Kentucky 	1,403,768	595,783
Louisiana 	1,245,933	710,014
Maine 	377,765 	340,991
Maryland 	933,204 	1,595,277
Massachusetts 	1,124,979	1,993,720
Michigan 	2,401,734	2,000,264
Minnesota 	1,404,123	1,236,035
Mississippi 	775,103 	440,091
Missouri 	1,660,602	993,148
Montana 	314,680 	170,345
Nebraska 	562,135 	250,291
Nevada 	533,219 	481,935
New Hampshire 	367,610 	299,518
New Jersey 	2,159,259	2,164,545
New Mexico 	352,396 	320,974
New York 	2,644,366	4,606,308
North Carolina 	2,539,431	2,175,397
North Dakota 	235,365 	86,018
Ohio 	3,235,902	2,245,544
Oklahoma 	1,005,303	399,196
Oregon 	904,290 	908,237
Pennsylvania 	3,135,354	2,738,016
Rhode Island 	197,975 	244,248
South Carolina 	1,256,622	800,818
South Dakota 	254,096 	101,399
Tennessee 	1,637,277	824,958
Texas 	4,704,130	3,870,983
Utah 	766,137 	308,915
Vermont 	110,090 	170,595
Virginia 	1,877,284	1,734,718
Washington 	1,356,260	1,554,944
West Virginia 	604,596 	80,898
Wisconsin 	1,503,600	
1,220,593
 Wyoming                                          200,359                           30,494
Category:US Elections 2020
Category:ASB - Biased
Category:Outdated Articles