2020 United States presidential election

{{silver}}
[[File:ElectoralCollege2020 with results.svg|right|thumb|300px|That point in the movie where the bad guy looks defeated [[2024 United States presidential election|but there's 20 minutes left in the runtime]].]]
{{uspolitics}}
{{cquote|Given my experience working for Mr. Trump, I fear that if he loses the election in 2020, there will never be a peaceful transition of power.|||Michael Cohen, former lawyer to [[Donald Trump]].<ref>Mindock, Clark. [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-impeachment-refuse-leave-office-nixon-cohen-white-house-a8814991.html What would happen if Trump refused to leave office after 2020 election loss?], ''Independent''. 16 June, 2019.</ref>}}
The '''2020 United States presidential election''' (also known as '''the COVID election''') was held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as the incumbent [[Republican Party]] idiot (and president) '''[[Donald Trump]]''' tried to secure his reelection against the [[Democratic Party]] candidate and former vice president '''[[Joe Biden]]'''. This was a highly unusual campaign season, taking place during the [[COVID-19 pandemic]], the associated economic [[recession]], and widespread social unrest. Measures to make voting easier during the pandemic helped 2020 become the highest-turnout election in over a century.<ref>{{cite web | last=Parks | first=Miles | title=Expanded Access To Voting Yielded Huge Turnout. Will States Take It Away? | website=NPR | date=2020-11-25 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/11/25/937050893/expanded-access-to-voting-yielded-huge-turnout-will-states-take-it-away}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=Record High Turnout in 2020 General Election | website=Census.gov | date=2021-10-05 | url=https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/04/record-high-turnout-in-2020-general-election.html}}</ref> Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump by winning the longtime Republican strongholds of [[Georgia]] and [[Arizona]] alongside the [[Wisconsin|three]] [[Pennsylvania|swing]] [[Michigan|states]] of the Rust Belt, and he finished with 306 votes in the [[Electoral College]].{{efn|306 is the exact same number of votes Trump won in 2016, although he only received 304 of them due to faithless electors.}} Biden received 81.3 million votes, breaking the previous record of 69.5 million, which had been set in [[2008 United States presidential election|2008]] by [[Barack Obama]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Lewis | first=Sophie | title=Joe Biden breaks Obama's record for most votes ever cast for a U.S. presidential candidate | website=CBS News | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/joe-biden-popular-vote-record-barack-obama-us-presidential-election-donald-trump/}}</ref> While Biden crushed Trump by a margin of 7 million in the popular vote, the overall election was extremely close due to razor-thin margins in four states.<ref>{{cite web | last=Swasey | first=Benjamin | title=Narrow Wins In These Key States Powered Biden To The Presidency | website=NPR | date=2020-12-02 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/12/02/940689086/narrow-wins-in-these-key-states-powered-biden-to-the-presidency |}}</ref>{{efn|Georgia, Arizona, and Wisconsin were decided by less than 0.7% of the vote; Pennsylvania was decided by less than 1.2%. If Biden had lost the first three, it would have been a 269-269 tie, sending the election to a contingent House election which Trump would have won. If Biden had lost all four states, Trump would have won with 289 electoral votes.}}  

Despite similarly narrow margins and an outright lost popular vote, Trump had called his [[2016 United States presidential election|2016]] victory a landslide.<ref>{{cite web | last=Seipel | first=Arnie | title=FACT CHECK: Trump Falsely Claims A 'Massive Landslide Victory' | website=NPR | date=2016-12-11 | url=https://www.npr.org/2016/12/11/505182622/fact-check-trump-claims-a-massive-landslide-victory-but-history-differs |}}</ref> [[Pwned|Biden cited that statement to also claim a mandate]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Rupar | first=Aaron | title=Biden’s post-Electoral College speech was a stinging rebuke of Trump | website=Vox | date=2020-12-15 | url=https://www.vox.com/2020/12/14/22175364/biden-electoral-college-speech-trump |}}</ref>

In the lead-up to election season, Trump's presidency melted down into absolute bedlam. A Democratic-controlled [[House of Representatives]] ground his agenda to a halt, and Trump's conflict with the House resulted in the longest government shutdown of unprecedented length.<ref name="tshutdown">{{cite web | last=Restuccia | first=Andrew | last2=Everett | first2=Burgess | last3=Caygle | first3=Heather | title=Longest shutdown in history ends after Trump relents on wall | website=POLITICO | date=2019-01-25 | url=https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/25/trump-shutdown-announcement-1125529 |}}</ref> Then came a scandal related to his attempts to weaponize the country of [[Ukraine]] against his expected opponent, Joe Biden. This resulted in Trump's [[impeachment]] by the House, making him the third president in US history to be impeached. Then came the [[Black Lives Matter]] protests, the president's unhinged response to the protesters, and the absolute wrecking ball that was the [[COVID-19 pandemic]]. His mishandling of the pandemic contributed to unnecessary deaths<ref>{{cite web | last=Holpuch | first=Amanda | title=US could have averted 40% of Covid deaths, says panel examining Trump's policies | website=the Guardian | date=2021-02-11 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/10/us-coronavirus-response-donald-trump-health-policy |}}</ref> and worsened the economic crisis.<ref>{{cite web | last=Nadeau | first=Sarah | last2=Cusick | first2=Julia | last3=Shepherd | first3=Madeline | title=5 Ways the Trump Administration’s Policy Failures Compounded the Coronavirus-Induced Economic Crisis | website=Center for American Progress | date=2021-11-07 | url=https://www.americanprogress.org/article/5-ways-trump-administrations-policy-failures-compounded-coronavirus-induced-economic-crisis/ |}}</ref>

On the Democratic side, Joe Biden eventually prevailed in the primaries despite hitting stumbling blocks related to the [[racist]] skeletons in his closet from his [[US Senate|Senate]] days<ref>{{cite web | last=Breuninger | first=Kevin | title=Kamala Harris attacks Joe Biden's record on busing and working with segregationists in vicious exchange at Democratic debate | website=CNBC | date=2019-06-28 | url=https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/27/harris-attacks-bidens-record-on-busing-and-working-with-segregationists.html |}}</ref> and allegations of sexual harassment from multiple women.<ref>{{cite web | last=Arnold | first=Amanda | last2=Lampen | first2=Claire | title=All the Women Who Have Spoken Out Against Joe Biden | website=The Cut | date=2020-04-12 | url=https://archive.ph/20201217214742/https://www.thecut.com/2020/04/joe-biden-accuser-accusations-allegations.html}}</ref> His campaign promises were standard and uninspiring Democratic fare: a better COVID response, expanded [[Obamacare]], criminal justice reform, reversal of Trump's immigration policies, and an emphasis on improving the nation's infrastructure.<ref>{{cite web | title=Joe Biden: Where does he stand on key issues? | website=BBC Home | date=2020-08-15 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53575474 |}}</ref> Instead of proposing any significant policy changes, Biden focused his campaign on a simple "return to normalcy," an end to Trumpian chaos and the ravages of the pandemic.<ref>{{cite web | last=Klein | first=Ezra | title=Joe Biden’s promise: a return to normalcy | website=Vox | date=2019-05-20 | url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/5/20/18631452/joe-biden-2020-presidential-announcement-speech |}}</ref> At the time, this appeal was in-tune with the mood of the country. He also mostly eschewed in-person campaigning in favor of a primarily online strategy, becoming the first candidate in American history to do so.<ref>{{cite web | last=Alter | first=Charlotte | title=How Joe Biden Won the White House | website=TIME | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://time.com/5907674/joe-biden-wins-2020-election/ |}}</ref> An [[internet]]-based campaign proved to be an ideal way to market a candidate who was too old to handle the pressures of frequent rallying and door-knocking.

While the polls predicted an absolute stampede of a win for Biden, the actual result was much closer, and the margins were distressingly narrow in the states that mattered.<ref>{{cite web | title=Steve Kornacki: The polls were off in 2020. Will they be again in 2024? | website=NBC News | date=2024-10-22 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/steve-kornacki-polls-off-2020-trump-biden-harris-rcna176619 |}}</ref> Due to the significantly increased number of mail-in ballots, vote results came in much slower than usual.<ref>{{cite web | title=The 2020 election took days to call. Could it happen again this year? | website=NBC News | date=2024-02-27 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/election-wait-mail-ballots-swing-states-rcna140221 |}}</ref> Election Night was a nail-biter, although it became clear that Biden had an advantage fairly early.<ref>{{cite web | title=Opinion: A brutal nail biter | website=CNN | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/04/opinions/who-is-winning-the-election-roundup/index.html |}}</ref> [[Pennsylvania]], the decisive state for Biden's victory, wasn't called until over 87 hours after polls closed.<ref>{{cite web | last=Savitsky | first=Shane | title=How long it took each state to be called in the 2020 presidential election | website=Axios | date=2024-10-25 | url=https://www.axios.com/2024/10/25/how-long-states-called-election |}}</ref> 

The unexpected closeness of the election and the unusually-long counting process led to a proliferation of [[conspiracy theories]] such as "Voting machines changed/deleted votes for Trump!" or "Election workers threw out bags of ballots!" or the especially-popular "Mail-in ballots were fraudulent!"<ref>{{cite web | last=Cohen | first=Li | title=6 conspiracy theories about the 2020 election – debunked | website=CBS News | date=2021-01-15 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/presidential-election-2020-conspiracy-theories-debunked/ |}}</ref> Trump both promoted and encouraged this response, while personally rejecting the election results and refusing to concede.<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump tweets words 'he won'; says vote rigged, not conceding | website=AP News | date=2020-11-16 | url=https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-tweets-he-won-not-conceding-9ce22e9dc90577f7365d150c151a91c7 |}}</ref> Behind the scenes, the Trump administration launched an unprecedented legal effort to overturn the election result<ref>{{cite web | last=Mier | first=Alberto | title=Timeline of the coup: How Trump tried to weaponize the DOJ to overturn the 2020 election | website=CNN | date=2021-11-05 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/05/politics/january-6-timeline-trump-coup/index.html |}}</ref> through methods such as attempting to send fraudulent electors from swing states to vote for him,<ref>{{cite web | last=Amiri | first=Farnoush | title=How the Trump fake electors scheme became a 'corrupt plan,' according to the indictment | website=AP News | date=2023-08-02 | url=https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-jan-6-investigation-fake-electors-608932d4771f6e2e3c5efb3fdcd8fcce |}}</ref> encouraging Vice President [[Mike Pence]] to overrule Congress' certification of the Electoral College results,<ref>{{cite web | last=Pilkington | first=Ed | title=‘A roadmap for a coup’: inside Trump’s plot to steal the presidency | website=the Guardian | date=2021-10-30 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/oct/30/trump-2020-election-steal-presidency-coup-inside-story |}}</ref> and even personally calling Georgia's secretary of state to ask him to "find" enough votes to flip the state back to Trump.<ref>{{cite web | last=Jason Morris | first=Chandelis Duster,Devan Cole | title=In call, Trump demands Georgia officials ‘find’ votes to tilt election | website=CNN | date=2021-01-03 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/03/politics/donald-trump-brad-raffensperger-call-washington-post/index.html |}}</ref> 

All of this nonsense culminated in the [[2021 US coup attempt]], in which Trump encouraged his supporters to violently attack the US Capitol building during the Congressional certification of the results on January 6th, 2021.<ref>{{cite web | last=Naylor | first=Brian | title=Read Trump's Jan. 6 Speech, A Key Part Of Impeachment Trial | website=NPR | date=2021-02-10 | url=https://www.npr.org/2021/02/10/966396848/read-trumps-jan-6-speech-a-key-part-of-impeachment-trial |}}</ref> The Capitol attack led to an unprecedented second impeachment for Trump, the trial for which took place after the disgraced president left office.<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump impeached after Capitol riot in historic second charge | website=AP News | date=2021-01-14 | url=https://apnews.com/article/trump-impeachment-vote-capitol-siege-0a6f2a348a6e43f27d5e1dc486027860 |}}</ref> Fuck you, Donald.

==Background==
[[File:-UNGA (48795662063).jpg|thumb|right|325px|Trump and Zelenskyy in September 2019.]]
===The chaos president===
Trump's first term had been a dumpster fire, and the final years and months were the worst yet. The Democratic Party won a comfortable majority in the [[House of Representatives]] during the [[2018 United States midterm elections|2018 midterm elections]]. Confrontation between Trump and Congress over whether the government should spend money on a [[Great Wall of America|dumbass border wall]] resulted in the longest government shutdown in American history in early 2019.<ref name="tshutdown"/>

Recognizing Biden as his most credible potential opponent in the lead-up to the election, Trump tried to condition military aid to [[Ukraine]] on its president [[Volodymyr Zelenskyy]] publicly opening a criminal investigation into Biden's son, who had ties to a Ukrainian energy company.<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump impeachment: The short, medium and long story | website=BBC Home | date=2019-09-23 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49800181 |}}</ref> This little bit of attempted ratfuckery got Trump [[impeachment|impeached]] in December 2019, making him the third president in US history to face that sanction.<ref>{{cite web | title=President Donald Trump impeached by US House, 3rd in history | website=AP News | date=2019-12-19 | url=https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-ap-top-news-elections-politics-election-2020-d78192d45b176f73ad435ae9fb926ed3 |}}</ref> 

In the aftermath of the {{wpl|Murder of George Floyd|police murder of George Floyd|,}} he promised to greet [[Black Lives Matter]] protesters with "the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons, I have ever seen."<ref>{{cite web | last=Rogers | first=Alex | title=Trump’s response to police killing threatens to further deepen unrest in America, Democrats and Republicans say | website=CNN | date=2020-05-31 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/31/politics/trump-george-floyd-protests/index.html |}}</ref> Trump's pledge that, "when the looting starts, the shooting starts," further exacerbated racial tensions.<ref>{{cite web | last=Sprunt | first=Barbara | title=The History Behind 'When The Looting Starts, The Shooting Starts' | website=NPR | date=2020-05-29 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/05/29/864818368/the-history-behind-when-the-looting-starts-the-shooting-starts |}}</ref>

===Trump's COVID response was a shitshow===
[[File:Press Conference at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (50423785711).jpg|thumb|right|365px|The president's medical team reports on his condition at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, October 2020. Yes, the idiot caught COVID himself.]]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump's poor decisions and idiotic statements were widely blamed for worsening the situation and undermining his own administration's response to the crisis.<ref>{{cite web | last=Diamond | first=Dan | title=Trump's mismanagement helped fuel coronavirus crisis | website=POLITICO | date=2020-03-07 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/07/trump-coronavirus-management-style-123465 |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Karlawish | first=Jason | title=A pandemic plan was in place. Trump abandoned it | website=STAT | date=2020-05-17 | url=https://www.statnews.com/2020/05/17/the-art-of-the-pandemic-how-donald-trump-walked-the-u-s-into-the-covid-19-era/ |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=Trump White House made 'deliberate efforts' to undermine Covid response, report says | website=NBC News | date=2021-12-17 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-white-house-made-deliberate-efforts-undermine-covid-response-report-n1286211 |}}</ref> An October 2020 study from the University of Oxford found that Trump's mishandling of COVID resulted in a 28% greater rate of excess deaths than in [[Europe]] and potentially cost more American lives than did American combat fatalities in [[World War I]].<ref>{{cite web | title=Research finds that inadequate US pandemic response cost more American lives than World War I | website=University of Oxford | date=2020-10-01 | url=https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2020-10-01-research-finds-inadequate-us-pandemic-response-cost-more-american-lives-world-war-i |}}</ref> Holy ''shit''. 

The thing is, the widely-spread public criticism was an avoidable situation for Trump. Public approval of Trump's pandemic response was initially quite high in March 2020 (60%), during the time in which he declared a national emergency, imposed travel bans, signed a $2 trillion stimulus package, and announced that the federal government would devote all necessary resources to develop a vaccine.<ref name="covapp">{{cite web | last=Brenan | first=Megan | title=Leadership Ratings on Pandemic After One Year | website=Gallup.com | date=2021-03-09 | url=https://news.gallup.com/poll/332417/leadership-ratings-pandemic-one-year.aspx |}}</ref> By April 2020, however, public approval of Trump's handling of the pandemic dropped by 10%, with a corresponding decrease in his overall job performance rating.<ref>{{cite web | last=Jones | first=Jeffrey M. | title=Americans Divided on Trump's Handling of COVID-19 Situation | website=Gallup.com | date=2020-04-30 | url=https://news.gallup.com/poll/309593/americans-divided-trump-handling-covid-situation.aspx |}}</ref> This happened when Trump started to publicly question his own administration's health experts and leave the states to their own devices in handling the pandemic.<ref name="covapp"/> Voters consistently gave higher approval ratings to Democratic governors than either Trump or Republican governors.<ref name="covapp"/> Meanwhile, Trump was hitting [[Twitter]] to say that his supporters should "liberate" Democratic-governed states like [[Minnesota]] and [[Michigan]] from their pandemic lockdown measures.<ref>{{cite web | last=Pager | first=Tyler | title=Trump stokes US partisan divide as coronavirus threatens his reelection prospects | website=The Independent | date=2020-04-20 | url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/trump-coronavirus-partisan-democrats-republicans-2020-election-a9474571.html |}}</ref>

After the Black Lives Matter protests started, Trump's job approval dropped to 39% in June,<ref>{{cite web | last=Jones | first=Jeffrey M. | title=Trump Job Approval Slides to 39% | website=Gallup.com | date=2020-06-10 | url=https://news.gallup.com/poll/312572/trump-job-approval-slides.aspx |}}</ref> before stabilizing at 42% by August.<ref>{{cite web | last=Jones | first=Jeffrey M. | title=Trump Job Approval 42%; Below 50% on Seven Key Issues | website=Gallup.com | date=2020-08-17 | url=https://news.gallup.com/poll/317477/trump-job-approval-below-seven-key-issues.aspx |}}</ref> These are not the healthiest numbers for an incumbent.

COVID also significantly worsened the wealth gap between white Americans and Black Americans, contributing to the rising African-American backlash against Trump.<ref>{{cite web | last=Major | first=Derek | title=The Coronavirus Pandemic Has Widened The Wealth Gap and Increased Income Inequality | website=Black Enterprise | date=2020-10-13 | url=https://www.blackenterprise.com/the-coronavirus-pandemic-has-widened-the-wealth-gap-and-increased-income-inequality/ |}}</ref> Young Americans and Latino Americans were also disproportionately impacted.<ref>{{cite web | last=Adamczyk | first=Alicia | title=Inequality has been building for decades in the U.S., but experts say the pandemic 'ripped it open' | website=CNBC | date=2020-10-23 | url=https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/23/coronavirus-is-exacerbating-economic-inequality-in-the-us.html |}}</ref>

Trump's COVID shitshow finally hit its peak in October 2020, when the president, his wife, and dozens of White House aides came down with the disease.<ref>{{cite web | last=Buchanan | first=Larry | last2=Gamio | first2=Lazaro | last3=Leatherby | first3=Lauren | last4=Keefe | first4=John | last5=Koettl | first5=Christoph | last6=Walker | first6=Amy Schoenfeld | title=Tracking the White House Coronavirus Outbreak | website=The New York Times | date=2020-10-02 | url=https://archive.ph/nufvi|}}</ref>

===...but the pandemic also benefited his campaign===
[[File:OPEN our OHIO IMG 0144 (49790376873).jpg|thumb|right|345px|Anti-lockdown protesters in [[Ohio]], April 2020.]]
However, it's a mischaracterization to say that COVID only hurt Trump. He won back a lot of support by vigorously campaigning against unpopular pandemic-era measures, such as prolonged closures of schools<ref>{{cite web | last=Kristof | first=Nicholas | title=The Problem With Coronavirus School Closures | website=The New York Times | date=2020-11-19 | url=https://archive.ph/OGx1R}}</ref> and churches,<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump declares churches 'essential,' calls on them to reopen | website=AP News | date=2020-05-22 | url=https://apnews.com/article/virus-outbreak-donald-trump-lifestyle-ap-top-news-religion-8a34b6599602dbd751f2c1fcb93387fe |}}</ref> and by quite literally signing off on a round of federal stimulus checks that were sent out to voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Gittleson | first=Ben | title=An inside look at how Donald Trump's name came to appear on stimulus checks | website=ABC News | date=2021-05-07 | url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/inside-donald-trumps-stimulus-checks/story?id=77534116 |}}</ref> Public health experts further infuriated [[conservatism|conservatives]] by giving the green-light to Black Lives Matter protests despite having recently recommended lockdowns and stay-at-home orders.<ref>{{cite web | last=Diamond | first=Dan | title=Suddenly, Public Health Officials Say Social Justice Matters More Than Social Distance | website=POLITICO | date=2020-06-04 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/04/public-health-protests-301534 |}}</ref> 

Trump's characterization of lockdown measures as being a "cure worse than the problem itself," resonated with voters who were primarily concerned with how the pandemic response was impacting the economy.<ref name="lsecvd">{{cite web | last=Algara | first=Carlos | last2=Amlani | first2=Sharif | title=For many 2020 presidential election voters, economic concerns about COVID-19 restrictions trumped public health | website=USAPP | date=2022-10-31 | url=https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2022/10/31/for-many-2020-presidential-election-voters-economic-concerns-about-covid-19-restrictions-trumped-public-health/ |}}</ref> Voters who placed the economy as their foremost concern were very likely to vote for Trump, while voters who had public health as their priority didn't have quite the same likelihood of backing Biden.<ref name="lsecvd"/> During the election campaign, COVID was also hitting the large blue states (like [[California]] and [[New York]]) much harder than red states or even swing states, so many voters around the country did not understand or feel the urgency that motivated the lockdown measures.<ref>{{cite web | last=Pelham | first=Brett | title=Two Reasons Why COVID-19 May Help Donald Trump Get Re-elected | website=SPSP | date=2020-06-22 | url=https://spsp.org/news-center/character-context-blog/two-reasons-why-covid-19-may-help-donald-trump-get-re-elected |}}</ref> Trump's "economy first" message was a fairly viable strategy for Republicans, as it caused an upsurge in support for them that manifested as an unexpectedly close election night.<ref name="lsecvd"/><ref name="guardecon">{{cite web | last=Glenza | first=Jessica | title=Fears about economy under Covid lockdown helped Trump outperform polls | website=the Guardian | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/04/exit-polls-economy-covid-lockdown-trump |}}</ref>

Trump was also president during one of the largest expansions of the [[welfare]] state in modern American history,<ref>{{cite web | last=Savage | first=Luke | title=The US Welfare State Expanded During the Pandemic. On Biden’s Watch, It’s Been Rolled Back. | website=Jacobin | date=2023-09-08 | url=https://jacobin.com/2023/09/biden-pandemic-welfare-state-rollback-economic-perfromance-polls |}}</ref> spending over $5 trillion on critically-necessary policies like emergency food benefits, free school meals, unemployment benefits, Medicaid expansion, and moratoriums on evictions and foreclosures.<ref>{{cite web | last=Miller | first=Claire Cain | last2=Parlapiano | first2=Alicia | title=The U.S. Built a European-Style Welfare State. It’s Largely Over. | website=The New York Times | date=2023-04-06 | url=https://archive.ph/KUR1t}}</ref> The $2 trillion federal stimulus bill that Trump signed in March was the most expensive bill of its kind in US history, and it contained decidedly anti-free market measures compelling manufacturers to produce much-needed medical supplies.<ref>{{cite web | title=Coronavirus: Trump signs into law largest bailout in US history | website=BBC Home | date=2020-03-27 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52070718 |}}</ref>

By September, the press were remarking on the "eerie stability" of Trump's approval numbers considering everything that had happened by that point.<ref>{{cite web | last=Klein | first=Ezra | title=Can anything change Americans’ minds about Donald Trump? The eerie stability of Trump’s approval rating, explained.| website=Vox | date=2020-09-02 | url=https://www.vox.com/2020/9/2/21409364/trump-approval-rating-2020-election-voters-coronavirus-convention-polls |}}</ref> Although there's a [[Correlation does not imply causation|correlation-causation problem]], it's probably significant that many of the regions hardest-hit by COVID shifted the most towards Trump during this election.<ref>{{cite web | last=McMinn | first=Sean | title=Many Places Hard Hit By COVID-19 Leaned More Toward Trump In 2020 Than 2016 | website=NPR | date=2020-11-06 | url=https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/11/06/930897912/many-places-hard-hit-by-covid-19-leaned-more-toward-trump-in-2020-than-2016 |}}</ref>

===Expanded voting rights===
[[File:An absentee ballot dropbox (50997674929).jpg|thumb|right|315px|An absentee ballot box in [[Wisconsin]], October 2020.]]
Another unusual aspect of the 2020 election: voting access. Fearing COVID outbreaks at polling places, states across the country passed laws allowing for no-excuse early voting and mail-in voting (with some states sending mail ballots to every voter). All told, a record 76% of American voters were eligible to cast a ballot by mail.<ref>{{cite web | last=Love | first=Juliette | last2=Stevens | first2=Matt | last3=Gamio | first3=Lazaro | title=Where Americans Can Vote by Mail in the 2020 Elections | website=The New York Times | date=2020-08-11 | url=https://t.co/zaJpu3OhNB |}}</ref> 

There were logistical challenges, however. Trump-appointed postmaster general Louis DeJoy had implemented measures to eliminate overtime and late trips, causing a backlog of undelivered mail in the United States Postal Service (USPS).<ref>{{cite web | last=Katz | first=Eric | title=Looking to Cut Costs, New USPS Leader Takes Aim at Overtime and Late Trips | website=Government Executive | date=2020-07-15 | url=https://www.govexec.com/pay-benefits/2020/07/looking-cut-costs-new-usps-leader-takes-aim-overtime-and-late-trips/166917/ |}}</ref> More of the incompetence that typified the Trump administration, although thankfully, DeJoy suspended those policies ahead of the election.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bogage | first=Jacob | last2=Gardner | first2=Amy | last3=Cox | first3=Erin | title=Postmaster general announces he is ‘suspending’ policies blamed for mail delays | website=Washington Post | date=2020-08-18 | url=https://archive.ph/EYBxq}}</ref> In August, Trump said he would not authorize additional resources for the USPS or for states because he personally opposed allowing more people to vote by mail.<ref>{{cite web | last=Gardner | first=Amy | last2=Dawsey | first2=Josh | last3=Kane | first3=Paul | title=Trump opposes election aid for states and Postal Service bailout, threatening Nov. 3 vote | website=Washington Post | date=2020-08-13 | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mail-voting/2020/08/13/3eb9ac62-dd70-11ea-809e-b8be57ba616e_story.html |}}</ref> 

Trump repeatedly attacked the validity of mail-in voting, saying that mail ballots were especially susceptible to [[voter fraud]]. He also referred to the practice of third-party ballot deliveries as "ballot harvesting," a practice which is not coincidentally most common among minority voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Parks | first=Miles | title=Trump, While Attacking Mail Voting, Casts Mail Ballot Again | website=NPR | date=2020-08-19 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/08/19/903886567/trump-while-attacking-mail-voting-casts-mail-ballot-again |}}</ref> His comments came despite the fact that [[Hypocrisy|Trump had voted by mail during the 2020 Republican primaries]].<ref name="tmailprim">{{cite web | title=After voting by mail, Trump denounces voting by mail | website=MSNBC.com | date=2020-04-08 | url=https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/after-voting-mail-trump-denounces-voting-mail-n1179036 |}}</ref> When pressed on this inconvenient detail, Trump rambled about an imagined scenario where Democrats would pack "thousands and thousands of people" into "somebody's living room" and just fill out countless numbers of ballots.<ref name="tmailprim"/> This was stupid for numerous reasons, not the least of which is the fact that nobody then or now has living rooms that can fit thousands of people.

==Democratic nomination==
[[File:Democratic Party presidential primaries results, 2020.svg|thumb|right|415px|{{legend|#224192|Joe Biden|border=1}}
{{legend|#228B22|Bernie Sanders|border=1}}{{legend|#f2ba42|Pete Buttigieg|border=1}}
{{legend|#9370db|Michael Bloomberg (have fun trying to find [[American Samoa|where he won]])|border=1}}]]
{{main|2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination}}
In 2019, the Democratic Party hoped to redeem itself from that stinging defeat of 2016, in which [[Hillary Clinton]] had underperformed to the point that she almost lost [[Minnesota]]<ref>{{cite web | title=Minnesota Election Results 2016 | website=CNN | url=https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results/states/minnesota |}}</ref> (a state which has backed the Democratic nominee in every election since 1972),<ref>{{cite web | title=Minnesota extends blue streak for 13th consecutive presidential election | website=CBS Minnesota | date=2024-11-06 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minnesota-democratic-presidential-election-history/ |}}</ref> and came within 3,000 votes of losing [[New Hampshire]].<ref>{{cite web | title=New Hampshire Election Results 2016 | website=CNN | url=https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results/states/new-hampshire |}}</ref> Now, though, the opportunity seemed ripe for a Democratic return to the White House, and Clinton was no longer The Chosen One. Hopefuls crowded the primary field, with some decently well-known names like Senators [[Amy Klobuchar]] and [[Elizabeth Warren]], some absolute nobodies like {{wpl|John Delaney|}} and {{wpl|Eric Swalwell|}}, and a few intriguing options like [[Ohio]] [[Populism|populist]] {{wpl|Tim Ryan|}} or the surprisingly successful smooth-talker [[Pete Buttigieg]].<ref name="dprimcand">{{cite web | title=All the Democratic candidates who ran for president in 2020 | website=CBS News | date=2020-06-22 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/media/2020-democratic-presidential-candidates/ |}}</ref> There were also a few total jokes,<ref name="dprimcand"/> like the insincere and ideologically-inconsistent [[California]] Senator [[Kamala Harris]],<ref>{{cite web | last=Beauchamp | first=Zack | title=Why Bernie Sanders failed | website=Vox | date=2020-04-10 | url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/4/10/21214970/bernie-sanders-2020-lost-class-socialism |}}</ref> and [[Hawaii]]'s [[Tulsi Gabbard]], most known for being supportive of the brutal [[Syria|Syrian]] [[dictator]] [[Bashar al-Assad]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Luce | first=Dan De | title=Democrats and Republicans in Congress worried that Gabbard might leak to Assad regime | website=NBC News | date=2024-12-07 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/democrats-republicans-congress-worried-gabbard-might-leak-information-rcna181316 |}}</ref> 

None of them stood a chance against the two big names: former Vice President [[Joe Biden]] and 2016's populist insurgent [[Bernie Sanders]], back for another round. With Biden running a moderate establishment-backed campaign and Sanders still hoping to push the Democrats to the left, the stage seemed set for another climactic showdown between the Democratic establishment and the outsider fighting for the young and the working class. This just didn't happen. Unfortunately for Sanders, the 2020 Democratic electorate was very different from the 2016 electorate. In 2016, many Democrats were hungry for an alternative to the disappointing [[neoliberalism|neoliberal]] policies of the Obama administration, but 2020 Democrats had the sole objective of finding the candidate most likely to beat Trump.<ref>{{cite web | title=Poll: Dems want 'electable' challenger who can beat Trump. Values come second. | website=NBC News | date=2019-02-04 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/poll-dems-want-electable-challenger-who-can-beat-trump-values-n966636 |}}</ref> The relatively high level of Democratic interest in unknowns like Buttigieg or {{wpl|Beto O'Rourke|}} showed that the party was looking for a white [[centrism|centrist]] man who wouldn't be in any way threatening to the broader electorate.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bacon | first=Perry Jr. | title=Why Bernie Sanders Lost | website=FiveThirtyEight | date=2020-04-08 | url=https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-bernie-sanders-lost/ |}}</ref>

[[File:Biden Sanders debate 2020.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Biden and Sanders meet on the debate stage in March 2020.]]

That last bit shouldn't minimize the fact that the Democratic establishment ''did'' try their best to screw Sanders, even though their efforts probably weren't necessary. Liberal [[media]] outlets like MSNBC and [[CNN]] lambasted Sanders as an unelectable radical with toxic supporters, who would lead the Democrats into certain defeat against Trump.<ref>{{cite web | last=Uyehara | first=Mari | title=Why Does Mainstream Media Keep Attacking Bernie Sanders as He Wins? | website=GQ | date=2020-02-12 | url=https://archive.ph/805bx}}</ref> The Party also made no effort to hide its antipathy towards Sanders. Party officials were open about the fact that they intended to deny Sanders the nomination even if he arrived at the Convention with the greatest number of delegates,<ref>{{cite web | last=Lerer | first=Lisa | last2=Epstein | first2=Reid J. | title=Democratic Leaders Willing to Risk Party Damage to Stop Bernie Sanders | website=The New York Times | date=2020-02-27 | url=https://archive.ph/H8Yb3}}</ref> <ref>{{cite web | last=> | first=Full Bio | title=Sanders Alone On Debate Stage to Say Candidate With the Most Votes Should Get Nomination at Convention | website=Common Dreams | date=2020-02-19 | url=https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/02/19/sanders-alone-debate-stage-say-candidate-most-votes-should-get-nomination-convention |}}</ref> and former president Obama used his influential platform to voice doubts over Sanders' ability to win.<ref>{{cite web | last=Marcetic | first=Branko | title=The Democratic Party’s Real War in 2020 Was Against Bernie Sanders | website=Jacobin | date=2021-03-16 | url=https://jacobin.com/2021/03/democratic-party-war-against-bernie-sanders-2020-election |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Coleman | first=Justine | title=Obama privately said he would speak up to stop Sanders: report | website=The Hill | date=2019-11-26 | url=https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/472090-obama-privately-said-he-would-speak-up-to-stop-sanders-report/ |}}</ref> 

Biden, meanwhile, had a rough road in the primaries despite taking up Clinton's mantle as the establishment's Chosen One. While he had a great deal of name recognition as Obama's former right-hand man, and he could truthfully say that he had favorable polling against Trump,<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20230514003526/https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/joe-biden-democrats-best-chance-beat-trump-2020-no-other-ncna961836 Joe Biden is the Democrats' best chance to beat Trump in 2020. No other liberal darling even comes close.] ''NBC News.''</ref> Biden had his own baggage. No less than eight women came forward in 2019 to accuse Biden of touching and kissing them inappropriately.<ref>[https://archive.ph/20201217214742/https://www.thecut.com/2020/04/joe-biden-accuser-accusations-allegations.html All the Women Who Have Spoken Out Against Joe Biden]. ''The Cut.'' 12 April 2020.</ref> The issue attracted attention, and Biden made an apology video pledging to be "more mindful and respectful of people's personal space."<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20200620090251/https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/us/politics/joe-biden-women-video.html/ Joe Biden, in Video, Says He Will Be ‘More Mindful’ of Personal Space]. ''New York Times.''</ref> Former staffer Tara Reade also outright accused him of sexually assaulting her, although media outlets were quick to point out inconsistencies in her story and her previous goodwill towards Biden.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20200412090835/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/12/us/politics/joe-biden-tara-reade-sexual-assault-complaint.html Examining Tara Reade’s Sexual Assault Allegation Against Joe Biden]. ''New York Times.'' April 12, 2020.</ref><ref>[https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/15/tara-reade-left-trail-of-aggrieved-acquaintances-260771  ‘Manipulative, deceitful, user’: Tara Reade left a trail of aggrieved acquaintances]. ''Politico.''</ref> During the debates, Kamala Harris attacked him for opposing school integration during his time in the Senate,<ref name="bidhardeb">[https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/27/politics/democratic-primary-debate-night-two-joe-biden-bernie-sanders-kamala-harris/index.html  ‘That little girl was me’: Harris’ attack on Joe Biden steals spotlight at Democratic primary debate]. ''CNN.'' June 28, 2019.</ref> and for naming [[Segregation|segregationist]] Senators [[Strom Thurmond]] and [[Jesse Helms]] as his personal friends.<ref name="bidhardeb"/> Biden looked visibly uncomfortable, and he couldn't come up with any good rebuttals.

Biden went on to lose critical early contests in [[Iowa]], [[New Hampshire]], and [[Nevada]].<ref name="bidpath">[https://www.npr.org/2020/08/16/902640265/joe-bidens-long-and-rocky-road-to-the-democratic-nomination Joe Biden's Long And Rocky Road To The Democratic Nomination]. ''NPR.''</ref> His campaign looked dead in the water. However, Biden still had one advantage: Black support. He promised his supporters that he would turn things around by winning [[South Carolina]],<ref name="howbidwon">[https://time.com/5907674/joe-biden-wins-2020-election/ How Joe Biden Won the White House]. ''Time.''</ref> and with the help of an endorsement from the state's Representative {{wpl|James Clyburn|}}, he actually did.<ref name="bidpath"/> As Biden racked up more Southern states, his fellow moderates dropped out to clear the field for the Chosen One, and Sanders had no choice but to concede on 7 April and endorse Biden.<ref>[https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/08/politics/bernie-sanders-drops-out/index.html  Bernie Sanders drops out of the 2020 race, clearing Joe Biden’s path to the Democratic nomination]. ''CNN.''</ref>

Like the primaries, the Democratic National Convention was very different from what had taken place four years before. Due to the pandemic ravaging the country, this Convention was primarily virtual, and Biden gave his acceptance speech in a nearly-empty hall in [[Delaware]].<ref>[https://apps.npr.org/liveblogs/20200820-dnc/share/biden-accepts-nomination-hold-79.html Biden Accepts Nomination: ‘This Is A Life-Changing Election’]. ''NPR.'' Aug. 20, 2020.</ref>

==Campaign issues==
[[File:Trump throws face mask at Florida rally.webp|thumb|right|395px|Trump throws a campaign-branded face mask to his supporters during a rally in [[Florida]].]]
{{cquote|Will you shut up, man?|||Biden to Trump after being repeatedly interrupted during their first debate.<ref name="firstdebat">{{cite web | title="Shut up, man": First debate between Biden and Trump devolves into personal jabs | website=CBS News | date=2020-09-30 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/will-you-shut-up-man-trump-biden-first-debate-personal-jabs/}}</ref>}}
===The pandemic===
{{main|COVID-19 pandemic}}
What else would have been the top issue of the election? American deaths from the ongoing pandemic hit 223,000 in mid-October,<ref>{{cite web | title=This Week in Coronavirus: October 16 to October 22 | website=KFF | date=2020-10-23 | url=https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/this-week-in-coronavirus-october-16-to-october-22/ |}}</ref> and Biden's attacks on Trump's botching of the crisis became a key theme of his campaign. In September, Biden said Trump "waved the white flag" in surrender to the pandemic, and he then added, "it's almost criminal."<ref>{{cite web | last=Gambino | first=Lauren | last2=Smith | first2=David | last3=Walters | first3=Joanna | title=Joe Biden decries Trump’s 'almost criminal' Covid response | website=the Guardian | date=2020-09-10 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/10/biden-trump-coronavirus-pandemic-woodward-book |}}</ref> While rejecting the idea that he was campaigning "on the false promises of being able to end this pandemic by flipping a switch," Biden did pledge to "let science drive our decisions."<ref name="covidpledges">{{cite web | title=US Election 2020: Trump slams lockdowns, Biden accuses him of insulting victims | website=BBC Home | date=2020-10-29 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54727919 |}}</ref> Biden's pandemic response plan called for increasing federal funding for vaccine research and expanding testing capabilities, using the full authority of the Defense Production Act to force the manufacturing of more masks and face shields, and the creation of a government task force meant to address minority communities which were being disproportionately impacted by the pandemic due to racial inequality.<ref name="covplans">{{cite web | last=Moore | first=Elena | title=Trump's And Biden's Plans On The Coronavirus Pandemic | website=NPR | date=2020-10-16 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/10/16/919139204/trumps-and-biden-s-plans-on-the-coronavirus-pandemic |}}</ref>

Trump, on the other hand, published no action plan to address the pandemic.<ref name="covplans"/> Instead, Trump insisted that everything would start going back to normal by January with the release of the then-undeveloped vaccine and pledged to hold [[China]] "fully accountable" for the spread of the virus.<ref name="covplans"/> Most of Trump's messaging on COVID was focused on his hysterical warnings that Biden would put the entire country into a pandemic lockdown: "If you vote for Joe Biden it means no kids in school, no graduations, no weddings, no [[Thanksgiving]]s, no [[Christmas]], and no Fourth of July together."<ref name="covidpledges"/> He also mocked Biden for wearing a face mask during the pandemic,<ref>{{cite web | last=LeBlanc | first=Paul | title=Trump mocks Biden for wearing mask: ‘Did you ever see a man that likes a mask as much as him?’ | website=CNN | date=2020-09-04 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/03/politics/trump-biden-coronavirus-mask/index.html |}}</ref> and erratically alternated between supporting mask recommendations and opposing them.<ref>{{cite web | last=Smith | first=Savannah | title=Unmasked: How Trump's mixed messaging on face-coverings hurt U.S. coronavirus response | website=NBC News | date=2020-08-10 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/calendar-confusion-february-august-trump-s-mixed-messages-masks-n1236088 |}}</ref>

A post-election Gallup poll indicated that 58% of voters were either very or somewhat confident in Biden's ability to handle the pandemic, while only 42% said the same about Trump.<ref name="covidpoll">{{cite web | last=Atske | first=Sara | title=5. Key post-election issues: The pandemic and the economy | website=Pew Research Center | date=2020-11-20 | url=https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/11/20/key-post-election-issues-the-pandemic-and-the-economy/ |}}</ref> Biden voters were much harsher on Trump's ability to tackle the crisis than vice versa. While 55% of Trump voters said they had zero confidence in Biden's pandemic-management ability, 86% of Biden  voters said the same about Trump.<ref name="covidpoll"/>

===The economy===
[[File:Biden Trump debate 2020.jpg|thumb|right|365px|Two out-of-touch old men yell at each other on the debate stage, October 2020.]]
COVID also threw the economy into chaos, and three months of the pandemic caused unemployment to spike higher than two years of the [[Great Recession]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Kochhar | first=Rakesh | title=Unemployment rose higher in three months of COVID-19 than it did in two years of the Great Recession | website=Pew Research Center | date=2024-04-14 | url=https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/06/11/unemployment-rose-higher-in-three-months-of-covid-19-than-it-did-in-two-years-of-the-great-recession/ |}}</ref> After hitting a peak of nearly 15%, the national unemployment rate declined to a still-bad 7% in October.<ref>{{cite web | title=Unemployment rate falls to 6.9 percent in October 2020 : The Economics Daily: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics | website=Bureau of Labor Statistics | date=2020-11-12 | url=https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2020/unemployment-rate-falls-to-6-point-9-percent-in-october-2020.htm |}}</ref> The US economy went into a recession and shrank by 3.5%, and overall performance made 2020 the worst year for US economic growth since 1946.<ref>{{cite web | last=Siegel | first=Rachel | last2=Dam | first2=Andrew Van | last3=Werner | first3=Erica | title=2020 was the worst year for economic growth since World War II | website=Washington Post | date=2021-01-28 | url=https://archive.ph/EVU0e}}</ref> With economic decline on voters' minds, Trump capitalized on the situation by warning that lockdowns and similar pandemic measures would cause even more pain to Americans.<ref>{{cite web | last=Berkeley Lovelace Jr. | first=Noah Higgins-Dunn | title=Trump says nationwide lockdown would 'ultimately inflict more harm than it would prevent' | website=CNBC | date=2020-08-03 | url=https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/03/trump-says-nationwide-lockdown-would-ultimately-inflict-more-harm-than-it-would-prevent.html |}}</ref> Much of his economic messaging focused on the need to prematurely reopen the US economy to put people back to work, despite the pandemic still accelerating.<ref>{{cite web | title=President Trump Wants To Reopen Economy Despite CDC Warnings | website=NPR | date=2020-05-06 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/05/06/851631806/president-trump-wants-to-reopen-economy-despite-cdc-warnings |}}</ref> Economists meanwhile warned that ending pandemic measures before the virus was brought under control would worsen the impact of the crisis and lead to greater long-term damage to the economy.<ref>{{cite web | last=Miranda | first=Leticia | last2=Tellez | first2=Anthony | title=Trump says not to be 'afraid' of Covid-19 — but economists disagree| website=NBC News | date=2020-10-05 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-tweets-stock-market-gains-are-great-news-america-millions-n1242205 |}}</ref>

Trump also claimed to have built the greatest economy in American history during his pre-pandemic years, but the facts showed that he had inherited the positive economic trends from the late years of the Obama administration and that the economy was most certainly not the greatest in American history.<ref>{{cite web | title=US 2020 election: The economy under Trump in six charts | website=BBC Home | date=2018-10-18 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-45827430 |}}</ref> Biden attacked Trump on the economy, saying that Trump "squandered" the "longest economic expansion in history from the Obama-Biden administration."<ref name="bidenecon">{{cite web | last=Pager | first=Tyler | title=Biden Says Trump Squandered Economic Expansion Begun With Obama | website=Bloomberg.com | date=2020-06-08 | url=https://archive.ph/0mn4G}}</ref> While Trump touted his party's passage of "the biggest tax cuts in American history," data actually showed that the tax cuts disproportionately benefited the wealthiest Americans while middle class income growth slowed during Trump's term.<ref>{{cite web | title=The middle class needs a tax cut: Trump didn't give it to them | website=Brookings | date=2022-03-09 | url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-middle-class-needs-a-tax-cut-trump-didnt-give-it-to-them/ |}}</ref> Biden rightly said that Trump's tax cuts for the rich amounted to him "turning his back on the middle class."<ref name="bidenecon"/>

While Biden and Trump were both reluctant to say this, the positive economic trends dating from the Obama administration masked a long-term crisis in the American economy. Just looking at economic growth ignored the facts that middle class incomes had been stagnant for decades, overall employment and wages had been outright declining for many years, rates of upward mobility had also been declining for many years, and racial disparities were worsening.<ref>{{cite web | title=Seven reasons to worry about the American middle class | website=Brookings | date=2023-06-20 | url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/seven-reasons-to-worry-about-the-american-middle-class/ |}}</ref> Trump repeatedly pointing out high numbers on the stock market ignored the fact that the stock market has very little impact on the economic lives of the middle and lower class.<ref>{{cite web | last=Egan | first=Matt | title=Analysis: The simple thing Trump doesn’t get about the stock market | website=CNN | date=2020-09-16 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/16/investing/stock-market-trump-economy/index.html |}}</ref> Biden's touting of the Obama administration's supposedly great economy ignored the fact that widespread disillusionment with stagnation and the inadequate response to the aftermath of the [[Great Recession]] is one of the reasons that [[Trumpism]] and 2016's populist backlash happened in the first place.<ref>{{cite web | last=Savage | first=Luke | title=Obama’s Failure to Adequately Respond to the 2008 Crisis Still Haunts American Politics | website=Jacobin | date=2021-10-28 | url=https://jacobin.com/2021/10/meltdown-gibney-sirota-podcast-obama-2008-financial-crisis |}}</ref>

===Racial unrest and protests===
[[File:George Floyd protests in Philadelphia 20.jpg|thumb|right|375px|National Guard and riot police supervise protests in Philadelphia, [[Pennsylvania]].]]
On 25 May, 2020, Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd, a Black man, by kneeling on his neck while other police officers looked on.<ref>{{cite web | last=Forliti | first=Amy | last2=Webber | first2=Tammy | last3=Karnowski | first3=Steve | title=3 ex-cops convicted of rights violations in Floyd killing | website=AP News | date=2022-02-25 | url=https://apnews.com/article/death-of-george-floyd-george-floyd-minneapolis-race-and-ethnicity-racial-injustice-ab7a1e89268ac60a58ae8a317e0b6079 |}}</ref> This crime was captured on video, and it set the match to the long-building powder keg of racial resentment in America. The resultant [[Black Lives Matter]] protests were one of the largest mass movements in American history, with between 15 and 26 million people estimated to have taken part in actions across the nation.<ref>{{cite web | last=Buchanan | first=Larry | last2=Bui | first2=Quoctrung | last3=Patel | first3=Jugal K. | title=Black Lives Matter May Be the Largest Movement in U.S. History | website=The New York Times | date=2020-07-03 | url=https://archive.ph/fCDG0}}</ref> Only 4% of the protests turned violent, and said violence was frequently instigated by police and counter-protesters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Chenoweth | first=Erica | last2=Pressman | first2=Jeremy | title=This summer’s Black Lives Matter protesters were overwhelmingly peaceful, our research finds | website=Washington Post | date=2020-10-16 | url=https://archive.ph/VNmp2}}</ref> Unfortunately, the widespread nature of the protests meant that violent incidents resulted in a combined total of over 1$ billion in damage, the most expensive fallout from civil unrest in American history.<ref>{{cite web | last=Kingson | first=Jennifer A. | title=Exclusive: $1 billion-plus riot damage is most expensive in insurance history | website=Axios | date=2020-09-16 | url=https://www.axios.com/2020/09/16/riots-cost-property-damage |}}</ref>

Trump's response was unhinged. Along with calling protesters "thugs"<ref>{{cite web | last=Nicole Chavez | first=Ray Sanchez | title=Trump calls protesters ‘thugs’ despite peaceful demonstrations in Tulsa and much of the US | website=CNN | date=2020-06-20 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/20/us/nationwide-protests-saturday/index.html |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=False ‘thug’ narratives have long been used to discredit movements | website=NBC News | date=2020-09-27 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/not-accident-false-thug-narratives-have-long-been-used-discredit-n1240509 |}}</ref> and threatening them with "vicious dogs" and "ominous weapons,"<ref>{{cite web | last=Segers | first=Grace | title=Trump rips White House protesters, says "vicious dogs" were ready | website=CBS News | date=2020-05-30 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/george-floyd-protest-white-house-president-trump-secret-service/ |}}</ref> the president threatened to send in the military to quell the protests.<ref>{{cite web | last=Horton | first=Jake | title=Does Trump have the right to send in federal forces? | website=BBC Home | date=2020-06-02 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52893540 |}}</ref> Trump also took advantage of the moment to spread fear and [[paranoia]] among his supporters to drive up turnout, including by sending a mass text message baselessly claiming that [[Antifa]] would "attack your homes if Joe's elected. Pres Trump needs you..."<ref>{{cite web | last=Connolly | first=Griffin | title=Trump campaign sends fear-mongering text warning of Antifa assaults if Biden wins election | website=The Independent | date=2020-09-13 | url=https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-election-2020/trump-text-antifa-alert-biden-2020-election-b434221.html |}}</ref> All of this combined sparked a new era of white conservative backlash against [[civil rights]] movements in the line of what the United States experienced during the late 1960s.<ref>{{cite web | last=Cineas | first=Fabiola | title=The “racial reckoning” of 2020 set off an entirely new kind of backlash | website=Vox | date=2024-06-03 | url=https://www.vox.com/policy/351106/backlash-politics-2020-george-floyd-race |}}</ref>

During this period, Biden knelt with protesters in [[Georgia]],<ref>{{cite web | last=Williams | first=Austin | title=Joe Biden shares picture of himself kneeling with demonstrator at George Floyd protest | publisher=FOX 5 Atlanta | date=2020-05-31 | url=https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/joe-biden-shares-picture-of-himself-kneeling-with-demonstrator-at-george-floyd-protest |}}</ref> and he condemned Trump for encouraging brutality and spreading division.<ref name="nprbflo">{{cite web | last=Detrow | first=Scott | title='He Thinks Division Helps Him': Biden Condemns Trump's Protest Response | website=NPR | date=2020-06-02 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/06/02/867671792/biden-to-condemn-trumps-protest-response-in-speech |}}</ref> Biden placed particular emphasis on an incident where Trump ordered riot police to clear out protesters from a church near the White House so that Trump could pose with a [[Bible]].<ref name="nprbflo"/>

Racial unrest also swept up Asian-American communities as well. Inflammatory rhetoric from the president tying Asians to the ongoing pandemic, such as "China virus" and "Kung Flu," resulted in a sharp uptick in online hate directed at Asian-Americans.<ref>{{cite web | last=Reja | first=Dr. Mishal | title=Trump's 'Chinese Virus' tweet helped lead to rise in racist anti-Asian Twitter content: Study | website=ABC News | date=2021-03-18 | url=https://abcnews.go.com/Health/trumps-chinese-virus-tweet-helped-lead-rise-racist/story?id=76530148 |}}</ref> Anti-Asian hate crimes increased by nearly 150% in 2020, with most incidents happening in New York City and Los Angeles, which are cities with high Asian-American populations.<ref>{{cite web | title=Anti-Asian hate crimes increased by nearly 150% in 2020, mostly in N.Y. and L.A., new report says | website=NBC News | date=2021-03-09 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-crimes-increased-nearly-150-2020-mostly-n-n1260264 |}}</ref>

===Immigration policy===
[[File:Overcrowded Families in McAllen Station-10Jun2019-DHS OIG.png|thumb|right|375px|A migrant detention facility in [[Texas]], June 2019.]]
{{main|Undocumented immigration}}
{{cquote|Minor was separated at the border from his biological mother. Minor was tearful when he arrived and would not speak or engage in conversation with anyone.|||Employee of the US Office of Refugee Resettlement in a report from June 2018.<ref name="famsep">{{cite web | last=Ferriss | first=Susan | title=The Trump administration knew migrant children would suffer from family separations. The government ramped up the practice anyway. | website=The Texas Tribune | date=2019-12-16 | url=https://www.texastribune.org/2019/12/16/trump-administration-knew-family-separations-harm-migrant-children/ |}}</ref>}}
One of Trump's biggest areas of focus as president during his first term was immigration, and specifically his efforts to limit it. This was only to be expected considering his emphasis on the issue in [[2016 United States presidential election|2016]]. While deportation rates didn't change much, he did vastly increase rates of detentions and decrease admissions for refugees (especially [[Islam|Muslims]]).<ref>{{cite web | last=Lowther | first=Ed | title=US election 2020: Trump's impact on immigration | website=BBC Home | date=2020-10-21 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54638643 |}}</ref> Quite a few of his policies were tied up in federal court, while his [[Great Wall of America|wall]] and his pledge to deport millions never materialized.<ref>{{cite web | last=Roy | first=Diana | last2=Klobucista | first2=Claire | last3=McBride | first3=James | title=Immigration in the 2020 Election | website=Council on Foreign Relations | date=2019-10-24 | url=https://www.cfr.org/election2020/candidate-tracker/immigration |}}</ref> 

Despite being fairly ineffectual when it came to "Build the Wall",<ref>{{cite web | last=Rodgers | first=Lucy | last2=Bailey | first2=Dominic | title=Trump wall: How much has he actually built? | website=BBC Home | date=2019-01-21 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46824649 |}}</ref> the Trump administration did earn widespread outrage due to its "zero tolerance" policy of separating children from their parents after they illegally crossed the border as a means of deterring further crossings.<ref>{{cite web | title=Family Separation in Their Own Words: The Lasting Harm of the Trump Administration’s Zero Tolerance Policy | website=ReliefWeb | date=2024-01-23 | url=https://reliefweb.int/report/united-states-america/family-separation-their-own-words-lasting-harm-trump-administrations-zero-tolerance-policy |}}</ref><ref name="famsep"/> Detention facilities were dangerously overcrowded,<ref> {{cite web | last=Owen | first=Quinn | title=Nearly 900 migrants found at Texas facility with 125-person capacity: DHS watchdog | website=ABC News | date=2019-05-31 | url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/900-migrants-found-texas-facility-125-person-capacity/story?id=63404988 |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=From bad to 'sheer inhumanity': Detention conditions for migrants worse under Trump, advocates say | website=NBC News | date=2019-07-02 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/bad-sheer-inhumanity-detention-conditions-migrants-worse-under-trump-advocates-n1025961 |}}</ref> and a 2019 report from an inspection by the Department of Homeland Security contained some absolutely insane quotes like, "children at three of the five border patrol facilities we visited had no access to showers," or "cells smelled of what might have been unwashed bodies/body odour, urine, untreated diarrhea, and/or soiled clothing/diapers."<ref>{{cite web | last=Rennix | first=Brianna | last2=Robinson | first2=Nathan | title=Crammed in to cells and forced to drink from the toilet | website=the Guardian | date=2019-07-03 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/03/migrant-dentention-centres-us-border-patrol |}}</ref> At least seven children died while in the custody of immigration enforcement due to poor conditions and inadequate healthcare.<ref>{{cite web | last=Acevedo | first=Nicole | title=Why are migrant children dying in U.S. custody? | website=NBC News | date=2019-05-29 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/why-are-migrant-children-dying-u-s-custody-n1010316}}</ref> Should we put that on Trump's list of first term accomplishments?

During the election campaign, Biden's team released a 22-page position paper outlining his plan to "immediately end Trump's assault on the dignity of immigrant communities" and "restore our moral standing in the world and our historic role as a safe haven for refugees and asylum-seekers."<ref>{{cite web | last=Burnett | first=John | title=Biden Pledges To Dismantle Trump's Sweeping Immigration Changes | website=NPR | date=2020-09-14 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/09/14/912060869/biden-pledges-to-dismantle-trumps-sweeping-immigration-changes-but-can-he-do-tha |}}</ref> Some of his most significant promises were to halt construction on Trump's wall, focus on reuniting families separated under Trump's policies, and limit raids by [[Immigration and Customs Enforcement]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Rainey | first=Rebecca | last2=Bender | first2=Bryan | title=Biden will stop the border wall and loosen immigration again | website=POLITICO | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/2020/11/07/joe-biden-policies-immigration-border-wall-433627 |}}</ref> In regards to the detention centers, Biden pledged to begin scaling them back and ending the privately-run facilities, but he never did either.<ref>{{cite web | last=Ted Hesson | first=Mica Rosenberg,Kristina Cooke | title=Biden vowed to reform immigration detention. Instead, private prisons benefited | website=Reuters | date=2023-08-07 | url=https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-vowed-reform-immigration-detention-instead-private-prisons-benefited-2023-08-07/ |}}</ref>

===Healthcare===
[[File:Joe Biden leaves the stage at a drive-in rally at the State Fairgrounds in Falcon Heights Minnesota (50549815153).jpg|thumb|right|375px|Biden attends one of his characteristically small rallies in [[Minnesota]], October 2020.]]
In a Gallup poll from August 2020, healthcare rated as the second most-important issue for voters (68% "very important") behind the economy (79%), while the COVID outbreak actually ranked fourth (62%).<ref>{{cite web | last=Atske | first=Sara | title=4. Important issues in the 2020 election | website=Pew Research Center | date=2020-08-13 | url=https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/08/13/important-issues-in-the-2020-election/ |}}</ref> During the campaign, Trump stuck to his failed pledge to "repeal and replace" the [[Affordable Care Act]] while promoting the {{wpl|Medicare Advantage|}} program to get people on private insurance rather than public.<ref name="hcpol">{{cite web | last=Simmons-Duffin | first=Selena | title=Comparing Biden's And Trump's Different Visions For Health Care | website=NPR | date=2020-10-22 | url=https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/10/22/926372475/comparing-bidens-and-trump-s-different-visions-for-health-care |}}</ref> Nothing new, in other words.

Healthcare was much more divisive for the Democrats. Like [[Hillary Clinton]] before him, Biden opposed Medicare-for-All and even pledged to veto it should a bill ever reach his desk.<ref>{{cite web | last=Higgins | first=Tucker | title=Biden suggests he would veto 'Medicare for All' over its price tag | website=CNBC | date=2020-03-10 | url=https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/10/biden-says-he-wouldd-veto-medicare-for-all-as-coronavirus-focuses-attention-on-health.html |}}</ref> The pandemic did not change Biden's mind.<ref>{{cite web | title=The coronavirus crisis hasn't changed Joe Biden's mind on 'Medicare for All' | website=NBC News | date=2020-03-30 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/coronavirus-crisis-hasn-t-changed-joe-biden-s-mind-medicare-n1172361 |}}</ref> However, Biden did promise a so-called "Bidencare" policy, which would create a public insurance plan which would be sold on Obamacare's marketplaces.<ref>{{cite web | last=Scott | first=Dylan | title=Joe Biden’s health care plan, explained in 800 words | website=Vox | date=2020-11-06 | url=https://www.vox.com/21540041/election-2020-joe-biden-health-care |}}</ref> 

The public option promise, of course, went completely unmentioned once Biden won.<ref>{{cite web | last=Ramaswami | first=Aditi | title=Joe Biden Promised a Public Option for Health Care. What Happened to It? | website=Jacobin | date=2022-08-11 | url=https://jacobin.com/2022/08/joe-biden-public-option-health-care-insurance-subsidies |}}</ref>

===Acceptance of election results===
Trump's attacks on mail-in voting (which people became dependent on due to the [[COVID-19 pandemic]]), as well as his repeated refusal to confirm that he would accept defeat,<ref>Feuer, Will, [https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/19/president-trump-wont-agree-to-accept-2020-election-results-as-biden-leads-in-polls.html President Trump won’t agree to accept 2020 election results as Biden leads in polls — ‘I have to see’], ''CNBC''. 19 July 2020</ref> sparked widespread fears that if he was defeated, he would reject the results and resort to a variety of extraordinary measures to remain in power.<ref>Chang, Alvin, [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2020/oct/16/us-presidential-election-scenarios-timeline Timeline: what a normal US election looks like and what might happen in 2020], ''[[The Guardian]]''.</ref> 

Though most Congressional Republicans dismissed such a scenario,<ref>Bade, Rachel, Kane, Paul, and Itkowitz, Colby, [https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/what-senate-republicans-are-saying-after-trump-refused-to-commit-to-an-orderly-transfer-of-power/2020/09/24/276973ba-fe8d-11ea-9ceb-061d646d9c67_story.html What Senate Republicans are saying after Trump refused to commit to an orderly transfer of power], ''[[Washington Post]]''. 24 September 2020.</ref> nothing about the GOP's behavior over the past four years suggested they wouldn't just shut up and comply with Trump. Some Republican politicians dropped less-than-subtle hints about their plans to follow the Dear Leader and disregard electoral norms, with Utah Senator [[Mike Lee]] openly tweeting, "[w]e're not a democracy", and "[d]emocracy isn't the objective..."<ref>{{cite web | last=Beauchamp | first=Zack | title=Sen. Mike Lee’s tweets against “democracy,” explained | website=Vox | date=2020-10-08 | url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21507713/mike-lee-democracy-republic-trump-2020 |}}</ref> Trump himself doubled down, declaring that "the only way we're going to lose this election is if this election is rigged."<ref>Liptak, Kevin, [https://edition.cnn.com/2020/08/17/politics/donald-trump-campaign-swing/index.html Trump warns of 'rigged election' as he uses conspiracy and fear to counter Biden's convention week], ''[[CNN]]''. 18 August 2020.</ref>

Just months before the election, the [[FBI]] director rejected Trump's claims that voter fraud was a legitimate concern, testifying to Congress that, "We have not seen, historically, any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election, whether it’s by mail or otherwise."<ref>{{cite web | last=Cillizza | first=Chris | title=Analysis: The FBI director just totally shut down Donald Trump’s vote-fraud conspiracy | website=CNN | date=2020-09-25 | url=https://us.cnn.com/2020/09/25/politics/christopher-wray-election-fraud-vote-fraud/index.html |}}</ref>

===Other issues===
*<u>The Supreme Court</u>: Justice [[Ruth Bader Ginsburg]] died just 45 days before the election,<ref>{{cite web | last=Reston | first=Maeve | title=Analysis: Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death throws dramatic election into even more chaos | website=CNN | date=2020-09-19 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/19/politics/supreme-court-ginsburg-senate-2020/index.html |}}</ref> and the prospect of another Trump-appointed justice on the Court galvanized Democratic donors.<ref>{{cite web | title=Ginsburg's death draws big surge of donations to Democrats | website=AP News | date=2020-09-20 | url=https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-ruth-bader-ginsburg-elections-us-supreme-court-courts-36c93e5034e428b0b3a4078c2588bb30 |}}</ref> Despite the closeness to the election, Senate Republicans forced through Trump's nominee with the closest confirmation vote in American history.<ref>{{cite web | title=Barrett confirmed as Supreme Court justice in partisan vote | website=AP News | date=2020-10-27 | url=https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-donald-trump-virus-outbreak-ruth-bader-ginsburg-amy-coney-barrett-82a02a618343c98b80ca2b6bf9eafe07 |}}</ref> Despite fury from Democrats, Biden avoided discussing how or whether he would attempt to reform the Court.<ref>{{cite web | last=Sarah Mucha | first=Devan Cole | title=Biden says he’s ‘not a fan’ of court-packing and that he doesn’t want to make the election about the issue | website=CNN | date=2020-10-13 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/13/politics/joe-biden-court-packing-not-a-fan/index.html |}}</ref>
*<u>Climate change and the "Green New Deal"</u>: During the first Biden-Trump debate, Trump said he believed "to an extent" in the evidence that human greenhouse gas emissions are contributing to global warming, but he pledged to continue his administration's pro-fossil fuel policies.<ref>{{cite web | last=McKeever | first=Amy | title=Latest: Trump's and Biden's environmental policy promises and actions | website=Science | date=2020-10-28 | url=https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/latest-trump-biden-environmental-policy-promises-actions |}}</ref> While Biden said he would not follow or support the [[Green New Deal]] plan put forward by progressive Democrats, his $2 trillion climate plan was designed with significant input from progressives.<ref>{{cite web | last=Berardelli | first=Jeff | title=How Joe Biden's climate plan compares to the Green New Deal | website=CBS News | date=2020-10-05 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/green-new-deal-joe-biden-climate-change-plan/ |}}</ref>

==The campaign trail==
{{GOPTicket20}}
===The Trump campaign: what an absolute shitshow===
{{cquote|[[Proud Boys]], stand back and stand by.|||One of Trump's many insane statements, this time from his first debate with Biden.<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump to far-right extremists: 'Stand back and stand by' | website=AP News | date=2020-09-30 | url=https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-joe-biden-race-and-ethnicity-donald-trump-chris-wallace-0b32339da25fbc9e8b7c7c7066a1db0f |}}</ref>}}
Within hours of his inauguration, Trump filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to run for reelection, and he announced his reelection campaign no less than five times during his term.<ref>{{cite web | last=Graham | first=David A. | title=Trump Never Stopped Campaigning Long Enough to Govern | website=The Atlantic | date=2019-06-18 | url=https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/trump-cant-relaunch-a-campaign-that-never-stopped/591949/ |}}</ref> He never stopped campaigning, and instead turned the permanent campaign into a core element of his presidency.<ref>{{cite web | last=Martinez | first=Gabriela | title=How Trump has made campaigning 'part of the presidency' | website=PBS News | date=2019-06-18 | url=https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/how-trump-has-made-campaigning-part-of-the-presidency |}}</ref>

Of course, things weren't going to be so easy for Trump. He's just naturally better at campaigning offensively and presenting himself as an outsider politician; being the incumbent president forced him to defend his job performance while removing much of his outsider mystique.<ref>{{cite web | last=Greenblatt | first=Alan | title=Five Reasons Donald Trump Lost the Presidency | website=Governing | date=2020-11-03 | url=https://www.governing.com/now/five-reasons-donald-trump-lost-the-presidency.html |}}</ref> Sure enough, his reelection campaign was almost comically bad. His early campaign kickoffs seemed to have paid dividends in the form of a $1.6 billion cash advantage, but the Trump team managed to through most of that cash before the proper election season had even started.<ref>{{cite web | last=Kim | first=Soo Rin | title=How Trump’s team spent most of the $1.6 billion it raised over 2 years | website=ABC News | date=2020-10-24 | url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trumps-team-spent-16-billion-raised-years/story?id=73795897 |}}</ref> Trump's team was divided by finger-pointing, complaining, and "an atmosphere of [[paranoia]]."<ref>{{cite web | last=Isenstadt | first=Alex | title=Paranoia and finger-pointing in Trumpworld as election approaches | website=POLITICO | date=2020-10-24 | url=https://archive.ph/zGTdv}}</ref> Republican political consultant {{wpl|Frank Luntz|}} furiously said in October that, "I've never seen a campaign more mis-calibrated than the Trump campaign. Frankly, his staff ought to be brought up on charges of political malpractice," after noting the fact that the campaign's closing message was focusing more on Hunter Biden than on issues voters actually gave a shit about.<ref>{{cite web | last=Easley | first=Jonathan | title=GOP pollster Luntz blasts Trump campaign as worst he’s ever seen | website=The Hill | date=2020-10-20 | url=https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/521868-gop-pollster-luntz-blasts-trump-campaign-as-worst-hes-ever-seen/ |}}</ref> Discord between Trump's staffers and the increasingly distressed Republican National Committee grew to the point where communication between them broke down, and the RNC decided to run its own advertisements without consulting with Trump's people.<ref name="thisfuckingvirus">{{cite web | last=Korecki | first=Natasha | last2=Isenstadt | first2=Alex | last3=Kumar | first3=Anita | last4=Orr | first4=Gabby | last5=Cadelago | first5=Christopher | last6=Caputo | first6=Marc | title=Inside Donald Trump’s 2020 undoing | website=POLITICO | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/2020/11/07/this-f-ing-virus-inside-donald-trumps-2020-undoing-434716 |https://archive.ph/lHf61}}</ref>

In 2019, pundits widely noted that Trump had no real policy proposals for his second term and had presented basically no vision for what that term would look like or why he was even seeking it.<ref>{{cite web | last=Crowley | first=Michael | title=Trump Heads Into 2020 With No Clear Policy Agenda. But It May Not Matter. | website=The New York Times | date=2019-09-05 | url=https://archive.ph/h7Kds|}}</ref> The Republican Party didn't even publish a platform, instead opting to swear loyalty to Trump's whims and re-publish its 2016 platform<ref>{{cite web | last=Prokop | first=Andrew | title=Why Republicans didn’t write a platform for their convention this year | website=Vox | date=2020-08-24 | url=https://www.vox.com/2020/8/24/21399396/republican-convention-platform-2020-2016 |}}</ref>—in the process making it clear that much of the 2016 platform had not been realized by the Trump administration.<ref>{{cite web | last=Reich | first=Robert | title=Trump’s 40 Biggest Broken Promises | website=The American Prospect | date=2020-08-27 | url=https://prospect.org/politics/trumps-40-biggest-broken-promises/ |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=US election 2020: Has Trump delivered on his promises? | website=BBC News | date=2016-11-14 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-37982000 |}}</ref>

[[File:Donald Trump with supporters (50549003946).jpg|thumb|right|325px|Trump at a crowded rally in [[Arizona]], October 2020. We cannot stress enough that this picture was taken during a global pandemic.]]

Not to mention, Trump was also his usual deranged self on the campaign trail. Some of his greatest hits include "We'll have to get rid of the ballots" to ensure a peaceful transfer of power to himself,<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump on peaceful transition if he loses: 'Get rid of the ballots' and 'there won't be a transfer' | website=NBC News | date=2020-09-23 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/trump-peaceful-transition-if-he-loses-get-rid-ballots-there-n1240896 |}}</ref> or saying the US is more corrupt and harder to deal with than [[Russia]] and [[North Korea]],<ref>{{cite web | last=Chait | first=Jonathan | title=Trump: The U.S. Is Worse to Deal With Than Russia, China, or North Korea | website=Intelligencer | date=2020-11-03 | url=https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/11/trump-u-s-worse-to-deal-with-than-russia-china-north-korea.html |}}</ref> or suggesting that Biden was a pedophile who wanted to "destroy suburbia" while taking performance-enhancing drugs.<ref>{{cite web | last=Glasser | first=Susan B. | title=Here Are Twenty Other Disturbing, Awful Things That Trump Has Said This Month, and It’s Not Over Yet | website=The New Yorker | date=2020-09-24 | url=https://archive.ph/7zhlF}}</ref> Trump also decided that it would be a good idea to campaign against pop star {{wpl|Lady Gaga|}} for some reason (no, really<ref>{{cite web | title=The Countdown: Lady Gaga gets drawn in as campaign heats up | website=BBC Home | date=2020-11-02 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54776996 |}}</ref>) and promoted a [[conspiracy theory]] that the United States never actually killed [[Osama Bin Laden]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Sicard | first=Sarah | last2=Simkins | first2=J.D. | title=QAnon conspiracy about SEAL Team Six raid on Osama bin Laden picks up steam | website=Military Times | date=2020-10-15 | url=https://www.militarytimes.com/off-duty/military-culture/2020/10/15/qanon-conspiracy-about-seal-team-six-osama-bin-laden-raid-picks-up-steam/ |}}</ref> He even praised [[QAnon]].<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump praises QAnon conspiracists, appreciates support | website=AP News | date=2020-08-19 | url=https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-ap-top-news-religion-racial-injustice-535e145ee67dd757660157be39d05d3f |}}</ref>

Of course, Trump's biggest liability was COVID. While he was able to turn it around somewhat by campaigning against lockdowns, the undeniable fact was that Trump had botched the pandemic response and most voters knew it. After being warned about the issue in February by his staffers, Trump reportedly snapped, "This fucking virus, what does it have to do with me getting reelected?"<ref name="thisfuckingvirus"/> As it turned out, quite a bit. He stuck his head in the sand by insisting that testing less for the virus would make the problem go away<ref>{{cite web | last=Weixel | first=Nathaniel | title=Trump on coronavirus: ‘If we stop testing right now, we’d have very few cases, if any’ | website=The Hill | date=2020-06-15 | url=https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/502819-trump-on-coronavirus-if-we-stop-testing-right-now-wed-have-very-few-cases/ |}}</ref> and then laughably listing "ending the COVID-19 pandemic" as one of his achievements in October.<ref>{{cite web | last=Kelly | first=Caroline | title=White House lists ending Covid-19 pandemic as an accomplishment despite cases spiking to record levels | website=CNN | date=2020-10-28 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/27/politics/white-house-ending-covid-19-pandemic-accomplishment-record-cases-spike/index.html |}}</ref> His mixed-messaging on face masks was noted and criticized,<ref>{{cite web | last=Smith | first=Savannah | title=Unmasked: How Trump's mixed messaging on face-coverings hurt U.S. coronavirus response | website=NBC News | date=2020-08-10 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/calendar-confusion-february-august-trump-s-mixed-messages-masks-n1236088 |}}</ref> and a Stanford University study came out in late October indicating that Trump's packed campaign rallies (during a pandemic!) had directly caused more than 700 deaths.<ref>{{cite web | last=Lim | first=David | title=Study links Trump rallies to more than 700 Covid deaths | website=POLITICO | date=2020-10-31 | url=https://archive.ph/zzI9x}}</ref> 

Trump's insistence that COVID wasn't as devastating as it was, combined with his ineffective response and catching the virus himself, all presented the image of an incompetent jackass who didn't give a damn about the defining issue of the day.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bennett | first=Brian | last2=Rogers | first2=Tessa Berenson | title=How Donald Trump Lost The Election | website=TIME | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://time.com/5907973/donald-trump-loses-2020-election/ |}}</ref> And, of course, that image was reality. Fuck you, Donald.

===The Biden campaign: playing it safe and promising normalcy===
{{DemTicket20}}
{{cquote|With the coronavirus outbreak freezing the country’s public life, Mr. Biden has been forced to adapt to a cloistered mode of campaigning never before seen in modern American politics. [T]he former vice president is in a distinctive kind of lockdown, walled off from voters, separated from his top strategists and yet leading in the polls.|||"A Candidate in Isolation: Inside Joe Biden’s Cloistered Campaign," published by ''[[The New York Times]]'' on 25 April, 2020.<ref>{{cite web | last=Burns | first=Alexander | last2=Goldmacher | first2=Shane | last3=Glueck | first3=Katie | title=A Candidate in Isolation: Inside Joe Biden’s Cloistered Campaign | website=The New York Times | date=2020-04-25 | url=https://archive.ph/GPDVs}}</ref>}}
100 years ago in the year 1920, [[Warren G. Harding]] won the presidency by focusing his campaign message on a return to "normalcy" after the chaos of the [[Woodrow Wilson]] administration, the {{wpl|Spanish Flu|}}, and American intervention in [[World War I]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Magazine | first=Smithsonian | title=Warren Harding Tried to Return America to 'Normalcy' After WWI and the 1918 Pandemic. It Failed. | website=Smithsonian Magazine | date=2020-05-19 | url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/warren-harding-back-to-normalcy-after-1918-pandemic-180974911/ |}}</ref> In 2020, Biden's strategy was very similar: promising to heal the country after a period of unrest marked by an asshole incumbent and a deadly pandemic.<ref>{{cite web | title=Joe Biden’s ‘Return to Normalcy’ Campaign Has Echoes of 1920 | website=Bloomberg | url=https://archive.ph/vXr1K}}</ref> 

Consistently leading in the polls, Biden decided to play it safe.<ref name="howbidwon"/> While Republicans mocked him for "hiding in his basement" and Democrats fretted, Biden ran a primarily virtual campaign, the first of its kind.<ref>{{cite web | title=Basement-bound Biden campaign worries some Democrats | website=AP News | date=2020-05-13 | url=https://apnews.com/article/40f5b192c91a10574596b0b26ec1eb7c |}}</ref> Instead of holding in-person rallies, Biden appeared on news channels and talk shows while appearing regularly on a podcast he launched to speak directly to voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Gambino | first=Lauren | title=Biden's lead over Trump widens – but strain on his virtual campaign grows | website=the Guardian | date=2020-05-09 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/09/joe-biden-election-2020-online-campaign-trump |}}</ref> Biden presented himself as a steady and sober hand that would restore trust in America, and much of his strategy focused on allowing Trump the airtime and national prominence to shoot himself in the foot.<ref>{{cite web | last=Strauss | first=Daniel | last2=Gambino | first2=Lauren | title=Joe Biden: from a campaign that almost collapsed to fighting Trump for the presidency | website=the Guardian | date=2020-11-01 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/01/joe-biden-campaign-us-election |}}</ref>

Of course, Biden didn't just sit on his ass; there were things he actively got right. While Biden stuck to a moderate tone during the election, he did assemble a series of "unity task forces" with supporters of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.<ref>{{cite web | last=Detrow | first=Scott | title=Democratic Task Forces Deliver Biden A Blueprint For A Progressive Presidency | website=NPR | date=2020-07-08 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/07/08/889189235/democratic-task-forces-deliver-biden-a-blueprint-for-a-progressive-presidency |}}</ref> While Medicare-for-All didn't make it into the recommendations, the task forces did get Biden to pledge to some significant progressive policies such as net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, the creation of a postal banking system to expand banking access for low-income families, banning for-profit charter schools, and establishing universal prekindergarten for 3- and 4-year-olds.<ref>{{cite web | last=Nilsen | first=Ella | title=How Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders joined forces to craft a bold, progressive agenda | website=Vox | date=2020-07-09 | url=https://www.vox.com/21317850/joe-biden-bernie-sanders-task-forces-progressive-agenda |}}</ref> Biden learned from the mistakes of [[Hillary Clinton]] and made an affirmative case for himself instead of simply bashing Trump, and he made an effort to reach out to progressives and unite the Democrats.<ref>{{cite web | last=Merica | first=Dan | title=Biden team sees lessons in Clinton’s loss as Trump renews 2016 playbook | website=CNN | date=2020-05-20 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/20/politics/biden-strategy-2020-election-clinton-trump/index.html |}}</ref> 

One of his best moves was emphasizing compassion at a moment when the country felt uncertain and afraid. Biden emphasized his personal background—losing his first wife and baby daughter in a 1972 car accident and his son to [[cancer]] in 2015—to emphasize that he personally understood the losses people were experiencing due to COVID.<ref>{{cite web | last=McManus | first=Doyle | title=Column: Joe Biden's empathy was his superpower in 2020. Can he find it again in 2024? | website=Los Angeles Times | date=2024-04-15 | url=https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2024-04-15/column-joe-bidens-empathy-was-his-political-superpower-in-2020-can-he-find-it-again-in-2024 |}}</ref> He created solemn videos mourning COVID death milestones<ref name="howbidwon"/> in a stark contrast to Trump's indifference and repeated golfing trips during the same period.<ref>{{cite web | last=Haltiwanger | first=John | title=Trump went golfing 25 times as a virus swept across the US and killed over 200,000 Americans | website=Business Insider | date=2020-09-22 | url=https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-golfed-25-times-covid-19-spread-killed-over-200000-2020-9 |}}</ref> After the police murder of George Floyd and the subsequent protests, Biden recorded a video which was played at Floyd's funeral offering his condolences.<ref>{{cite web | title=Biden calls for 'racial justice' during emotional George Floyd funeral speech | website=NBC News | date=2020-06-09 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/biden-calls-racial-justice-during-emotional-george-floyd-funeral-speech-n1228566 |}}</ref> Presenting Biden as a kind man in contrast to Trump's cruelty created an affirmative argument in favor of voting for him, and it resonated with a large portion of American voters during a time of suffering.<ref>{{cite web | last=Beauchamp | first=Zack | title=The kindness is the point | website=Vox | date=2020-08-21 | url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/8/21/21394980/joe-biden-dnc-2020-summary-kindness |}}</ref> In the end, Biden's slow strategy of presenting caution and compassion to the nation paid off.

==Results (Trump, you're fired)==
[[File:2020.11.06 Outside the White House, Washington, DC USA 311 46053 (50573663956).jpg|thumb|right|385px|Protesters celebrate Trump's defeat outside the White House.]]
{{cquote|I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT!|||Donald Trump on [[Twitter]], 7 November.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bennett | first=John T. | title=Trump tweets he won the election 'BY A LOT' as he heads to golf | website=The Independent | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-election-2020/trump-joe-biden-voter-fraud-pennsylvania-election-b1672827.html |}}</ref>}}
On Election Night, it became clear that something had gone terribly wrong. Trump's strategy of stoking fears that Biden would introduce more lockdown measures and thereby destroy the economy resulted in a higher-than-expected level of support for the president,<ref name="guardecon"/> and the election came down to just a handful of states despite polls indicating an easy victory for Biden.<ref name="trumpleading">{{cite web | last=Montanaro | first=Domenico | title=Results Still Unclear And 5 Other Takeaways From Election Night 2020 | website=NPR | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/11/04/931083534/6-takeaways-from-election-night-2020 |}}</ref> Due to the large number of mail-in ballots and the archaic rules for processing them,<ref>{{cite web | last=Jeremy Herb | first=Fredreka Schouten | title=Workers whittle down piles of uncounted ballots in key states | website=CNN | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/04/politics/mail-in-ballots-pennsylvania-georgia-michigan-wisconsin/index.html |}}</ref> votes were counted slowly. The morning after the election, Trump was ahead by 13% in Pennsylvania with 64% of the vote counted and 6% in Michigan with 77% of the vote counted.<ref name="trumpleading"/> While the so-called "red mirage" of an early lead for Trump was expected and predictable,<ref>{{cite web | last=Cohen | first=Marshall | title=How to spot a red or blue ‘mirage’ in early election night results | website=CNN | date=2020-10-30 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/30/politics/red-blue-mirage-election-results/index.html |}}</ref> it was a strong sign that Trump's 2016 victories in the Rust Belt were no fluke. After a tense waiting period lasting several days, Biden's victory was confirmed on November 7 after Pennsylvania finally processed enough of its mail-in ballots to reveal the outcome.<ref>{{cite web | last=Cohen | first=Marshall | title=Analysis: How a post-election crisis was manufactured in Pennsylvania | website=CNN | date=2020-11-14 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/14/politics/pennsylvania-election-crisis/index.html |}}</ref> 

The satisfying result was that Trump became the 11th president in American history to lose reelection.<ref>{{cite web | last=Grantham-Philips | first=Wyatte | title=One-term presidents: U.S. presidents who ran for reelection but lost | website=USA TODAY | date=2020-10-30 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/10/30/one-term-presidents-u-s-presidents-who-ran-reelection-but-lost/6085465002/ |}}</ref> Biden won five of Trump's 2016 states: [[Pennsylvania]], [[Wisconsin]], [[Michigan]], [[Georgia]], and [[Arizona]]. On the other hand, Trump's easy victories in [[Ohio]], [[Iowa]], and [[Florida]] cemented those three states' transformations from swing states into Republican strongholds.<ref>{{cite web | last=Chinni | first=Dante | title=Vote in 2020 shows changing battleground map | website=NBC News | date=2020-11-15 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/vote-2020-shows-changing-battleground-map-n1247861 |}}</ref>

2020 saw the greatest turnout of the 21st century, the greatest number of votes cast in American history up to that point, and the highest Asian-American turnout ever recorded up to that point.<ref>{{cite web | last=Munson | first=Olivia | title=How many people voted in 2020? Inside the numbers on Biden vs. Trump | website=USA TODAY | date=2024-10-25 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/10/25/how-many-people-voted-2020-election/75838131007/ |}}</ref> In terms of the popular vote, Biden won 51.3% against Trump's 46.8%, a margin of over 7 million votes.<ref name="bigandsmall">{{cite web | last=Chinni | first=Dante | title=Did Biden win by a little or a lot? The answer is ... yes. | website=NBC News | date=2020-12-20 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/did-biden-win-little-or-lot-answer-yes-n1251845 |}}</ref> However, the swing states were much more Republican-leaning than the country as a whole, and Trump's resultant advantage in the [[Electoral College]] was the largest advantage any party has had since 1948.<ref>{{cite web | last=Skelley | first=Geoffrey | title=Even Though Biden Won, Republicans Enjoyed The Largest Electoral College Edge In 70 Years. Will That Last? | website=FiveThirtyEight | date=2021-01-19 | url=https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/even-though-biden-won-republicans-enjoyed-the-largest-electoral-college-edge-in-70-years-will-that-last/ |}}</ref> Back in 2016, Trump won the three states that put him over the top in the Electoral College by a combined 77,744 votes, while Biden won his three closest critical states by just 42,844 votes.<ref name="bigandsmall"/> Thanks to the USA's weird-ass election system, Biden won by more than Trump and less than Trump at the same time.

Biden's victory was driven by turnout: relatively few counties flipped from one party to other between 2016 and 2020, but Biden generally increased his support from most Democratic regions compared to Clinton's election performance.<ref name="turnout">{{cite web | last=Montanaro | first=Domenico | title=How Biden Won: Ramping Up The Base And Expanding Margins In The Suburbs | website=NPR | date=2020-11-18 | url=https://www.npr.org/2020/11/18/935730100/how-biden-won-ramping-up-the-base-and-expanding-margins-in-the-suburbs |}}</ref> Many of his largest improvements over Clinton came from suburban counties,<ref>{{cite web | title=Suburban gains powered Biden's 2020 win, but Trump's support swelled among women | website=NBC News | date=2021-06-30 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/new-data-shows-how-biden-trump-shifted-electorate-n1272852 |}}</ref> especially those around Atlanta and Philadelphia.<ref name="turnout"/> While Biden won a higher percentage of the white vote than Clinton in 2016 (a deficit of 17% compared to 20%), he lost ground with the major nonwhite voting cohorts.<ref name="brookariz">{{cite web | title=Exit polls show both familiar and new voting blocs sealed Biden’s win | website=Brookings | date=2022-03-09 | url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/2020-exit-polls-show-a-scrambling-of-democrats-and-republicans-traditional-bases/ |}}</ref> In Arizona and Georgia, for example, Biden won by sharply increasing his share of the white vote despite both states' racial diversity and what you would usually expect from a Democrat's performance.<ref name="brookariz"/> The loss in minority support was severe: compared to Clinton, Biden lost 8 points with Latino voters and lost 3 points with Black voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Prokop | first=Andrew | title=A new report complicates simplistic narratives about race and the 2020 election | website=Vox | date=2021-05-10 | url=https://www.vox.com/2021/5/10/22425178/catalist-report-2020-election-biden-trump-demographics |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=How 2024 exit polls compare with the 2020 and 2016 elections | website=CNN | date=2024-11-06 | url=https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2024/politics/2020-2016-exit-polls-2024-dg/ |}}</ref> In summary, Biden's victory was nice to have, but it showed ominous signs for the Democratic Party's future.

===Table===
All candidates who received over 1% of the popular vote.
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Candidate
!Electoral vote
!Popular vote
!States carried
!Percentage
|-
|style="background:#0000FF; color:#FFF"|'''Joe Biden'''
|306
|81,283,501
|25 + [[District of Columbia|DC]] + [[Nebraska]]-2
|51.3%
|-
|style="background:#FF0000 ; color:#FFF"|'''Donald Trump'''
|232
|74,223,975
|25 + [[Maine]]-2
|46.8%
|-
|style="background:#FFFF00; color:#000000"|'''Jo Jorgensen'''
|0
|1,865,535
|0
|1.18%
|}

===Maps===
<gallery mode="packed" heights="300">
File:ElectoralCollege2020.svg|[[United States Electoral College|Electoral College]] votes from each state and the District of Columbia.{{efn|[[Maine]] and [[Nebraska]] both allocate their electoral votes by congressional district, with two votes going to the state at-large. Trump won Maine-2, and Biden won Nebraska-2.}}
File:2020 United States presidential election results map by county.svg|Results by county, shaded by the winner's vote share. 
File:2020 U.S. presidential election margins.svg|Results by margin of victory in each state.
File:U.S. 2016 to 2020 presidential election swing.svg|Swing in county margins from 2020 to 2024. Some of the starkest shifts happened in Hispanic regions.
</gallery>

===Close states===
States where the margin of victory was under 1%:
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Georgia, 0.23% (11,779 votes) – 16 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Arizona, 0.31% (10,457 votes) – 11 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Wisconsin, 0.63% (20,682 votes) – 10 electoral votes'''</span> (tipping-point state)

States where the margin of victory was between 1% and 5%:
# '''<span style="color:darkblue;background:white">Pennsylvania, 1.16% (80,555 votes) – 20 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''North Carolina, 1.35% (74,483 votes) – 15 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Nevada, 2.39% (33,596 votes) – 6 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Michigan, 2.78% (154,188 votes) – 16 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''Florida, 3.36% (371,686 votes) – 29 electoral votes'''</span>

States/districts where the margin of victory was between 5% and 10%:
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''Texas, 5.58% (631,221 votes) – 38 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Nebraska's 2nd congressional district, 6.50% (22,091 votes) – 1 electoral vote'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Minnesota, 7.11% (233,012 votes) – 10 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''New Hampshire, 7.35% (59,267 votes) – 4 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''Maine's 2nd congressional district, 7.44% (27,996 votes) – 1 electoral vote'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''Ohio, 8.03% (475,669 votes) – 18 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkred;background:white">'''Iowa, 8.20% (138,611 votes) – 6 electoral votes'''</span>
# <span style="color:darkblue;background:white">'''Maine, 9.07% (74,335 votes) – 2 electoral votes'''</span>

==Aftermath==
[[File:Trump December 2020 Oval.jpg|thumb|right|365px|Trump in the Oval Office, December 2020. Staffers described him as "moody" and "sometimes depressed" during this period.<ref>{{cite web | last=Baker | first=Peter | title=Trump’s Final Days of Rage and Denial | website=The New York Times | date=2020-12-05 | url=https://archive.ph/zmN4s}}</ref>]]
===Trump's post-election meltdown===
The day after the election took place, Trump falsely declared victory even though the swing states were still counting votes and neither candidate had reached the threshold to be elected yet.<ref>{{cite web | last=Wilkie | first=Christina | title=Trump tries to claim victory even as ballots are being counted in several states | website=CNBC | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/04/trump-tries-to-claim-victory-even-as-ballots-are-being-counted-in-several-states-nbc-has-not-made-a-call.html |}}</ref> During Election Night and the days after, the president posted a desperate and unhinged flurry of Tweets claiming victory and claiming that votes were being "illegally" counted past Election Night to deny him that victory.<ref>{{cite web | last=Qiu | first=Linda | title=Trump has amplified voting falsehoods in over 300 tweets since election night. | website=The New York Times | date=2020-11-16 | url=https://archive.ph/JEJUS}}</ref> 

Despite everything, Trump had begun Election Day convinced that he would defeat Joe Biden.<ref name="trumpdestruct">{{cite web | last=Liptak | first=Kevin | title=Inside Trump’s loss: A culmination of self-destructive decisions | website=CNN | date=2020-11-08 | url=https://edition.cnn.com/2020/11/08/politics/donald-trump-loss-election-2020/index.html |}}</ref> Fearful of telling the president bad news, his campaign team encouraged that confidence and encouraged him to believe that he was winning the election even after the results made clear that he was losing.<ref name="trumpfantasy">{{cite web | last=Rucker | first=Philip | last2=Parker | first2=Ashley | last3=Dawsey | first3=Josh | last4=Gardner | first4=Amy | title=20 days of fantasy and failure: Inside Trump’s quest to overturn the election | website=Washington Post | date=2020-11-29 | url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201206163715/https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-election-overturn/2020/11/28/34f45226-2f47-11eb-96c2-aac3f162215d_story.html}}</ref> He arrived back at the White House from his watch party in the early hours of the morning, looking tired and haggard, but his tiredness turned to rage after watching ''[[Fox News]]'' call the Republican stronghold of [[Arizona]] for Biden.<ref name="trumpdestruct"/> In the days afterwards, Trump refused to concede and alternated between despondence and anger.<ref name="trumpdestruct"/> 

Trump's family members, including his son-in-law Jared Kusher, privately approached the president to urge him to at least write a concession speech, but the president rebuffed them.<ref name="trumpdestruct"/> Multiple national-level Republicans condemned Trump's denial of the results and publicly called on him to concede.<ref>{{cite web | last=Perkins | first=Tom | last2=Beaumont | first2=Peter | title=Donald Trump's baseless vote fraud claim opens cracks in Republican ranks | website=the Guardian | date=2020-11-07 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/06/republicans-break-ranks-with-donald-trump-over-baseless-vote-claim |}}</ref> Despite the utter lack of evidence and many Republican officials speaking to the contrary, half of Republican voters believed the election was rigged.<ref>[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-poll-idUSKBN27Y1AJ Half of Republicans say Biden won because of a 'rigged' election: Reuters/Ipsos poll] by Chris Kahn (November 18, 2020 3:05 AM) ''Reuters''.</ref>

In the days following the election, after it became clear that his refusal to concede was just a giant fit of childishness, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley became increasingly alarmed that Trump would attempt stage a [[self-coup]] similar to what [[Hitler]] did on March 23, 1933 (a "Reichstag moment" in Milley's words).<ref name=thebault>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/joint-chiefs-chairman-feared-potential-reichstag-moment-aimed-at-keeping-trump-in-power/2021/07/14/a326f5fe-e4ec-11eb-a41e-c8442c213fa8_story.html Joint Chiefs chairman feared potential ‘Reichstag moment’ aimed at keeping Trump in power] by Reis Thebault (July 14, 2021) ''The Washington Post''.</ref><ref name=gangel>[https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/14/politics/donald-trump-election-coup-new-book-excerpt/index.html 'They're not going to f**king succeed': Top generals feared Trump would attempt a coup after election, according to new book] by Jamie Gangel et al. (July 14, 2021) ''CNN''.</ref><ref>[https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/germany-1933-democracy-dictatorship/ Germany 1933: From democracy to dictatorship] ''Anne Frank House''.</ref> This was prescient on the part of Milley because Trump did attempt to stage a self-coup on January 6, 2021, and Milley took steps preceding the coup to assure that Trump would not be able to seize control of the military if a coup attempt did happen.<ref name=thebault/><ref name=gangel/> This is one of those rare cases when a [[Nazi analogies|Nazi analogy]] is valid.

===Time-wasting lawsuits from Trump's legal team===
[[File:Giuliani Four Seasons Press Conference 2020.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Giuliani's farcical press conference at Four Seasons Total Landscaping.]]
While Trump publicly demanded that states stop counting votes, he privately raged at his legal team for failing to successfully challenge the ongoing count in court.<ref>{{cite web | last=Orden | first=Erica | last2=Perez | first2=Evan | last3=Scannell | first3=Kara | last4=Liptak | first4=Kevin | title=Trump unhappy with legal team’s lack of major impact on election count | website=CNN | date=2020-11-06 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/06/politics/trump-legal-team/index.html |}}</ref> The subsequent weeks and months would give the president a plethora of new reasons to be disappointed with his lawyers. 

On November 8, the president's legal team led by [[Rudy Giuliani]] held a press conference to explain their legal strategy to supporters and the press. While it was supposed to take place at the luxury Four Seasons hotel in Philadelphia, a farcical mix-up led to the conference being held at Four Seasons Total Landscaping, a suburban business situated between a crematorium and an erotica bookstore.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bekiempis | first=Victoria | title=Keep on digging: Trump team holds press conference at suburban garden centre | website=the Guardian | date=2020-11-08 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/08/the-other-four-seasons-trump-team-holds-press-conference-at-suburban-garden-centre |}}</ref> Sometimes truth really is stranger than fiction. 

By early December, Trump's lawyers filed and promptly lost over 50 legal challenges to the election result.<ref name="scotuspenn">{{cite web | last=Liptak | first=Adam | title=Supreme Court Rejects Republican Challenge to Pennsylvania Vote | website=The New York Times | date=2020-12-08 | url=https://archive.ph/pUAwv}}</ref> Trump's own appointees were among the judges tossing his cases.<ref>{{cite web | last=Alexander | first=Harriet | title=Trump-appointed judges among 86 who have so far dismissed election fraud law suits | website=The Telegraph | date=2020-12-13 | url=https://archive.ph/nW91N}}</ref> On December 4, Trump's team hilariously had cases dismissed in six states on the same day.<ref name="sixstate">{{cite web | last=Cheney | first=Kyle | last2=Gerstein | first2=Josh | title=Donald Trump’s brutal day in court | website=POLITICO | date=2020-12-04 | url=https://archive.ph/GNFix}}</ref> One of the most strongly-worded opinions came from a conservative judge in Wisconsin: "The relief being sought by the petitioners is the most dramatic invocation of judicial power I have ever seen. Judicial acquiescence to such entreaties built on so flimsy a foundation would do indelible damage to every future election."<ref name="sixstate"/> 

A challenge to Pennsylvania's result made it to the Supreme Court on December 8, and the Court unanimously issued a one sentence order refusing to consider the case.<ref name="scotuspenn"/> A few days later, another case reached SCOTUS. This time, it came from [[Texas]] Attorney General {{wpl|Ken Paxton|}}, who convinced no less than 18 other Republican state attorneys general and 126 Republican members of Congress to sign on to his ''Texas v. Pennsylvania'' case seeking to throw out the results in Biden's four closest-won states.<ref>{{cite web | last=Biskupic | first=Joan | title=The Supreme Court’s clear message to President Trump: Stop | website=CNN | date=2020-12-12 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/11/politics/trump-turmoil-supreme-court/index.html |}}</ref> On December 12, the Court issued a 7-2<ref>{{cite web | last=Howe | first=Amy | title=Justices throw out Texas lawsuit that sought to block election outcome | website=SCOTUSblog | date=2020-12-12 | url=https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/12/justices-throw-out-texas-lawsuit-that-sought-to-block-election-outcome/ |}}</ref> judgement that Texas had no legal standing to sue.<ref>{{cite web | last=Ariane de Vogue | first=Maegan Vazquez | title=Supreme Court rejects Trump’s bid to overturn election | website=CNN | date=2020-12-11 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/11/politics/supreme-court-texas-trump-biden/index.html |}}</ref> Trump reacted with his characteristic whining: "The Supreme Court has really let us down. No Wisdom, No Courage!"<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump lashes out at Supreme Court after Texas election lawsuit rejected | website=CBS News | date=2020-12-12 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-supreme-court-texas-lawsuit-election/ |}}</ref>

This all happened for good reason: his legal team were morons (and the president moreso). The lawsuits were based on no evidence, and while Biden's victory was decided by tens of thousands of votes, the lawsuits focused on small-potatoes technical issues that had no chance of changing those tens of thousands of votes.<ref>{{cite web | title=‘Frivolous,’ ‘Insubstantial,’ ‘Bad Faith’: Harvard Law Experts Weigh In On Trump Election Lawsuits | website=The Harvard Crimson | date=2020-11-19 | url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2020/11/19/hls-trump-election-lawsuits/ |}}</ref> While the president's legal team spoke of a rigged election in public, they changed their tune in court to avoid sounding like absolute lunatics before the justice system.<ref>{{cite web | last=Rogers | first=Tessa Berenson | title=In Court, Trump's Lawyers Aren't Claiming 'Massive' Fraud | website=TIME | date=2020-11-20 | url=https://time.com/5914377/donald-trump-no-evidence-fraud/ |}}</ref>

===More attempts to overturn the results===
Trump's campaign against the forces of reality were not limited to mere lawsuits. He also abused the powers of his office by mounting a public pressure campaign against Republican officials in the swing states to encourage them to interfere with the results directly.<ref name="gopoff">{{cite web | last=Rucker | first=Philip | last2=Gardner | first2=Amy | last3=Dawsey | first3=Josh | title=Trump uses power of presidency to try to overturn the election and stay in office | website=Washington Post | date=2020-11-20 | url=https://archive.ph/ajdOm}}</ref> The president was directly involved. Trump personally made phone calls to two Republican members of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers, urging them to unilaterally throw out the results from this majority-Black county in Michigan.<ref>{{cite web | last=Mauger | first=Craig | title=Trump recorded pressuring Wayne Co. canvassers not to certify 2020 vote | website=detroitnews.com | date=2023-12-21 | url=https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2023/12/21/donald-trump-recorded-pressuring-wayne-canvassers-not-to-certify-2020-vote-michigan/72004514007/ |}}</ref> Trump then held a meeting in the White House with Michigan's state Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield, but he failed to convince them to participate in his attempts to deny the will of Michigan's voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Clark | first=Dartunorro | title=Michigan election board votes to certify Biden win, dealing blow to Trump effort | website=NBC News | date=2020-11-23 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/michigan-election-board-votes-certify-biden-win-dealing-blow-trump-n1248685 |}}</ref>

Trump also set his sights on Georgia, demanding that its Republican governor {{wpl|Brian Kemp|}} use "emergency powers" to block the certification of the results and then call a special legislative session to name a slate of Republican electors.<ref name="kemp">{{cite web | last=Bluestein | first=Greg | title=How Brian Kemp Resisted Trump’s Pressure to Overturn the Georgia Election Results | website=POLITICO | date=2022-03-19 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/03/19/brian-kemp-david-perdue-donald-trump-2020-00018601 |}}</ref> Ever the moaning bitch, Trump responded to Kemp's refusals by taking to social media to call him an "obstructionist who refuses to admit that we won Georgia, BIG!" before trying to order Kemp to resign.<ref>{{cite web | title=Georgia governor pushes back on Trump's call for resignation | website=AP News | date=2020-12-30 | url=https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-georgia-elections-atlanta-d491c77a42460d122dcef2f9770224dd |}}</ref> Trump also made a phone call to Georgia's Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, to command him to "find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have."<ref>{{cite web | last=Knutson | first=Jacob | title=The call that got Trump in trouble in Georgia | website=Axios | date=2023-08-15 | url=https://www.axios.com/2023/08/15/trump-georgia-election-interference-call |}}</ref> Raffensperger refused, not eager to commit actual election fraud and get himself arrested. 

===The "fake electors" plot===
[[File:Kenneth Chesebro mugshot.jpg|thumb|right|245px|Mugshot of Kenneth "Cheese Bro" Chesebro, taken in Fulton County, Georgia in 2023.]]
The real point behind Trump's interference with state certifications was to enable the Trump administration's illegal plot to send un-elected individuals to the Electoral College from states that Biden won to vote for Trump on behalf of those states. This plot originated the day after Trump's defeat, first outlined by Wisconsin lawyer and Trump campaign attorney {{wpl|Kenneth Chesebro|}}<ref name="cheesebro">{{cite web | title=New emails show Trump’s stealing the 2020 election was always Plan A | website=MSNBC.com | date=2024-03-06 | url=https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-kenneth-chesebro-emails-fake-electors-rcna141978 |}}</ref> (yes, the Wisconsin guy's name was Cheese Bro).

Under federal law, December 8 was the "safe harbor" deadline for states to certify their election results and confirm the electors that they will send to the Electoral College.<ref name="sharbor">{{cite web | last=LeBlanc | first=Paul | title=Analysis: Biden won, but the election is still not over. Here are the key dates to watch | website=CNN | date=2020-11-23 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/22/politics/what-matters-for-november-22/index.html |}}</ref> If the safe harbor deadline was not met, Republicans argued, then Congress could consider "alternate" slates of electors.<ref name="sharbor"/> All of the legal challenges and all of the phone calls and meetings described above were part of a strategy to delay the certification of the election results.<ref>{{cite web | title=Trump making longshot bid to slow state vote certifications | website=AP News | date=2020-11-13 | url=https://apnews.com/article/trump-bid-slow-state-vote-ceritification-f221509e0baf30cbd004428f04b152fa |}}</ref> Chesebro's idea was that Republican-controlled state legislatures could unilaterally appoint electors for Trump in defiance of the will of the voters and then demand that Congress count those electors.<ref name="cheesebro"/> Trump held an in-person meeting with Chesbro in the Oval Office about implementing this plan.<ref>{{cite web | last=Cohen | first=Marshall | title=Exclusive: Recordings describe 2020 Oval Office photo-op where Trump was briefed on fake electors and January 6 | website=CNN | date=2023-12-13 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/13/politics/trump-2020-oval-office-fake-electors-recordings |}}</ref>

Trump supporters in seven Biden-won states submitted phony electoral vote certificates to Congress, none of which contained any indication that the electors listed had not been chosen by the states' voters.<ref>{{cite web | last=Oversight | first=American | title=American Oversight Obtains Seven Phony Certificates of Pro-Trump Electors | website=American Oversight | date=2021-03-02 | url=https://americanoversight.org/american-oversight-obtains-seven-phony-certificates-of-pro-trump-electors/ |}}</ref> Luckily, all seven swing states went ahead and certified Biden's electoral college victory by the deadline, refusing to participate in this illegal and far-fetched scheme.<ref name="fakelec">{{cite web | last=Jarrett | first=Laura | title=What to know about the Trump 'fake electors' scheme in the 2020 election | website=NBC News | date=2023-08-03 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/what-know-fake-electors-trump-indictment-2020-election-rcna98013 |}}</ref> At this point, it was clear that the fake electors plot had failed. But Trump's and Chesebro still had one last-ditch plan...

===January 6th coup attempt===
[[File:2021 storming of the United States Capitol DSC09156 (50826223403).jpg|thumb|right|350px|A functional gallows built by people shouting "Hang Mike Pence!".<ref>[https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/15/dc-capitol-rioters-nearly-reached-vice-president-mike-pence.html Capitol rioters came within a minute of reaching Pence, report says]. ''NBC News.''</ref>]]
{{main|2021 U.S. coup attempt}}
In a meeting on December 16 after the states certified the election results, Chesebro falsely told Trump that it was still possible to overturn the election because fake electors in six states had held their own ceremonies to vote for Trump, filling the president with false hope and more anger.<ref>{{cite web | last=Willis | first=Haisten | last2=Duda | first2=Jeremy | last3=Masterson | first3=Kathleen | last4=Fahrenthold | first4=David A. | title=As electoral college formalizes Biden’s win, Trump backers hold their own vote | website=Washington Post | date=2020-12-14 | url=https://archive.ph/0f9HO}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=The mountain of evidence against Trump is still growing bigger | website=MSNBC.com | date=2023-12-15 | url=https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-kenneth-cheseboro-fake-electors-audio-rcna129791 |}}</ref> This began a sustained pressure campaign on Vice President [[Mike Pence]], as Trump and his team believed that Pence could theoretically use the administration's undermining of the election result as an excuse to throw out Electoral College votes from states that Biden won while presiding over Congress' formalization of the results on January 6th.<ref name="pencepress">{{cite web | last=Jalonick | first=Mary Clare | last2=Amiri | first2=Farnoush | last3=Press | first3=Associated | title=What we know about how Pence's day unfolded on Jan. 6 | website=PBS News | date=2022-06-16 | url=https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/as-jan-6-hearings-what-we-know-about-how-pences-day-unfolded-on-jan-6 |}}</ref> Pence, of course, did not actually have this power.<ref>{{cite web | last=Naylor | first=Brian | title=Pence says Trump is wrong to insist VP could have overturned election results | website=NPR | date=2022-02-04 | url=https://www.npr.org/2022/02/04/1078367504/pence-says-trump-is-wrong-to-insist-he-could-have-overturned-election-results |}}</ref> 

An increasingly unhinged Trump tweeted about Pence throughout January 5th with statements like "If Vice President @Mike_Pence comes through for us, we will win the Presidency," or "All Mike Pence has to do is send them back to the States, AND WE WIN! Do it Mike, this is a time for extreme courage!"<ref name="pencepress"/> In the lead-up to January 6th, Texas Representative [[Louie Gohmert]] ("The Dumbest Guy in Congress"<ref>{{cite web | last=Spocchia | first=Gino | title=Gohmert mocked for ‘dumbest guy in Congress’ admission | website=The Independent | date=2021-06-10 | url=https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/louis-gohmert-dumbest-guy-congress-b1851356.html |}}</ref>) even sued Mike Pence to claim that the Vice President had the ability to overturn the election results; this was immediately laughed out of court.<ref>{{cite web | last=Berman | first=Dan | title=Federal judge throws out Gohmert lawsuit asking Pence to interfere in Electoral College count | website=CNN | date=2021-01-02 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/01/politics/gohmert-pence-electoral-college-lawsuit-thrown-out/index.html |}}</ref><ref>[https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.txed.203073/gov.uscourts.txed.203073.37.0.pdf Order of Dismissal for ''Gohmert v. Pence''.]</ref>  

Meanwhile, Trump announced plans to hold a protest event at the Capitol during the formalization proceedings, writing "Be there, will be wild!" on Twitter.<ref>{{cite web | last=Carless | first=Will | title=Trump protest DC: Jan. 6 rallies against election loss may be violent | website=USA TODAY | date=2021-01-04 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/01/04/january-6-dc-protests-against-election-certification-could-violent/4132441001/ |}}</ref> The protest organizers collaborated with extremist hate groups like the [[Proud Boys]] and the [[Oath Keepers]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Andrew Kaczynski | first=Em Steck | title=Videos show ‘Stop the Steal’ rally organizer saying he would work with extremist groups | website=CNN | date=2022-01-22 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/22/politics/ali-alexander-january-6-extremists-kfile/index.html |}}</ref> On January 6th, Trump spoke to his gathered supporters near the Capitol, telling them to "fight like hell" and again saying that, "All Vice President Pence has to do is send it back to the states to recertify and we become president and you are the happiest people."<ref name="pencepress"/> 

Incited by their president, Trump's supporters violently stormed the Capitol building in an attempt to prevent the confirmation of Biden's victory.<ref>{{cite web | last=Dozier | first=Kimberly | last2=Bergengruen | first2=Vera | title=Incited by the President, Pro-Trump Rioters Violently Storm the Capitol | website=TIME | date=2021-01-06 | url=https://time.com/5926883/trump-supporters-storm-capitol/ |}}</ref> In the process, they assaulted police officers, resulting in the death of one officer and serious injuries for others.<ref>{{cite web | last=Dreisbach | first=Tom | title=As Trump rewrites history, victims of the Jan. 6 riot say they feel 'betrayed' | website=NPR | date=2025-01-05 | url=https://www.npr.org/2025/01/05/nx-s1-5200594/jan-6-attack-capitol-riot-victims-violence |}}</ref> Police shot rioter Ashli Babbitt while she was attempting to climb through a broken window.<ref>{{cite web | last=Jalonick | first=Mary Clare | last2=Press | first2=Associated | title=Ashli Babbitt, Jan. 6 insurrectionist portrayed as martyr by some, had violent past | website=PBS News | date=2022-01-03 | url=https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/ashli-babbitt-jan-6-insurrectionist-portrayed-as-martyr-by-some-had-violent-past |}}</ref> Mike Pence spent the afternoon in hiding within the building while Trump tweeted that "Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what should have been done," and protesters screamed "Hang Mike Pence!" outside with a makeshift gallows.<ref name="pencepress"/> 

After the trashed and vandalized building was cleared, Congress reconvened and Pence presided over the confirmation of Biden's victory.<ref>{{cite web | title=Capitol riots: Congress certifies Joe Biden's victory after chaotic scenes | website=BBC Home | date=2021-01-07 | url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-55568621 |}}</ref> 

In the wake of the coup attempt, Twitter suspended Trump's account on the basis that company rules forbade someone from using their account to incite and encourage an attack on the United States.<ref>{{cite web | last=Allyn | first=Bobby | title=Twitter Permanently Suspends Trump, Citing 'Risk Of Further Incitement Of Violence' | website=NPR | date=2021-01-08 | url=https://www.npr.org/2021/01/08/954760928/twitter-bans-president-trump-citing-risk-of-further-incitement-of-violence |}}</ref> Who knew? The House of Representatives also impeached Trump for an unprecedented second time, and a majority of Senators (57, including 7 Republicans) voted to convict Trump.<ref name="impeachhisass">{{cite web | last=Montanaro | first=Domenico | title=Senate Acquits Trump In Impeachment Trial | website=NPR | date=2021-02-13 | url=https://www.npr.org/sections/trump-impeachment-trial-live-updates/2021/02/13/967098840/senate-acquits-trump-in-impeachment-trial-again |}}</ref> Unfortunately, 57 fell short of the 67 needed to convict Trump and prevent him from holding office ever again.<ref name="impeachhisass"/>

==Election denial conspiracy theories (and why they were stupid)==
[[File:Stop The Steal (50607710992).jpg|thumb|right|385px|Idiots gather at a "Stop the Steal" rally in Minnesota, November 14.]]
{{main|Voter fraud}}
{{cquote|If there was evidence of fraud, I had no motive to suppress it. But my suspicion all the way along was that there was nothing there. It was all [[bullshit]].|||[[Bill Barr]], Trump's Attorney General from 2019-December 2020<ref>[https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/06/william-barrs-trump-administration-attorney-general/619298/ Inside William Barr’s Breakup With Trump: In the final months of the administration, the doggedly loyal attorney general finally had enough.] by Jonathan D. Karl (June 27, 2021) ''The Atlantic''.</ref>}}
Before and after his loss,<ref>[https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-longstanding-history-calling-elections-rigged-doesnt-results/story?id=74126926/ Trump has longstanding history of calling elections 'rigged' if he doesn’t like the results] by Terrance Smith (November 11, 2020, 2:24 AM) ''ABC News''.</ref><ref>[https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53898142 RNC 2020: Trump warns Republican convention of ‘rigged election’] (25 August 2020) ''BBC News''.</ref> Donald Trump claimed the 2020 election was rigged against him. He largely pushed this objectively false,<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/10/us/politics/voting-fraud.html The Times Called Officials in Every State: No Evidence of Voter Fraud] by Nick Corasaniti et al. (Published Nov. 10, 2020; Updated Nov. 19, 2020) ''The New York Times''.</ref> conspiracy theory by rage and [[Danth's Law|despair tweeting on Twitter]].<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/16/technology/trump-has-amplified-voting-falsehoods-in-over-300-tweets-since-election-night.html Trump has amplified voting falsehoods in over 300 tweets since election night.] by Linda Qiu (Nov. 16, 2020, 3:44 p.m. ET) ''The New York Times''.</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Jibilian | first=Isabella | title=Twitter slaps new label on Trump's tweets that falsely claim to have won the election | website=Business Insider | date=2020-11-16 | url=https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-2020-election-label-trump-false-i-won-the-election-2020-11 |}}</ref><ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/11/13/trump-lost-his-twitter-feed-keeps-giving-supporters-false-hope/ Trump lost. But his Twitter feed keeps giving supporters false hope.] by Glenn Kessler (November 13, 2020 at 12:00 a.m. PST) ''The Washington Post''.</ref> 

Many of the false claims were initially propagated by Russell J. Ramsland Jr. with his company Allied Security Operations Group. Ramsland tried unsuccessfully to push similar false claims in 2018, but at that time no candidate took his bait.<ref name=brown>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/2021/trump-election-fraud-texas-businessman-ramsland-asog/ The making of a myth: Russell J. Ramsland Jr. sold everything from Tex-Mex food to light-therapy technology. Then he sold the story that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.] by Emma Brown et al. (May 9, 2021) ''The Washington Post''.</ref> In 2020, the false claims were incorporated into failed lawsuits by Trump lawyer [[Sidney Powell]], and by Trump surrogates ([[Louie Gohmert]] and [[Rudy Giuliani]]).<ref name=brown/>

Some of the most popular fraud claims included:

==="Dead people voted!"===
Trump supporters across the country alleged that states received and processed votes from dead people, claiming that this was ironclad proof of either widespread voter fraud or an impending [[zombie]] outbreak.<ref>{{cite web | title=False claims of voting fraud, pushed by Trump, thrive online | website=AP News | date=2020-11-10 | url=https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-joe-biden-donald-trump-politics-media-1bf96bf3910bdcbe0f125958357c8f1a |}}</ref><ref name="zombies">{{cite web | last=Perkins | first=Tom | title=The dead voter conspiracy theory peddled by Trump voters, debunked | website=the Guardian | date=2020-11-18 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/18/dead-voter-conspiracy-theory-debunked |}}</ref> In reality, those Trump supporters just had a bad case of the stupids. The supposed "dead voters" were either found alive or were confirmed to be dead people who had remained in their graves as expected.<ref name="zombies"/><ref>{{cite web | last=Holmes Lybrand | first=Tara Subramaniam | title=Fact check: Evidence undermines Trump campaign’s claims of dead people voting in Georgia | website=CNN | date=2020-11-13 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/12/politics/trump-campaign-georgia-dead-voters-fact-check/index.html |}}</ref> 

State election officials regularly check death records, make note of obituaries, and coordinate with motor vehicle departments to track canceled driver’s licenses all to make sure that dead people don't vote.<ref name="deadpeeps2">{{cite web | last=Swenson | first=Ali | title=How do states ensure dead people’s ballots aren’t counted? | website=AP News | date=2022-10-21 | url=https://apnews.com/article/2022-midterm-elections-voting-government-and-politics-presidential-299b03156144b12c0298184498f07958 |}}</ref> Quite a lot of work goes into this process. If a dead person is accidentally sent a mail ballot, and then it gets sent back, safeguards such as signature verifications are employed during the processing of mail ballots.<ref name="deadpeeps2"/> 

Quite a few people made clowns of themselves due to this false claim. [[Tucker Carlson]] of [[Fox News]] had to apologize on-air to a 96 year-old woman for accusing her of voting for her dead husband.<ref>{{cite web | last=Yasharoff | first=Hannah | title=Fox News host Tucker Carlson apologizes for false claim of voter fraud | website=USA TODAY | date=2020-11-15 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2020/11/15/fox-news-host-tucker-carlson-apologizes-false-claim-voter-fraud/6303120002/ |}}</ref> The Trump campaign, after investing a great deal of money and effort, hilariously produced a report in 2023 disproving claims that dead people voted.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bekiempis | first=Victoria | title=Trump’s own research showed that voter fraud did not cost him election – report | website=the Guardian | date=2023-03-17 | url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/17/trump-research-voter-fraud-claims-debunked |}}</ref>

==="Poll challengers were not allowed to watch ballot counts!"===
{{cquote|This claim, like Frankenstein's Monster, has been haphazardly stitched together...|||Judge William Brann, ''Donald J. Trump for President v. Boockvar''.<ref>[https://www.democracydocket.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/45/2020/11/Order-Granting-MTD.pdf DONALD J. TRUMP FOR PRESIDENT, INC., et al., v. KATHY BOOCKVAR, et al.]</ref>}}
Elections allow a certain number of challengers into counting areas to watch ballot counters. In Detroit, for example, MAGA supporters claimed they were being denied their right to watch the count. In reality, they were kept out because the number of challengers (Democrat and Republican alike) had already been met and those individuals were already inside the building.<ref>{{cite web | last=Baldas | first=Tresa | last2=Shamus | first2=Kristen Jordan | last3=Warikoo | first3=Niraj | last4=Petzold | first4=Evan | title=Chaos erupts at TCF Center in Detroit as challengers cry foul | website=Detroit Free Press | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/04/tcf-center-challengers-detroit-michigan/6164715002/ |}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=Fact check: Republican and Democrat challengers were present inside Detroit count | website=Reuters | date=2020-11-05 | url=https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-detroit/fact-check-republican-and-democrat-challengers-were-present-inside-detroit-count-idUSKBN27L2DR/ |}}</ref>

This claim also made it to federal court when Trump's legal team filed a lawsuit against Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar and the boards of elections of six counties claiming that their observers were unable to stand close enough to watch workers count mail and absentee ballots.<ref name="boock">{{cite web | title=Trump for President v. Boockvar et al. | website=ACLU Pennsylvania | date=2020-11-11 | url=https://www.aclupa.org/en/cases/trump-president-v-boockvar-et-al |}}</ref> The nonsensical 86-page brief primarily cited unverified news and social media reports, and the case was laughed out of court (and then the appeals court) not even a month later.<ref name="boock"/>

==="Votes were deleted!"===
Donny used Twitter to claim that {{wpl|Dominion Voting Systems}} deleted 2.7 million votes.<ref>{{cite web | last=Caldera | first=Camille | title=Fact check: Dominion voting machines didn't delete or switch votes | website=USA TODAY | date=2020-11-14 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/11/14/fact-check-dominion-voting-machines-didnt-delete-switch-votes/6282157002/ |}}</ref> The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency ({{wpl|Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency|CISA}}) and the National Association of State Election Directors ({{wpl|NASED}}) refuted that claim.<ref>{{cite web | last=Evon | first=Dan | title=Did Dominion Voting Systems Delete 2.7M Trump Votes? | website=Snopes | date=2020-11-13 | url=https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/dominion-deleted-trump-votes/ |}}</ref> According to a statement from those organizations, "there is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised".<ref>[https://www.cisa.gov/news/2020/11/12/joint-statement-elections-infrastructure-government-coordinating-council-election JOINT STATEMENT FROM ELECTIONS INFRASTRUCTURE GOVERNMENT COORDINATING COUNCIL & THE ELECTION INFRASTRUCTURE SECTOR COORDINATING EXECUTIVE COMMITTEES]</ref> The ''[[Washington Post]]'' examined this claim by reviewing voter data in 10 key swing states, comparing the vote count of counties that used Dominion machines with the vote count of counties that did not. The results were similar: Trump won 81% counties that used Dominion (compared to 79% of those that did not), and Biden won approximately 51% of the votes in counties that used Dominion, compared to a little over 50% in counties that did not. Nothing in these numbers suggests that any fraud took place.<ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/12/01/swing-state-counties-that-used-dominion-voting-machines-mostly-voted-trump/ "Swing-state counties that used Dominion voting machines mostly voted for Trump"] by Philip Bump, Washington Post, 2020 Dec 1</ref>

''Fox News'' also had a role in amplifying false claims about Dominion Voting Systems, and the company sued them for defamation in March 2021, seeking $1.6 billion.<ref>{{cite web | title=Dominion Voting sues Fox for $1.6B over 2020 election claims | website=AP News | date=2021-03-26 | url=https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-media-lawsuits-elections-912eea8e168f95d51dec02da78ac2760 |}}</ref> The ensuing legal proceedings exposed embarrassing internal exchanges showing that various network hosts like [[Tucker Carlson]] and [[Laura Ingraham]] privately disbelieved the claims and disparaged Trump's lawyers as being "complete nut[s]".<ref>{{cite web | last=Chase | first=Randall | title=Off camera, Fox hosts doubted 2020 election fraud claims | website=AP News | date=2023-02-17 | url=https://apnews.com/article/united-states-government-news-media-donald-trump-fraud-b52914ec21a97dec8b5d878a908d566f |}}</ref> In 2023, the network settled with Dominion for $787.5 million.<ref>{{cite web | last=Bauder | first=David | last2=Chase | first2=Randall | last3=Mulvihill | first3=Geoff | title=Fox, Dominion reach $787M settlement over election claims | website=AP News | date=2023-04-19 | url=https://apnews.com/article/fox-news-dominion-lawsuit-trial-trump-2020-0ac71f75acfacc52ea80b3e747fb0afe |}}</ref>

==="Hugo Chavez rigged the election!"===
[[File:Powell Giuliani presser 2020.jpg|thumb|right|375px|Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani try to keep straight faces while explaining that a man who died in 2013 rigged the 2020 election.]]
In a stunning moment of stupid brilliance, Trump's lawyers held a press conference where they claimed, on live television, that the ballot machines Dominion used were actually from [[Venezuela]] and made "at the direction" of former Venezuelan president [[Hugo Chavez]], who had been dead and buried for over seven years.<ref>Linda Qiu, [https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/19/technology/sidney-powell-venezuela.html How Sidney Powell inaccurately cited Venezuela’s elections as evidence of U.S. fraud.] ''The New York Times,'' 19 November 2020.</ref> Behind the scenes, Trump once again raged at his legal team, this time because [[Stopped clock|even he thought that the Venezuela claim was too fucking stupid to present with a straight face]].<ref name="trumpfantasy"/> Sidney Powell, the lawyer in question who most heavily signal-boosted these claims, was the former attorney of [[Michael Flynn]]<ref>{{cite web | last=Cohen | first=Zachary | title=What we know about infamous Oval Office meeting held by Trump’s inner circle in December 2020 | website=CNN | date=2022-07-12 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/12/politics/trump-oval-office-meeting-december-2020/index.html |}}</ref> and had also promoted [[QAnon]].<ref>{{cite web | title=Twitter bans Michael Flynn, Sidney Powell in QAnon account purge | website=NBC News | date=2021-01-08 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/twitter-bans-michael-flynn-sidney-powell-qanon-account-purge-n1253550 |}}</ref> 

Humiliated by her antics, Trump's legal team announced they had dumped Powell on 23 November and that [[Bullshit|she totally didn't really have that much to do with them anyways]] (yeah, right).<ref>{{cite web | last=Cillizza | first=Chris | title=Analysis: Donald Trump finally found someone with a too-crazy conspiracy theory about the 2020 election | website=CNN | date=2020-11-23 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/23/politics/sidney-powell-donald-trump/index.html |}}</ref> Her subsequent court filings, which she made despite no longer representing the Trump campaign, were littered with elementary misspellings (including two completely different misspellings of "district" on the header) and formatting issues (including failing to add spacing between words).<ref>Tony Aarons, [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-26/ex-trump-lawyer-files-election-lawsuits-in-distrcoict-court Ex-Trump Lawyer Sidney Powell Files Election Suits in ‘DISTRCOICT’ Court] ''Bloomberg,'' 26 November 2020.</ref>

On January 8, 2021, Dominion Voting Systems responded to this [[bullshit]] by suing Powell for {{wpl|defamation||,}} seeking damages of $1.3 billion.<ref>[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-08/sidney-powell-sued-by-dominion-voting-over-election-fraud-claims "Sidney Powell Sued by Dominion for $1.3 Billion Over Vote-Fraud Claims"] by Erik Larson, Bloomberg, 2021 January 8</ref> On February 4, {{wpl|Smartmatic||,}} another voting software company that was also mentioned heavily in the baseless fraud claims, responded to this bullshit as well by filing a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against not only Powell, but Rudy Giuliani, [[Fox News]] and three of the network's hosts: {{wpl|Maria Bartiromo||,}} [[Lou Dobbs]] and {{wpl|Jeanine Pirro||.}}<ref>[https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2021-02-04/voting-software-smartmatic-sues-fox-news-anchors-27-billion-election Voting software maker "Smartmatic sues Fox News and its anchors for $2.7 billion"] by Stephen Battaglio, Los Angeles Times, 2021 February 4</ref>

==="Trump won the bellwethers!"===
Trump's supporters have cited the fact that Trump managed to win 18 out of 19 counties that have voted for the winner of the presidency since 1980.<ref>{{cite web | last=Caldera | first=Camille | title=Fact check: 5 election statistics do not discredit Joe Biden's victory | website=USA TODAY | date=2020-12-31 | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/12/31/fact-check-5-election-statistics-do-not-discredit-joe-bidens-victory/4086497001/ |}}</ref> However, [[correlation does not imply causation]]; these counties and states just happened to have been on a streak (the most impressive being Valencia County, NM, which has voted with the winner in every election from 1952 to 2016).<ref>{{cite web | last=Chief | first=Dan Boyd / Journal Capitol Bureau | title=Valencia County's 17 presidential elections streak comes to an end | website=Albuquerque Journal | date=2025-01-03 | url=https://www.abqjournal.com/news/local/article_c8574142-46e2-5552-8955-2153f1f7efc8.html |}}</ref> As any smart gambler will say, improbable streaks sometimes happen and they always come to an end. 

FiveThirtyEight argued that these bellwethers fell because their demographics had become whiter and less educated than the national electorate as a whole.<ref name="bellweth">{{cite web | last=Matsumoto | first=Ryan | title=Where Did All The Bellwether Counties Go? | website=FiveThirtyEight | date=2021-02-01 | url=https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/where-did-all-the-bellwether-counties-go/ |}}</ref> In fact, they noted that a dramatic shift occurred in 2016, when 16 of the counties that were bellwethers beginning in 1980 broke their streaks and voted for [[Hillary Clinton]]; those counties were more diverse and educated, the types of voters that broke heavily for Clinton. While in the ones that Trump won, he managed to win them by higher margins than the national popular vote (unlike [[Barack Obama]], who won them much closer to his popular vote numbers).<ref name="bellweth"/> While they voted for the winners, it's inaccurate to say that those counties led the candidate to win, as their previous performances are not predictive of future results.

Additionally, Trump and his supporters have falsely claimed that no presidential winner in history has lost both Florida and Ohio. This is once again not true; [[John F. Kennedy]] won his election in 1960 while losing the Sunshine and Buckeye states to [[Richard Nixon]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Sherman | first=Amy | title=Fact-checking Trump's claim about election results in Florida, Ohio | website=Austin American-Statesman | date=2020-12-11 | url=https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/politifact/2020/12/11/fact-checking-trumps-claim-election-results-florida-ohio/6511973002/ |}}</ref>

==Concurrent elections==
[[File:2020 US House Election Results.svg|thumb|right|415px|2020 House results. Light colors are holds, and solid colors are flips.]]
===House of Representatives===
The day after the election, House Democrats were stunned to find dozens of races still uncalled with zero Republican incumbents ousted.<ref name="houseshock">{{cite web | last=Caygle | first=Heather | last2=Ferris | first2=Sarah | last3=Mutnick | first3=Ally | title=‘Dumpster fire’: House Democrats trade blame after Tuesday’s damage | website=POLITICO | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/2020/11/04/dems-post-mortem-election-2020-434044 |}}</ref> The day before, Majority Leader [[Nancy Pelosi]] had been boasting about this golden opportunity to expand their majority and potentially kick over a dozen Republicans out of the House.<ref name="houseshock"/> The exact opposite happened. Republicans flipped 13 seats from the Democrats, bringing the Democratic majority down to a narrow '''222''' seats compared to '''213''' Republicans.<ref>{{cite web | title=2020 House election results | website=CNN | url=https://www.cnn.com/election/2020/results/house | }}</ref> 

There were some key takeaways. Polls overestimated House Democrats about as much as they had overestimated Biden, and Trump being on the ballot had driven turnout from low-propensity voters who bolstered the Republicans in the House as well.<ref name="cook">{{cite web | last=Wasserman | first=David | title=Five Takeaways From Our 2020 House Forecast | website=Cook Political Report | date=2020-12-18 | url=https://www.cookpolitical.com/analysis/house/house-overview/five-takeaways-our-2020-house-forecast-and-three-resolutions-2021-and |}}</ref> Additionally, the Republican effort to recruit political outsiders who were women and minorities to run in House races paid off big; all of the 13 seats Republicans flipped from Democrats were won by candidates recruited this way.<ref name="cook"/> And while House Democrats rolled their eyes at Republican attack ads accusing them of being [[Socialism|socialists]] and "defund the police" radicals, the ads were convincing to enough voters in enough races to cause this result.<ref name="cook"/> The biggest reason Democrats underperformed, though, was the base's lack of interest in the House. While House Republicans received 1.4 million fewer votes than Trump, House Democrats received 3.9 million fewer votes than Biden.<ref>{{cite web | last=Galston | first=William A. | title=Why did House Democrats underperform compared to Joe Biden? | website=Brookings | date=2022-03-09 | url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/why-did-house-democrats-underperform-compared-to-joe-biden/ |}}</ref>

In the aftermath of this result, some Democrats started to wonder if the party could maintain itself if it was having so much trouble communicating with working class voters.<ref name="majgone">{{cite web | title='A huge catastrophe': Democrats grapple with congressional and state election losses | website=NBC News | date=2020-11-22 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/huge-catastrophe-democrats-grapple-congressional-state-election-losses-n1248529 |}}</ref> Representative [[Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez]] criticized her fellow House Democrats for running complacent campaigns and failing to invest in online advertising, and she also noted that every candidate who endorsed Medicare-for-All won their elections.<ref>{{cite web | last=Herndon | first=Astead W. | title=Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Biden’s Win, House Losses, and What’s Next for the Left | website=The New York Times | date=2020-11-08 | url=https://archive.ph/9mfYf}}</ref>

===Senate===
[[File:2020 United States Senate elections results map.svg|thumb|right|415px|2020 Senate results. Solid colors are flipped seats.]]
Results from the Senate were a mixed bag for Democrats. On one hand, Democrats Ossoff and Warnock flipped two Republican Senate seats in the longtime Republican stronghold of Georgia during two runoffs in 2021.<ref>{{cite web | title=Warnock, Ossoff win in Georgia, handing Dems Senate control | website=AP News | date=2021-01-06 | url=https://apnews.com/article/georgia-election-results-4b82ba7ee3cc74d33e68daadaee2cbf3 |}}</ref> Former astronaut and all-around badass Mark Kelly also flipped a seat from the Republicans in Arizona.<ref>{{cite web | last=LeVine | first=Marianne | title=Kelly defeats McSally in Arizona Senate race | website=POLITICO | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.politico.com/news/2020/11/04/arizona-senate-election-results-2020-433583 |}}</ref> On the other hand, this only left the Democrats with '''50''' seats against the Republicans' '''50''' seats,<ref>{{cite web | title=2020 Senate election results | website=CNN | url=https://www.cnn.com/election/2020/results/senate |}}</ref> a nearly unworkable majority that would require constant tiebreaking votes from Vice President [[Kamala Harris]].<ref>{{cite web | last=Megerian | first=Chris | last2=Mascaro | first2=Lisa | title=Vice President Harris breaks nearly 200-year-old record for Senate tiebreaker votes, casts her 32nd | website=AP News | date=2023-12-05 | url=https://apnews.com/article/kamala-harris-senate-tiebreaker-vote-39a1a63fccbaec363262abad2f644562 |}}</ref>

Despite the impressive results from Georgia, the Senate was overall a disappointment for Democrats. With bad Senate maps in [[2022 United States midterm elections|2022]] and [[2024 United States presidential election|2024]], 2020 was the Democrats' last chance in a long time to win a workable majority.<ref name="majgone"/> There were some major failures behind this. Despite representing a [[Maine|reliably blue state]] and polling behind her competitor, Senator Susan Collins won reelection by a large margin in a major disappointment for Democrats.<ref>{{cite web | title=The political survival of Susan Collins | website=Brookings | date=2022-03-09 | url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-political-survival-of-susan-collins/ |}}</ref> 

Democrats also fumbled the Senate race in [[North Carolina]] despite consistent polling leads because their candidate Cal Cunningham was exposed as an [[Adultery|adulterer]] after sexually explicit text messages leaked to the press.<ref>{{cite web | last=Kilgore | first=Ed | title=2020 Was a Victory That Quietly Crushed Democrats’ Hopes | website=Intelligencer | date=2021-10-20 | url=https://archive.ph/tgO69}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Robertson | first=Gary D. | title=Cunningham keeps low in NC Senate race marked by his affair | website=AP News | date=2020-10-24 | url=https://apnews.com/general-news-5b2812777ae5e5582858360aaf22b76d |}}</ref> Republican Thom Tillis won in North Carolina by a very narrow margin of 1.8%.<ref>{{cite web | title=North Carolina 2020 Senate election results | website=CNN | date=2000-01-01 | url=https://www.cnn.com/election/2020/results/state/north-carolina/senate/ |}}</ref> Cheating on your wife isn't cool, Cal.

Also, Democratic Senator Doug Jones lost his race in [[Alabama]] after defeating the [[pedophile]] [[Roy Moore]] in a 2017 special election, but we'll give him a pass for that one since that was always going to be an unwinnable race in the absence of another historic Republican scandal.<ref>{{cite web | last=Egan | first=Lauren | title=Alabama Sen. Doug Jones loses to Tommy Tuberville, NBC News projects | website=NBC News | date=2020-11-04 | url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/alabama-sen-doug-jones-loses-tommy-tuberville-nbc-news-projects-n1246014 |}}</ref> The Democratic pickup in [[Colorado]] is also barely worth mentioning for the same reason: the Republican incumbent was just never going to win in this overwhelmingly Democratic state.<ref>{{cite web | last=Wingerter | first=Justin | title=Why John Hickenlooper won and Cory Gardner lost Colorado’s U.S. Senate race | website=The Denver Post | date=2020-11-05 | url=https://www.denverpost.com/2020/11/05/john-hickenlooper-cory-gardner-us-senate-2020/ |}}</ref>

==See also==
*[[2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination]]
*[[2016 United States presidential election]] 
*[[2022 midterm elections]]
*[[2024 United States presidential election]]
*[[Fun:Socialism with Biden characteristics]]
*[[Gerontocracy]]

==External links==
* ''[[New York Times]]'' - [https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/upshot/2020-election-map.html An Extremely Detailed Map of the 2020 Election]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYOjWnS4cMY Childish Gambino - This Is America]

==Notes==
{{reflist|2|group=note}}

==References==
{{reflist|3|80%}}


{{POTUS20nav}}

[[Category:2020 US presidential election| ]]
[[Category:2021 U.S. coup attempt]]
[[Category:Conspiracy theories]]
[[Category:COVID-19]]
[[Category:Denialism]]
[[Category:Pseudostatistics]]
[[Category:Government incompetence]]
[[Category:Joe Biden]]
[[Category:Trumpism]]
[[Category:United States politics]]
[[Category:United States presidential elections]]

Categories: 2020 US presidential election, 2021 U.S. coup attempt, Conspiracy theories, COVID-19, Denialism, Pseudostatistics, Government incompetence, Joe Biden, Trumpism, United States politics, United States presidential elections