Joe Biden has been elected President of the United States of America. Much more than that, the democratic party flagbearer and his running mate have gone on to break records, set new ones, and open a fresh chapter in American history.
Crimefacts.News has followed the election from its swift sunrise to this steady sunset, and we bring you quick facts about the election and the ‘new America’.
Highest vote in American history
As of Saturday evening at 6:30 pm Nigerian time, the US had counted 74,857,880 votes for Joe Biden and 70,598,535 for incumbent President Donald Trump. These are the highest number of votes any candidate has polled in any election in US history.
First female vice-president in 231 years
Kamala Harris, Biden’s running mate, shattered yet another glass ceiling to become the first female vice-president of the United States.
The first vice-president of the US was John Adams, who took office in April 1729. A first female running mate on a major party ticket did not come until Democrats fielded Geraldine Ferraro in 1984.
The Republicans presented Sarah Palin in 2008, but that ticket did not win. No other woman has got a major party ticket as a running mate until Kamala Harris in 2020.
Win this win, she is also the first woman of colour to attain this position in American politics.
Biden has run for president three times since 1988
Biden ran for president for the first time in 1988. He pulled out of the race after he was found to have plagiarised a speech by a British politician Neil Kinnock. He was 45 years old.
Biden tried again in 2008 to pick the Democratic Party ticket, but lost to Barack Obama. Obama later picked him as running mate, and he went on to become the 47th vice-president of the US.
He came on the scene again in 2019/2020 — and after 32 years of trying, he is now the president-elect of the US.
Oldest President in US history
The oldest person to assume the presidency in US history was Donald Trump, who was sworn in at the age of 70 years and 220 days. Not only is Biden taken the presidency from Trump, but also taking this record off him.
At age 78, Biden will be America’s oldest president to assume office by the time of his inauguration in January 2021.
He would also be taking off the title previously held by Ronald Reagan as the oldest sitting president in US history. If he serves out his first term, he would be the first octogenarian to sit in the oval office as president.
It is worthy of note that Biden was once one of the youngest senators in US history.
Emhoff, Kamala Harris’ husband, is first-ever US ‘second gentleman’
“She made that decision, and I would have supported whatever she decided. But I’m not her political adviser. I’m her husband,” Douglas Emhoff, said about his wife, Kamala Harris after she made the decision to run with Biden.
Months later, he became the first-ever second gentleman in American history. The US has seen a good number of first ladies at the presidency, but this is the first “gentleman” at this height of US politics.
More women voted for Biden than Hillary Clinton
In 2016, Hillary Clinton became the very first woman in US history to win a major party ticket to run for president in the US. She lost to Donald Trump. Fresh data shows that women prefer Biden to Clinton.
It is expected that the absolute number of votes for Biden may be more, considering the higher turnout recorded in 2020 over 2016. But worthy of note is the key point that the women vote for Biden — in percentage terms — is more for Biden than Hillary.
According to John Zogby, a seasoned election pollster, Biden had more votes among women — and men.
“Among men, this time Joe Biden won 49% to 47%, he did much better among men than Hillary Clinton did against Trump in 2016. Among women, Biden won 57% to 42%, Biden also outperformed Hillary Clinton in 2016,” Zogby said.
In 2016, 54% of women voted for Clinton, according to exit polls, but more voted for Biden in 2020. Trump still maintained 42% of women votes — the exact percentage he had in 2016.
75 percent of Evangelicals voted for Trump
Trump lost many things in this election, but he did not lose his evangelical base. According to Zogby, who briefed the foreign media after the election, the president retained 75 percent of white evangelicals.
“White evangelicals supported President Trump’s 75 to 24. That was high and that is what the margin was that Trump had over Hillary Clinton give or take a point,” Zogby said.
This story will be updated as we get more facts from the final election results.
