Chaos 2020: The U.S. Presidential Election

Donald Trump and Joe Biden: two names that have taken the world by storm in the past few weeks with headlines and memes. The presidential candidates of 2020 have been the topic of news articles and stories all over the internet since November 3rd — Election Day — and to say that people are freaking out would be a severe understatement.

After four years of presidency in which Trump inhabited the White House, many citizens across the U.S. and even in foreign countries were anticipating the 2020 election. As many people were eager for a chance to kick Trump out of the job and leadership role that they clearly believed he was not fit for, they were telling others to “Vote Blue,” a phrase used often around election times.

This phrase finds its meaning in the two-party system with which the U.S. votes; Republicans (red) and Democrats (blue). Those saying “Vote Blue” were emphasizing the need to vote for Joe Biden, Trump’s Democratic rival, to stop Trump from causing more harm or affecting and impacting the country more in a negative manner.

Biden has run for the role of president previously, in the years 1988 and 2008, as a Democratic candidate. He served as vice-president in 2009—2017, under former President Barack Obama. (source)

Donald Trump has run for president twice before: while his campaign in 2000 was unsuccessful, he was able to beat Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in the election of 2016, and was inaugurated in January of 2017. (source)

The 2020 U.S. presidential election left thousands of families and individuals in a state of fear as they awaited the results on who would be the new president of the United States! We personally believe that Joe R Biden is/was the best candidate for the job, and here's why:

To begin with, let’s summarize what the former president, Donald J. Trump, has done to the United States, and the effects that his controversial and sometimes unprecedented ways of governing have had on the modern mindset of the U.S. 

When one thinks of a leader, a few things come to mind; strength, honesty, and empathy, to begin with. These common attributes considered of leaders completely come to a halt when talking about Donald Trump. Based on his comments we can confidently state that his concerns do not stray very far from the safety and security of one individual—himself. With quotes such as, “It is very hard for them to attack me on looks, because I am so good looking”, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose voters”, and “Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?”, it's clear to anyone paying close attention that Trump is self-absorbed and shallow. (SOURCE) 

We can clearly see the lack of professionalism and presidentialism that the forty-fifth president has displayed during his time in office. His language both online and offline has shocked thousands of people all over the world, and for good reason: many agree that his words represent the most outrageous and irresponsible spread of inequality and outright verbal abuse we’ve ever seen from a U.S. President. 

However, it’s not only his words that have had a massive impact on the country. As of the COVID-19 pandemic, The U.S. has lost over 245,943 citizens to the virus, by far the most in the world (SOURCE) This extreme rate can only be due to a few things: late action against the virus, incomplete tests/inconsistent testing and of course, down play on the severity of the virus.(SOURCE)

It seems as though much of this could be explained by the lack of prioritization that the former president had. He seemed more dedicated to keeping the economy rolling; even after the U.S. hit 20,500 cases, climbing to the top of the COVID-19 charts, he still seemed to be more focused on growing the economy and leaving the virus to perish naturally. 

Even during the main election process, instead of attempting to protect his supporters, he encouraged them to vote via ballots, rather than using the post in ballots. This decision would require citizens to stand in long queues and almost completely ignore the social distancing regulations. This simply didn’t sit right for many American citizens, and this may explain the extreme amount of Biden votes that came in via post in ballots.

As is customary in the battle for the title, both candidates running for president and both candidates running for vice-president participated in televised debates sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates.

Trump and Biden squared off on Tuesday, September 29th. The next debate had been scheduled for October 15th, but had to be cancelled due to complications involving Trump’s diagnosis of COVID-19; they eventually had their final debate on October 22nd, with vice-presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Mike Pence partaking in their debate only two weeks earlier (source).

In these debates, moderated by a single individual and with the running time of 21:00-22:30 ET — no commercial breaks — the moderators each determine questions for their respective debates, all of which are unknown to the CPD or the candidates in advance. The moderators are in charge of controlling the amount of time each candidate speaks, and are responsible for regulating conversation so “thoughtful and substantive exchanges occur.” (source)

The debates were a chance for the candidates, especially those running for president, to emphasize their campaigns and advertise their ideas and main points.

Trump’s campaign for re-election was centered on “the economy, jobs, immigration, and foreign policy.” (source) His infamous campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again (MAGA),” appeared a multitude of times in the days leading up to the election, the well-known red hats popping up on more than one occasion.

Trump has said that "Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign affairs, will be made to benefit American workers and American families.” And in an act of pure xenophobia that none of us are shocked by, he added, “We must protect our borders from the ravages of other countries making our products, stealing our companies, and destroying our jobs." (source)

As Biden was running against Trump, his campaign was established as an opposition to the Republican candidate. Biden said, "I believe history will look back on four years of this president and all he embraces as an aberrant moment in time. But if we give Donald Trump eight years in the White House, he will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation—who we are—and I cannot stand by and watch that happen." (source)

Biden had quite a few main points that he focused on throughout his election campaign. They were as listed: immigration, healthcare, energy and environmental issues, trade, economy, education, gun regulation, criminal justice, foreign policy, impeachment, labor, abortion, and Supreme Court vacancy. (source)

While families awaited the outcome of the election, thousands were worried that Donald Trump may gain another term in the White House. Millions of families had to go about their normal days with the burden of who would be governing their country for 4 years hanging on their shoulders. The enormous division between the people of the country has not benefited the wait either. Discrimination between the two parties has meant that news reporters have had an immense amount riding on them when they made decisions to call states in favour of certain parties.

They faced a huge amount of backlash from the opposing teams for simply reporting on the counts. With Donald Trump claiming fraud on the votes many of his supporters were simply ignoring the results, continuing to sunbathe, even after night drew closer. This meant that the winning Democrats were simply unable to enjoy their victory out of fear it would be snatched away before the new year.

Some of the key states that came into play when talking about fraud would have to be, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Georgia, Florida, and Michigan. (SOURCE) These states were an extremely close race between the Republicans and the Democrats. With Donald Trump claiming fraud on the voting , especially the online voting system, it came as no surprise when he asked for a recount of Georgia, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. With the results being so close between two parties Trump was indeed granted the recounts.

This left thousands of families heartbroken, as they realised that their president was simply not going to accept his defeat. With his claims of bringing the issue to the Supreme Court becoming more and more frightening, people struggled to understand where he was getting such ridiculous ideas from. 

Here is what we know about the 3 key states in this election:

Pennsylvania, being one of the most prominent states in the 2020 election has been mostly a blue wall for the last few elections. Even with Trump's attempts and many campaigns in the state, Biden’s running mate Kamala Harris stated that she would “Run in all 4 corners of the state.” Which clearly worked! Giving the democrats a 4 point lead in the state.

Michigan has many of the same dynamics at play as Pennsylvania, notably seeing many White working-class Reagan supporters switching to the Democrats — putting the state in their column in every presidential election from 1992 through 2012. This gave Biden’s team a 7 point lead in the state.

In 2016, Trump campaigned in Wisconsin five times. Hillary Clinton however, did not campaign at all in the state during the same period. The overall average gives Biden a 6 point lead in the state.

Even with the many close calls in these states Biden’s team still pulled through to win a massive 360 electoral votes! His running mate Kamala Harris says that she feels an immense amount of pressure as the first woman Vice President and first Vice President of colour. She explains in various interviews how she feels that the dreams of young girls all around the world depend on her succeeding. Being the Vice President, she is representing an entire generation of young women, and explains that as much as she is honored to be doing so, she does indeed feel an incredible amount of responsibility to succeed.

While we do at last know the results of the election, it was so frenzied during the wait to know who won that the mayhem of 2020 reached new levels, especially on social media.

Memes, tweets, and TikToks were being posted about states that took an especially long time to count the votes, as well as about several other shocking events — mostly related to pop culture — that occurred during the days in wait. Communities everywhere were biting their nails as both Trump and Biden stayed on each other’s tails in the race to 270 electoral college votes. The nation took a total of four days to project the winner; those four days wreaked havoc on news outlets and social media everywhere.

Near the beginning of the election, it seemed as though Trump would be able to pull ahead and win once again, meaning the world would have to go through another four years of his presidency — can’t say we were looking forward to that.

However, poll stations began counting a surprising amount of mail-in ballots, earning Biden a lead in several states that had previously been red, such as Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Georgia — to name a few. When he saw this, Trump started tweeting things that accused voter fraud and declared that the election was rigged.

These tweets and his claims prompted CNN News to write some hilariously passive-aggressive headlines while Trump himself was on air. Some of these headlines included: “Trump complains that mail-in votes are being counted,” “Without any evidence, Trump says he’s being cheated,” and “Trump blames polls for current election status.” (source)

After Biden was projected as the winner of the 2020 election, citizens all over the country took to the streets, victorious and filled with joy over the result. People were gathered in Washington D.C., New York, California, and many other states to celebrate the new president, who will be inaugurated by the end of January in 2021. (source)

It took four days to project the winner, and it was a stressful time for many, whether they were living in the U.S. or abroad; but at least they finally announced it. And hey: what else could happen?