Trump supporters descend on voting centres as Biden widens gap
London, Nov. 5, 2020 (AltAfrica)-Angry Donald Trump supporters have converged on vote-counting centres in key US election battleground states as protests swept the country. Currently, Biden is projected to have won 264 electoral votes, Trump 214, and 270 are needed to win.
“Stop the count!” they shouted in Detroit as the Trump campaign announced it had filed a lawsuit to stop the tallying of votes in the Midwestern state which was called for Joe Biden by CNN and other major networks on Wednesday.
hings may be moving faster in Georgia than original estimates suggested.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger just said the state had about 90,000 ballots to go by last night, but by this morning there were just around 25,000 ballots left to be counted.
Speaking to WSB-TV in Atlanta, Raffensperger said: “We should be done no later than noon-time today.” That’s 17:00 GMT.
Fulton County, home of Atlanta, is expected to conclude counting in the next hour, he said.
Biden is behind by about 18,000 votes in Georgia, according to the latest estimates.
If Biden wins Georgia, Trump’s chance of winning re-election plunges significantly
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STOP THE COUNT!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 5, 2020
In Phoenix, Arizona, dozens of Trump fans chanted “stop the steal” and “four more years” – as they demanded a complete count of ballots amid signs they were clawing back the Democrat’s lead in the state.
Meanwhile, thousands of mostly anti-Trump protesters took to cities from New York to Seattle across the US as the election remained undecided on Thursday morning. Police in Manhattan arrested more than 50 protesters after a peaceful demonstration led to clashes.
Here's what's happening in #Election2020:
— AP Politics (@AP_Politics) November 5, 2020
— Biden pushes closer to victory in the race for the White House.
— Trump sues in three states, laying ground for contesting the outcome.
— Protests in American cities over balloting. https://t.co/3lBpM0HCrf
The protests came as President Trump insisted without evidence there were major problems with the voting and the ballot counting, especially with mail-in votes, and as Republicans filed suit in various states over the election.
The confrontation in Detroit started shortly before the Associated Press declared that Mr Biden had won Michigan.
Video shot by local media showed angry people gathered outside the TCF Center and inside the lobby, with police officers lined up to keep them from entering the vote-counting area. They chanted, “Stop the count!” and “Stop the vote!”
Earlier, the Republican campaign filed suit in a bid to halt the count, demanding Michigan’s Democratic secretary of state allow in more inspectors.
The Phoenix protesters filled much of the parking lot at the Maricopa County election centre, where sheriff’s deputies were guarding both the outside of the building and the counting inside.
Wearing Trump gear, members of the crowd chanted, “Fox News sucks,” in anger over the network declaring Mr Biden the winner in Arizona.
Representative Paul Gosar, an Arizona Republican and staunch Trump supporter, joined the crowd, declaring: “We’re not going to let this election be stolen. Period.”
However, observers from both major political parties remained inside the election centre as ballots were processed and counted, and the procedure was live-streamed online at all times.
Two top county officials – one a Democrat, the other a Republican – issued a statement expressing concern about how misinformation had spread about the integrity of the election process.
