Joe Biden defeats Trump in Arizona; second Democrat to win state in 24 years

United State President-elect, Joe Biden, has won Arizona, a state in the south-west region of the US and a Republican stronghold.

This is the first time the state will vote a Democrat since Bill Clinton’s 1996 victory. Before Clinton, Arizona voted Harry Truman in 1948.

The Arizona victory extends Biden’s lead by 11 Electoral College votes to a total of 290, against President Donald Trump’s 217 votes.

Trump has, however, refused to concede the election. Rather, he alleged voter fraud, claiming that some of his votes were counted for Biden and a few others deleted.

In a tweet on Thursday, he claimed that “2.7 million Trump votes” were deleted nationwide.

US electoral officials have dismissed Trump’s claims as false, saying, “there is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised”.

Instead, they described the poll as the “most secure in American history”.

The Election Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council Executive Committee (GCC) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) made the declaration in a joint statement.

The bodies within the Department of Homeland Security worked on protecting U.S. voting systems.

They noted that there is no proof to buttress claims that the November 3 poll was compromised.

The statement said there is no evidence that any voting system deleted, lost, or changed votes.

The agencies added that when states have close elections, many will recount ballots.

GCC and CISA said states with close results have paper records of each vote, allowing the ability to go back and count each ballot if necessary.

“This is an added benefit for security and resilience. This process allows for the identification and correction of any mistakes or errors. There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.

“While we know there are many unfounded claims and opportunities for misinformation about the process of our elections, we can assure you we have the utmost confidence in the security and integrity of our elections, and you should too,” the statement read.

Their position negates President Donald Trump’s insistence that Joe Biden did not win.

Trump maintains that he won on legal votes and has filed lawsuits against the Democrats.

The General Services Administration (GSA) has not recognized Biden as president-elect.

The agency must formally acknowledge election winners before they can commence transition tasks.

Biden’s teams are considering filing a lawsuit against the GSA.

This week, Richard Pilger, a senior official of the Department of Justice resigned.

His exit followed Attorney General, William Barr’s directive for probe of alleged irregularities in the presidential election.

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