Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has gone ahead of President Donald Trump in the state of Georgia, a Republican stronghold that hasn’t supported a Democrat for president since 1992.
Biden needs to win just one more state among Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nevada or North Carolina to gain the 270 electoral votes he needs to be elected as the next President of the United States, provided that other race calls stand.
The former vice president was up by 917 votes, based on counting from Clayton County early Friday morning. Biden had trailed in the state since Election Night, but Trump’s initial lead of several hundred thousand votes shrank as election officials counted the mail-in ballots that heavily favoured the Democratic candidate.
Meanwhile, Election officials in key battleground states pushed back on claims by the Trump campaign that Republican poll watchers were being improperly denied access to observe the counting of ballots, saying that rules were being followed and they were committed to transparency.
Tasked this year with monitoring a record number of mail ballots, partisan poll watchers are designated by a political party or campaign to report any concerns they may have. With a few reports of overly aggressive poll watchers, election officials Thursday said they were carefully balancing access with the need to minimise disruptions.
PNN/Agencies