Biden at 253 and Trump at 214 – and this has been the situation on American news channels now for the past hours (at the time this editorial is being written). So one can safely say we are not yet completely clear about who the next president of the United States of America is to be – at least by Thursday night Pakistan time. But we can also say at this point that it does seem likely that Joe Biden will turn power and the White House back to the Democrats after a stint of what can only be called chaotic Republican rule under current President Donald Trump. It is difficult to say right now what this will mean for the US and for the world, since many policies do not hinge on who is sitting in the Oval Office. It is however clear that Biden, a low-key figure, is eager to unite a fractured country and has emphasized, again and again, that he is the president of all Americans, and not just those who voted blue.
Of course, with specific states still to be declared, there is time for the difference between the two to be made up. In the meanwhile, in what many around the world find amusingly familiar to their own American-intervened lands, Donald Trump is trying everything he can to undo this, unleashing a series of legal battles, which many experts believe will lead nowhere. In some cases, Republican protesters have tried to stop votes from being counted. There appears to be little logic, beyond the issue of whether Trump is winning or losing in that particular state. All this has added a further ugliness to what was already an ugly electoral process. There have also been riots already in some cities, with people demanding either that every vote be counted or that voting be delayed. Trump had insisted that ballots sent in by post, after the election had been held and ballot cast, would not be counted. So far, the rule that any ballot stamped for the election day on November 3 would indeed be counted is holding firm.
The main question, though, is of what the future of America is to be. It has become a country badly divided, with race and class the main issues of divide – further divided into ethnicity, gender, origin, and even on whether people belong to a rural or urban area. After a bitterly polarised four years of the Trump White House, the country does not look like it’s on the road to healing. The fact is that America stands starkly divided, and even with a Biden win the cult of Trump has only seen a rise. Nothing less than some deep introspection on its political and economic systems will help the US figure out how to mend the broken. Biden has said he hopes to unite people once more. While that is good to hear, especially after years of acrimonious statements, one wonders if centrist Democrats can see what went wrong in a country people would flock to for freedom and opportunity. What is of a lot of importance is also the fact that the Democratic Party may not be able to retain the Senate, which will mean a tough time for a Democratic president if he is elected. There is also the matter of conservative judges placed during the Trump years. All in all, a tough road ahead no doubt for Biden if he does take the White House. Meanwhile, the rest of the world waits to see who takes over the White House next. America may be deciding their president but for many countries around the globe, an American election also determines which way their economy, policy and fates will go.