Joseph Biden, former vice president and longtime senator from Delaware, was elected president of the United States last week, only the second Roman Catholic to be chosen by his countrymen for the highest office in the land. His running mate, Senator Kamala Harris, will become the first female vice president in the nation’s history, as well as the first person of Asian and Caribbean descent to win nationwide office.
The president-elect quoted from the Book of Ecclesiastes in his victory speech: “The Bible tells us that to everything there is a season — a time to build, a time to reap, a time to sow. And a time to heal,” Biden said. “This is the time to heal in America.” He concluded his speech by reciting the lyrics of the popular hymn, I will raise you up, on Eagle’s wings.
Biden won more votes than any presidential candidate in history, more than 75 million, and Trump also increased his vote totals from four years ago, winning 71 million votes. Unlike four years ago, however, when Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College, Biden is likely to end up with 306 electoral college votes, the same number Trump secured four years ago.
The final tallies were delayed as a record number of Americans voted by mail due to the pandemic. The networks and the Associated Press called the race midday on Saturday when the vote tally in the crucial swing states of Nevada and Pennsylvania swung decisively for Biden. North Carolina has not been called, and Trump leads there by 75,407 votes. Results are pending in Georgia, where Biden holds a narrow lead of only 10,353.
The polls in advance of the election were far off the mark for the second time in a row. They predicted Biden winning the popular vote by 8-10 per cent.
Early exit polls were similarly flawed, with one showing Trump winning the Catholic vote 49-37 per cent, only to be adjusted as vote totals came in to Biden winning 51-47 per cent. It was clear that Biden did marginally better among white, working class Catholics in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, but Trump improved his showing among Latino Catholics in both south Florida and the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. The Rio Grande Valley is the most heavily Catholic region in the country. In the diocese of Brownsville, Catholics are 85 per cent of the population.
Archbishop Jose Gomez, president of the US bishops’ conference, issued a statement congratulating Biden and Harris on their win: “We congratulate Mr. Biden and acknowledge that he joins the late President John F. Kennedy as the second United States president to profess the Catholic faith,” Gomez said. “We also congratulate Sen. Kamala D. Harris of California, who becomes the first woman ever elected as vice president.” He echoed the president-elect’s call for national unity, saying: “I believe that at this moment in American history, Catholics have a special duty to be peacemakers, to promote fraternity and mutual trust, and to pray for a renewed spirit of true patriotism in our country.”
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