Biden says he isn't declaring victory, but 'we believe we will be the winners'

Former Vice President Joe Biden is expressing confidence that he will win the 2020 presidential election as votes continue to be counted in key battleground states.

Biden spoke from Wilmington, Delaware, on Wednesday afternoon alongside Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) as he moved closer to potentially reaching 270 electoral votes. The Democratic presidential nominee said his campaign believes he will emerge victorious when states finish counting their votes, though he did not declare victory.

"After a long night of counting, it's clear that we're winning enough states to reach 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency," Biden said. "I'm not here to declare that we've won, but I am here to report, when the count is finished, we believe we will be the winners."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Key battleground states like Pennsylvania have not yet been called, but Biden is currently leading with 253 electoral votes, while Trump has 214, per The New York Times. On Wednesday afternoon, Biden was projected to win the two crucial battleground states of Wisconsin and Michigan, both of which Trump won in 2016, making the president's path to a win more difficult, though not impossible. Biden is ahead at the moment in enough states to take him past 270 electoral votes should his leads hold, FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver notes.

The Trump campaign is filing a lawsuit to "halt" the counting of votes in Michigan, while in Pennsylvania, the campaign has also said it's suing to "temporarily halt counting." Trump is ahead in Pennsylvania at this time and his campaign has prematurely declared victory in the state before any news network has called the race, but Biden said Wednesday that he feels "very good" about winning Pennsylvania.

Biden added in his remarks that once the 2020 election has ended, it will be time to "put the harsh rhetoric of the campaign behind us," to "lower the temperature," and to "come together as a nation." Brendan Morrow