It’s Official: Biden Wins 306 Electoral Votes, The Exact Number Trump Won In 2016 (And Called A “Landslide”)

Multiple networks officially projected Joe Biden as the winner in Georgia on Friday, making the final tally 306 electoral votes for Biden and 232 for President Trump. When Trump won with 306 electoral votes in 2016, he called it "a massive landslide victory."

The final electoral college map for the 2020 presidential election, as of November 13. | New York Times
The final electoral college map for the 2020 presidential election, as of November 13. | New York Times

President-elect Joe Biden has officially flipped the state of Georgia from red to blue, with all major networks projecting Biden as the winner on Friday afternoon. Around the same time, North Carolina was officially declared as won by President Donald Trump, bringing the final electoral college tally to 306 for Biden and 232 for Trump.

That’s also the exact breakdown of electoral college votes in 2016, when Trump won 306 and Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton won 232.

Despite the fact that Trump lost the popular vote to Clinton by nearly 3 million, the president has often referred to his 2016 electoral win as a “landslide,” even going so far as to frame a printout of the map to hang in the White House. He also frequently brought it up in unrelated press conferences, passed out copies to reporters, and showed it to visiting dignitaries.

The fact that Biden has now won 306 electoral college votes himself, as well as a historic 5+ million popular vote lead that is expected to grow as states tabulate their final results, undercuts Trump’s current baseless argument that he actually won the 2020 election.

Democratic elected officials used the news as an opportunity to congratulate President-elect Biden (again) and point out that such a margin reinforces the idea that he has a mandate to govern on the issues he highlighted in his campaign.

Georgia is proceeding with a hand recount and audit of its vote, but the Republican Secretary of State has said he is confident “the results are accurate” and will not change.

Stacey Abrams, the 2018 Georgia gubernatorial candidate and founder of Fair Fight Action, has been widely credited with helping lead an increase in voter registration and turnout among Black voters in the state, which helped Biden win. In addition to putting the president-elect over the top, Georgia is now the political epicenter of a fight for control of the Senate, with two runoff races in January that will decide whether Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell gets to stay in that job or is relegated to the back of the chamber.