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Joe Biden‘s victory in the US state of Georgia in the 2020 presidential election has been confirmed following a recount.
The Democratic president-elect was previously projected to win the state following the November 3 election, making Biden the first Democrat to win in Georgia since Bill Clinton in 1992.
Following a hand recount — which resulted in officials in four Georgia counties discovering an estimated total of 5,800 untallied votes (the result of human error and not fraud, according to Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger) — incumbent Donald Trump narrowed Biden’s lead by just 1400 votes.
But Biden still beat his Republican rival by 12,284 votes overall, according to the election audit that is required by Georgia state law. The Associated Press called the result last night (November 19) following the recount.
The recount also found the error rate to be no greater than 0.73% in any Georgia county, and that Biden’s margin of victory over Trump remained at under 0.5%.
The results are set to be certified today (November 20), although the losing campaign can request another recount (which would be done using scanners) within two business days if the winning margin remains within 0.5%.
Raffensperger, a Republican, said that the hand-counted audit of ballots had not altered Biden’s victory in Georgia.
“Georgia’s historic first statewide audit reaffirmed that the state’s new secure paper ballot voting system accurately counted and reported results,” he said in a statement.
“This is a credit to the hard work of our county and local elections officials who moved quickly to undertake and complete such a momentous task in a short period of time.”
Biden is now projected to win 306 electoral college votes to Trump’s 232, with the former having long passed the 270 threshold to win. Trump has repeatedly refused to concede defeat, alleging various unsubstantiated claims of electoral fraud and launching legal action in a number of states.
Earlier this week, former US President Barack Obama ruled out the prospect of joining Joe Biden‘s cabinet when he takes office in January.
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