The congress of the USA established the first Tuesday of November to carry out the electoral processes in all the states of the country. The particularity of voting on a weekday, as well as the time of year It was established in 1848 and responds to when the northern country was an agricultural economy: the choice of the month corresponded to an instance of the year when the harvests had ended and the day of the week cleared for religious reasons both Saturday and Sunday and Monday, to move to the respective state capitals to cast the vote.
Various elements of this anachronistic electoral system inherited from the slave era continue to a large extent until the current presidential elections, in which Kamala Harris (after the withdrawal of Joe Biden’s candidacy) and donald trump. Let us remember that in United States the president is elected indirectly. People go to the polls and the resulting popular (non-mandatory) vote translates into a certain number of electoral delegates from each state.
Elections in the United States: what is the indirect system that determines the new president?
That candidate who wins the election in the state receives the total amount of its delegatesall of which They make up the electoral college that defines the president. The winner of the election will be whoever has gathered the most electoral delegates according to their state victories, and not whoever has gathered the most votes of the popular will. An example of this was the 2016 election in which Hillary Clinton beat Trump by almost three million votes without being elected.
Of the 50 states that make up the country plus its capital, the members of the college are widely distributed among those such as Alaska or Delaware with just 3 delegatesother intermediates such as Illinois with 19, even Florida with 30, Texas with 40 or California with 54 delegates. It can be said that this defines the states that are key for a presidential election in which the winner needs to gather 270 votes (out of 538) from the Electoral College.
In this sense, there have been comfortable victories such as those of Ronald Reagan in the 80’s who obtained more than 500 electoral delegates or George Bush Sr. who achieved more than 400, and to a lesser extent Bill Clinton with 379.
The “swing states”, the key to victory in the elections in the United States
On the other hand, only a quarter of American presidents (11 out of 45) failed in their reelection bid, including the Democrat James Carterthe republican George Bush father and even himself donald trump. But is it really a narrow number of votes in a handful of states that will define the election? These are the so-called hinge states or “swing states” and they are precisely those that can tip the balance: Iowa, Florida, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, North Carolina, Ohio and especially Pennsylvania in the current election. They correspond to the so-called “rust belt and Sun states.”
On the other hand, we can mention that the two major parties of the American political system have their historical bastions. In TexasFor example, the Democrats have not been able to prevail since the mid-70s. That is to say, there is a mix of geographical and class variables in the vote of the American electorate and even priority agenda items such as immigration in those states bordering Mexicofaced with a scenario of promises of mass deportations by trump in a country with 60 million Latinos.
Harris vs Trump: what is at stake in the elections
There is also another variety of elements that are of interest when highlighting the current presidential elections that were characterized by a low level of debate and crossed accusations of fascism and communism by the candidates. Let us remember that The United States enters the current election in a context of marked polarization and radicalization of the social environment with expressions like movement “Black lives matter” until armed far-right white supremacist militias. This explains to a large extent Trump as the expression of a latent conservative tendency in North American society. It is worth noting that despite losing the elections in 2020, the Republican candidate has managed to remain at the center of the political scene and has been the protagonist of the last three presidential elections.
The arrival of these new elections has taken place within a framework of sustained rise in unemployment and inequality and the decline of the United States as an industrial power against to the rise of China.
china united states war conflict.jpg
Let us remember that past Democratic administrations have encouraged direct competition with China but they have done so within a framework of an active foreign policy in the multilateral order and even cooperation in certain aspects.
The proposal of trump is to resume the trade war with the Asian country by raising import duties to 60% for China and even lower with other countries in what is a strong bias of protectionist strengthening.
This confluence of social, economic and international variables and factors They are a cocktail of instability for the American political system which will be combined with a scenario and result that will surely be open, taking into account that the final results on November 5 may take a week or even longer. Added to that, it is possible that the results end up being judicialized due to the tightness and definition in few states. The latter will not be new taking into account the election of 2000 or even the last one in which he was elected. Joe Bidenwhen the New York magnate dedicated himself to challenging the results, even supporting the takeover of the Capitol by his supporters.
trump may have its revenge as a relevant phenomenon in North American politics and Harris bets on establishing herself as the first female president in the history of the USAbut both within an increasingly thin margin of doubt and questioning of the very rules of the electoral political system.
Source: Ambito
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