US Election Outcome: International Response

The 2020 election between incumbent President Donald Trump and former Vice-President Joe Biden was one of the most tumultuous elections in American history. After four days of counting votes and polls in each state reporting the results, the Associated Press projected that Joe Biden would be the next President of the United States. Once the AP called the race, more and more national and international news organizations followed suit. However, just because they have called the election does not mean that Biden won.

President Trump has not conceded the race, claiming that the Democratic Party has committed election fraud. In past elections, few presidential candidates have refused to concede once the other candidate was projected to win. It is important to note that a concession to an election is not legally binding, meaning that a person who concedes could technically win, it is just an act based on principle. Furthermore, the election is still not over yet, as Trump and his campaign are contesting it in the courts and the matter will possibly make its way to the Supreme Court.

This contention isn’t stopping other countries’ leaders and media from congratulating Joe Biden on winning the presidency. These include Canada’s Justin Trudeau, Britain’s Boris Johnson, France’s Emmauel Macron, Germany’s Angela Merkel, South Korea’s Moon Jae-in, Japan’s Yoshihide Suga, and more. Many of the major players in international policy have declared that Biden won and offered their praise.

However, other important countries, such as Russia, Brazil, China and Mexico have not done the same. All of these countries have stated that they wanted to wait for official results instead of prematurely recognizing Biden as the President-elect. Furthermore, it seems that they do not want to get entangled or interfere with U.S. political controversy. This might be the right call considering that the election is not technically over as votes are still being counted and the individual state legislatures have not certified the results and may not for some time.