Biden didn't beat Trump Trump beat himself

Democrat Joe Biden is now the president-elect of the United States. The former vice president to Barack Obama will be sworn in as the 46th US president in January. After three tries (his previous two unsuccessful bids were in 1988 and 2008), Biden, who turns 78 on November 20, will finally make it to the White House as the oldest ever elected American president.

The election numbers were very close although in the Electoral College system unique to the US, they do not exactly tell the whole story. In the electoral college system, a candidate may beat his rival by, say, a million actual votes in Montana but only gets to pick up three electoral votes that the state has to offer. On the other hand, he may lose by only one vote in, say, California, but his rival picks up California's 55 electoral votes to win.

So it is not really the closeness of the contest that makes up the real narrative of the election or that which defines its character. Given the other factors that came into play, it might be right to say that Biden did not really beat Donald Trump but rather that Trump more likely beat himself. Certain facts that emerged after the voting showed that Trump actually had things going for him had he not overarched himself in the wrong places.

For example, Trump may not have been as obnoxious and racist as he had been portrayed and characterized by the American media since day one of his presidency. As it turned out, more women and, more significantly, more black women, voted for Trump in 2020 than in 2016. Overall, more blacks voted for him in his reelection bid than when he ran for the first time in 2016.

And while the majority of Trump's voters were still white, a significant number of white voters have shifted their support to Biden, perhaps not really because they are for Biden but because they have been turned off by Trump. And here's where it really got perplexing for the supposed nemesis of immigrants. More Latino voters actually voted for Trump in 2020 than did in 2016. So what gives?

Clearly Biden could not have won given these realities after the fact. It looked like Trump had his reelection pretty sewed up. Maybe he just didn't realize it. Trump's biggest enemy is himself. And if he does not know that, his close circle, including his family, could have told him. Maybe they didn't know either. Maybe they believed the relentless crusade mounted by the media against him and did not put their own ears to the ground.

For more Latinos and blacks, including black women, to vote for Trump in 2020 than in 2016 is a change that does not happen overnight. That means that long before the election, when the demonization of Trump went through the roof, these swing votes already happened, already made up their minds. It was something that happened close to the election that swung support significantly away from Trump, benefitting Biden.

And I think I know the answer. The deluge of early voting and voting by mail is rooted in the non-political factor called pandemic fear. The pandemic is an issue of life and death. And Trump has failed miserably in dealing with it. It was the early voting and voting by mail that did away Trump. This was the vote of people who feared for their lives, lives threatened by a pandemic that Trump regarded so cavalierly. Biden didn't win. Trump lost.