Dear editor,

QUESTIONS keep coming in to me on who will win the US Presidency. It will take several more days to get official results. But it is clear to me, an objective analyst, that Biden would be the next President. Kamala Harris, a Caribbean (Jamaican father) and Indian-American (Indian Tamil Hindu mother), would be the next Vice-President. Congrats are in order for both.
As I had forecast before the US elections, after analyzing opinion polls and as I examined exit poll numbers of voting of various categories of voters, as well as having examined voting returns from the counting on Tuesday evening, I concluded that Joe Biden, the Democratic challenger, would win the Presidency of the US. On three different seminars before the election, I was asked who would win, and I replied, Biden. And right after the voting, I was asked again who would win, and I responded, “Biden.” I was also asked who would be better for Guyana and India. My response was it does not matter who wins the Presidency, US-Guyana and US-India relations would not be adversely impacted. Guyanese and Indian nationals who favoured Trump were not pleased with my response, and a few were very hostile.

I must confess, I am a Labour activist, having served as head of the branch of my union for some fifteen years. I also taught Labour Economics for over a decade. The UFT union historically supported Democratic candidates, with rare exception backing a Republican or an Independent. I volunteered annually for every election campaign, going back the last three decades. I toed the union line, canvassing votes for its endorsed candidates, almost all of whom were/are Democrats. Occasionally, in my private capacity, I volunteered for a Republican candidate that served my community’s interests in Greater Richmond Hill.  And in 2020, my Union supported the Biden/Harris ticket. I was given a list of names and telephone contacts in battleground states to convince to vote Democrat. That is how it was done every year, including for every Presidential election going back to Clinton in 1992. Be that as it may, my analysis of the 2020 election, or of any election, was/is not clouded by my support or campaigning for Biden or endorsed candidates. It is based on objective analysis of polls, and my own conversations with voters. I am professional and non-partisan. Like almost all other pollsters, I, too, was wrong in 2016 when I accepted the polls that Hillary Clinton would win the Presidency. She did win the popular votes by almost 3M votes, but lost in the Electoral College to Donald Trump.

For 2020, after examining the counting trends on Tuesday evening, and all day Wednesday, that had Trump in the lead in most battleground states, I told inquiring minds that Biden would win the Presidency, based on the mail-in ballots. The gap between the two contenders was not too huge to overcome, once the mail-in ballots were counted. Mail-in ballots tend to be heavily Democratic, while in-person ballots tend to be heavily Republican. Mail-in ballots are usually counted last, after Election Day’s voting. Thus, Biden’s numbers kept rising after Tuesday, when the mail-in ballots were being counted.

I told the many people I spoke with in India, Guyana, America, Canada, the UK, and around the Caribbean on Wednesday evening that Biden would win the Presidency, although many insisted it was over for Biden. I insisted that Biden had a very good chance of overtaking Trump, once the counting of the mail-in votes came in. And sure enough, that is exactly what has happened. Except for North Carolina, which is up in the air, Biden should win all of the undeclared battleground states. However, a declaration would take some days, because military ballots from overseas would still have to come in and be counted. The deadline for those ballots varies until next Thursday, but they would have to be postmarked latest on November 3.
I’ve published several such articles on the ICDN website, as well as in the newspapers in Guyana and the West Indian website, explaining why Biden would win, based on voting trends.
President Trump could go to court to challenge the results and demand recounts, and there should be a recount in states with close outcomes. But the numbers won’t change much. There is no evidence of fraud; Biden has won convincingly. The Supreme Court won’t help him. In fact, the Supreme Court may reject his appeal. The court won’t entertain requests to throw out ballots or stop counts; Trump has lost. The only issue I have is that mail-in ballots should have been delivered or reached counting sites by Tuesday evening, at close of voting. (I will pen a piece about why Biden/Harris would be better for India, Guyana and the globe).

Yours truly,
Dr. Vishnu Bisram (Political Scientist)