Philadelphia city commissioners predict vote counting will take several more days
PHILADELPHIA - Democrat Joe Biden stood on the cusp of winning the presidency Friday night, three days after Election Day, as the long, exacting work of counting votes widened his lead over President Donald Trump in critical battleground states.
“I think what the president needs to do frankly is put his big boy pants on and acknowledge he lost and congratulate the winner. Just as Jimmy Carter did, just as George H.W. Bush did and frankly Al Gore did and stop this and let us move forward as a country,” said Mayor Jim Kenney.
He made that comment during a press conference Friday afternoon while expressing no uncertainty about the outcome.
Mayor Kenney was joined by city commissioners overseeing the vote counting process inside the Pennsylvania Convention Center.
“I think it’s safe to say democracy has won,” said City Commissioner Omar Sabir. Still, they say the process continues and that it will take several more days.
“We still want everyone to exert patience, ignore a lot of the noise that’s going on and allow us to complete the counting process,” said Sabir.
The process still includes provisional ballots and ballots allowed to come in up until three days after the election which means ballots that came in Friday.
Pennsylvania’s Secretary of State ordered all counties to segregate those mail in ballots that came in after Election Day as they could be at the heart of legal action. As they continue the very important work inside the convention center, outside for the second day people on both sides turn out for a party with two themes. Count every vote or stop the vote in Philly.
“We’re going to continue to count the ballots as quickly as we can without sacrificing accuracy as we have done from the beginning. That’s where we are at. We'll be done when we are done,” said City Commissioner Deeley.
More than 2.6 million mail-in ballots were cast, and there has been no report of fraud or any other problem with the accuracy of the count.
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