Biden On Cusp Of Presidential Win; Trump Plays Defense In Court

Updated at 9:58 a.m. Eastern Time:

ACROSS AMERICA — Democrat Joe Biden strengthened his "blue wall" in battleground states overnight, pushing closer to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the rancorous 2020 presidential election and deny President Donald Trump a second term in the White House.

Biden has claimed Michigan and Wisconsin's 26 electoral votes, leaving only a handful of states to be decided. On the defensive, the Trump campaign filed legal challenges in several key swing states, though it's unclear if any of the legal manuevering will help the president as his path to re-election narrows.

Projections by The Associated Press put Biden's lead at 264 after the Great Lakes state wins. Any of the battleground states yet to be called — Georgia (16 electoral votes), Nevada (6 electoral votes), North Carolina (15 electoral votes) or Pennsylvania (20 electoral votes) — would make him the president-elect.

Trump, whose count stands at 214 in The AP's projections, would need to win all four of the states to be re-elected.

Other news organizations have been more conservative and have not put Arizona, with 11 electoral votes, in the win column for Biden. Those projections put Biden's electoral vote total at 253.

With millions of votes still to be counted, Biden has amassed more than 71 million popular votes, more than any other presidential candidate in history, and a more than 3.2 million lead over Trump. At a Wednesday afternoon news conference, Biden said that if he is elected, he will be a president for all Americans, not just those who voted for him.

“I will govern as an American president,” Biden said. "There will be no red states and blue states when we win. Just the United States of America.”

Biden's measured tone was a sharp contrast to Trump, who early Wednesday morning falsely claimed that he had won re-election and the count of ballots received after Election Day — but allowed under individual state laws — amounted to election "fraud" that he would go to court to stop.

His campaign followed through with lawsuits in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia and Wisconsin.

The former vice president didn't declare himself the winner of the race, as Trump had done, but told supporters to remain patience.

"We the people will not be silenced," Biden said. "We the people will not surrender."

Related: Biden Projected Winner Of Michigan's 16 Electoral Votes | Wisconsin Called For Biden, Adding 10 Electoral Votes | Trump Campaign Sues To Stop Pennsylvania Vote Count | Trump Campaign Files Lawsuit To Stop Michigan Count

Lonnie Scott, executive director of Progress Michigan, a liberal advocacy group, said Trump only filed the suit to stop The Associated Press and other media outlets from calling the race for Biden.

“This is a Hail Mary,” he told The Associated Press.

The Trump campaign said its lawsuit in Pennsylvania is intended "to stop Democrat election officials from hiding the ballot counting and processing from our Republican poll observers."

According to Trump deputy campaign manager Justin Clark, the campaign seeks "to temporarily halt counting until there is meaningful transparency and Republicans can ensure all counting is done above board and by the law."

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Trump hasn't appeared publicly since his extraordinary early morning remarks from the East Room of the White House. He falsely claimed he'd won and that “a sad group of people" was "trying to disenfranchise” the millions of Americans who had voted to give him another term, earning a stinging rebuke from both Democrats and fellow Republicans.

Related: Republicans React To Trump Election Fraud Claim

Trump hasn't addressed the nation since his early morning news conference, but he again asserted on Twitter that he had won a second term, writing that his campaign had claimed the electoral votes in Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina, as well as Michigan, which he claimed had found "a large number of secretly dumped ballots."

More important than the Electoral College map, Biden said, is that his campaign has "won with the majority of the American people."

When the final tabulations are in and a winner is declared, Americans must "do what we've always done" and "put the harsh rhetoric and campaign behind us."

"We are not enemies," he said, repeating a campaign pledge to represent all Americans, regardless of party affiliation, if he is elected. "What brings us together as Americans is so much stronger."

Other states still to be called by The Associated Press and others are Georgia with 16 electoral votes, North Carolina with 15 and Nevada with six. Republicans have mounted legal challenges in Nevada, contesting local decisions that could take on national significance in the close election.

Related: 1.4 Million Ballots Still Uncounted In Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania Counties With Most Mail-In Votes To Be Counted

Biden campaign officials said the legal challenges are the latest of several court skirmishes over mail-in and early voting that spurred a record 102 million ballots amid a coronavirus pandemic that made many Americans skittish about showing up to vote in person.

“The American people get to pick their president,” Biden campaign manager Jen O'Malley Dillon said at the Wednesday morning news conference. "The president does not get to say whose votes are counted."

The Biden campaign said it will vigorously fight any court effort by the Trump campaign to stop the tabulation of votes.

Related: What To Know If Presidential Vote Goes To Supreme Court

Biden, whose path to an Electoral College win became more difficult than it appeared it would be before polls tightened in the final hours of the campaign, also spoke to his supporters early Wednesday, telling them to remain patient.

Millions of Americans stood in long lines Tuesday waiting to cast their ballots in a presidential election that will shape how the nation deals with a surging coronavirus pandemic that sent early voting to record levels and fundamental questions of economic fairness and racial justice.

Both parties benefit from early voting, but Democrats historically outperform Republicans in mail-in and absentee voting, while Republicans generally prefer to vote at the polls. Depending on which types of votes — the nearly 102 million early votes or the in-person votes — have been reported by the states, the Electoral College map could change significantly.

The pandemic that so altered voting patterns loomed large over the race, a judgment of Trump’s handling of the outbreak that has killed more than 233,500 people and infected more than 9.4 million people in the United States. Infection rates are surging, with daily confirmed cases up 43 percent over the past two weeks, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The election is also a referendum on Trump’s aggressive version of populism. In his first term, he has challenged cherished traditions of democracy, bending Washington to his will and changing how the United States is viewed by its friends and foes around the world.

Biden defined the race as a battle for America’s soul, combining his trademark folksy decency with policy recommendations hearkening back to his eight years as Obama’s vice president and embracing those purported by more progressive rivals in the Democratic primary.

With the coronavirus now surging anew, voters ranked the pandemic and the economy as top concerns in the race between Trump and Biden, according to AP VoteCast, a national survey of the electorate.

Voters were especially likely to call the public health crisis the nation’s most important issue, with the economy following close behind. Fewer named health care, racism, law enforcement, immigration or climate change.

The survey found that Trump’s leadership loomed large in voters’ decision-making. Nearly two-thirds of voters said their vote was about Trump — either for him or against him.

Election Day was mostly peaceful, despite high anxiety in the days leading up to the vote in the most tempestuous election in modern memory. A decision by a federal judge ordering the U.S. Postal Service to sweep its facilities for 300,000 undelivered ballots added some drama to the day, as did the erection of an anti-scaling fence around the White House.

Related: Postal Service Misses Court Deadline On Ballot Sweep

About 1,000 protesters gathered a block from the White House on Black Lives Matter Plaza, and hundreds of others marched through parts of downtown Washington, D.C., sometimes blocking traffic and setting off fireworks.

Election Day also saw a smattering of protests across the country, but there were no signs of violence or widespread unrest in the hours immediately after polls closed.

Workers had boarded up business windows in cities across the country in the event that the election results led to unrest, and several cities planned “Protect the Results” rallies Wednesday.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.