Vice President Mike Pence, who presided over the count conducted by a joint session of Congress, announced that Biden had won the Electoral College vote early Thursday after the House and Senate easily defeated Republican objections lodged against the votes sent by two states, Arizona and Pennsylvania.
The late-night session was anything but the normal routine for counting Electoral College votes, after the proceedings were halted for more than five hours while lawmakers were forced into lockdown by pro-Trump rioters that overran US Capitol Police.
But lawmakers vowed to finish what they had started, and the Senate reconvened just after 8 p.m. ET Wednesday, nearly six hours after it abruptly recessed.
“To those who wreaked havoc in our Capitol today, you did not win,” Pence said as the Senate session resumed following the evacuations of the complex. “As we reconvene in this chamber, the world will again witness the resilience and strength of our democracy, even in the wake of unprecedented violence and vandalism in this Capitol.”
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has pushed back against Trump’s effort to use the joint session to overturn the election results, said that Congress has “faced down much greater threats than the unhinged crowd we saw today.”
“They tried to disrupt our democracy. They failed,” the Kentucky Republican
As they reconvened, Democrats and some Republicans condemned Trump’s rhetoric in the lead-up to Wednesday’s session, saying he deserved some of the blame for inciting the pro-Trump rioters who stormed into the Capitol.
“This mob was a good part President Trump’s doing, incited by his words, his lies,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said. “Today’s events almost certainly would not have happened without him.”
The Senate voted 93 to 6 to dismiss the objection raised by Republicans to Arizona’s results, and 92 to 7 to reject the objection to Pennsylvania.
In the House, a majority of Republicans voted to object to the results, but they were still soundly rejected, 303 to 121 for Arizona and 282 to 138 for Pennsylvania, with all Democrats in opposition. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was among the House Republicans to vote to reject the two states’ results.
The riots prompted several Senate Republicans who had planned to object to decide they would no longer do so.
“I think today changed things drastically,” said Sen. Mike Braun, an Indiana Republican who was one of the objectors. “Whatever point you made before that should suffice. (Let’s) get this ugly day behind us.”
Sen. Kelly Loeffler, the Georgia Republican who lost her Senate race on Tuesday, said she had prepared to object to her home state’s presidential election results, but took a different course after the riots.
“The violence, the lawlessness and siege of the halls of Congress are abhorrent and stand as a direct attack on what my objection was intended to protect, the sanctity of the American democratic process,” Loeffler said.
Another two Republicans who planned to object, Sens. Steve Daines of Montana and James Lankford of Oklahoma, released a joint statement saying they were dropping their objections. “We now need the entire Congress to come together and vote to certify the election results,” the senators said.
Not all Republicans dropped their objections. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas stood by his Arizona objection that preceded the rioting, while Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, who was the first Republican senator to announce plans to object, condemned the violence but argued that the Senate floor was the proper venue to debate the allegations surrounding the election.
He joined an objection put forward by GOP Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, forcing the chambers to split for a second round of debate and votes.
Other Republicans who voted to object to the Arizona results included Sens. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi, Roger Marshall of Kansas, John Kennedy of Louisiana, Tommy Tuberville of Alabama and Cruz. Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming voted to object to Pennsylvania, while Kennedy voted to certify in that state.