America holds its breath: conspiracy theorists and authoritarian governments take strength as Trump prepares to contest the election

“Oh, what a night”, as Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons sang of December 1963. Turns out the night of 3 November 2020 delivered a Blue Ripple, not a Blue Wave. In the most closely contested presidential election since George W. Bush eventually won the White House in 2000 with a 500-vote victory in Florida, there is as yet no decisive result. The outcome may not be clarified until the weekend. Meantime, morning-after lawsuits will crash down on states still counting mail-in votes.

At the time of writing, Joe Biden has 220 Electoral College votes compared with Donald Trump’s 213. Florida falling to Trump fairly decisively confirmed that this would be no early shut-out event for Biden. The scene is now set for a constitutional crisis, with both camps claiming victory.

President Trump has now announced victory from his White House party, and that he is heading to the Supreme Court to secure his position. The mail-in votes still being counted will now be disputed.

Joe Biden will be forced into a response on morning TV, upping the stakes, or he will be seen to be weak. Having disappointed his supporters already, does he have the cojones to counter a Trump legal onslaught?  The Trump-Pence campaign is now sending out emails looking for cash to fund legal action. Mike Pence is pestering everyone. The court strategy has clearly been long planned.

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For America’s last “stolen” election, look to LBJ’s primary election for the Senate in Texas in 1948. It was eventually decided by the Supreme Court. Long term, Trump’s move potentially plays into the hands of authoritarian leaders – Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping – who tell their people 21st-century democracy is failing.

This is the messy election Americans wanted to avoid. The constitution assumes a smooth transfer of power. Even in the Florida hanging-chad election of 2000, Al Gore conceded to George W Bush in the national interest. In this election, expect both candidates to put their own interests first.

Civil unrest threatens to erupt. Watch over coming days for demonstrations from both extremes of the political spectrum. In New York, the forces of law and order have already conceded. Apartment buildings in the swanky upper East and West sides are already shuttered, as the New York Police Department told managers they could not guarantee protection.

NYPD cops, with time on their hands following overtime cuts, are moonlighting for security firms. Friends report a “Mad Max” feel on the streets. Having been told to “Stand by and stand back” by the President, will extremists like The Proud Boys now think it time to step up?

Election night was not the smooth path to a Biden victory many Democrats had smugly assumed. In the greatest democracy on the planet – at least, that is its self-described epithet – a burst water main comically stopped the count in hotly contested North Carolina and vote counters went home. “Nothing to see here. No votes were damaged in the flood”.

Conspiracy theorists on the eventual losing side will have a field day. Richard Nixon’s Watergate plumbers could be upstaged. Where were they when they were needed? It could take until 12 November for North Carolina to complete the count. Currently, Trump is 75,000 votes ahead, but with 100,000 mail in votes favouring Biden – some of which may arrive post-election day and contested as illegal – there is everything to play for.

Democrat supporting media were crowing at close of polls of a Biden lead of 10%. The pro-Biden swing in the popular vote slumped to only a 1% improvement on Hillary Clinton’s 48.2%.

How often do pollsters have to get it wrong before they are all put into merciful receivership? They will now skulk for a while, reconfigure their algorithms, then bounce back, claiming, “This time we’ve really nailed it”. Monarchs in the middle ages had alchemists. We have pollsters.

That popular vote delivers no Electoral College votes, which are the votes that count. 270 needed to win. If the Democrats lose a presidential election twice in a row having won the popular vote, look out for a strident campaign to change the “unfair” electoral college system, specifically fashioned by the founding fathers to give disproportionate heft to smaller states.

Why? Because, as I tire of having to lecture European friends, the USA is not a nation state. It is a federation of states – some big some small. The price the big fish paid for federation in 1787 was to allow the minnows a disproportionate advantage, to prevent them being overwhelmed. It is also why each state has two senators, irrespective of its population.

Florida is apparently secure for Trump. The Rust belt tell-tale state of Ohio, too. A “Told you so” 5:00am GMT message from the President’s campaign manager there, (declaration of interest, he’s a good friend), Robert Paduchik, was confirmation. Bob can sniff victory on the ground. If Donald Trump remains President, it will be down to the Republicans’ well-oiled campaigning machinery. There were highly professional “Bobs” in all the battleground states.

Whatever the outcome, Donald Trump will still dominate the Republican party. Those disgruntled Republicans who “wanted their party back”, so supported Biden, backed by the likes of Cindy McCain and James Comey, have been well and truly stuffed. It would have taken a Biden landslide to loosen the hold Trump has established in his party since he hatched, a cuckoo in the nest, in 2016.

The House of Representatives remains solidly Democrat – no surprise there – and although former Democratic Governor, John Hickenlooper, is projected to unseat incumbent Republican Senator, Cory Gardner, in Colorado, the Democrats’ opportunities to retake the chamber seemed to be shrinking as vote counting went deeper into election night.

The show goes on.