Vice President Kamala Harris personally called president-elect Donald Trump to concede the race on Wednesday and ensure a peaceful transfer of power in January, a Harris aide said ahead of her afternoon speech at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
The 4 p.m. event at the Democratic nominee’s alma mater is expected to be a formal concession speech. Dissatisfied with the early election results that were in favor of Trump, Harris left her election-night watch party without giving her supporters in attendance a speech.
The former president ultimately won the election early Wednesday, having passed the 270 electoral-vote threshold first.
President Joe Biden also called his 2020 opponent to congratulate him on his election victory, according to the Associated Press. During the call, he invited Trump to the White House to discuss the transition at an unknown date. Seventy-five days remain until the presidential inauguration on January 20, 2025.
The president plans to address the U.S. regarding the election results on Thursday. Biden also spoke with Harris to congratulate her on the campaign.
Biden’s relationship with the vice president has been tense in the final stretch before Election Day. Biden reportedly did not attend Harris’s watch party on Tuesday night, and as results continued coming in Wednesday morning, Biden was blamed by his own party for Harris’s loss.
“We ran the best campaign we could, considering Joe Biden was president,” an unnamed Harris aide told Politico. “Joe Biden is the singular reason Kamala Harris and Democrats lost tonight.”
“Why did Joe Biden hold on for as long as he did? He should have not concealed his [health] and dropped out a lot sooner,” an anonymous Democratic donor told Reuters.
The 81-year-old president privately thought he was the only Democratic candidate who could beat Trump and maintained he was fit to be president for a second term, despite his declining mental health and elderly age. Biden decided to drop out in July and hand the reins to Harris, saying at the time that it was “in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down.”
As of Wednesday afternoon, Trump stands at 292 electoral votes compared to Harris’s 224. The Republican nominee clinched the race in five key swing states — Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, and North Carolina. He is also leading in the two western swing states, Arizona and Nevada.