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President Donald Trump

Disunited America

When Congress was meeting on 6 January to certify Joe Biden’s victory, Trump and his advisers like Rudy Giuliani who considers it a “stolen election,” were inciting their supporters to march on Capitol Hill. Giuliani advised them to engage in ‘combat’.

Trump rebuffed

While the President has the power to veto a Bill passed by Congress, a two-thirds majority in each house of the bicameral legislature can override this. The Democrat-dominated House of Representatives had already overturned the veto.

Battle for Senate

The importance of these contests, which will be decided before 20 January when the inaugural takes place, is that they will determine who controls the Senate. A Republican win will mean that the Joe Biden presidency will be hobbled by a potentially obstructionist Congress.

Not letting go

Mr Trump and his supporters may like to believe that they are victims of an electoral swindle, and while they are entitled to take their grievances about fraud to appropriate courts, it could not have escaped their attention that a difference overall of more than five million votes between the two candidates could not only have been conjured up through deceit.

Blaming doctors

The controversy erupts even as the United States continues to report high numbers of infections and death ~ with more than 90,000 positive diagnoses and more than 900 deaths on Friday. Medical professionals ~ an estimated 16 million of them across the country ~ will be incensed at Mr Trump’s allegation for as the AMA statement noted “physicians, nurses, and frontline health care workers have risked their health, their safety and their lives to treat their patients and defeat a deadly virus.”

Fault lines

The consequences of President Trump’s cavalier approach to safety protocols have already visited the White House, making the world’s most powerful office-cum-residence its most prominent containment zone.