The full results of the midterm legislative elections were still awaited Thursday in the United States, where Joe Biden was pleased that his camp had thwarted the predictions of a crushing defeat, but the attention was already moving towards the presidential of 2024.
The Democratic president will probably have to deal with a House of Representatives in the hands of Republicans, which will complicate the rest of his term, but the victory of his opponents promises to be much shorter than they thought.
The control of the Senate was still uncertain. The final composition of the upper house, suspended with three seats, should indeed only be known in weeks. Because the counting of votes in Arizona and Nevada could still take several days, and in Georgia, a second round is scheduled for December 6.
For a long time, the Republicans believed they had a boulevard to take back the two chambers from their rivals, promising a “red wave”, even a “tsunami”.
“That did not happen,” rejoiced Joe Biden, 79, on Wednesday at a press conference with all smiles, saying that on November 8, the day of these historically perilous elections for the party in place, was “a good day for democracy”.
The president had largely focused his campaign on the defense of democracy and rights, including abortion rights. He had urged Americans to block the most extreme fringe of the conservative camp and its “extreme MAGA philosophy”, going so far as to call its ideology “semi-fascism”.
The acronym MAGA refers to former President Donald Trump’s iconic slogan, “Make America Great Again”, which continues to hammer home that the 2020 presidential election was “stolen” from him. by Joe Biden.
The Republicans, they have insisted more in their campaign on the economy and inflation, which has reached record levels.