PHOENIX — It’s been a long time coming, but the 2020 election in Arizona effectively ended Tuesday night, when polls closed and unofficial results began to get released.
Former Vice President Joe Biden took Arizona and its 11 crucial Electoral College votes early Wednesday morning.
The Associated Press called the race for Biden at 12:51 a.m., with him leading President Donald Trump by five points with 97% of precincts reporting.
Jo Jorgensen, the Libertarian Party candidate, was also on Arizona’s ballot for president but held just 1% of the vote.
The Associated Press said it declared the race "after an analysis of ballots cast statewide concluded there were not enough outstanding to allow Trump to catch up."
"With 80% of the expected vote counted, Biden was ahead by 5 percentage points, with a roughly 130,000-vote lead over Trump and about 2.6 million ballots counted," the news desk said in an article.
"The remaining ballots left to be counted, including mail-in votes in Maricopa County, where Biden performed strongly, were not enough for Trump to catch up to the former vice president."
You can see the results for the presidential election in Arizona below:
FULL RESULTS: Tap here for the results in all the Arizona races
Trump and Biden have been going head-to-head since both candidates became their party’s presumptive nominees in March and April, respectively.
Arizona has traditionally voted for the Republican nominees for president.
Trump won Arizona in the 2016 presidential election over then-Democratic Party nominee Hillary Clinton. He won all 11 of Arizona’s electoral votes.
In fact, Arizona has only voted for one Democratic presidential candidate since 1952: Former President Bill Clinton in 1996.
But that could change this year: According to FiveThirtyEight.com, a statistical analysis website, Biden has been leading in an average of 2020 presidential general election polls in Arizona since March.
More 12 News coverage of Election Day:
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has sickened nearly 250,000 people and killed more than 6,000 in Arizona as of Tuesday, Biden has not campaigned much in the state. He visited just once, on Oct. 8.
By contrast, Trump and his surrogates held many large events, including campaign rallies, during the last several months of the election season.
Trump himself delivered remarks at two “Make America Great Again” victory rallies in Bullhead City and Goodyear on Oct. 28.
Trump also visited Prescott and Tucson for two separate rallies on Oct. 19, his first trip to Arizona since announcing he had been diagnosed with COVID-19 in early October.
You can see the electoral vote results for the presidential election below:
You can see the national popular vote results for the presidential election below: