The US Congress convened Monday to count electoral college votes and certify President-Elect Donald Trump’s victory over Vice President Kamala Harris in the November presidential election.
Harris, in her constitutional role as President of the Senate, presided over the joint session that lasted less than an hour.
It comes four years after a violent mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, delaying the tally of votes showing that Joe Biden had defeated Trump in the 2020 election.
After finalizing the certification of Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential win — and her loss — Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters that, by performing her constitutionally mandated duty to oversee the certification process as president of the Senate, she “did what I have done my entire career, which is take seriously the oath.”
Harris — who four years earlier was both vice president-elect and the sitting junior senator from California — led senators from their chamber across the Capitol’s ornate rotunda into the House chamber at exactly 1 p.m. Monday, the date laid out in American law for Congress to officially certify the election of the next President and Vice President.
Unlike four years ago, when then-vice president Mike Pence read out the results and asked if senators or representatives had any objections to each state’s electoral vote totals, this year’s joint session employed a new procedure devised by lawmakers in the wake of Trump’s effort to overturn the election results four years ago.
Though Harris called the joint session to order, she played no role in the counting or reading of the Electoral College vote totals.
Instead, selected tellers — members of the House and Senate chosen by leadership — read out the states and their vote results in alphabetical order.
While Pence had taken a moment to ask for objections and read other parliamentary language about the provenance of the electoral certificates, Harris did not interject as each state’s results were called out.
Trump’s vote total passed the requisite 270 needed for him to claim the presidency after the results from the state of Texas were read.
Once all the states had been read out, Harris called for the House and Senate tellers to report the result.
She then read out the words that sealed her defeat, telling the joint session: “The votes for President of the United States are as follows: Donald J. Trump of the state of Florida has received 312 votes. Kamala D. Harris of the State of California has received 226 votes.”
Harris then read out the result for the next vice president, telling the assembled House and Senate members that Vance had received 312 votes while her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, had earned 226.
“This announcement of the state of the vote by the President of the Senate shall be deemed a sufficient declaration of the persons elected president and vice president of the United States, each for a term beginning on the 20th day of January, 2025 and shall be entered. Together with the list of the votes on the journals of the House and the Senate,” she said.
In a pre-recorded video message, she had said she would “perform her constitutional duty as Vice President of the United States to certify the results of the 2024 election” and called her role “a sacred obligation—one I will uphold guided by love of country, loyalty to our Constitution, and my unwavering faith in the American people,”
“The peaceful transfer of power is one of the most fundamental principles of American democracy. As much as any other principle, it is what distinguishes our system of government from monarchy or tyranny,” she said.
