Joe Biden wins California, heads toward historic margin in the state

Former Vice President Joe Biden has won the state of California.

The Associated Press made the call almost immediately after polls closed on Tuesday.

Preliminary results showed the Democratic candidate leading 66% to 32%.

Pre-election polling suggested Biden could secure the largest victory margin in a California presidential election since 1920, when Republican Warren Harding defeated Democrat James Cox by 42 percentage points.

Although Californians cast more than 12 million ballots before Election Day, it may take weeks to count the ballots that continue to arrive in the mail or those that had to be cast provisionally at polling places. State law allows ballots to arrive in the mail up to 17 days after the election, as long as they are postmarked by Nov. 3.

California has long supported the Democratic candidate in presidential elections. Hillary Clinton won the state by 30 points in 2016, and Barack Obama won with 23 percentage points in 2012.

George H. W. Bush was the last Republican to carry the state, in 1988.

While Biden won California handily early in the night, he struggled to secure victory in several key battleground states, and results are still pending in key states like Pennsylvania and Georgia.

Shortly before 3 a.m., Trump, speaking from the White House, falsely declared victory. The president has not secured the 270 electoral votes needed to win the race, and Biden said he remains hopeful about his own prospects for winning.

This story was originally published November 3, 2020 at 8:11 PM with the headline "Joe Biden wins California, heads toward historic margin in the state."