President-elect of the United States
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A president-elect (literally: elected president ) in the United States is a person who was elected as the coming president in the presidential election but has not yet assumed this office (cf. Elekt ).
Due to the several months gap between the election (beginning of November) and the assumption of office (January 20, 1933 even not until March 4) of another person as president, there is a phase with the presidency transition in which a president who is still in office resigns and an elected presidential candidate preparing to take office. In addition to the informal title of President-elect that is customary in the media and society from election day, there are also constitutional and other legal regulations for the transitional phase in which the title is used formally. In the constitution, the spelling President-elect is used instead of the spelling President-elect commonly used in America today.
The term does not apply to an incumbent president who has been elected for a directly subsequent second term. In analogy to the President-Elect of standing in front of the office is Vice President as Vice President-Elect titled.
The last President-elect was Donald Trump from November 9, 2016 to January 20, 2017 , who won the presidential election on November 8, 2016 .
Basics
The exact definition of the period in which an elected candidate can be called President-Elect is difficult.
Electoral system
The United States has a tiered electoral system. In the nationwide general election, only electors are formally determined and then cast their votes. This only happens about 6 weeks after the election. The votes will not be counted until January 6th in a joint session of the Congress . If the election is unsuccessful, the House of Representatives elects the President and the Senate elects the Vice-President, which can drag on until after the day of inauguration on January 20th.
Popular handling
De facto , however, the two-party system in the USA and the regulation in almost all states in which the candidate receives all electorates of the state with a simple majority in the respective state results in a clear majority in the electoral college.
Therefore, the candidate is usually called President-Elect as soon as his opponent publicly admits his defeat (so-called concession ) and congratulates the elected candidate. Nowadays, this is usually still the case on election night. In the 2012 election, for example, this took place an hour after the polling stations closed, but this can be counted as late, as the clear prognosis for the state of Ohio has already confirmed the winner.
From the moment of his established election victory on national election day, the president-elect has had a large informal influence on American politics.
Delays
Exceptions to this are rare. In the 1960 election , Richard Nixon did not admit defeat until the following day because of the narrow vote gap. The election in 1876 was only clarified after a long tug-of-war between the parties because of the tight results, so that the later President Rutherford B. Hayes was only two days before the inauguration on March 4, 1877 for President-elect . The 2000 election was only decided in December after legal disputes over the extremely tight election result in the state of Florida , which also gave the decisive majority of the electorate.
Constitutional regulations
Mention in the Constitution ( 20th Amendment to the United States Constitution ) gives the institution of President-elect constitutional status without, strictly speaking, an actual office with an assigned function and formal powers. While other constitutional articles regulate the election and its course, the 20th amendment stipulates what happens if the President-elect dies or there is no properly elected candidate by election day.
In this sense, only those who have been properly elected are President-elect . H. emerges as the winner in the electoral committee or, in the absence of a majority, was elected by the House of Representatives at a later date.
Succession arrangements
Death of a president-elect before taking office, the new elected automatically Vice President ( Vice President-elect ) at the term end of the outgoing president as the new president day. If one is also not available, Congress may by law determine a procedure for appointing a provisional president to assume office. This was done through the Presidential Succession Act , last re-enacted in 1947. This determines the succession of the president for other cases, e.g. B. if both the President and the Vice President can no longer perform their duties. Under the current rules, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives is then acting President.
If a candidate dies after his election victory on national election day and before his election by the electors, the electoral college may, at its own discretion, appoint another successor. More likely, however, is the election of a successor suggested by the party of the deceased election winner. In such a case, the major parties in the USA have come up with rules on how to determine a new presidential candidate. However, such a case has never occurred before.
Formally assigned President-elect status
Various congressional legal opinions have dealt with the exact timing of the election of the President-elect . They suggest that whoever receives an absolute majority of the electoral vote or who is elected in the House of Representatives will immediately become president-elect . The election therefore usually takes place on the day of the meeting of the electoral college, according to the expert reports, before the election is announced and accepted.
The electoral college meets around six weeks after national election day. The ballot papers for this actual presidential election will not be counted until the beginning of January in a joint meeting of the House of Representatives and the Senate and the result will be determined. Strictly speaking, therefore, is only the beginning of January a candidate in accordance with the 20th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States as president-elect announced. The President-elect becomes President of the United States regardless of being sworn in at the end of the outgoing President's term. If there is no absolute majority for a candidate in the electoral college, the House of Representatives determines the next president in an election. The elected candidate will be the President-elect immediately upon completion of this election . If this does not succeed immediately, the Vice-President-Elect becomes Vice President and Acting President on the day of the swearing-in, until a President can be elected. If this cannot be determined due to a lack of majority in the electoral college, the Senate elects the vice-president. If this also fails, then the further succession regulation to determine a provisional president will be used until the elections can be concluded regularly.
Different electoral votes
No constitutional article or national law binds electors to the November election results. The electors are free to choose. However, some states have passed laws to prevent electors from voting against the will of the electorate in their state (so-called faithless electors , i.e. "faithless electors"). Indeed, in US history electors have rarely cast an unexpected vote. The last time that more than one elector cast a dissenting vote was in the 2016 election . This was also the case with most of the dissenters, with the exception of the special case of the 1872 election , when the defeated Democratic candidate Horace Greeley died before the electoral committee met. Three of his 66 electorates voted for him, but those votes had to be invalidated. The remaining 63 electors distributed their votes to other people.
Further legal regulations
Several laws regulate the special position of the President-elect . Their intention is usually to enable a smooth assumption of office from the outgoing president, especially in matters of national security.
Since the future president was de facto established in November, the law The Presidential Transition Act (German: Law on the transfer of office of the president) was passed in 1963. In order to enable a smooth handover, this law assigns the "obvious" winner of the presidential election a budget, work space and other privileges. The President of the General Services Administration will declare the obvious winner as early as possible . Among other things, it is common for the prospective president to receive intelligence reports on the security situation and personal protection. The obvious winner is already named President-elect in this act .
Web links
- greatagain.gov: President-elect Donald J. Trump , official government website of the next-elected US President Donald Trump
Individual evidence
- ↑ Matthias Rossbach, Katja Gelinsky, FAZ.net: Barack Obama. Today the president will be elected.
- ^ Presidential and Vice Presidential Succession: Overview and Current Legislation. ( Memento of the original from January 30, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Congressional Research Service of The Library of Congress. 2004
- ↑ US Congress, House of Representatives: Proposing an Amendment to the Constitution of the United States , report to accompany SJ Res. 14, 72nd Cong., 1st sess., Rept. 345 (Washington, GPO: 1932). 1933.
- ↑ Presidential Transition Act of 1963 (Public Law 88-277) ( Memento of the original from January 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
