Biden formally clinches Electoral College victory with California’s 55 votes

(CNN) – President-elect Joe Biden has received enough electoral votes to officially clinch the presidency, a major milestone that he reached when California’s electors awarded him the state’s 55 electoral votes at their meeting Monday in Sacramento.

CNN projected five weeks ago that Biden would win the White House, but his victory was formalized Monday after presidential electors gathered in statehouses across the country as part of the Constitutional process to officially elect a President.

This development is a crushing blow to President Trump’s controversial and unprecedented attempts to block Biden’s victory in the Electoral College by filing longshot lawsuits and pressuring lawmakers in battleground states to overturn millions of legal votes.

In California, Biden won more than 63% of the statewide vote, while Trump earned about 34%.

Democrats have won California’s electoral votes every cycle since 1992. The state voted for Republicans in the six presidential elections before that.