washington the pandemic and the fragile economy weighed heavily on voters in tuesdays presidential election a contest that for many amounted to a referendum on president donald trumps leadership in a time of turmoilap votecast an expansive survey of the electorate found roughly twothirds of voters said their opinion of the republican president either for or against drove their choice only about a third said the same of his democratic rival former vice president joe biden this was the case nationally as well as in many of the battleground states that will determine which candidate wins a majority in the electoral collegethe results suggest that trumps leadership personality and omnipresence in the spotlight have defined the race even as voters grappled with a historic set of overlapping crisesas the coronavirus surges across the country roughly 4 in 10 voters said the pandemic was the top concern facing the country the economy followed close behind the choice of about 3 in 10 voters in a year of racial justice protests and debate over structural racism about 1 in 10 voters cited racism as the most important issuelive updates us election results 2020the coronavirus outbreak has claimed more than 230000 american lives and launched a political debate about how to stop the disease trump has argued for prioritizing the economy over public health protections falsely claiming the nation was rounding the turn in its effort to contain the virus biden has cast trumps rhetoric as dangerous and vowed to take a more aggressive approach if electedvoters were divided on whether the nation has contained the spread of the virus about half of voters said the virus is somewhat or mostly under control and about half described the coronavirus as out of controlabout 6 in 10 voters said the governments higher priority should be limiting the spread of the coronavirus even if it damages the economyvoters in key battleground states shared anxieties about the virus and its spread in wisconsin which saw an october spike in cases close to half of voters said the pandemic was the top issue facing the country and about 6 in 10 said it was not under control about twothirds said the government should prioritize stopping its spread even if it means economic paintrump and biden faced a dissatisfied and distrustful electorate about 6 in 10 voters are unhappy with the direction of the country roughly threequarters said they are dissatisfied or angry with the way the federal government is workingthe majority of voters made up their minds long ago threequarters said theyve always known how they would vote trumps campaign spent much of the campaign focused on turning out entrenched voters rather than convincing voters who might have been persuadablemore than 100 million americans rushed to vote early and by mail taking advantage of new rules intended to make voting safer and easier during the pandemic trump has sought to sow doubt about the new voting systems and the legitimacy of the count and claimed