Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, but is refusing to concede to Biden

• President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election but is refusing to concede.
• "This election is not over," the campaign said in a statement on Friday.
• President-elect Joe Biden won Pennsylvania on Friday, according to Decision Desk HQ, which clinched his victory.
• Trump is breaking from a democratic tradition in the US that dates back to country's earliest days.

President Donald Trump is refusing to concede after losing the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden, leaving the US on the verge of a constitutional crisis.

Trump in a statement Saturday accused Biden of "rushing to falsely pose as the winner" after dozens of news outlets projected the former vice president to have won the election.

"The simple fact is this election is far from over," Trump said in a statement disseminated to news outlets.

"Joe Biden has not been certified as the winner of any states, let alone any of the highly contested contests headed for mandatory recounts, or states where our campaign has valid and legitimate legal challenges that could determine the ultimate victor," the statement continued.

In a series of tweets on Saturday that were quickly flagged by Twitter for including false information, Trump incorrectly said he "WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT!" and baselessly suggested voter fraud.

The Trump campaign is trying to undercut the integrity of mail-in voting with litigation in multiple states against mail-in ballots. The president is falsely arguing that vote by mail leads to widespread voter fraud.

Biden surpassed 270 electoral votes by flipping the battleground state of Pennsylvania Friday morning.

Multiple news outlets declared on Saturday morning Biden the winner of the 2020 presidential elections. Business Insider and Vox were among the news outlets that projected Biden to be the winner of the 2020 presidential election on Friday, using the results from Decision Desk HQ.

CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and other national outlets called the election for Biden shortly after 11 a.m. ET Saturday.

Earlier that morning Trump tweeted, "I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT!" Twitter flagged the tweet.

The president early on Wednesday morning falsely declared that he won the election as votes were still being counted across the country, while also pushing the baseless assertion that the contest was being stolen from him. There is no evidence of widespread of voter fraud in the 2020 election. Voter fraud is extremely rare in the US.

Trump on Thursday evening reiterated the false notion that he won the election and continued to disseminate disinformation.

"If you look at the legal votes, I win very easily," Trump said to reporters at the White House. There is no basis for claiming that illegal votes led to Biden's victory.

Trump wouldn't commit to a peaceful transfer of power prior to the election, and repeatedly pushed the baseless assertion that he would only lose if the election was "rigged."

"We're going to have to see what happens," Trump said in late September when asked if he'd commit to a peaceful post-election process.

With this decision, the president is upending a hallmark of the democratic process in the US, and the country is in uncharted waters.

Refusing to concede breaks from a democratic tradition that dates back to 1797 when George Washington willingly stepped down as the nation's first commander-in-chief. The first peaceful transfer of power between two political parties occurred after John Adams lost to Thomas Jefferson in the 1800 election, and no president has since broken that precedent.

Trump's move could undermine public confidence in the US electoral process moving forward. He's mirroring the behavior of authoritarians who refuse to give up power and reject the results of democratic elections.

No president in modern US history has challenged American democracy in the ways Trump has.

Trump was impeached in December 2019 in relation to his efforts to pressure Ukraine into launching inquiries into the Bidens. The president was essentially accused by Democrats of soliciting a foreign government to dig up political dirt and interfere in the 2020 presidential election. There was no evidence of illegal activity or wrongdoing on the part of the Bidens with respect to Ukraine.

Beyond his impeachment, Trump has also repeatedly ignored or violated democratic norms. He has habitually attacked the free press, lashing out at virtually any negative coverage. He's also the first president in decades to refuse to release his tax returns, and unlike past presidents also declined to divest from his businesses.

Trump's ongoing ties to his business empire as president have raised a myriad ethical and constitutional issues. The president's properties have reportedly earned at least $8.1 million from US taxpayers and from the president's supporters since he took office in January 2017.

Michelle Mark contributed to this report.