Congress has formally affirmed President-elect Joe Biden’s 2020 victory, completing a final step in the electoral process after a mob incited by President Don- ald Trump breached the US Capitol on Wednesday and forced lawmakers to evacuate both the House and Senate chambers.

Vice President Mike Pence, who presided over the count con- ducted by a joint session of Congress, announced that Biden had won the Electoral College vote early Thursday after the House and Senate easily de- feated Republican objections lodged against the votes sent by two states, Arizona and Pennsylvania.

Track The Electoral Vote Count In Congress

The late-night session was anything but the normal routine for counting Electoral College votes, after the proceedings were halted for more than five hours while lawmakers were forced into lockdown by pro-Trump rioters that overran US Capitol Police.

But lawmakers vowed to finish what they had started, and the Senate reconvened just after 8 p.m. ET Wednesday, nearly six hours after it abruptly recessed.

“To those who wreaked hav- oc in our Capitol today, you did not win,” Pence said as the Senate session resumed following the evacuations of the complex. “As we reconvene in this chamber, the world will again witness the resilience and strength of our democracy, even in the wake of unprecedented violence and vandalism in this Capitol.”

Joint Session In The Shadow Of Georgia’s Runoff

Wednesday’s events played out as Democrats swept the Georgia Senate races, taking control of a 50- 50 Senate after Biden is sworn in and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris becomes the Senate’s tie-breaking vote.

The question of how to handle the count had created a major divide inside the Republican Party. The Sen- ate Republican fight spilled into the open last week following Hawley’s announcement, with Trump attacking McConnell and other Republicans who hadn’t joined.

In the House, No. 3 Republi- can Cheney -- daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney -- forcefully pushed back on the objections, while McCarthy quietly backed them.

The last time a lawmaker forced votes on the Electoral College results was in 2005, when Sen. Barba- ra Boxer, a California Democrat, ob- jected to President George W. Bush’s win in Ohio, which she said was never an effort to overturn the election result. In 2017, a group of House Democrats raised several objections to states Trump won, but they were gaveled down because they didn›t have a senator join – by then-vice president Biden.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

CNN’s Dana Bash, Lauren Fox, Ted Barrett, Ali Zaslav, Daniella Diaz and Evan Perez contributed to this report.