Sharply split US makes its choice
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voters are expected to cast their ballots, on top of the 83 million who have already voted early.
The first ballots cast yesterday mirrored the nationwide divide. Overnight, the six registered voters in the tiny hamlet of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, split their votes between Harris and Trump in voting just past midnight.
However, some officials hoped that the change in vote counting rules in some key battleground states may expedite the declaration of results.
Due to the enormous size of the US, voting opened in Hawaii, one of the last states to do so, around 7 hours after voting opened in the country. Hawaii, with four electoral college votes, will be one of the last states to close its polls at 19:00 local time (05:00 GMT). Some locations in Alaska will remain open an hour later.
Yesterday, both candidates put in final pleas to voters ahead of the voting.
“Today, we vote because we love our country and we believe in the promise of America,” Harris wrote on social media.
Trump released a sombre, one-minute ad, then posted: “This will be the most important day in American History.”
Later, the Republican candidate cast his vote in Florida. His opponent, Kamala Harris, cast her vote by mail ballot to California.
Wearing his trademark red cap, Trump told media present at the voting centre that he was “feeling good”. “I feel very confident... and it looks like Republicans have shown up in force,” he said.
In a radio interview on the election day, Harris urged Americans to “get out and vote”, particularly in battleground states.
“We’ve got to get it done. Today is voting day, and people need to get out and be active,” she said on Atlanta station WVEE-FM.
Harris said she will host her Election Night watch party at her alma mater Howard University, a historically Black university in Washington, DC.
Meanwhile, several media outlets reported that Trump will be joined by Tesla and SpaceX boss Elon Musk this evening.
The former president’s campaign is hosting a watch party at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home and Palm Beach Club for thousands of supporters. It is not clear if Trump and Musk will attend these events.
Long queues formed in Erie, a city in battleground Pennsylvania.
“It’s way, way, way more people here than the last election,” Marchelle Beason, 46, told AFP after casting her ballot for Harris at an elementary school.
“We’re so divided right now, and she’s about peace. And everything that her opponent has to say is really negative,” she added.
At the same school, 56-year-old Darlene Taylor, who said she lives on disability benefits, noted her main issue is to “close the border”.
“We don’t need another four more years of high inflation, gas prices (and) lying,” said Taylor, who wore a homemade Trump shirt.
Meanwhile, a Pennsylvania court yesterday approved a request by the local board of elections to extend voting hours by two in a strongly pro-Trump county after voting machines in the key swing state experienced an election day software glitch.
On election day, control of Congress, and by extension, the ability of the new president to enact their agenda, is also at stake. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs, as are 34 of the Senate’s 100 seats.
Trump’s campaign has suggested he may declare victory on election night even while millions of ballots have yet to be counted, as he did four years ago. The former president has repeatedly said any defeat could only stem from widespread fraud, echoing his false claims from 2020. The winner may not be known for days if the margins in battleground states are as slim as expected.
In Georgia, there were five non-credible bomb threats at polling locations across the state, leading to evacuations in two locations. Later, Georgia’s secretary of state told the press that the threats came from Russia.
Meanwhile, the FBI warned Americans about two new fake videos falsely citing terror threats and voter fraud, the latest in a string of disinformation that officials feared would intensify on election day.
One fabricated video purporting to be from the federal law enforcement agency falsely cited a high terror threat and urged Americans to “vote remotely,” while another video includes a fake press release alleging to be from the agency and claiming rigged voting among inmates in five prisons.
Both are “not authentic,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation said in a statement.
Federal, state, and local officials have been warning Americans about attempts to undermine the election with wrong information and have urged US voters to seek out credible information from reliable sources.
However, the threats caused little disruption in the voting process as the voters gave their opinion through ballots on who should be the next US president.
No matter who wins, history will be made.
Harris, 60, the first female vice president, would become the first woman, Black woman and South Asian American to win the presidency. Trump, 78, the only president to be impeached twice and the first former president to be criminally convicted, would also become the first president to win non-consecutive terms in more than a century.
Opinion polls show the candidates running neck and neck in each of the seven states likely to determine the winner: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Reuters/Ipsos polling shows Harris leading among women by 12 percentage points and Trump winning among men by seven percentage points.
A final outcome of the polls may not be known for several days if the results are close, adding to tensions in a deeply divided nation.
And there are fears of turmoil and even violence if Trump loses, and then contests the result as he did in 2020.
The world is also anxiously watching, as the result will have major implications for conflicts in the Middle East, Russia’s war in Ukraine, and tackling climate change, which Trump calls a hoax.
Some experts said Trump’s return to power would instantly fuel international instability, with US allies in Europe and Nato alarmed by his isolationist “America First” policies.
Trading partners are also nervously watching his vow to impose sweeping import tariffs.
Trump has said he would not seek election again in 2028.