Election 2024 live updates: Latest results as Trump and Harris go head to head in crucial battleground states
Polls begin to close as America awaits results from battleground states
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Your support makes all the difference.The first polls have closed as Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump conclude their campaigns for the White House. Florida has been called for Trump and New York for Harris, while key battleground swing states Pennsylvania and Georgia are still being counted.
Voting will conclude in three more states — Nevada, Montana, and Utah — at 10pm ET.
The economy and the state of US democracy are among the top issues cited by voters in NBC News’s exit poll, according to the preliminary results.
Thirty-five percent said democracy was their top issue while slightly fewer, 31 percent, said the economy. Abortion was the top issue for 14 percent of voters while 11 percent said immigration. Four percent said foreign policy was most important to them.
Meanwhile, Trump dismissed critics who expressed concerns that he would not concede an election loss as “crazy” as he cast his vote in Florida.
The former president told reporters as he voted with his wife Melania Trump: “If I lose an election, if it’s a fair election, I’d be the first one to acknowledge it.”
Trump later declared that his supporters are “not violent people.”
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Pets head to the polls
Democrat wins Maryland Senate race over former governor
Maryland's Senate race ended in a clear show of dominance for the Democrats. Prince George's County Executive Angela Alsobrooks held a substantial early lead, mostly with mail-in ballots and early voting, and the AP called her race shortly after 9:30 pm over former Governor Larry Hogan.
State officials were forced to delay the release of more Election Day data given long lines of people still waiting to vote in some precincts, particularly in college campuses in Montgomery and Prince George's County (two heavily blue areas in the shadow of Washington DC). Alsobrooks was able to turn out key constituencies, including Democrats worried about a GOP majority in the Senate.
Signs of pessimism for Harris chances: ‘Early indications here are not sterling’
As results come in across the US, there is some concern about Kamala Harris’s prospects beginning to creep in.
Speaking about early voting numbers on Amazon’s live election coverage hosted by Brian Williams, Democratic strategist James Carville expressed pessimism regarding results from some suburban districts.
“Loudoun County, Virginia’s not great,” Carville said. “Think Dulles Airport, suburban Washington — [I] think [Joe Biden] was like 62% in 2020. I’m seeing 57, 58 right now. There are troubling signs out there, but we got a big vote coming out of Philadelphia. Let’s just wait a second. Let’s see what happens in North Carolina and Georgia; but I would be less than honest if I didn’t say the early indications here are not sterling.”
Carville tempered his remarks by saying increased turnout in Pennsylvania, particularly Philadelphia, was more encouraging.
Over on NewsNation, Geraldo Rivera told Elizabeth Vargas that the early results left him “cautiously pessimistic” about the Harris campaign.
“I’m cautiously pessimistic, Elizabeth,” he said. “It seems to me as if Kamala Harris has not succeeded and I was hoping against hope that Georgia and/or North Carolina would fall into her category. It did not happen.”
Vargas noted that both those states were still too early to call.
Florida to keep six-week abortion ban after reproductive rights amendment fails
Abortion access will not be a constitutional right in the state of Florida.
The measure proposed enshrining the right to abortion care in the state, which would overturn state-level bans on abortion at 14- and six-weeks of pregnancy, and land a major victory for abortion rights advocates two years after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v Wade.
The measure is not projected to clear the 60 percent threshold required to amend the state’s constitution.
Alex Woodward has the details.
Florida’s abortion rights amendment fails, keeping six-week ban in place
Voters were asked to change the state’s constitution to enshrine a right to abortion access
Watch: Josh Stein thanks North Carolina after state elects him Governor over divisive Mark Robinson
How to understand exit polls on Election Night
This Election Day, voters will be monitoring their TVs, laptops and phones as results of this year’s presidential and congressional elections pour in. Exit polls are a key indication of the potential results, as pollsters survey voters after they cast their ballots to determine who they backed and how they feel about certain issues. Here’s everything you need to know about who conducts them and how to understand them:
How to understand exit polls on Election Night
Exit polls are one tool that media organizations use to help explain how a state’s electoral votes might swing, Katie Hawkinson reports
People attend a ‘Democrats Abroad’ election night party in London as Americans head to the polls on November 6, 2024
What happens if there’s an Electoral College tie?
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have been neck-and-neck in the polls, prompting questions over what would happen if the Electoral College is tied.
The Constitution has a solution. Read more by Kelly Rissman here:
What happens if there’s Electoral College tie - and what happened the year there was
Only once in US history has the president not been chosen by the Electoral College, since the current system came into play.
Trump wins Ohio and Texas
The Associated Press has called Ohio, once considered a swing state, and Texas for Donald Trump.
He won both in 2016 and 2020.
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