U.S. Election Day 2020 updates: Nearly 102 million Americans voted early; Pelosi says she’s certain Democrats will ‘solidly hold’ onto their House majority
Americans will cast their votes Tuesday for President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden, selecting a leader to steer a nation battered by a surging pandemic that has killed more than 231,000 people, cost millions their jobs and reshaped daily life.
Here are the latest election day updates:
2:40 p.m. The North Carolina State Board of Elections voted Tuesday to keep four polling places open longer because they opened late, which is expected to delay statewide reporting of results.
The longest extension was 45 minutes for a site in Sampson County. That means the state can't publicly report any statewide results until 8:15 p.m.
The state's more than 2,600 polling places are otherwise scheduled to close at 7:30 p.m. But state elections officials said in a news release last week that if hours are extended at any polls, they wouldn't publicly post any results until all polls are closed.
Board Chair Damon Circosta confirmed at the meeting Tuesday that the extended hours would delay public release of results.
The polling places that opened late include one site in Cabarrus County, one in Guilford County and two in Sampson County. The delays were at least partly due to issues with printers or other electronic equipment. The extensions, which only apply to the individual precincts and not other sites in those counties, range from 17 minutes to 45 minutes and match the extra time it took to get them open.
Board Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell said at a news conference in the morning before the vote was held that it's not unusual to extend polling place hours on Election Day.
2:10 p.m. The latest tally of early voting in the U.S. shows that almost 102 million Americans cast their votes before Election Day, an eye-popping total that represents 73% of the total turnout of the 2016 presidential election.
The Associated Press tally reveals that the early vote in several states, including hotly-contested Texas and Arizona, has already exceeded the total vote of four years ago.
Early voting - whether in-person or by mail-in or absentee ballot - has swelled during the COVID-19 pandemic as voters have sought the safety and convenience it offers. The greatest gains have been witnessed in Kentucky, where almost 13 times as many voters cast their ballots early as in 2016.
12:45 a.m. The third-ranking Democrat in the U.S. House is predicting Democrats will pick up as many as a dozen House seats.
Majority Whip Jim Clyburn told reporters outside a polling place in Columbia, South Carolina, on Tuesday that he believed it would be a good night for Democrats" up and down the ticket.
Clyburn says, Holding the House would just be status quo. Winning the Senate would make it good."
Democrats control the House 232-197, with five open seats and one independent. It takes 218 seats to control the chamber. Republicans control the Senate.
Clyburn has expressed concerns about voter suppression. He says President Donald Trump has been literally stoking flames of indecision, unrest, threatening violence."
Clyburn says the nation's division didn't start with Trump, and it won't stop with Trump."
12:42 p.m. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she's absolutely certain" that Democrats will solidly hold" onto their House majority.
On an Election Day conference call with reporters, the California Democrat said this election is about nothing less than taking back the soul of America, whether our nation will follow the voices of fear or whether we will choose hope."
Pelosi and Rep. Cheri Bustos say the party is reaching deep into Trump country to win seats. Bustos is chair of the campaign arm for House Democrats, who are well positioned to try to add longtime GOP seats in Long Island, Arkansas, Indiana and rural Virginia.
Bustos says Democrats are going to see some wins in those deep red districts."
Pelosi says she's confident Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden will win the White House from President Donald Trump.
Biden has spent the day visiting Pennsylvania. Trump had a phone interview on Fox News Channel.
(UPDATED) 11 a.m. First lady Melania Trump has cast her vote, stopping in at a voting centre in Palm Beach, Florida, close to President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.
Trump switched his residence from New York to Palm Beach County last year and voted in person on Oct. 24 during early voting. Asked why she didn't vote with the president, the first lady told reporters on Tuesday: It's Election Day so I wanted to come here to vote today for the election."
The first lady waved and smiled to reporters. She was the only person not wearing a mask when she entered the Morton and Barbara Mandel Recreation Center to vote, presumably for her husband. It's unclear if she wore a face covering inside the voting centre.
10:43 a.m. JUNEAU-Voting concludes Tuesday in Alaska's closely watched U.S. Senate race, with Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan seeking to fend off a challenge from independent Al Gross.
The ballot also includes a rematch of the 2018 U.S. House race between U.S. Rep. Don Young and independent Alyse Galvin. President Donald Trump, who won the state in 2016, and Democrat Joe Biden are vying for Alaska's three electoral votes.
Most of the Legislature's 60 seats are up for election, with control of the House and Senate up for grabs. The Senate in recent years has been led by Republicans. Since 2017, the House has been held by a bipartisan coalition.
The ballot also includes a measure that would overhaul Alaska's oil tax structure, which oil companies have spent heavily to defeat, and a measure that would create ranked-choice voting in Alaska general elections, an issue that has cut across party lines.
Supreme Court Justice Susan Carney faces opposition from some conservative groups in her retention vote. The Alaska Judicial Council, which reviews judicial performance, recommended she be retained.
10:35 a.m.: NEW ORLEANS - A panel of federal appeals court judges has rejected an eleventh hour Republican effort to bar Election Day drive-thru voting in Houston.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans denied the request in a one-sentence ruling issued late Monday. The court hadn't been asked to invalidate votes already cast at drive-thru sites in the Houston area.
The request stemmed from a lawsuit brought by conservative Texas activists, who have railed against expanded voting access in Harris County, where a record 1.4 million early votes have already been cast. The county is the nation's third-most populous and a crucial battleground in Texas, where President Donald Trump and Republicans are bracing for the closest election in America's largest red state in decades on Tuesday.
9:55 a.m. WASHINGTON-Federal authorities are monitoring voting and any threats to the election across the country at an operations centre just outside Washington, D.C., run by the cybersecurity component of the Department of Homeland Security. Officials there said there were no major problems detected early Tuesday but urged the public to be wary and patient.
U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency director Christopher Krebs said from the centre there was some early indication of system disruption," but he did not elaborate. He says he has confidence that the vote is secure, the count is secure and the results will be secure."
Krebs says officials have seen attempts by foreign actors to interfere in the 2020 election." But he says officials have addressed those threats quickly" and comprehensively."
Krebs says Election Day in some sense is halftime." He says, There may be other events or activities or efforts to interfere and undermine confidence in the election." He asks all Americans to treat all sensational and unverified claims with skepticism and remember technology sometimes fails."
9:35 a.m.: Joe Biden is spending Election Day campaigning in his hometown of Scranton and in Philadelphia. He will meet with voters in each city.
Pennsylvania is key to Biden's White House hopes. While his aides say he has multiple paths to nab 270 Electoral College votes, his easiest is by winning Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Biden has campaigned in the Keystone State more than any other.
The cities Biden is visiting Tuesday hold both strategic and symbolic significance: Biden has made his working-class upbringing in Scranton a centrepiece of his campaign, framing his economic pitch from the perspective of Scranton versus Wall Street, as he seeks to win back the blue-collar voters who helped deliver Donald Trump a win in 2016.
9:15 a.m.: WASHINGTON-A veteran Republican operative who got his start in politics by helping to persuade a judge to throw out hundreds of mail-in ballots is organizing an army" of volunteers for President Donald Trump's campaign to monitor voting in Democratic-leaning areas on Tuesday.
Mike Roman, Trump's director of Election Day Operations, is a former White House aide from Pennsylvania who gathered claims in 1993 of voter fraud, resulting in a court ruling overturning election results and getting his candidate seated in the Pennsylvania State Senate.
For months, Trump has been trying to undercut the validity of mail-in ballots, a long-used method of voting that was up this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Roman, who previously ran the secretive in-house intelligence unit for the political network led by GOP megadonors Charles and David Koch, has organized what the campaign claims is 50,000 poll watchers. Many many of them registered through an Army For Trump" website that asks his supporters to enlist" in his reelection fight.
8:56 a.m.-President Donald Trump says he believes his large rally crowds during his fast-paced weeks of campaigning are the ultimate poll" and translate into a lot of votes for his reelection.
Trump told Fox News Channel's Fox & Friends" on Tuesday he will spend Election Day making phone calls to people who have been loyal to him and will go to his campaign headquarters in suburban Virginia to thank the staff.
Trump said he would declare himself the winner of the election Only when there's victory." There has been concern that Trump will declare victory early - before vote counts are definitive. But the Republican president told Fox there's no reason to play games." He says he thinks he has a very solid chance at winning."
Trump also says he understands why businesses are boarding up their storefronts but thinks it's very sad they feel the need to do it. He predicts that if there is violence and unrest, it will be in Democratically run cities like Chicago; New York; Portland, Oregon; Oakland, California; and Baltimore and blames weak leadership."
8:30 a.m. DELAWARE-Joe Biden has started Election Day with a visit to church - and the grave of his late son, Beau.
Biden and his wife, Jill, made an early morning stop at St. Joseph's on the Brandywine in Wilmington, Delaware, the church he typically visits on Sunday when home. Biden had granddaughters Finnegan and Natalie in tow Tuesday.
After a brief church visit, the four walked to Beau Biden's grave in the church cemetery.
Beau died of brain cancer in 2015, and Biden often speaks on the campaign trail of his courage while deployed to Iraq as a major in the Delaware Army National Guard.
Biden's late wife, Neilia, and infant daughter, Naomi, died in a car crash in 1972, shortly after Biden was elected senator. They are also buried in the cemetery.
Biden is spending the rest of his day in Pennsylvania as he makes a final push to get out the vote.
7:45 a.m. BEIJING-Global stock markets and U.S. futures rose Tuesday on investor hopes that a possible victory by challenger Joe Biden in the American presidential election might lead to more economic stimulus.
Dow futures were up 1.6 per cent while those for the S&P 500 were 1.3 per cent higher ahead of the start of trading on Wall Street. European indexes were up firmly in midday trading, while Asian markets closed higher.
Traders are betting Biden might push for a bigger U.S. stimulus package if he unseats President Donald Trump. That would require support in the Senate, which is controlled by Trump's Republicans. Some incumbents, also up for re-election this week, face challengers from Biden's Democratic Party.
On Monday, Wall Street closed higher amid indications Biden might be leading.
7 a.m.: FLORIDA-Trump and Biden have campaigned heavily in Florida, each hoping to win the prized battleground state's 29 electoral votes. Millions have already voted by mail and in person before Tuesday's election, setting records for early voting.
Besides the presidential race, 27 congressional seats are at stake in Florida. Neither of the state's two senate seats are up for election this year.
6 a.m. NEW YORK-An unprecedented Election Day has gotten under way in New York, with polls now open statewide.
A record 3.5 million votes were cast in the state before the polls even opened Tuesday.
That included at least 1 million absentee ballots and 2.5 million ballots cast in the early voting period that ended Sunday. Any ballots postmarked by Tuesday will be counted. Polls close at 9 p.m.