By Aaron Miller-
The U.S elections are hanging on a knife edge, with Donald Trump and his rival Joe Biden neck and neck in key swing states.
Biden is ahead by 11 points on the electoral college and has gathered 224 points against Trump’s 213 points. Biden has been ahead in the polls for weeks, but the first results of the elections reveal a much tighter race than first expected. There are fears that the final election results could lead to mayhem on the street by supporters of both parties, if they contest the election outcomes.
Earlier, Mr Trump held a get together at the White House, comprising of highly partisan guests who were a mixture of friends, family and political friends, a gathering described by as a ‘super spreader’ . Trump claimed to be winning big, and vowed to launch Supreme Court challenge against the some of the voting process, alleging fraud. No evidence of fraud has yet been found.
Trump said: Millions of people voted for us tonight. A very sad group of people is trying to disenfranchise that group of people,” the president said from the East Room of the White House. “And we won’t stand for it.”
Mr Biden equally said he was “on track” to victory. Millions of votes remain uncounted and no candidate can credibly claim victory as yet. There is no evidence
More than 100 million people cast their ballots in early voting before election day, setting the U.S on course for the highest turnout in a century.
The eventual presidential must win at least 270 votes in what is called the electoral college. Each U.S state gets a certain number of votes partly based on its population and there are a total of 538 up for grabs.
Trump is projected to have won the must-win state of Florida – a major boost to his re-election aspirations. The president last night expressed some doubt about the eventual outcome when he stated he had not prepared an election or concession speech.
A loss for Mr Trump in that once reliably Republican state would be a potentially serious setback.
The Rust Belt battlegrounds of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin which took Mr Trump to the White House four years ago – still look as though they could tip either way. In every state except two – Maine and Nebraska – the candidate that gets the most votes wins all of the state’s electoral college votes.
Due to these rules, a candidate can win the election without getting the most votes at the national level, similar to the scenario in 2016 when Donald Trump won a majority of electoral college votes although more people voted for Hillary Clinton across the U.S
Pennsylvania is considered a must-win for Mr Trump to stay on track for victory in an election in which he has been the underdog.
Mr Trump will keep hold of Ohio and Missouri, known as bellwether states because they have so often predicted the eventual winner, according to the BBC’s projection.
In a speech at about 02:30 local time (07:30 GMT) Trump said: “We were getting ready to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election.
Millions of postal ballots have still to be counted and there is no evidence of fraud. Earlier, Mr Biden predicted in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, that he would be victorious.
The Democrat said: “We feel good about where we are, we really do. I am here to tell you tonight we believe we’re on track to win this election.”
He added: “We’re going to have to be patient until the hard work of tallying votes is finished and it ain’t over until every vote, every ballot is counted.”
Mr Trump tweeted from the White House: “We are up BIG, but they are trying to STEAL the Election. Twitter labelled the post as potentially “misleading about an election or other civic process”.