In a country more fractured than ever, former President Donald Trump is emerging as the winner of this Tuesday’s United States elections. Counting is progressing slowly, particularly in the key state of Pennsylvania and the rest of the Midwest, but Kamala Harris’ path to victory is narrowing.
The first results pointed to clear victories for the Republican in Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona, while uncertainty continues in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan, where some signs also suggest a victory for Trump. Fuller scrutiny in these states may take several days.
The Harris campaign He insisted that votes remained to be counted, especially in areas of large cities, especially in the Midwest, among other things due to the delay in the closing of polling stations due to lines and false bomb warnings in Pennsylvania. But some signs elsewhere, such as smaller cities in some counties, pointed in Trump’s direction.
For example, the first results showed more support for the Republican in some neighborhoods of Dearborn, the city with the highest concentration of Arab-Americans in the United States and where part of the Democratic voters were demobilized by the Gaza war. Harris’ campaign also showed vulnerabilities in Michigan’s Jewish community, skeptical of her support for Israel compared to Joe Biden.
Uncertainty
As the polls reflected, the result of the elections is close so it is more difficult to estimate who has won until the count is over or nears the end in more counties. The AP news agency, which is the organization in practice that collects and adds up the votes on election night, could not yet declare the winner of the elections this Wednesday morning.
The closeness of the result is mixed with the obstacles to the scrutiny, particularly of the vote by mail in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The rules on how to vote by mail and when to process those ballots change from state to state and Pennsylvania has been a focus of tension since a 2019 law allowed voting by mail without having to justify the request, but at the same time it did not allow processing those votes – with tasks such as checking the mandatory signatures on the envelopes or removing the ballots from their various wrappings – until election day.
The battle in the tightest states
Advantage of each candidate in percentage points and total votes in the 2024 presidential elections
Divided country
The gap in the country between two candidates opposed in style, substance, gender and life experience is even greater, according to the first data, with a new fracture between the Midwest and the south of the country. The main concern among Americans, according to exit polls, is now democracy, and many voters cited concern for the future of a country led by a politician who promises to persecute his perceived enemies, purge the Administration and behave like a “dictator” (his most recent collaborators in his first Government define him as “fascist”).
Trump’s larger victories in Florida and Georgia, states that were traditionally more divided, and in Kentucky and West Virginia, Republican strongholds, and the greater swing toward Harris compared to Biden four years ago in traditionally Democratic states paint a picture of a country that is increasingly more geographically segregated.
More pro-Trump Latinos
Some exit polls indicate that in some states the advantage of Democrats over Republicans among the population that identifies as Latino or Hispanic has diminished. Harris won among these communities, but with a smaller margin compared to Biden’s victory four years ago in a trend that has been noted in the last decade, especially among men.
However, there are big differences between states, particularly due to the effect of Trump’s victory among Puerto Ricans in Florida, where the Republican has swept.
High participation
Participation is expected to be record high and early local data pointed to an unusually high level of participation.
“Today when we went out to open, there was a line around the entire block. We had never seen that before,” explained this Tuesday morning Eileen Walker, a retired nurse and representative of the Democratic district committee in central Philadelphia. She has been involved in politics all her life and claimed that she had never seen such mobilization as in these elections.
The lines throughout the country stretched for several blocks of voters who hurried the closing of the polling stations, which had the obligation to allow whoever was in line to vote before the end of voting.
Trump heats up the party in Florida
The former president has summoned some of his friends and political allies to attend the electoral count at his Mar-a-Lago mansion, in Florida. Among them, Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro; and the ultra-British leader, Nigel Farage, as well as the owner of Tesla and X, Elon Musk; or Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
Tucker Carson has accompanied Trump at several electoral events, such as the one in which the former president told him that Liz Cheney – a Republican who has asked to vote for Harris – “should feel” what it is like to have “nine guns shooting at your head.” .
While Trump followed the count with his friends in his mansion, a few kilometers away, at the Palm Beach Convention Center, some of his followers gathered eager to celebrate an electoral victory that they seem to cherish this Tuesday night, but that they still They can’t sing this Tuesday night.
In a video posted on social media, Trump encouraged voting and predicted “a great victory,” while “he was doing well everywhere.”
Source: www.eldiario.es
