Washington, Nov 4 (UNI) Republican candidate Donald Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden might have to wait for some more time, with bated breaths, to get the final outcome of the US Presidential Polls 2020.
The competition is turning out a cliff-hanger and a neck-to-neck race for the Top Post of world's most powerful country as millions of votes are yet to be counted.
In the Congressional election, the Democrats seemed set to retain majority in the House of Representatives, while in the Senate it looked a close contest.
Battleground states remain too early to call, but Trump's Florida win has given a befitting impetus to the morale of 74-year-old leader.
In the race to win 270 Electoral College votes, according to latest update, Biden captured 224 electoral college votes while Trump, not far behind, has so far won 213 seats.
The vote has become a de-facto referendum on Trump's first term, which has been overshadowed this year by the novel coronavirus pandemic, its impact on the economy and a flare-up of civil unrest over accusations of police brutality against black people.
His "America First" policy has also brought sweeping changes to the country's global standing and rattled alliance and trade relationships.
The country this time saw an unprecedented level of over 100 million early votes cast by mail and in-person in what is expected to become record turnout in 120 years.
To win the presidency, either of the candidates needs to secure at least 270 of the 538 Electoral College votes allocated to the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The candidate who wins the popular vote in a state captures that state's electoral votes, usually in a winner-take-all manner.
A losing presidential candidate typically concedes shortly after the outcome is known. The election witnessed a high turnout of 67 per cent.
But tens of millions of mail-in ballots could take days or even longer to be counted in some states, possibly complicating efforts to decide the winner in the hours after polls close Tuesday night.
Among the top battleground states, election experts had said that the southern state of Florida may be a highly predictive contest in that if Biden wins it, Trump's path to re-election would become "very narrow."
During a live broadcast by UNI in collaboration with People of India Origin (PIO-TV), straight from the battleground, experts favouring Biden were surprised over Trump's "unexpected" performance. "We are optimistic and its too early to tell about any outcome", one of the panelist remarked.
There is a sizeable Indian Diaspora in the US which this time seems inclined towards electing Biden as the next President.
Notably, the Indian American population is the second-largest immigrant group in the country after Mexicans.
Meanwhile, Twitter today flagged one of the Trump's tweet claiming of victory in the elections. Trump had tweeted that he will be will be making a statement tonight. The social media giant, attached a warning to Trump's post, reading, "Some or all of the content shared in this Tweet is disputed and might be misleading about an election other civic process."
But Trump didn't stop there. He declared an unsupported victory in a speech from the ceremonial East Room of the White House - with millions of ballots yet to be counted ! Several top Republicans expressed alarm at Trump's unsubstantiated comments.
On Tuesday, Trump said in a phone interview with Fox News that he would declare himself winner of the election "only when there's victory" and that "there's no reason to play games." But Trump has refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he is defeated. "Losing is never easy. Not for me. It's not," he had said later in the day.
Biden, too, addressed the supporters in his home state of Delaware. In his address, the 77-year-old leader, maintained confidence of winning the polls. "It ain’t over till every vote is counted," Biden asserted.
But, amidst all the uncertainties, Trump appeared before cameras at the White House early Wednesday to declare that he believed he had won and said he would go to the Supreme Court to try to have the counting stopped.
"This is a major fraud on our nation," Trump contended, adding, 'As far as I’m concerned, I already have won.' The comments drew sharp criticism from various political factions.
Meanwhile, the US stocks opened higher following election night. Market analysts believed a delayed election outcome would cause widespread uncertainty, which is typically the enemy of Wall Street.
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