US voters have their day amid pandemic,

false reports, fears of social unrest

(12:30 a.m. HKT/11:30 a.m. EST) The United States

presidential race is at a deadlock with counting in key
states including Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania
and Nevada still ongoing. Should Biden win in the
states that he is leading in, he is likely to become the
46th U.S. president, but the race remains too close to
call, especially with many absentee and mail-in ballots
still to be counted.

Biden has eked out a small lead in Nevada, Michigan and Wisconsin, which carry 32 electoral
votes in total. If Biden is confirmed to win these states, he could reach the 270 electoral
votes needed to win the entire election.

Trump initially led the polls in Michigan and Wisconsin, but both states switched to Biden in
the early hours of Wednesday, Eastern Time.

Meanwhile, Trump has maintained his lead in North Carolina and Georgia, where counting
has almost been completed. These states could give him 31 electoral votes.

He is also leading by a wide margin in Alaska, although less than half of the votes had been
counted. The candidate who wins this state gains three electoral votes.

Trump has been holding a strong lead in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state with 20
electoral votes. More than 75% of votes have been counted, but there remains a large
volume of absentee ballots that could take as late as Friday to be tallied.

If Trump is able to maintain his edge and win in all the states that he is leading in, he would
receive a total of 267 electoral votes, which is still a few shy of winning the election.
(3:20 p.m. HKT/2:20 a.m. EST) Donald Trump tried to claim victory in the early hours of
Wednesday, speaking from the White House even as millions of votes cast in the United
States presidential polls were yet to be counted.

“We did win this election,” Trump told his supporters, noting the leads he was holding in
several U.S. states that had not been called in his favor, including Pennsylvania and Michigan.

“This is a fraud on the American public,” he said, vowing to go to Supreme Court to dispute
ballot counts.

Trump’s premature remarks of an election triumph drew criticism as commentators stressed

that a candidate needed 270 electoral votes to declare victory in the hard-fought race.

Neither Trump or his rival, Democrat Joe Biden, has accumulated the necessary 270 votes so
far, with Biden collecting 220 and Trump, 213.