USA Trump edges closer to victory in US presidential election

Donald Trump is on his way back to the White House after winning the contested states of Georgia and North Carolina. Democrat Kamala Harris would now have to win Pennsylvania to win the US presidential election. After 89% of the votes have been counted, Republican Trump is ahead there with 50.8% and a lead of just over 165,000 votes.

Also alarming for Harris: after 58% of the votes had been counted, Trump also led with a good 52% in Michigan and with around 51% in Wisconsin after 84% of the votes had been counted. It was unclear whether Harris would be able to catch up with this lead.

No appearance at election party

Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin are the so-called "blue wall" for the Democrats, which can pave the way to victory in the presidential election. Hillary Clinton lost all three to Donald Trump when she lost in 2016, Joe Biden won them four years ago.

Polls had predicted an extremely close race. The New York Times now sees a 93% probability of a Trump victory. Harris refrained from appearing at her party's election party in Washington.

There is a lot at stake in the election: the domestic political stability of the USA and the already shaky balance of world politics. If he wins the election, Trump can hope for more leeway for his initiatives: The Republicans regained the majority in the US Senate.

The decisive swing states

To win, a candidate needs 270 votes from electors in different states. As the majority of states vote reliably for Democrats or Republicans, the result in seven swing states, where both parties had a realistic chance of success before the election, will be decisive in the end.

The swing states are Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and North Carolina - as well as Arizona and Nevada in the west of the USA. Pennsylvania in particular, with 19 electoral votes, is always seen as potentially decisive. Both Harris and Trump were particularly active there in the home stretch of the election campaign.

Surprisingly, Harris only narrowly won Virginia, where Joe Biden had prevailed four years ago with a lead of around ten percentage points. After 91 percent of the votes had been counted, Harris was ahead with 51.5 percent.

Clear-cut results in most states

As expected, Harris and the Republican Trump prevailed after voter surveys and initial vote counts in several states where their victory was considered certain. These include Florida, Texas and South Carolina for Trump and New York, Massachusetts and Illinois for Harris. So far, Trump has received 246 electoral votes in North Carolina and Georgia, while Harris has received 210 in the large state of California, among others.

Economy or women's rights?

Trump built his election campaign on Americans' dissatisfaction with high inflation in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and also stoked fears of an alleged increase in crime caused by criminal immigrants.

Harris described Trump as a threat to democracy and focused on women's rights in light of the abortion bans in several Republican-dominated states.

The outcome of the election will show whose messages resonated better with voters. Many who wanted to vote for Trump said that economic development was more important to them than the personalities of the candidates.

Also a decision on congressional majorities

The election also decided the majorities in the US Congress. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and around a third of the 100 seats in the Senate were up for election. The party that controls Congress can severely limit a president's room for maneuver.

The Republicans currently hold the majority in the House of Representatives with 220 to 212 seats.

The key to the Republicans' important success in the Senate was the victory of Republican Senator Deb Fischer from the state of Nebraska. She defended her hard-fought seat against the independent candidate Dan Osborn and thus helped her party over the hurdle to gain control of the House of Representatives.

Russia gets involved

Russia once again tried to sow chaos during election day. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation traced bomb threats against polling stations back to Russia. None were found to be credible. The bomb threats had been made at two polling stations in the particularly contested "swing state" of Georgia, which is why voting was briefly interrupted there.

SDA