Donald Trump has won North Carolina and Georgia and taken a lead over Kamala Harris in most of the other five battleground states that will decide the winner of the US election, BBC’s US partner CBS projects.
CBS says Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are leaning towards Trump and he is ahead in the other so-called Rust Belt state of Michigan. The results are not final.
Incomplete returns also suggest Trump has a lead in Nevada, while the race remains tight in the other sun belt battleground of Arizona.
In more good news for Trump’s fellow Republicans, the party is projected to win majority control of the Senate.
As expected, Trump has won conservative strongholds from Florida to Idaho, while Harris swept liberal states from New York to California, CBS projects.
The Democrat was expected to spend election night at Howard University in Washington DC, where she was an undergraduate, but it emerged after midnight that she would not attend.
Following the announcement by campaign co-chairman Cedric Richmond, the crowd all but disappeared from Harris HQ at the historically black college.
The party-like atmosphere of a few hours earlier at Howard had already turned sour as two swing states were called for Trump.
From Harris HQ, Democratic fundraiser Lindy Li told the BBC that it is “pretty grim right now”.
“People are getting increasingly anxious,” she said, “but there is still a pathway. I am still holding on to that, but this is not the night we wanted.”
Trump was expected to appear shortly at his campaign watch party in West Palm Beach, Florida, where the mood was celebratory.
Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and Trump mega-donor, is spending election night with the Republican nominee.
Whichever way it goes the result will be historic – giving America its first woman president or marking a seismic political comeback for Trump.
Whoever takes the White House may have their hands tied by Congress, which is also up for grabs in Tuesday’s vote.
CBS projects Republicans will win control of the Senate after wresting two seats in West Virginia and Ohio from the Democrats and beating off a stiff challenge in Texas.
Neither party seemed to have an overall edge in the House, which Republicans narrowly control. [BBC News]