Trump claims victory as he takes commanding lead in election results

Donald Trump has declared victory over Kamala Harris in the US presidential election as he stands on the cusp of a historic political comeback.

The Republican told his ecstatic supporters at a campaign party in Florida that they would usher in “a new golden age for America”.

The BBC’s US partner CBS projects Trump has vaulted to a commanding lead in the seven battleground states that will decide the winner of the election. He would be the first former president to return to the White House in more than 130 years.

In more good news for Trump, his party is projected to win majority control of the Senate.

Trump is projected to win the key swing states of Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia. CBS says Wisconsin is leaning towards Trump and he is ahead in the other so-called Rust Belt state of Michigan. The results are not final.

He also has a lead in Nevada, while the race remains tight in the other sun belt battleground of Arizona.

As expected, Trump has swept conservative strongholds from Florida to Idaho, while Harris won liberal states from New York to California, CBS projects.

The Democrat had been expected to address a crowd on election night at Howard University in Washington DC, where she was an undergraduate, but it emerged after midnight that she would not appear.

Following the announcement by campaign co-chairman Cedric Richmond, the crowd all but disappeared from Harris HQ at the historically black college.

CBS exit poll data suggests Vice-President Harris – who was hoping to become America’s first woman president and campaigned heavily for abortion rights – may have under-performed with women. Some 54% of female voters cast their ballots for her, the numbers indicate. But Joe Biden won the support of 57% of women in 2020.

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