WASHINGTON — A presidential campaign marked by upheaval and rancor headed for its Election Day finale on Tuesday, as Americans decided whether to send Donald Trump back to the White House or elevate Kamala Harris to the Oval Office.
Voters faced a stark choice between two candidates who have offered drastically different temperaments and visions for the world’s largest economy and dominant military power. More than 82 million people voted early. Those casting Election Day ballots mostly encountered a smooth process around the country, with isolated reports of hiccups that regularly happen, including long lines, technical issues and ballot printing errors.
Trump voted in Palm Beach, Florida, near his Mar-a-Lago club, and said afterward that he was feeling “very confident.”
“It looks like Republicans have shown up in force,” he told reporters, wearing a red “Make America Great Again” baseball cap. He said he had not prepared a speech on the results — win or lose — saying, “I’m not a Democrat. I’m able to make a speech on very short notice.”
Harris, the Democratic vice president, did phone interviews with radio stations in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Arizona and Nevada. She stands to be the first female president if elected and has promised to work across the aisle to tackle economic worries and other issues without radically departing from the course set by President Joe Biden.
Trump, the Republican former president, has vowed to replace thousands of federal workers with loyalists, impose sweeping tariffs on allies and foes alike, and stage the largest deportation operation in U.S. history.
In Scranton, Pennsylvania, Liza Fortt arrived at her polling location in a wheelchair and not feeling well. But she said she ventured out anyway to vote for Harris.
“It means a lot to me and my grandkids, my granddaughters, my nieces. … I was just waiting for this day to come,” said Fortt, who is 74 and Black. She said she never thought she’d have such an opportunity, to cast a ballot for a Black woman in a presidential race.
“I’m proud, to see a woman, not only a woman, but a Black woman,” Fortt said.
Harris and Trump entered Election Day focused on seven swing states, five of them carried by Trump in 2016 before flipping to Biden in 2020: the “blue wall” of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin as well as Arizona and Georgia. Nevada and North Carolina, which Democrats and Republicans respectively carried in the last two elections, also were closely contested.
Tommy Ray Brewer, a 72-year-old auto mechanic, voted for Trump in Black Mountain, North Carolina, which was hard-hit by Hurricane Helene.
“People are really divided right now. They’re mad. They’re angry because of the situation that the United States is in,” Brewer said. “I have heard people say we’re in the best shape we’ve ever been in. But I say, ‘have you been to the grocery store, have you been to the gas station?’”
The closeness of the race and the number of states in play raised the likelihood that, once again, a victor might not be known on election night.
In the 2020 presidential race it took four days to declare a winner. Regardless, Trump has baselessly claimed that if he lost, it would be due to fraud. Harris’ campaign was preparing for him to try to declare victory before a winner is known on Tuesday night or to try to contest the result if she wins. Four years ago, Trump launched an effort to overturn the voters’ will that ended in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump said Tuesday that he had no plans to tell his supporters not to refrain from violence if Harris wins, because they “are not violent people.” Asked about accepting the race’s results either way, Trump said, “If it’s a fair election, I’d be the first one to acknowledge it.” He visited a nearby campaign office to fire up staffers before a party at a nearby convention center.
Harris voted by mail in her home state of California. She’ll have a watch party at her alma mater, Howard University in Washington.
Harris, 60, would be the first woman, Black woman and person of South Asian descent to serve as president. She also would be the first sitting vice president to win the White House in 36 years.
“I think this is an inflection point in terms of this is the moment where we have two very different visions of the future of our nation,” Harris said in a Tuesday interview with The Big Tigger Morning Show on V-103 in Atlanta. “And mine is focused on progress.”
A victory would cap a whirlwind campaign unlike any other in American history. Harris ascended to the top of the Democratic ticket less than four months ago after Biden, facing massive pressure from his party after a disastrous debate performance, ended his reelection bid.
Trump, 78, would be the oldest president ever elected. He would also be the first defeated president in 132 years to win another term in the White House, and the first person convicted of a felony to take over the Oval Office.
He survived one assassination attempt by millimeters at a July rally. Secret Service agents foiled a second attempt in September.
Trump’ s winning would affirm that enough voters put aside warnings from many of Trump’s former aides or instead prioritized concerns about Biden and Harris’ stewardship of the economy or the U.S.-Mexico border.
It would all but ensure he avoids going to prison after being found guilty of his role in hiding hush-money payments to an adult film actress during his first run for president in 2016. His sentencing in that case could occur later this month. And upon taking office, Trump could end the federal investigation into his effort to overturn the 2020 election results.
The potential turbulence of a second Trump term has been magnified by his embrace of the Republican Party’s far right and his disregard for long-held democratic norms. Trump has used harsh rhetoric against Harris and other Democrats, calling them “demonic,” and has suggested military action against people he calls “enemies from within.”
Harris, pointing to the warnings of Trump’s former aides, has labeled him a “fascist” and blamed Trump for putting women’s lives in danger by nominating three of the justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. In the closing hours of the campaign, she tried to strike a more positive tone and went all of Monday without saying her Republican opponent’s name.
Federal, state and local officials have expressed confidence in the integrity of the nation’s election systems. They nonetheless were braced to contend with what they say is an unprecedented level of foreign disinformation — particularly from Russia and Iran — as well as the possibility of physical violence or cyberattacks.
Both sides have armies of lawyers in anticipation of legal challenges on and after Election Day. And law enforcement agencies nationwide are on high alert for potential violence.
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Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in Palm Beach, Florida, Darlene Superville and Eric Tucker in Washington, and Marc Levy in Allentown, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.