Trump wins US election, Netanyahu, Starmer react

Republican Party candidate Donald Trump has won the United States presidential election after garnering 279 electoral college votes.

Kamala Harris of the Democratic Party, who now has 223 electoral college votes, is preparing her concession speech which will be delivered soon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the UK’s Keir Starmer have been among the first world leaders to congratulate Donald Trump on winning the US presidential election.

In his statement, Netanyahu – who has had a difficult relationship with President Joe Biden – spoke of “history’s greatest comeback”, adding that Trump’s return to office offered a “new beginning for America, a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America”.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said: “I look forward to working with Trump in the years ahead.”

He added: “From growth and security to innovation and tech, I know that the UK-US special relationship will continue to prosper on both sides of the Atlantic for years to come.”

Kamala Harris under pressure as her path to victory narrows

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.

Around 86 million voters cast their ballots early amid one of the most turbulent campaigns in recent American history.

Vice-President Harris, 60, only became the Democratic Party candidate in July, after President Joe Biden withdrew from the race under pressure from within the party.

Trump, 78, was the target of two assassination plots – narrowly avoiding a sniper’s bullet in Pennsylvania.

The former president said he felt “very confident” as he voted earlier on Tuesday near his home in Palm Beach, Florida, with his wife, Melania.

“If I lose an election, if it’s a fair election, I’m going to be the first one to acknowledge it,” he said.

He posted earlier on his social media platform, Truth Social, saying “law enforcement coming” to Philadelphia because of “massive cheating”.

US Election: Michigan Muslims shun Harris over Mideast turmoil

Haunted by the daily violence ravaging the Middle East, Soujoud Hamade, a registered Democrat, felt compelled to back Green Party candidate Jill Stein in the US presidential election.

“It is very emotional,” the 32-year-old real estate lawyer told AFP after casting her ballot Tuesday at a school in Dearborn, the nation’s largest Arab-majority city, where voters could prove decisive in the key battleground of Michigan.

“Every time I watch the news or get on social media, I see my people being decimated, I see my home country being destroyed,” added the Lebanese-American, disillusioned by the Biden-Harris administration’s unwavering support for Israel.

Hamade says she’s clear-eyed about the two-way nature of the race between Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican former President Donald Trump.

Still, she insists her vote is far more than just a protest.

She’s banking on helping Stein crack five percent of the national popular vote, a threshold that would unlock future federal funding for the Green Party and “move the needle forward” toward breaking the two-party hold on US politics.

Dearborn, a Detroit suburb famous as the birthplace of Henry Ford and the home of Ford Motor Company’s headquarters, has a population of around 110,000, with 55 percent of residents claiming Middle Eastern or North African heritage.

The city overwhelmingly backed President Joe Biden in 2020, helping him narrowly flip Michigan blue.

But recent polling shows a shift away from the Democratic Party among Muslim and Arab-Americans.

That trend was evident in conversations with voters around the city on Election Day.

– ‘Single-issue voter’ –

Stein, a Jewish physician and the Green Party’s perennial left-wing candidate is predicted to do well among Muslims, as well as progressives and youth voters nationwide — potentially acting as a spoiler for Harris.

“She’s the only one who’s anti-genocide,” said Muhammad Hijazi, a 28-year-old engineer who described himself as a “single-issue voter” who had previously voted Democrat but had now “lost faith.”

The Democrats, he argued, don’t have a plan to bring peace to the Middle East, and he doesn’t trust Trump to do any better.

Yet signs suggest Trump, too, may fare better than in past cycles. Unlike Harris, he visited Dearborn, addressing a modest-sized audience last week.

His outreach to Michigan’s Muslim community secured endorsements from the Muslim mayors of Hamtramck and Dearborn Heights, while his newfound connection to the community — through Lebanese-American son-in-law Michael Boulos, husband of Tiffany Trump — has further endeared him.

Harris’ decision to campaign with former Republican lawmaker Liz Cheney, a staunch supporter of the Iraq War, was the final straw for Dearborn Heights Mayor Bill Bazzi, he told Trump supporters at the former president’s final Michigan rally.

Charles Fawaz, a 29-year-old first-grade teacher of Lebanese descent who voted for Trump, told AFP he was impressed that the former president “showed up.”

“When Trump was president, everything was fine with our foreign policy because other leaders respected our country,” Fawaz said.

Even if Trump doesn’t deliver on Middle Eastern peace, he hopes Republicans will manage the economy better.

Former Democrats here say they know some liberals will blame them if Harris loses, but they reject the accusation.