The dizzying presidential contest between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris hurtled toward an uncertain finish on Tuesday, as millions of Americans lined up at polling stations to choose between two sharply different visions for the country.
A race churned by unprecedented events – two assassination attempts against Trump, President Joe Biden's surprise withdrawal and Harris' rapid rise – remained neck and neck, even after billions of dollars in spending and months of frenetic campaigning.
Voting is set to close in six states at 1pm (NZ time).
Trump, who has frequently spread false claims that he won the 2020 presidential election against Biden and whose supporters attacked the US Capitol on January 6 in 2021, voted near his home in Palm Beach, Florida.
"If I lose an election, if it's a fair election, I'm gonna be the first one to acknowledge it," Trump told reporters. He did not elaborate.
Harris, who had earlier sent in her ballot by mail to her home state of California, took part in radio interviews on Tuesday, encouraging listeners to vote. Later, she was due to address students at Howard University, a historically black college in Washington where she was an undergraduate.
"To go back tonight to Howard University, my beloved alma mater, and be able to hopefully recognize this day for what it is, is really full circle for me," Harris said on a radio interview.
More than 80 million Americans had already voted before Tuesday, either via mail or in person, and lines at several polling stations on Tuesday were short and orderly.
Hoax bomb threats, many of which appeared to originate from Russian email domains, were directed at polling locations in three battleground states - Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin - as voting was under way, the FBI said. None of the threats were immediately determined to be credible, it said.
Democracy under threat - exit poll
Nearly three-quarters of voters in Tuesday's presidential election say American democracy is under threat, according to preliminary national exit polls from Edison Research, reflecting the deep anxiety the nation faces after a contentious campaign.
Democracy and the economy ranked by far as the most important issues for voters, with around a third of respondents citing each, followed by abortion and immigration at 14% and 11%, the data showed. The poll showed 73% of voters believed democracy was in jeopardy, against just 25% who said it was secure.
The data underscores the depth of polarisation in a nation whose divisions have only grown starker during a fiercely competitive race. Trump has employed increasingly dark and apocalyptic rhetoric on the campaign trail, while stoking unfounded fears that the election system cannot be trusted. Harris has urged Americans to come together, warning that a second Trump term would threaten the underpinnings of American democracy.
The figures represent just a slice of the tens of millions of people who have voted, both before and on Election Day, and the preliminary results are subject to change through the course of the night as more people are surveyed.
Forty-four percent of voters viewed Trump favourably, compared with 46% in the 2020 exit polls, when he lost to President Joe Biden. Harris was viewed favourably by 48% of respondents, compared with Biden's 52% rating in 2020.
Harris was relying on a large turnout by women voters to compensate for her electoral weakness with men. The exit polls showed women made up 53% of the electorate, largely unchanged from the 52% in 2020 exit polls.
The share of voters without a college degree - who largely favor Trump - was at 57%, down slightly from 2020's 59%, according to the data.
History will be made
In Dearborn, Michigan, Nakita Hogue, 50, was joined by her 18-year-old college student daughter, Niemah Hogue, to vote for Harris. Niemah said she takes birth control to help regulate her period, while her mother recalled needing surgery after she had a miscarriage in her 20s, and both feared efforts by Republican lawmakers to restrict women's health care.
"For my daughter, who is going out into the world and making her own way, I want her to have that choice," Nakita Hogue said. "She should be able to make her own decisions."
At a library in Phoenix, Arizona, Felicia Navajo, 34, and her husband Jesse Miranda, 52, arrived with one of their three young kids to vote for Trump.
Miranda, a union plumber, immigrated to the U.S. from Mexico when he was four years old, and said he believed Trump would do a better job of fighting inflation and controlling immigration.
"I want to see good people come to this town, people that are willing to work, people who are willing to just live the American dream," Miranda said.
Trump's campaign has suggested he may declare victory on election night even while millions of ballots have yet to be counted, as he did four years ago. The former president has repeatedly said any defeat could only stem from widespread fraud, echoing his false claims from 2020. The winner may not be known for days if the margins in battleground states are as slim as expected.
No matter who wins, history will be made.
Harris, 60, the first female vice president, would become the first woman, black woman and South Asian American to win the presidency.
Trump, 78, the only president to be impeached twice and the first former president to be criminally convicted, would also become the first president to win non-consecutive terms in more than a century.
Opinion polls show the candidates running neck and neck in each of the seven states likely to determine the winner: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Reuters/Ipsos polling shows Harris leading among women by 12 percentage points and Trump winning among men by seven percentage points.
The contest reflects a deeply polarized nation whose divisions have only grown starker during a fiercely competitive race. Trump has employed increasingly dark and apocalyptic rhetoric on the campaign trail. Harris has urged Americans to come together, warning that a second Trump term would threaten the underpinnings of American democracy.
Control of both chambers of Congress is also up for grabs. Republicans have an easier path in the U.S. Senate, where Democrats are defending several seats in Republican-leaning states, while the House of Representatives looks like a toss-up.
DARK RHETORIC
During the campaign, Trump hammered first Biden and then Harris for their handling of the economy, which polls show is at the top of voters' concerns despite low unemployment and cooling inflation. But he showed a characteristic inability to stay on message, at one point questioning Harris' Black identity and vowing to protect women "whether they like it or not."
Even more than in 2016 and 2020, Trump has demonized immigrants who crossed the border illegally, falsely accusing them of fomenting a violent crime wave, and he has vowed to use the government to prosecute his political rivals.
Polls show he has made some gains among black and Latino voters. Trump has often warned that migrants are taking jobs away from those constituencies.
By contrast, Harris has tried to piece together a broader coalition of liberal Democrats, independents and disaffected moderate Republicans, describing Trump as too dangerous to elect.
She campaigned on protecting reproductive rights, an issue that has galvanized women since the US Supreme Court in 2022 eliminated a nationwide right to abortion.
Harris has faced anger from many pro-Palestinian voters over the Biden administration's military and financial support for Israel's campaign in Gaza. While she has not previewed a shift in US policy, she has said she will do everything possible to end the conflict.
After Biden, 81, withdrew amid concerns about his age and mental ability, Harris sought to turn the tables on Trump, pointing to his rambling rallies as evidence he is unfit, and has tried to court young voters, seen as a critical voting bloc.
Trump countered the likes of Harris supporters Taylor Swift and Beyoncé with Elon Musk, the world's richest man, who played an increasingly visible role as a surrogate and a top donor to Trump's cause.
Tuesday's vote follows one of the most turbulent half-years in modern American politics.
In May, a New York jury found Trump guilty of falsifying business records to hide hush money payments to a porn star. Four weeks later, Trump and Biden met for their only debate, where the incumbent president delivered a disastrous performance that supercharged voters' existing concerns about his mental acuity.
In July, Trump narrowly escaped a would-be assassin's bullet at a Pennsylvania rally. Barely a week later, Biden exited the race.
