Donald Trump has won North Carolina and Georgia and taken a lead over Kamala Harris in several other battleground states that will decide the winner of the US election, BBC’s US partner CBS projects.

CBS also says Wisconsin is leaning towards a Trump win and he is also narrowly ahead in the other so-called Rust Belt states of Pennsylvania and Michigan. The results are not final.

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

In more good news for Trump, Republican candidates were edging closer to gaining majority control of the Senate.

Harris 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.

CBS exit poll data suggests Harris 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.

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.

BBC