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2020 Election Latest: Biden campaign willing to fight Trump in court

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                                Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks to supporters in Wilmington, Del.
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Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks to supporters in Wilmington, Del.

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                                President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House, early Wednesday, in Washington.
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President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House, early Wednesday, in Washington.

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                                From left, Niki Gotzev, Milo Shea and Ryan Thomas, all of the District of Columbia, react to local election results, Tuesday, in Washington.
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From left, Niki Gotzev, Milo Shea and Ryan Thomas, all of the District of Columbia, react to local election results, Tuesday, in Washington.

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                                Staff at the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections receive and count ballots late into the night on Tuesday in Tampa.
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Staff at the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections receive and count ballots late into the night on Tuesday in Tampa.

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                                People wait in line to vote at a polling place before it opened on Election Day in Las Vegas.
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People wait in line to vote at a polling place before it opened on Election Day in Las Vegas.

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                                Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks to supporters in Wilmington, Del.
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                                President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House, early Wednesday, in Washington.
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                                From left, Niki Gotzev, Milo Shea and Ryan Thomas, all of the District of Columbia, react to local election results, Tuesday, in Washington.
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                                Staff at the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections receive and count ballots late into the night on Tuesday in Tampa.
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                                People wait in line to vote at a polling place before it opened on Election Day in Las Vegas.

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Scenes from around America on Election Day 2020

WASHINGTON >> The Latest on the presidential campaign (all times local):

4 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden’s campaign says it will fight any efforts by President Donald Trump’s campaign to go to the U.S. Supreme Court to prevent ballots from being tabulated.

In a statement sent before 4 a.m. Wednesday, Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon called Trump’s statement that he will “be going to the U.S. Supreme Court” and that he wants “all voting to stop” “outrageous, unprecedented and incorrect.”

O’Malley Dillon says the Biden campaign has “legal teams standing by ready to deploy to resist that effort.” And she says, “They will prevail.”

The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the presidential race. There are still hundreds of thousands of votes left to be counted, and the outcome hinges on a handful of uncalled battleground states.

3:06 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won at least three of Maine’s four electoral votes in his bid to unseat President Donald Trump.

Biden won the statewide tally and the 1st Congressional District, good for three electoral votes. Trump, meanwhile, hoped to claim one electoral vote in a win in the 2nd Congressional District. The 2nd Congressional District hasn’t yet been called.

Maine split its electoral votes four years ago, awarding three to Democrat Hillary Clinton and one to Trump, who won the more rural and conservative of Maine’s congressional districts.

2:52 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won Arizona and its 11 electoral votes, flipping a critical battleground state that Donald Trump won four years ago and that could help determine which candidate wins the presidency.

The victory by Biden was a huge blow to Trump’s chances for reelection. Arizona has backed a Democratic presidential candidate only once in the last 72 years.

2:40 a.m.

President Donald Trump is vowing to ask the Supreme Court to weigh in on the inconclusive election. The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the presidential race.

Trump appeared before supporters at the White House early Wednesday morning and cried foul over the election results, calling the process “a major fraud on our nation.” But there’s no evidence of foul play in the cliffhanger.

The night ended with hundreds of thousands of votes still to be counted, and the outcome still unclear in key states he needs if he is to win against Democrat Joe Biden.

Nevertheless, he has cast the night as a disenfranchisement of his voters. He said: “We will win this and as far as I’m concerned we already have won it.”

Trump says: “We’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court — we want all voting to stop.”

In fact, there is no more voting — just counting.

1:55 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won at least one of Maine’s four electoral votes in his bid to unseat President Donald Trump.

Biden won the state’s 1st Congressional District, good for one electoral vote.

1:27 a.m.

President Donald Trump has won four of Nebraska’s five electoral votes, while Democrat Joe Biden has won one electoral vote from the state.

The 1st Congressional District was called for Trump early Wednesday. He also won the 3rd Congressional District earlier, as well as the statewide vote. Trump gets one electoral vote for each congressional district, plus two electoral votes for winning the statewide vote.

Biden’s win in the 2nd Congressional District, which includes Omaha, is a flip from 2016, when Trump narrowly won it against Democrat Hillary Clinton.

1:22 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District, which includes Omaha. That flips a district that Donald Trump won in 2016.

Nebraska, one of two states that divides its electoral votes, has five total electoral votes up for grabs. On Tuesday, Trump won the statewide vote, which is good for two electoral votes. He also won the 3rd Congressional District, which nets him a third vote.

1:12 a.m.

Twitter is hiding an election-related post by President Donald Trump, warning that its content is disputed and could be misleading.

Trump stated without evidence early Wednesday that Democrats were trying to “steal” the election. He also falsely said votes cannot be cast after polls are closed.

States allow voters to cast ballots if they are in line when polls close. Some states also allow mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day but received later to be counted.

1:05 a.m.

President Donald Trump has won Texas and its 38 electoral votes.

Historic turnout and suburban revolt around Texas’ booming big cities gave Republicans a rare sweat in America’s biggest red state, but Trump bested Democrat Joe Biden in the state.

Trump won Texas by 9 points in 2016 and all but took a win here for granted. He didn’t swing through Texas for campaign rallies or swamp television airwaves, and his conservative allies on the ground scoffed at Biden’s chances as a far reach.

12:59 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won at least one of Maine’s four electoral votes in his bid to unseat President Donald Trump.

Biden won Maine’s 1st Congressional District, good for one electoral vote. The statewide vote, which is worth two electoral votes, and the 2nd Congressional District, which is worth one electoral vote, still have not been called.

Maine split its electoral votes four years ago, awarding three to Democrat Hillary Clinton and one to Trump, who won the more rural and conservative of Maine’s congressional districts.

It marked the first time in state history that Maine divided its electoral votes.

12:55 a.m.

President Donald Trump says he’s planning to make a statement early Wednesday morning as the race remains too close to call.

Neither Trump nor Democrat Joe Biden has reached the 270 Electoral College vote threshold.

Trump is insisting by tweet that “Votes cannot be cast after the Poles are closed!” even though, in multiple states, ballots can be counted if they arrive after after Election Day.

Many of the battleground states have yet to be called, including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin.

12:51 a.m.

Joe Biden is asking his supporters to “keep the faith” and urging them to “be patient” as the counting goes on in the drawn-out U.S. presidential election.

The Democratic presidential candidate emerged Wednesday after midnight to speak on the election results that have left the outcome in the balance. He spent the evening watching the returns come in from his home in Wilmington, Delaware, then drove downtown by motorcade to make his statement outside the Chase Center.

He told a gathering of supporters that his hopes for victory remain high despite the uncertainty and cautioned them that it could take a day or longer to know who won.

He told them: “Your patience is commendable.”

12:35 a.m.

President Donald Trump has won Florida and its 29 electoral votes, the biggest prize among the perennial battlegrounds and a state crucial to his reelection hopes.

A victory in Florida means reelection is within Trump’s grasp. A loss in the state would have made it nearly impossible for Trump to reach the 270 electoral votes needed to retain the White House.

Democrat Joe Biden’s campaign had hoped the devastating toll of the coronavirus pandemic, particularly among older adults, would put him in a strong position in a state popular with retirees.

Trump narrowly beat Democrat Hillary Clinton in the state in 2016.

12:25 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden will speak shortly on the election results, as many of his key states remain too close to call.

The Biden campaign gathered the press pool that covers him in Wilmington, Delaware, for an early Wednesday morning statement but offered no further guidance.

Biden has spent the night watching the returns come in from his home, while reporters waited near the Chase Center in downtown Wilmington for potential remarks.

Biden began his day early Tuesday with a handful of campaign stops across the all-important state of Pennsylvania as voters went to the polls.

Hours after the polls have closed across America, however, the result of the presidential election remains unclear. A number of key states still have hundreds of thousands of ballots outstanding, after a large influx of mail ballots have slowed down the count in states across the nation.

12:21 a.m.

President Donald Trump has won Iowa and Montana.

The Republican nominee on Wednesday was awarded six electoral votes from Iowa and three electoral votes from Montana.

Trump won Iowa by more than 9 percentage points four years ago against Democrat Hillary Clinton, but his support eroded significantly over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the overall direction of the country.

12:19 a.m.

President Donald Trump has won Ohio and its 18 electoral votes, holding on to a battleground state where the race against Democrat Joe Biden had tightened in recent months.

The Republican nominee comfortably carried the Midwestern state four years ago, but polls heading into the final weeks showed Biden well within range, forcing the president to spend more time in the state than anyone expected.

In 2016, Trump saw notable support from blue-collar manufacturing and mining communities disenchanted with his opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton, and buoyed by the Republican’s promise to bring back jobs to their hard-hit communities.

12:13 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has carried Minnesota, turning back a strong push by President Donald Trump and holding on to a state narrowly won by Democrat Hillary Clinton four years ago.

Biden was awarded the state’s 10 electoral votes on Tuesday.

Trump came within 1.5 percentage points of carrying Minnesota in 2016 and made winning the state this time a personal priority.

12:06 a.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won the state of Hawaii.

He was awarded its four electoral votes on Tuesday.

Hawaii is a reliably Democratic state and last went for a Republican presidential candidate in 1984, when it was won by Ronald Reagan.

11:08 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of Utah.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its six electoral votes.

Utah hasn’t supported a Democratic presidential candidate since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964.

11 p.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won California, Oregon and Washington state, while President Donald Trump has won Idaho.

California, Oregon and Washington are all liberal states, while Idaho is conservative.

Biden nets 74 electoral votes for the three Western states, while Trump takes four electoral votes from Idaho.

10:54 p.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won New Hampshire and its four electoral votes, holding on to a state that President Donald Trump only narrowly lost in 2016.

The state was considered a 2020 battleground despite not going for a Republican presidential candidate since George W. Bush in 2000.

10:31 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of Missouri.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its 10 electoral votes.

In 2016, Trump beat Democrat Hillary Clinton in the state by 18 percentage points.

10:15 p.m.

Republicans and President Donald Trump’s campaign got no quick decision from the Nevada Supreme Court on an appeal aimed at stopping the count of mail-in ballots in the Las Vegas area.

The state high court did not stop election night counting, calling instead for written filings to be completed Monday, Nov. 9, in a case that could affect the vote tally in Clark County, a Democratic stronghold in an otherwise red GOP state.

Trump campaign officials say they want transparency.

State Democrats say Republicans are trying to undermine the election.

Nevada is a presidential battleground state with six electoral votes at stake. Democrat Hillary Clinton won the state in 2016.

9:59 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of Kansas.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its six electoral votes.

In 2016, Trump coasted to victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton by 20 percentage points in the state.

9:37 p.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won the state of Colorado.

He was awarded its nine electoral votes on Tuesday.

The state, which went for Democrat Hillary Clinton four years ago, has trended sharply to the left since President Donald Trump’s 2016 election.

9:27 p.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won the District of Columbia.

He was awarded its three electoral votes on Tuesday.

9 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won Louisiana, Nebraska, Nebraska’s 3rd Congressional District, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming, while Democrat Joe Biden has won New Mexico and New York.

Nebraska, one of two states that divides its electoral votes, has five total electoral votes up for grabs. Trump won the statewide vote, which is good for two electoral votes. He also won the 3rd Congressional District, which nets him a third vote.

Nebraska’s 1st and 2nd congressional districts haven’t yet been called.

Trump nets 20 electoral votes from his wins in Louisiana, Nebraska, Nebraska’s 3rd, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming, while Biden takes 34 electoral votes for winning New Mexico and New York.

8:52 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of Indiana.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its 11 electoral votes.

Indiana is the home state of Trump’s running mate, Vice President Mike Pence.

Trump won Indiana by 19 percentage points in 2016 over Democrat Hillary Clinton.

8:30 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of Arkansas.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its six electoral votes.

Arkansas is a reliably Republican state that hasn’t gone for a Democratic presidential candidate since Bill Clinton in 1996.

8 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Tennessee, while Democrat Joe Biden has won Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Rhode Island.

The results were not a surprise. Biden is very strong in the states that went for him, just as Trump is strong in the states he won.

Trump takes 33 electoral votes for winning those four states, while Biden adds 69 electoral votes to his total for winning seven states.

7:56 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won the state of South Carolina.

The Republican nominee on Tuesday was awarded its nine electoral votes.

Trump handily won the state in 2016 over Democrat Hillary Clinton. South Carolina hasn’t voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

Joe Biden’s victory in the South Carolina primary in February started a wave of wins that helped cement his status as Democrats’ presidential nominee. South Carolina Republicans didn’t hold a primary, an early sign of their support for Trump’s reelection.

7:36 p.m.

Democrat Joe Biden has won the state of Virginia.

He was awarded its 13 electoral votes on Tuesday.

Democrat Hillary Clinton won Virginia over Republican Donald Trump in 2016, helped in part by her choice of running mate: Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine.

Virginia has grown increasingly liberal over the last four years, and as a result of the 2019 elections, Democrats now control every branch of government in the state.

7:30 p.m.

President Donald Trump has coasted to victory in West Virginia, taking its five electoral votes.

The Republican nominee defeated Democrat Joe Biden on Tuesday in a reliably conservative state.

The last Democrat to win a presidential race in West Virginia was Bill Clinton in 1996.

Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton in West Virginia four years ago by 42 percentage points, one of his highest margins of victory in the nation. Many in the state credit him for his conservative populism and promises to help the declining coal industry, even as few expected he could bring back jobs in a dying field.

7 p.m.

President Donald Trump has won Kentucky, and Democrat Joe Biden has carried Vermont.

They are the first two states called in the 2020 presidential election.

Kentucky is reliably conservative, while Vermont is considered one of the most liberal states.

Trump wins eight electoral votes from Kentucky, while Biden takes three for winning Vermont.

———

6:30 p.m.

President Donald Trump called into talk radio shows in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin just hours before polls closed.

Trump projected confidence Tuesday that he will win key states like North Carolina and Florida and said he’s expecting a “great” evening.

He was set to call into conservative host Mark Levin’s show minutes after the first two interviews, but Levin abruptly said Trump would not be appearing. Levin said he was told the president couldn’t come on the show but gave no further details.

Trump told Wisconsin host Vicki McKenna that he is expecting a strong night based on lines of people waiting to vote. Trump has sown doubts about mail voting, without evidence, and is expecting most of his supporters to turn out on Election Day.

At the same time, his campaign was hosting a call with reporters in which they projected confidence but predicted a tight race that would come down to turnout.

———

6:25 p.m.

In North Carolina, an armed man loitering at a polling site on Election Day has been arrested and charged with trespassing.

Thirty-six-year-old Justin Dunn was legally carrying a firearm but loitered at the Charlotte site after voting Tuesday morning, which prompted a precinct official to call police over fears of voter intimidation. A precinct official accompanied by a police officer asked him to leave the site and banned him from the location.

Police say Dunn left the precinct but returned about two hours later. He was taken into custody and charged with second-degree trespassing.

Publicly listed numbers for Dunn were disconnected when a reporter tried to reach him Tuesday.

———

5:45 p.m.

More than 13,000 votes in one South Carolina county will have to wait a while to be counted because of a printing error.

Dorchester County Election Commissioner Todd Billman said at a news conference Tuesday that the mail-in ballots did not have the proper bars printed at the top so the scanner used to count the votes won’t register them. He says the error does not affect anyone’s vote.

The votes will have to be counted by hand and will not be counted Tuesday. Billman says Dorchester County’s full results will be finished by the Friday deadline to certify returns.

The county went for Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016.

The Senate race between Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham and his Democratic challenger, Jaime Harrison, as well as the U.S. House race between Rep. Joe Cunningham and Republican challenger Nancy Mace, will be affected by the unscanned ballots.

———

5:25 p.m.

Vermont Gov. Phil Scott says he voted for Joe Biden for president, making him the first Republican governor in the nation to acknowledge voting for the Democratic presidential candidate.

The Republican governor told reporters Tuesday after casting his ballot in his hometown of Berlin, Vermont, that he had never voted for a Democrat in his life.

“As many of you knew, I didn’t support President Trump. I wasn’t going to vote for him,” Scott said. “But then I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t enough for me to just not vote. I had to vote against.”

He says he “put country over party, which again wasn’t an easy thing to do in some respects.”

A couple of other current Republican governors have said they aren’t voting for Trump, but they said they weren’t voting for Biden, either. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker says he left his ballot blank for president. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan says he voted for President Ronald Reagan, who died 16 years ago.

———

5 p.m.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden isn’t making any predictions about the outcome of the election as the final hours of voting tick down.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday outside a Delaware community center, Biden said he’s “superstitious” about offering predictions for election night but remains “hopeful.” He says he’s heard from aides that there’s “overwhelming turnout” among young people, women and older Black adults in places like Georgia and Florida.

He says, “The things that are happening bode well for the base that has been supporting me — but we’ll see.” Still, he admitted, “It’s just so uncertain” because of how many states are in play.

Biden also wouldn’t commit to commenting on any results on election night, even if President Donald Trump weighs in on the vote. “If there’s something to talk about tonight, I’ll talk about it,” Biden said. “If not, I’ll wait till the votes are counted the next day.”

Biden capped off a day of last-minute campaigning in his hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and in Philadelphia with a couple of local stops in Wilmington, Delaware. He spoke to the CEO of a community center for teens and visited a pool where he worked as a teenager, closing out a day that began before the sun rose.

———

4:45 p.m.

The cybersecurity agency at the Department of Homeland Security says the U.S. election so far has featured the usual technical glitches and routine issues but no apparent signs of any malicious cyber activity — at least not yet.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency also says it’s too early to declare victory as polls near closing time around the nation Tuesday and with days of vote counting and certification ahead.

A senior agency official says, “It has been quiet and we take some confidence in that but we are not out of the woods yet.” The official spoke on condition of anonymity to brief reporters about ongoing nationwide election monitoring efforts ahead of the release of any kind of official evaluation.

The official warned that local and state election systems could experience problems as results are reported, but the most likely cause would be from high demand put on the system as people overwhelm websites to check results.

— By AP writer Ben Fox

———

4:30 p.m.

Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris is heading to Wilmington, Delaware, after spending the afternoon campaigning in battleground Michigan.

She reminded voters at a Detroit church on Tuesday how slim Donald Trump’s margin of victory was in the state in 2016. She urged them to try to get two other people to vote as well.

She also urged people to remember why they are voting if they are stuck in long lines.

Earlier Tuesday, she campaigned alongside Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, who is up for reelection, Sen. Debbie Stabenow and Rep. Brenda Lawrence in Southfield. Peters is in a competitive race against Republican John James.

She will join Joe Biden in Delaware on Tuesday night.

———

4:25 p.m.

A spokesperson for the Iowa secretary of state says hand sanitizer on voters’ hands caused a ballot scanner to jam at a polling place in Des Moines.

Spokesperson Kevin Hall says some voters’ hands were moist when they handled the ballots and the buildup of sanitizer eventually caused the scanner to stop working.

The machine was fixed in about an hour.

To prevent another breakdown, poll workers moved the sanitizing station farther back in the line so voters’ hands would be dry when they first touched the ballots.

It was a problem unique to the coronavirus era. Iowa is considered one of the tossup states in Tuesday’s election between President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden.

———

2:30 p.m.

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has ordered U.S. Postal Service inspectors to sweep more than two dozen mail processing facilities for lingering mail-in ballots and for those ballots to be sent out immediately.

The order, which includes centers in central Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Detroit, Atlanta, south Florida and parts of Wisconsin, comes after national delivery delays leading up to the election and concerns the agency wouldn’t be able to deliver ballots on time.

The Postal Service’s ability to handle the surge of mail-in ballots became a concern after its new leader, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a major GOP donor, implemented a series of policy changes that delayed mail nationwide this summer. Delivery times have since rebounded but have consistently remained below the agency’s internal goals of having more than 95% of first-class mail delivered within five days, with service in some battleground areas severely lagging, according to postal data.

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