Counting has begun for the US elections and, according to early leads, Donald Trump is ahead in the Red states of Indiana and Kentucky. Both states have usually voted in favour of Republican candidates.
In Indiana, which has 11 electoral college votes, 6% of votes have been counted and, of those, Republican nominee Donald Trump has received 63.1% of the votes while Democratic nominee Kamala Harris has polled 35.8%. In 2020, Trump got 57% of the votes while then Democratic candidate Joe Biden got 41%.
Kentucky has eight electoral college votes and of the 3% of ballots counted as of 5.23 am (IST) former president Trump has polled 66.8% while Vice President Harris has received 32.1%. The state had voted in favour of Trump in 2020, with 62.1% of votes going to him and 36.2% being polled by Biden.
In the next few hours, polls are set to close in the seven swing or battleground states of Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin, which will effectively decide who will be the 47th President of the United States. The contest between Trump and Harris has been a fiercely fought one and both sides appeared to be in a dead heat even on Tuesday, which was the day of voting.
Exit polls showed that the state of democracy and the economy, and abortion, were the most important issues for American voters heading into the election. Exit polls conducted by CBS News revealed that almost six in 10 people ranked the state of democracy as their number one issue, followed by abortion, which was picked by five per cent of voters as an important issue. Economy was picked as a priority issue by one in ten.
