Americans are heading to the polls for election day, and Donald Trump has been highly active on social media. The US President has thrown his support behind dozens of Republican candidates in a series of Truth Social posts, while also sharing links directing voters to polling information. The endorsements span several states, including Texas, a traditionally Republican stronghold, where Trump has urged voters to back the party's candidates.
But Texas and other Republican strongholds have been predicted to flip to the Democrats, with Trump's grip on US politics poised to weaken dramatically.
When will UK viewers know the results?
The first indicators start arriving late on Tuesday night (3 November), with the earliest polls on the US East Coast, such as in parts of Indiana and Kentucky, closing around midnight UK time. As the clock passes 1am and into 3am, polls begin to close in vital battleground states like Florida, Georgia, and Pennsylvania, with early projections for safe seats and initial trends filtering onto British screens during this window.
By the time the UK wakes up on Wednesday morning (4 November), initial tallies for key House and Senate races will dominate breakfast news programmes. However, experts warn that morning updates often capture only the tip of the iceberg in closely contested districts.
Tallies may take days to confirm
Because states manage their own electoral rules, ranging from varying deadlines for mail-in ballots to distinct recount thresholds, narrow margins in toss-up seats mean British viewers might have to wait well past election night before the final balance of power in Washington is officially confirmed. A definitive outcome for total control of Congress frequently takes days to crystallise.
Speaking to Fox News today, Trump claimed he believed the results of the midterms would be "better than you think" for Republicans, declaring that "inflation is solved" and "everything's going good." This comes after an NBC poll published yesterday put Trump's approval rating at a record low of 40%, though some pollsters have it as low as 31%.
Early voting surges
In this midterm, 58 million early ballots have been cast, compared with 45 million in the 2022 midterms. Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer said he was optimistic that "there will be a new Democratic majority in the United States Senate" when polls close today. "We don't want to count our chickens before they hatch. So I'd characterize our mood as nauseously optimistic," Schumer said.
In Alaska, polls have just opened in the key state, where people will be closely watching the Senate race. Trump-ally Republican Dan Sullivan is up for re-election, but polls suggest Democrat Mary Peltola could win. An independent candidate named Daniel J Sullivan is running with a similar name to the Republican incumbent, and it has been alleged this 'spoiler' candidate was encouraged to run as part of a project hatched by a Democrat-aligned group. Trump has demanded Peltola be "removed from the ballot and prosecuted". A federal judge on Sunday dismissed a case brought by the Justice Department seeking to block the certification of Alaska's race if Sullivan loses.
In Florida, some voters were being directed to cast their ballots in new places on Tuesday after their polling sites were relocated due to continued rain and flooding. Officials in Brevard, Broward, Highlands, Indian River, Martin, Okeechobee, Palm Beach and St. Lucie counties set up alternative polling sites for 21 original sites involving 30 precincts.
