Joe Biden wins; will serve as the 46th President of the United States

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has won the most votes out of any candidate in American history, notching a tally of over 70 million votes nationwide; crossing President Obama's previous record of 69.4 million votes in 2008.

It has also been reported that Biden has won the state of Wisconsin and its 10 electoral votes, polling narrowly ahead of President Trump with 49.4% of the votes; in addition to maintaining a slender lead in Michigan, Nevada, and Arizona.

In comparison, incumbent President Donald Trump is currently trailing with 67.3 million votes. The Trump campaign has filed a lawsuit in Michigan, requesting the state to halt counting until it receives "meaningful access" to observe the opening of ballots and the counting process.

The excruciatingly close U.S. presidential election hung in the balance on Wednesday, with a handful of closely contested states set to decide the outcome in the coming hours or days, even as President Donald Trump falsely claimed victory and made unsubstantiated allegations of electoral fraud.

Donald Trump is seeking to continue his presidency for another four years. His Democratic challenger, 77-year-old Joe Biden is hoping to unseat him.

Democratic’s Biden has held a consistent lead in the polls throughout campaigning but in the last week, Trump has led energetic rallies as he seeks to produce another shock result.

Live Updates

Trump's lead in Georgia falls to 665 votes

Trump's lead in Georgia continues to fall as more mail-in ballots come in. The latest count indicates that Biden is only 665 votes away from overtaking Trump in Georgia. According to AP, 99% of votes have been counted and there are roughly 3000 more votes left to count.

------------

Trump's lead in Georgia narrows further

President Trump’s lead in Georgia has narrowed over the past few hours, and that just happened again.

According to CNN, due to another batch of votes that just came in from Fulton County — the largest county in the state and home to Atlanta.

Fulton County reported the results of more than 8,000 additional ballots. Trump’s lead in the state narrowed from more than 30,000 at midnight to just more than 18,500.

Overnight, Fulton had about 20,000 absentee ballots to be counted. The county just reported the results of 8,351 of those, with Biden getting 6,410 of those votes and Trump getting 1,941 of them.

Police arrest 10 in Portland, 50 in New York on night after U.S. vote

Portland Police said it arrested ten people in the demonstrations after declaring riots in the city’s downtown area while the New York Police Department (NYPD) said it made about 50 arrests in protests that spread in the city late on Wednesday.

Pennsylvania county finishes counting mail-in and absentee votes

Allegheny County, home to Pittsburgh, says it has finished tabulating mail-in and absentee ballots, CNN reported on Thursday.

County spokesperson Amie Downs told CNN that the county tabulated 313,072 absentee and mail-in votes.

Downs said the county will resume tabulating several precincts’ worth of in-person votes later Thursday morning.

Arizona's Maricopa County ballot results are slightly delayed

Maricopa County will post its next batch of ballot results closer to 1:30 a.m. ET/11:30 p.m. MT, because of the process of uploading the data, according to Diana Solorio, a spokesperson for Maricopa County Elections Department.

Joe Biden will win at least three of Maine's electoral votes, CNN projects. There are four electoral votes at stake in Maine.

Maine allows electoral votes to be split. In Maine, two of four electoral votes go to the statewide winner and one electoral vote goes to the winner in each of the two congressional districts.

200,000 ballots left to be counted in Georgia, secretary of state says From CNN’s Jason Morris and Wes Bruer

About 200,000 ballots are left to be counted in Georgia, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said.

Speaking at a press conference at the Georgia Capitol on Wednesday, Raffensperger said “every legal ballot will be counted”.

U.S. election plagued by online misinformation about legitimate ballot counting

Online misinformation about the results of the U.S. election continued to spread on Wednesday as President Donald Trump falsely claimed victory with millions of votes still to be counted and pushed unfounded allegations about the counting of legitimate ballots.

Facebook Inc FB.O and Twitter have flagged multiple posts from the president as votes were still being counted, in a real-time test of their rules on handling misinformation and premature claims of victory.

Biden expected to address Americans today

As per CNN, Joe Biden will address the American people today as the nation awaits election results.

US president Donald Trump has questioned Joe Biden’s mail-in ballot lead saying that one by one, his lead started to magically disappear.

Republicans retain tight grip over Texas oil and gas regulator

A Texas Republican businessman swept to victory in the Texas Railroad Commission over a Democratic energy lawyer who had sought to put climate change on the state energy regulator’s agenda.

Jim Wright’s win keeps the Republican Party’s 25-year dominance over the commission and other state-wide offices. It overseas companies producing 4.7 million barrels of oil per day.

Texas voters also backed U.S. President Donald Trump over Democrat Joe Biden and sent Republican John Cornyn to his fourth U.S. Senate term.

Georgia's Fulton County begins counting remaining absentee ballots

Fulton County, Georgia, has just begun counting absentee ballots at 8:30 a.m. ET Wednesday after stopping Tuesday night at 10:30 p.m ET.

According to CNN, An estimated 48,000 absentee ballots are still outstanding.

Roughly 79,000 absentee mail ballots are still uncounted in DeKalb County. They are scheduled to start counting at 11a.m. ET this morning.

Bettors stampede back in favor of Biden as results stream in

Democratic candidate Joe Biden was back as clear favorite to win the U.S. presidential election in online betting markets on Wednesday morning, a reversal of fortune for President Donald Trump who had been favored overnight.

The shift, according to data from three odds aggregators, came after Biden overtook Trump in the battleground state of Wisconsin, with an estimated 89% of the vote tallied there.

British-based Smarkets exchange was giving Biden a 78% chance, while New Zealand-based predictions market PredictIt had Biden at nearly 80%. Trump’s chances on Smarkets were sitting at 21% - a massive drop from nearly 80% overnight.

Joe Biden has won absentee ballots counted in Pennsylvania by an overwhelming margin so far, according to data from the Secretary of State early Wednesday.

President Trump leads by nearly 700,000 votes in Pennsylvania as of 5 a.m. on Wednesday, and Biden’s chances depend on whether he can win a large percentage of the more than 1.4 million absentee ballots that remain to be counted.

So far, Biden has won absentee voters in Pennsylvania, 78 percent to 21 percent, according to the Secretary of State’s office. The results comport with the findings of pre-election surveys and an analysis of absentee ballot requests, which all indicated that Mr. Biden held an overwhelming lead among absentee voters.

US election betting odds point to 50-50 chance

Betting market odds on the US presidential election have begun to tighten once again after clearly flipping overnight in favour of Republican President Donald Trump over Democratic candidate Joe Biden, according to data from three aggregators.

According to AP, Joe Biden has won Arizona, making him the second Democratic presidential candidate since 1948 to win the longtime Republican stronghold. With Arizona win, Biden takes 11 important electoral votes.

Democrats' victory in Arizona is a huge blow to Trump’s chances for reelection.

US President says as far as I am concerned, we did win this election. Trump accuses Democrats of attempting to "steal" the election from him.

Donald Trump is projected to win North Dakota.

The state is a firm stronghold for Republicans. Since 1940, only one Democratic presidential candidate has won the state: Lyndon B Johnson.

As per CNN, Trump will win South Carolina. There are nine electoral votes at stake in South Carolina.

Joe Biden will win New York, as per CNN. There are 29 electoral votes at stake in New York. It takes 270 electoral votes to win the 2020 presidential election.

Trump and Biden split first states to be called, run neck-and-neck in Florida

President Donald Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden split the first U.S. states to be projected in the White House race on Tuesday, with the two contenders neck and neck in vital Florida and other competitive battleground states, including Georgia and Ohio, still up in the air.

President Trump will win Tennessee, as per CNN projects. There are 11 electoral votes at stake in Tennessee. It takes 270 electoral votes to win the 2020 presidential election.

Joe Biden wins Virginia and its 13 electoral votes.

As polls began to close in seven states, Trump also was projected to win Kentucky by the Associated Press, and Biden was projected by Fox News to win Democratic-leaning Vermont and Virginia in widely expected results. Indiana had been expected to go to Trump.

According to Edison Research, the president secured a victory in Indiana by securing 11 electoral votes, while he has also won the polls from Kentucky.

Meanwhile challenger Joe Biden is victorious in Vermont.