Trump picks up Florida and Texas, dashing Dems’ hopes of an Election Day pick-up

• Trump has been declared the winner in 20 states, including Florida, while Harris has won ten.
• But none of the seven key swing states have been called yet.
• Trump is now the first GOP presidential candidate since 1988 to win Miami-Dade county.

With results coming in, former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have each been declared the winner in several states, but there haven’t been any surprises so far.

Trump has won 20 states, totaling 198 electoral votes. Harris has won nine states, totaling 109 electoral votes. A candidate must win a majority of the 538 electoral votes — 270 — to win.

The election is expected to come down to just seven “battleground” states that polling has indicated either candidate could win: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

Polls have now closed in all of those states, but none of them have been called.

The Trump trade is taking off

Investors are betting on a Trump victory, with a range of markets moving sharply on early election results.

The US dollar strengthened to a multi-month high, bitcoin hit a record high, and Treasuries sold off in moves that reflect the expected impact of a Trump presidency.

A sitting senator is underwater in Ohio, with big implications for Democrats’ chances of keeping control of the upper chamber

Trump is projected to easily win Ohio again, as he did in 2016 and 2020. But the real race in the state is for Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown’s seat.

Brown is running well ahead of Harris, but is trailing his GOP challenger, Bernie Moreno, by several points. Just over half of precincts reporting so far.

If Brown were to lose, Democrats are all but guaranteed to lose their majority in the US Senate. If he wins, they have a shot — but would need to reelect Democratic Sen. Jon Tester in Montana as well.

Trump is the first Republican since 1988 to win Miami-Dade county

Not only did Trump expand his margins of victory in Florida, but he also cinched Miami-Dade County, once a Democratic stronghold. His win in the county illustrates the phenomenal rightward swing of the Sunshine State.

In 2016, Hillary Clinton won Miami-Dade by 30 percentage points; in 2020, Biden won it by 7 percentage points. Trump is projected to win the county by double-digit margins, the Associated Press reported, with 95% of the vote counted.

There’s a significant Latino population in the county, and the key demographic group has started to move toward Republicans. Harris’ campaign didn’t spend a lot of money in Florida, considering the state, once a battleground, out of reach.

Democrats are starting to bite their nails in Georgia as the race tightens

With 66% of the votes counted in the key battleground of Georgia, Democrats are starting to get anxious. Trump has 53% of the votes to Harris’ 47%, and the former president is establishing a comfortable lead in GOP-favored areas.

A senior Democratic analyst said that Harris “needs an Election Day Hail Mary” to a veteran political reporter in the state. At least 12 polling precincts in the state stayed open past the original 7:00 pm closing time after unfounded bomb threats linked to Russia caused temporary closures.

Marijuana legalization and abortion rights referenda fail in Florida

Floridians are projected to have rejected ballot measures that would have expanded abortion rights and legalized recreational marijuana for adults 21 and older, according to NBC, CNN, and The Associated Press.

The abortion referendum’s expected failure is particularly notable, given that abortion rights advocates have racked up a string of unbroken victories in states around the country since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. As a result, Florida’s ban on almost all abortions after six weeks will remain in place — one of the most restrictive policies in the country.

Gov. Ron DeSantis declared victory over the progressive referendums shortly after the final polls closed in the state. He and his allies made it their mission to sink the measures, each of which needed to garner at least 60% support to pass.

“With polls now closed in Florida — Amendment 3 has failed. Amendment 4 has failed,” DeSantis wrote on X.

Trump had previously announced that he would support the marijuana legalization referendum.

DeSantis has powered a massive sea change in the state’s politics, shifting what was once the nation’s biggest swing state into favorable ground for Republicans.

Trump is projected to win Texas, but Colin Allred’s running strong against Ted Cruz

Trump is projected to have won Texas and its 40 Electoral College votes, according to NBC News’ and ABC News’ projections.

The former president’s victory isn’t all that surprising, but it’s a reminder that Democrats’ decades of pining for a major upset in Texas have yet to come to fruition.

Meanwhile, Colin Allred — a Democratic congressman from the Dallas area — is outrunning Harris in the state. But he still remains behind Cruz by roughly six points with nearly 60 percent of the vote in.

Democrats have long seen the Texas race as one of their top pickup opportunities, and were thrilled at Allred’s moderate-minded campaign. But Democrats have not won a statewide race in Texas since 1994.

A suburban Virginia county swung several points to the right since 2020, a potential warning sign for Democrats

Loudoun County, a highly educated suburban county in Northern Virginia, has reported the vast majority of its results — and it’s not looking great for Democrats. Polling has closed in the state, but the full results haven’t been reported yet.

Harris is currently leading Trump by more than 16 points in Loudoun. But that’s a significant decline from 2020, when Biden defeated Trump by 25 points in the county.

It’s too soon to say if that trend will continue across other states, but it’s not a positive indicator for Harris, who has sought to peel off GOP voters from Trump in suburban areas.

A Trump ally got trounced in North Carolina’s gubernatorial race

North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein is projected to have won the state’s gubernatorial election, holding the swing state for Democrats, according to Fox News’ and NBC News’ projections.

Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, a Trump ally, who has a history of making controversial comments, was rocked by a CNN report that he previously made explicit posts on a pornographic message board called NudeAfrica. Robinson has repeatedly denied that he wrote the messages, which included posts that said “slavery is not bad” and that the user was a “black NAZI!.”

Trump never pulled his endorsement from Robinson, a longtime ally, but Republicans are afraid that the Republican’s struggles could affect Trump at the top of the ticket.

How to read the Electoral College math

The US uses the Electoral College to elect a president. Each state gets a set number of votes that correlates with its population — if a state has two US senators and three House members, it has five electoral votes.

The winner must get at least 270 electoral votes — a majority of the 538 total. In the vast majority of states, either Harris or Trump is widely expected to win, leaving the campaigns to fight over the 93 electoral votes up for grabs in the seven battleground states.

If Harris wins Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan on Tuesday night or early Wednesday, she will have a projected 273 electoral votes — enough to make her the winner.

If Trump sweeps those states, he’ll have a projected 266 electoral votes — not enough to be declared the winner, but it would put him in a very strong position to win.

Harris’ easiest path to victory would be to win the traditional “blue wall” states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin — a result that should put her at 270 electoral votes. She has generally polled better in these states than the Sun Belt states of Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, and North Carolina.

For Trump, one path to victory would involve holding on to all or most of the Sun Belt states while also winning Pennsylvania, Michigan, or Wisconsin.