A view shows voting booths at PS 20 Anna Silver Elementary School, on Election Day for the 2024 US presidential election in Manhattan, New York City, US, Nov. 5, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Andrew Kelly

The dizzying presidential contest between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris hurtled toward an uncertain finish on Tuesday as millions of Americans headed to the polls to choose between two sharply different visions for the country.

A race whipsawed by unprecedented events — two assassination attempts against Trump, President Joe Biden’s surprise withdrawal, and Harris‘ rapid rise — remained too close to call, even after billions of dollars in spending and months of frenetic campaigning.

The first ballots cast on election day mirrored the nationwide divide. Overnight, the six registered voters in the tiny hamlet of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, split their votes between Harris and Trump in voting just past midnight.

Elsewhere on the East Coast, polls began opening at 7 am (1200 GMT) in more than two dozen states.

Trump‘s campaign has suggested he may declare victory on election night even while millions of ballots have yet to be counted, just as he did four years ago. The former president has repeatedly said any defeat could only stem from widespread fraud, echoing his false claims from 2020. The winner may not be known for days if the margins in key states are as slim as expected.

No matter who wins the White House, history will be made.

Harris, 60, the first female vice president, would become the first woman, Black woman, and South Asian American to win the presidency. Trump, 78, the only president to be impeached twice and the first former president to be criminally convicted, would also become the first president to win non-consecutive terms in more than a century.

Opinion polls in the campaign‘s final days have shown the candidates running neck-and-neck in each of the seven states likely to determine the winner: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

Reuters/Ipsos polling shows a significant gender gap, with Harris leading among women by 12 percentage points and Trump winning among men by 7 percentage points.

The contest reflects a deeply polarized nation whose divisions have only grown starker during a fiercely competitive race.

Control of both chambers of Congress is also up for grabs. Republicans have an easier path in the US Senate, where Democrats are defending several seats in Republican-leaning states, while the House of Representatives looks like a toss-up.

The candidates spent the final weekend barnstorming the swing states in search of every available vote. Trump staged his final rally on Monday evening in Grand Rapids, Michigan, while Harris held twin rallies in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.

More than 80 million Americans had already voted before Tuesday, either via mail or in person, according to the University of Florida Election Lab.

During the campaign, Trump hammered first Biden and then Harris for their handling of the economy, which polls show is at the top of voters‘ concerns despite low unemployment and cooling inflation. But he showed a characteristic inability to stay on message, at one point questioning Harris‘ Black identity and vowing to protect women “whether they like it or not.”

Polls show he has made some gains among Black and Latino voters, despite the historic nature of Harris‘ candidacy. Trump has often warned that migrants are taking jobs away from those constituencies.

By contrast, Harris has tried to piece together a broader but challenging coalition of liberal Democrats, independents, and disaffected moderate Republicans, describing Trump as too dangerous to elect.

She campaigned on protecting reproductive rights, an issue that has galvanized women since the US Supreme Court in 2022 struck down a 1973 decision that established a constitutional right to an abortion.

Harris has faced anger from many anti-Israel voters over the Biden administration’s military and financial support for Israel’s war against Hamas terrorists in Gaza. While she has not previewed a shift in US policy, she has said she will do everything possible to end the conflict.

After Biden, 81, withdrew amid concerns about his age, Harris sought to turn the tables on Trump, pointing to his rambling rallies as evidence he is unfit. Her campaign‘s embrace of viral memes and a parade of celebrity endorsements gained her traction with young voters seen as a critical voting bloc.

Trump countered the likes of Harris supporters Taylor Swift and Beyonce with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, who played an increasingly visible role as a surrogate and a top donor to Trump‘s cause.

Tuesday’s vote follows one of the most turbulent half-years in modern American politics.

In May, a New York jury found Trump guilty of falsifying business records to hide hush money payments to a porn star. Four weeks later, Trump and Biden met for their only debate, where the incumbent president delivered a disastrous performance that supercharged voters‘ existing concerns about his mental acuity.

In July, Trump narrowly escaped a would-be assassin’s bullet at a Pennsylvania rally, just before the Republican National Convention. Barely a week later, Biden exited the race, bowing to pressure from Democratic leaders.

Harris‘ entry into the race re-energized her party, and she raised more than $1 billion in less than three months.

The post Trump vs Harris: US Voters Head to Polls as Turbulent Campaign Concludes first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

US Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) speaks during the House Financial Services Committee hearing in Washington, DC, Sept. 30, 2021. Photo: Al Drago/Pool via REUTERS

Both Democratic and Republican parties are scrambling to galvanize Jewish support on the eve of the 2024 U.S. Presidential election.

In what is projected to potentially be the closest presidential election in over 20 years, both parties believe that Jewish voters could play a major role in determining the election’s outcome. As the race for the White House enters the final hours, Democrats and Republicans have deployed some of their most vocal pro-Israel allies in a last-minute pitch to the Jewish community.

Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) visited Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to court Jewish voters who feel alienated by Rep. Summer Lee’s (D-PA) unrelenting anti-Israel rhetoric. Torres sought to assuage fears that Vice President Kamala Harris harbors similar views on Israel as Lee.

In addition, Torres defended the Biden administration’s record on Israel, arguing that a potential Harris administration would continue to strengthen ties with the Jewish state and mitigate any threats from Iran.

“I joined the Harris campaign in showing solidarity with the Pittsburgh Jewish community, which has been profoundly shaken by both the Tree of Life mass shooting and the post-October 7th outbreak of antisemitism,” Torres told Jewish Insider.

“I did my best to reassure the Jewish community that the Democratic Party — despite the background noise on Twitter, Twitch, and TikTok — has been and will remain fundamentally pro-Israel and that the Vice President herself falls squarely within the pro-Israel consensus that has historically governed American politics, rejecting both the [a]nti-Zionism of the far left and the America-[F]irst isolationism of the far right,” Torres continued.

On the conservative side of the aisle, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) filmed a video with the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) in support of former President Donald Trump.

“This is the most important election cycle in our lifetime, and as we have seen on college campuses, the rot of antisemitism is real in the Democratic Party.

She accused the Biden White House of betraying Israel and the Jewish people. She lambasted the Biden administration for their failure “to combat antisemitism”

“It is Republicans who have always – and will always – stand strongly with Israel, and stand up and clearly condemn antisemitism,” Stefanik said.

While serving on the Education and the Workforce Committee, Stefanik has lambasted administrators of elite universities for their mealy-mouthed condemnations of antisemitism and tolerance of anti-Jewish violence on campus. Last December, Stefanik engaged in a fiery back-and-forth with the presidents of Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology over a purported antisemitic campus atmospheres.

Early indicators suggest that Harris is expected to win a smaller share of the Jewish vote than previous Democratic candidates. Jewish voters, highly-concentrated in important areas such as the suburbs of Detroit and Philadelphia, could prove critical in Harris’s bid to win the White House.

Liberal CNN commentator Van Jones cautioned Monday that Harris has suffered an erosion of Jewish support in the Philadelphia metro.

Jones said that he’s “worried” that the “Jewish vote in the suburban areas” of Philadelphia have dramatically soured on Harris.

“Biden won the Jewish vote [in suburban Philadephia] by 70%” Jones said, referencing the 2020 election.

“Some polls show Kamala at 50-50” among Jewish voters in suburban Philadelphia, Jones lamented.

The post Democrats, Republicans Make Final Push for Jewish Voters on Eve of US Presidential Election first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

In a gentrifying West Toronto neighbourhood full of signs advocating for Black lives, transgender youth and the unhoused, the clerk’s refusal to hang up a sign of my own design […]

The post Quiet antisemitism in Toronto’s Roncesvalles Village leaves a resident wondering how this area is considered ‘progressive’ appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.