US election: Harris, Trump vow to win as campaigns wrap up
Published November 4, 2024last updated November 5, 2024
What you need to know
Both Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris and former Republican President Donald Trump were campaigning in the key swing state of Pennsylvania on the final day before the election on November 5.
With 19 electoral votes, Pennsylvania is the biggest prize among the seven key swing state states that could flip one way or the other. Either Trump or Harris will need at least 270 electoral votes to become the next US president.
Vice President Kamala Harris said she was "feeling good" as she boarded a plane from Michigan to Pennsylvania to attend a flurry of rallies peppered with celebrity appearances.
Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump threatened to impose tariffs on Mexico as he addressed a cheering crowd in North Carolina's capital, Raleigh. He also labeled his opponent "incompetent."
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Below, you can read a roundup of developments in the race to the White Housefrom November 4, 2024:
Kamala Harris confident of victory in last rally at Philadelphia
US Democratic presidential candidate Harris spent the last day of campaigning in Philadelphia, where she expressed confidence she would win.
"The momentum is on our side. We will win," Harris told the crowd.
"Just one more day in the most consequential election of our lifetimes and the momentum is one our side," she added. "This could be one of the closest races in history — every single vote matters."
Harris, 60, spoke at the famous steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where the movie "Rocky" was shot. She called herself the underdog like Rocky and said she was ready to "climb to victory."
The event consisted of A-list celebrities such as Lady Gaga, Oprah Winfrey and Jon Bon Jovi. Gaga sang "God Bless America," and Winfrey came to the stage with some first-time voters.
Also on the last day of campaigning, Harris' rally in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, saw celebrities like Cedric the Entertainer, Katy Perry and Andra Day.
Trump calls for death penalty to migrants who kill US citizens, police
On the last day of the presidential election campaign, Trump called for the death penalty for migrants who kill US citizens or law enforcement officers.
"I am hereby calling for the death penalty for any migrant that kills an American citizen or a law enforcement officer," he told a crowd in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which is a battleground state.
Trump, 78, has consistently held an anti-immigrant rhetoric during his campaign.
Trump also mused that god may have saved him from an assassin’s bullet so that he could become president, adding he has a 95% chance of winning.
If elected, he said he would end inflation, deport irregular migrants and impose tariffs on goods entering the United States from Mexico and Canada.
He also promised the "four greatest years in the history of the country."
US cybersecurity head says disinformation rampant, but results not compromised
The US cybersecurity agency CISA, alongside the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), issued a joint warning on election interference on Monday.
The three agencies said they had "been observing foreign adversaries, particularly Russia, conducting additional influence operations intended to undermine public confidence in the integrity of US elections and stoke divisions among Americans."
"Russia is the most active threat," the statement said.
"These efforts risk inciting violence, including against election officials," the agencies said. "We anticipate Russian actors will release additional manufactured content with these themes through election day and in the days and weeks after polls close."
The agencies said that Russian-influenced operators had posted false articles and videos claiming electoral fraud in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris.
The statement also said that Iran had launched "malicious cyber activities" to negatively impact the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's campaign.
CISA chief Jen Easterly said her department had seen no activity that could directly affect the US election result, but reported a rise in disinformation thought to be orchestrated from abroad, according to reporting from Reuters.
She added that the 2024 US presidential election had been confronted with an "unprecedented" amount of disinformation from certain "adversaries."
Easterly said the "election infrastructure has never been more secure and that the election community has never been better prepared to deliver safe, secure, free and fair elections."
Easterly recently told NBC News that Russia, Iran and China were conducting influence operations to undermine American confidence in election legitimacy and "to stoke partisan discord."
What are the swing states?
The US is made up of 50 states, but when it comes to presidential elections some states matter more than others.
While many "safe states" usually vote reliably one way or the other, "swing states" could be won by either the Democratic or Republican candidate. This toss-up potential makes them attractive to candidates since these votes could push the election either way.
In this race, the states to look out for are: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Read DW's analysis on which issues matter the most in each of the battleground states.
DW speaks to voters in Washington DC on final day of campaigning
DW's special correspondent Aya Ibrahim has spoken with voters in the US capital ahead of Tuesday's vote.
'False or misleading' claims by Musk on election reach 2 billion views on X — non-profit
False or misleading claims on the US election made by billionaire Elon Musk have achieved 2 billion views on the social media platform X this year, according to a report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate non-profit group.
Musk owns the platform X and is a supporter of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
The center said that at least 87 of Musk's posts this year have promoted claims about the US election that fact-checkers have rated as false or misleading.
One of the false claims, according to the report, made by Musk was that there had been a "triple digit" rise over the past four years of undocumented immigrants in swing states.
It said that Musk's political posts have received 17.1 billion views since he endorsed Donald Trump in July. The non-profit group said that this was twice as many views as all the political campaigning ads that X has recorded in its political ads disclosure dataset for the same time period.
The center estimated that "it would cost a political campaign $24 million [€22 million] to run ads reaching as many views as Musk's posts did."
Harris pledges to be 'president for all' in final pitch to voters
Speaking in swing state Pennsylvania during the final hours of her campaign, Kamala Harris promised she would govern for all if elected.
"I will be a president for all Americans," she said to the crowd in Allentown. "Momentum is on our side. Can you feel it?"
"The race is not over," she said, acknowledging the tight race for the White House. "Make no mistake, we will win," she added.
Turning her comments to Donald Trump, Harris said the last decade of US politics had been driven by hate and division due to the space occupied by her opponent.
"I believe access to health care should be a right and not a privilege for those who can afford it," she said. "I am not looking to score political points, I am looking to make progress."
"I then ask you — are you ready to make your voices heard? Do we believe in freedom? Do we believe in opportunity? Do we believe in the promise of America? And are we ready to fight for it? And when we fight, we win."
Musk's $1 million voter giveaway allowed to continue, judge rules
A Pennsylvania judge has decided to allow billionaire Elon Musk'sto continue giving away $1 million (€900,000) every day to registered swing state voters with just one day to go before the US presidential election.
Tesla CEO Musk, who has thrown his full support behind Donald Trump, has already given away $16 million to registered swing state voters who qualified for the giveaway by signing his political petition supporting free speech and gun rights and said the final winner will be announced on Election Day on Tuesday.
At a hearing in Philadelphia on Monday, Judge Angelo Foglietta rejected Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner’s bid to block the giveaways.
Krasner alleged the payouts amounted to an illegal lottery with hazily defined rules. Monday's decision came even after Musk's aides admitted to hand-picking winners based on who they thought would be good spokespeople, rather than the random selection that Musk had asserted.
Musk's offer is limited to registered voters in the seven states expected to decide the election: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
The giveaway falls in a gray area of election law, and legal experts have been divided on whether Musk could be violating federal laws against paying people to register to vote.
The US Department of Justice has warned America PAC the giveaway could violate federal law, according to media reports, but federal prosecutors have not taken any public action.
How swing states will decide the election?
Pollsters say battleground states are too close to call. With a total of 50 electoral votes, these states are likely to determine who wins the election:
Trump arrives late in Reading, Pennsylvania
Trump reached his rally in Reading on Monday evening later than scheduled, entering to the Lee Greenwood song "God Bless the USA" as usual.
Female members of the crowd were positioned behind him to be visible on the television footage, waving pink "Women for Trump" placards.
He called Pennsylvania a very special place where he had gone to school filled with incredible people.
"You built this country. You're going to save this country, too," Trump said. "Because, you know, if we win Pennslyvania, we win the whole ball of wax. It's over."
He posed his stock opening question to the audience, of whether they felt better off now than four years ago.
"What a shame, what they've done to our country. They've destroyed our country, but we're going to get it back, and fast. We're a nation in decline, but that will not be long, believe me. And after four years of economic suffering, we will create the greatest economic boom the world has ever seen."
Trump told the crowd "I've been waiting four years for this, and so have you," urging the crowd both to vote and to encourage others to do so on Tuesday.
NATO chief Rutte says alliance will 'stay united' whoever wins in US
NATO will remain solid whoever wins the US election, Secretary General Mark Rutte said in Berlin on the eve of the vote.
"Whoever wins those elections, we will work with Kamala Harris, we will work with Donald Trump, and make sure that the alliance stays united," Rutte said alongside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Former Dutch Prime Minister Rutte said he had "no doubt" that whoever emerges as winner would continue to support NATO because it is "in the interest of the United States."
Trump's comments during the campaign about the war in Ukraine have caused some unease among NATO allies, and the Republican candidate also clashed with European leaders on issues such as military spending while in office from 2017 to 2021.
Harris 'feeling good' on star-studded final day
US Vice President Kamala Harris said she was "feeling good," giving a thumbs-up and a wave as she boarded her plane to her first event of the day in Allentown, Pennsylvania's third-largest city.
The Democratic candidate was traveling from Detroit after campaigning in the Great Lakes swing state of Michigan.
Like Trump, Harris is focusing her last day's campaigning on Pennsylvania, a battleground state carrying a hefty chunk of 19 Electoral College votes.
Harris is holding a rally in Allentown with the part-Puerto Rican, part-Cuban rapper Fat Joe before visiting a Puerto Rican restaurant in Reading with New York congressional representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. This follows Democrats criticizing comments regarding Puerto Rico made at recent Trump campaign rallies.
The vice president is also set to hold an evening Pittsburgh rally with performances by DJ D-Nice amd Katy Perry before rallying at Philadelphia's Museum of the Arts, on the steps made famous in the Sylvester Stallone boxing movie "Rocky."
The final event is set to include remarks from celebrities Lady Gaga, DJ Jazzy Jeff, Ricky Martin and Oprah Winfrey.
US election issues: Abortion rights
Along with the economy and the rising cost of living, migration and health care, abortion rights is an issue that pulls many American voters to the ballot box.
The vote on November 5 marks the first presidential election since the US Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling in 2022. Until then, the 1972 decision guaranteed every woman in the US the right to decide whether to continue or terminate a pregnancy during the first trimester.
But in June 2022, a conservative majority of the nine-member Supreme Court voted to repeal this law.
Since then, each US state has devised its own abortion laws, some of which are very restrictive. In some Republican-ruled states such as Kentucky or Louisiana, abortions are completely illegal, even in cases of rape. In other states, abortions are only permitted until early in pregnancy, when many people do not yet realize they are pregnant.
Read DW's analysis on how abortion rights matter more in this election.
Millions of votes across US already cast
More than 77 million people have participated in early voting — either in person or by mail. That's roughly half the total number of people who voted in 2020's elections.
So many people have already cast ballots that some officials say polling stations in states like Georgia might be largely deserted on Election Day.
Here's a look at how early voters felt in two of the seven key swing states — Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Trump threatens tariffs on Mexico
Donald Trump told the audience at his rally in Raleigh, North Carolina that he would impose tariffs on products entering the United States from Mexico if the country's recently elected President Claudia Sheinbaum didn't stop migrants crossing the border.
"She's supposed to be a very nice woman, they say. I haven't met her. And I'm going to inform her on day one or sooner that, if they don't stop this onslaught of criminals and drugs coming into our country, I'm going to immediately impose a 25% tariff on everything they send into the United States of America," he said.
"You're the first ones I've told it to, congratulations North Carolina," Trump said to cheers from the crowd.
"It's only got a 100% chance of working because if that doesn't work I'll make it 50, and if that doesn't work I'll make it 75 for the tough guys... then I'll make it 100."
The former predicted that Mexico would then deploy soldiers to its southern border to stop migrants heading north.
As of 2022, Mexico was the second-most prolific importer of goods into the US, behind only China and narrowly ahead of Canada.
The US and its two neighbors are part of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a free trade deal that replaced its better known predecessor NAFTA in 2020, which Donald Trump signed during his first term as president. This deal allows for the tariff-free trade of many goods.
Trump also described his election rival Kamala Harris as incompetent. "Tomorrow you have to stand up and tell Kamala that you've had enough, you can't take any more, you just can't," he said.