US election 2024 live updates: Harris says it could be ‘one of the closest races in history’; Trump to address Michigan rally | US elections 2024

A Georgia poll worker was arrested on Monday on US charges that he sent a letter threatening to bomb election workers that he wrote to appear as if it came from a voter in the presidential election battleground state. Reuters reports:

Federal prosecutors said Nicholas Wimbish, 25, had been serving as a poll worker at the Jones County Elections Office in Gray, Georgia, on Oct. 16 when he got into a verbal altercation with a voter.

The next day, Wimbish mailed a letter to the county’s elections superintendent that was drafted to appear as if it came from that same voter, prosecutors said. The letter complained that Wimbish was a “closeted liberal election fraudster” who had been distracting voters in line to cast ballots, according to charging papers.

Authorities said the letter, signed by a “Jones county voter,” said Wimbish and others “should look over their shoulder” and warned that people would “learn a violent lesson about stealing our elections!”

Prosecutors said the letter ended with a handwritten note: “PS boom toy in early vote place, cigar burning, be safe.”

Wimbish was charged with mailing a bomb threat, conveying false information about a bomb threat, mailing a threatening letter, and making false statements to the FBI, prosecutors said. A lawyer for Wimbish could not be immediately identified.

Georgia is one of seven closely contested states expected to decide the outcome of Tuesday’s presidential election match up between Republican former President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

Concerns about potential political violence have prompted officials to take a variety of measures to bolster security during and after Election Day.

Adam Gabbatt

Dispatch from Grand Rapids, Michigan: They just showed a video here of Donald Trump shaving the head of Vince McMahon, the former CEO of WWE, during a wrestling event. It happened in 2007.

Needless to say, Trump hasn’t arrived yet.

Harris emphasises her message of unity in her remarks in Philadelphia, drawing a contrast with Donald Trump without mentioning his name, saying: “Instead of stewing on an enemies list I will work on my to-do list.”

She then lists some of the things she would do in office including banning corporate price gouging on groceries, cutting taxes for workers and middle class families and lowering the cost of health care, adding: “access to health care should be a right and not just a privilege of those who can afford it.”

She also mentions women’s right to control their own bodies and her determination to sign into law protections for women’s reproductive freedom.

She then goes back to her message of unity saying: “I pledge to listen to those who will be impacted by the decisions I make”. She also repeats comments she has made previously about listening to experts and giving people who disagree with her a seat at the table.

Harris take the stage in Philadelphia

Lauren Gambino

Harris came onstage to Beyoncé’s Freedom. She hugged Oprah before beginning her remarks.

Harris said her campaign started “as the underdog and climb to victory,” she said gesturing to the Rocky steps behind her.

“This could be one of the closest races in history,” Harris said.

“You will decide the outcome of this election Pennsylvania,” she said. “Make no mistake: we will win!”

The crowd begins chanting “We will win.”

Lauren Gambino

More from the Harris rally in Philadelphia: In a white pants suit, Oprah Winfrey laid the stakes pretty bare for the audience. She told a story about meeting a woman on a hike who said she wasn’t planning to vote this election.

“We don’t get to sit this one out, Oprah said. “If we don’t show up tomorrow, it is entirely possible that we will not have the opportunity to ever cast a ballot again.”

She said those were the “dangers” of not electing Harris on Tuesday.

Kamala Harris is taking to the stage in Philadelphia now for her final rally before election day, after an introduction by Oprah Winfrey.

Russia-linked disinformation operations have falsely claimed officials in battleground states plan to fraudulently sway the outcome of the extraordinarily close US presidential election, authorities have warned hours before Election Day. AFP reports:

Success in the seven swing states is key to winning the White House for rivals Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, and those states have previously been the focus of unsupported accusations of election fraud.

“Russia is the most active threat,” the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said Monday.

“These efforts risk inciting violence, including against election officials,” they added, noting the efforts are expected to intensify through Election Day and in the following weeks.

It was the latest in a series of warnings from the ODNI about foreign actors – notably Russia and Iran – allegedly spreading disinformation or hacking the campaigns during this election.

Tehran and Moscow have both denied such allegations in the past.

Lauren Gambino

More from Philadelphia, where Doug Emhoff just praised his wife, Kamala Harris as the “right president for this moment in our nation’s history.”

He joked that she will lead with her “laugh and that look.” Emhoff has been crisscrossing the country for Harris’s campaign.

Adam Gabbatt

Donald Trump was supposed to start speaking at 10.30pm local time in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Well, he didn’t – he isn’t even here yet – and according to a police officer I just spoke to it’s probably going to get to midnight before Trump actually appears.

In the meantime the campaign is desperately filling time. We’ve had an appearance from a local congressman – “Who the hell is that?” a Trump supporter behind me commented – and some lackeys just wheeled out a sort of T-shirt machine gun, which entertained people for a bit.

In contrast to Trump’s other rallies today, the Van Andel Arena, in downtown Grand Rapids, is actually almost full. “And let me tell you,” one of the speakers said just now, “There’s the same number of people waiting outside who couldn’t get in!”

I was a bit bored so I got up and went and looked outside. There is not a single person out there.

Lauren Gambino

Lady Gaga has just arrived on stage. She takes a seat at the piano and belts God Bless America.

She said she cast her vote for Harris – but there is little chance Lady Gaga is a battleground state voter. Instead she encourages everyone in the audience to vote and then brings out the future “first First Gentleman,” Doug Emhoff.

Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage as the US is set to vote in the 2024 presidential election.

With just hours to go before polls open, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have been making their final pitch to voters, honing in on the crucial battleground states of Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Polls continue to show the contest could not be closer, with both candidates tied in a number of key swing states.

The two candidates laid out starkly contrasting visions for America’s future on the eve of election day. Trump rambled through dark and dystopian speeches painting migrants as dangerous criminals while also launching personal attacks on a number of high-profile Democratic women. Harris delivered a more positive closing argument, shifting focus away from the threat posed by the ex-president, who is not mentioned in her final ad, and insisting “we all have so much more in common than what separates us”.

The polls are set to start opening on the US east coast in less than six hours time, with the rest of the country following in the hours after. Millions of Americans are set to vote across the day, but the outcome remains far from certain.

Here’s what else has been happening over the last 24 hours:

• Kamala Harris put all her chips on the key battleground state of Pennsylvania on Monday, as polls indicate an extremely close contest. She held several rallies and events including a stop at a Puerto Rican restaurant with Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and directly joined canvassing in a residential area in Reading, telling voters at one home: “I wanted to go door-knocking!”’

• Harris sought to strike a positive tone, saying she wanted to be a “president for all Americans”. A sign of a “strong” leader is someone willing to listen to the experts, the stakeholders and those who disagree, she said at a rally in Pittsburgh.

• Donald Trump meanwhile held rallies in Raleigh, North Carolina, two in Pennsylvania, but his tone was much darker, focusing on painting migrants as dangerous criminals while also launching personal attacks on a number of high-profile Democratic women. “They’re killing people. They’re killing people at will,” he said at one rally, giving gruesome details of specific murders allegedly committed by undocumented migrants. In North Caroliana he called Democratic congresswoman Nancy Pelosi a “crazyass bedbug” and attacked former first lady Michelle Obama, saying: “She hit me the other day. I was going to say to my people, am I allowed to hit her now? They said, take it easy, sir.”

• The influential podcast host Joe Rogan endorsed Donald Trump for president, writing on social media that his choice had been influenced by “the great and powerful Elon Musk”. Musk “makes what I think is the most compelling case for Trump you’ll hear, and I agree with him every step of the way”, Rogan wrote on X. “For the record, yes, that’s an endorsement of Trump.”

• The $1m-a-day voter sweepstakes that Elon Musk’s political action committee is hosting in swing states can continue through Tuesday’s presidential election, a Pennsylvania judge ruled on Monday. The common pleas court judge Angelo Foglietta – ruling after Musk’s lawyers said the winners are not chosen by chance – did not immediately give a reason for the ruling.

• A political action committee (Pac) linked to Elon Musk is accused of targeting Jewish and Arab American voters in swing states with dramatically different messages about Kamala Harris’s position on Gaza, a strategy by Trump allies aimed at peeling off Democratic support for the vice-president. Texts, mailers, social media ads and billboards targeting heavily Arab American areas in metro Detroit paint Harris as a staunch ally of Israel who will continue supplying arms to the country. Meanwhile, residents in metro Detroit or areas of Pennsylvania with higher Jewish populations have been receiving messaging that underscores her alleged support for the Palestinian cause.

• The Republican mega-donors Dick and Liz Uihlein, who are the third largest donors in this year’s US presidential election, have sought information about who employees at their company Uline will be voting for in Tuesday’s ballot. A screenshot seen by the Guardian shows how employees at the private Wisconsin paper and office products distributor were asked to take part in what was called an anonymous survey to track who the employees were voting for on 5 November.

Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage: