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The Latest Developments in U.S. Elections | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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A clerk gets ready to receive voters inside a polling station in Christmas, Florida on November 8, 2016,AP


Associated Press (AP)- Billionaire Warren Buffett is devoting part of Election Day to get-out-the-vote efforts — as he helps drive voters to the polls on a trolley he hired.

The longtime Democrat had promised to help boost turnout at a Hillary Clinton rally in Omaha in August. Buffett says some people have it tougher than others — maybe an illness or trouble with their car. He says he wants to do his part so everyone gets a chance to vote.

More than 1,000 people have volunteered to help Buffett drive voters to the polls.

Buffett is a supporter of Clinton’s, but on Tuesday he declined to talk about that. Instead, he said he just wanted to encourage everyone to vote regardless of party affiliation.
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11:40 a.m.

President Barack Obama says on Twitter that “progress is on the ballot” Tuesday.

He’s urging his more than 11 million Twitter followers to “go vote.” He also says they should make sure that their friends, family and everyone they know votes, too.Obama has campaigned aggressively to help elect Democrat Hillary Clinton.

He used the “progress is on the ballot” line at many of the get-out-the-vote rallies he headlined for his former secretary of state.
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11:35 a.m.

Election officials say voting machine problems in southern Utah are forcing poll workers to use paper ballots, potentially affecting tens of thousands of people.

Utah Director of Elections Mark Thomas says a programming problem has affected all voting in Washington County, but so far appears it appears limited to that county.

He says about 52,000 registered voters there have yet to cast their ballots.

Election workers are trying to fix the computer problem and hope they can start using the voting machines later in the day. Thomas says officials were prepared with backup paper ballots. But he said they will need to print more if the problem persists.

There are about 80,000 total registered voters in Washington County. Some 28,000 have already cast their ballots through early voting.
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11:25 a.m.

Donald Trump has voted in New York City. Hundreds of onlookers watched as Trump, his wife Melania, daughter Ivanka, and son-in-law Jared arrived Tuesday morning at their polling place at a public school on Manhattan’s East Side.

Trump said: “it’s a great honor, a tremendous honor” to be casting his ballot. He said he’s feeling confident about the outcome, citing “tremendous enthusiasm.”
As for his longstanding concerns about voter fraud, he says. “We’re always concerned about that.”

His final message to voters: “Make America great again. That’s all it is. That’s what it’s all about.”
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10:55 a.m.

WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange says he wasn’t trying to influence the U.S. presidential election when his organization published hacked emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

In a statement Tuesday, Assange denied he was trying to support Green Party candidate Jill Stein or take revenge for the jailing of former U.S. intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning.

Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for leaking secret U.S. government documents to WikiLeaks. Assange suggests WikiLeaks would publish material on Clinton’s Republican rival Donald Trump, if it received appropriate material and judged it newsworthy.

Assange said Wikileaks has not yet received information on the campaigns of Trump, Stein or other candidates “that fulfills our stated editorial criteria.”
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9:55 a.m.
As voters cast their ballots for president, some are convinced, while others are holding their breath. In Indianapolis, 50-year old homemaker Ranita Wires said she voted for Hillary Clinton because she trusts her, but said “this has been the worst,” and she’s “so glad it’s over.”

Craig Bernheimer voted for Donald Trump at his local polling station in Tulsa, Oklahoma early Tuesday, saying it has more to do with “what the other didn’t bring.”

New Mexico truck driver Richard Grasmick said he admired Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and intended to vote for him, but grew disillusioned by Johnson’s televised flubs on foreign affairs issues.

He said, “I wanted to go with Gary but he failed me.” Grasmick voted for Donald Trump instead.
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8:45 a.m.
Donald Trump’s eldest son says that his family will “respect the outcome” of a “fair election.” Donald Trump, Jr. told CNN’s New Day Tuesday that he thinks his father “will remain involved somewhat” if he loses the election. He said he hopes that the energy surrounding his father’s campaign “goes back to the people we are trying to fight for, the people who haven’t had a voice in a long time.”

He said, in retrospect, that “hopefully we shed some light on the process,” and enabled people to speak their minds freely, “without being put in some basket, without being boxed in a corner.”
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8:40 a.m.

Women across the United States are wearing pantsuits Tuesday in a show of support for Hillary Clinton. Many were inspired by a Facebook group called Pantsuit Nation that has more than 2 million members. Some are also wearing white in honor of the suffragists who wore white when they fought for women’s voting rights in the early 1900s.

In Alexandria, Virginia, Heather O’Beirne Kelly says she’s wearing a white pantsuit, inspired by the Facebook group and organized efforts to get women to wear white to vote.

New Yorker Denise Shull tried to buy a white pantsuit on Amazon, but they were sold out. She’s wearing a black-and-white suit to support Clinton, but also to symbolize “women making progress.”
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8:35 a.m.
Hillary and Bill Clinton are voting in their hometown of Chappaqua New York. The Clintons greeted supporters waiting outside the polling place after casting their ballots Tuesday morning.

Hillary Clinton said it was “the most humbling feeling” to vote “because so many people are counting on the outcome of this election.” Bill Clinton said he’s eager to be a political spouse, joking that he had “15 years of practice.”

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7:30 a.m.
Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine says he and Hillary Clinton can clinch the White House if they win any one of the “checkmate” states. In an interview with ABC’s Good Morning America Tuesday, Kaine said the battleground states of North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Florida and Ohio each hold the key to a win for the Democratic running mates.

He said that Tuesday’s election is a “history-making race” but he also warned against complacency, saying that “democracy always works better when people participate.”