Harris and Trump chase swing state votes as campaign nears climax | First Thing

Harris and Trump focus on key swing states of Arizona and Nevada. Plus, ‘brat’ is Collins’ word of the year

Good morning.

As the 2024 presidential race nears its climax on Tuesday, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump continue to rush around swing states, rallying voters in the hopes of being sworn into the world’s most powerful office on 20 January 2025.

What are the polls showing? It’s unclear. Nationally, Harris is at 47% and Trump 46%, but due to the electoral college system, it’s going to come down to a few swing states. It’s neck and neck.

How many have already voted? More than 65 million people have cast their ballots, as of 31 October at 11pm EST.

How do you spend a billion dollars in election funding? Check out Richard Luscombe’s piece on where the money actually goes.

Here’s what the US envoy to the UN said: Robert Wood bluntly warned that Pyongyang’s forces entering Ukraine “will surely return in body bags”.

Ukraine is bracing for the outcome of the US presidential election: in an interview with the Guardian in May, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he had “no strategy yet” for what to do if Trump returned to the White House, though he suggested the outline of a plan rooted in an appeal to the candidate’s vanity.