Record turnout as U.S. citizens elect new president

• Clinton wins in Dixville Notch
• Trump leads in Millsfield

In a record turnout, Americans went to the polls yesterday to elect a new president. Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump will watch the results roll in from New York locations just three kilometres apart.

Trump will be based at the New York Hilton Midtown while Clinton has hired the huge Javits Centre on the banks of Hudson River.

A Hilton staffer told Associated Press (AP) the hotel was booked solid. It’s usually one of the busiest places on the planet but Times Square was a ghost town yesterday with theatres closed to encourage people to vote.

Clinton’s supporters had travelled across the country to support their candidate. Trump was booed and cheered by rivals as he headed to the polls in New York, with voters locked out of a polling station and forced to queue while he was inside.

Comedian Harrison Greenbaum called it “craziness” on the streets as the public was locked out and forced to wait while Trump and his entourage went inside.

Outside, Trump joked to reporters it was a “tough decision” as construction workers praised him outside the polling station.

“It’s looking very good. Right now it’s looking very good. It will be an interesting day. Thank you,” he said.

Voters had donned their merchandise and taken to the streets of New York, prepared to wait until they see a result on Tuesday night.

Clinton supports lined up outside the Jacob K Javits Convention Centre where she will hold a party after polls close.

Voters in a New Hampshire hamlet, Dixville Notch, kicked off voting at midnight. Out of the six votes cast, Clinton beat Trump four votes to two. Libertarian Gary Johnson received one vote, and Mitt Romney received a surprise write-in ballot.

According to New Hampshire law, communities with fewer than 100 voters can open their polls at midnight and close them as soon as all registered voters have cast their ballots.

In other results, Clinton also beat Trump in Hart’s Location 17-14, but Trump was the overwhelming favourite in Millsfield, with a 16-4 edge. Overall, in the three tiny towns, Trump won 32 votes, while Clinton got 25.

Libertarian Gary Johnson picked up three votes. Bernie Sanders, John Kasich and 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney got write-in votes.

Both Clinton and Trump raced through several battleground states on Monday in a last-ditch attempt to encourage their supporters to show up and vote yesterday.

Clinton sought to capture more support from Latinos, African-Americans and young people, while Trump looked to win over disaffected Democrats and rev up a middle class that he said had been sidelined by the political establishment.

The democrat held the biggest rally of her campaign in Philadelphia on Monday night, drawing a crowd that the city’s Fire Department put at 33,000 to hear her and President Barack Obama, first lady Michelle Obama and rockers Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi.

The Reuters/Ipsos States of the Nation project gave Clinton a 90 percent chance of defeating Trump, seeing her on track to win 303 Electoral College votes out of the 270 needed, to Trump’s 235.

With surveys indicating a tight race in Michigan, which Democrats have long counted on winning, both candidates made campaign appearances there. Pennsylvania, another vote-rich state, was also seen as fertile ground by both camps in the closing hours of their campaigns.