Tag Archives: vote counting

Oil drops 3% as U.S. vote count continues and coronavirus cases rise

By Jessica Resnick-Ault

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Oil fell below $40 a barrel on Friday as drawn-out vote counting in the U.S. presidential election kept markets on edge and new lockdowns in Europe to halt surging COVID-19 infections sparked concern over the demand.

In the U.S. election, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden took the lead over President Donald Trump in Georgia and Pennsylvania on Friday, edging closer to winning the White House as a handful of states continue to count votes.

Three days after polls closed, Biden has a 253 to 214 lead in the state-by-state Electoral College vote that determines the winner, according to Edison Research. Winning Pennsylvania’s 20 electoral votes would put the former vice president over the 270 he needs to secure the presidency.

Coronavirus cases in the United States surged by at least 120,276 on Thursday, according to a Reuters tally, the second consecutive daily record rise as the outbreak spreads in every region.

Italy recorded its highest daily number of COVID-19 infections on Thursday while cases surged by at least 120,276 in the United States, the second consecutive daily record as the outbreak spreads across the country.

Brent crude fell $1.28, or 3.13%, to $39.65 by 11:33 a.m. EST (1633 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) dropped $1.24, or 3.08% to $39.65 a barrel.

Still, Brent was heading for a 6% weekly gain, and U.S. crude was up 4.5% on the week.

Diminishing prospects of a large U.S. stimulus package were also weighing on the market.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Friday that economic statistics including a 1 percentage point drop in the U.S. unemployment rate showed that Congress should enact a smaller coronavirus stimulus package that is highly targeted at the effects of the pandemic.

“Crude oil is very sensitive to the stimulus expectations, which just took a hit for the worse,” said Bob Yawger, director of energy futures at Mizuho. “The coronavirus situation is as negative a demand indicator as you can get,” he said.

Providing some support, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies including Russia, a group known as OPEC+, could delay bringing back 2 million barrels per day of supply in January, given weaker demand after new lockdowns.

U.S. crude inventories plunged last week by 8 million barrels, against analyst expectations for an increase.

(Additional reporting by Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by David Goodman and Louise Heavens)

Trump and Biden protesters duel outside vote-counting centers in cliffhanger election

By Mimi Dwyer and Joseph Tanfani

PHOENIX/PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Backers of President Donald Trump, some carrying guns, ramped up demonstrations on Thursday night against what he has baselessly called a rigged election, in battleground states where votes were still being counted.

The demonstrations were largely peaceful, although Trump supporters occasionally shouted with counter protesters. Trump says the election is being stolen but there has been no evidence of fraud.

In Arizona, one of the closely contested states in the too-close-to-call race between Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden, Trump and Biden supporters briefly scuffled outside the Maricopa County Elections Department in Phoenix.

Several heavily armed right-wing groups assembled on the site as election workers counted votes inside, but the protests remained mostly peaceful despite mounting tension.

Local election officials continued to tabulate ballots across the country, in some cases processing an unprecedented number of mail-in ballots that accumulated as a preferred voting option during the coronavirus pandemic.

In Philadelphia, police said they arrested one man and seized a weapon as part of an investigation into a purported plot to attack the city’s Pennsylvania Convention Center, where votes were being counted.

But otherwise the scene in Philadelphia was less confrontational – festive, even – where pro-Trump and pro-Biden demonstrators were separated by waist-high portable barriers under a strong police presence.

With the future of the presidency in the balance, restive encounters also unfolded in New York and Washington as well as swing-state cities such as Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Las Vegas, Nevada; Detroit, Michigan; and Atlanta, Georgia.

On the internet, Facebook removed a fast-growing group in which Trump supporters posted violent rhetoric, as it and other social media companies tackled baseless claims and potential violence.

Trump supporters took their cue from the president, who has repeatedly and falsely claimed that mail-in votes are especially prone to fraud.

In Phoenix, Trump supporters briefly chased a man who held up a sign depicting the president as a Nazi pig behind a stage where right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was speaking.

Police intervened and broke up the altercation after the man and his small group of counterdemonstrators were surrounded by Trump activists.

“They are trying to steal the election but America knows what happened and it’s fighting back,” Jones told the throng of some 300 people.

PHILADELPHIA FREEDOM

As mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania cut into Trump’s lead, Philadelphia demonstrators danced. Two people wearing postal box costumes bounced to pulsating music while carrying a banner that read, “The battle isn’t over.” Others, backed by a live drum corps, marched behind the sign, “Union members fight to count every vote.”

Trump activists waved flags and carried signs saying, “Vote stops on Election Day,” and “Sorry, polls are closed.” Biden backers showed their support for the civil servants who were at work inside.

“We can’t allow the ballot counters to be intimidated,” said Bob Posuney, 70, a retired social worker. “We’re not going to create a disturbance, or get anybody hurt.”

In Milwaukee, some 50 Trump supporters gathered for a “Stop the Steal” rally in front of a city building where votes were being counted, blasting country music, waving flags and carrying signs reading “Recount” and “Rigged”.

At least one man had a gun in holster.

Roughly a dozen counter protesters arrived later, shouting “Black lives matter” and “say their names,” referring to victims of police brutality. Others threw eggs at the Trump supporters from a passing car.

“My country’s future is what brings me out here tonight,” said Mitchell Landgraf, a 21-year-old construction worker who cast his first vote in a presidential election for Trump. “I’m afraid if it goes one way that this country will go downhill fast.”

At least 400 protesters gathered outside the Clark County Election Department in Las Vegas. Loud patriotic anthems blared over speakers as people waved giant Trump and American flags.

In Detroit, a Black Trump supporter and a Black Democratic supporter faced off for a yelling match. Earlier, police tried to separate Black Lives Matter-aligned protesters from the Trump group but soon relented, allowing them to mingle and shout at each other.

One woman carrying a holstered pistol she said she represented the Michigan Home Guard, a right-wing militia.

“I’m not going to violently burn the city down, but I’m going to continue to fight for election integrity,” said Michelle Gregoire, 29, in a state where election returns showed Trump with a lead on election night that turned into a Biden victory on Wednesday. “It’s not OK what they’re doing in there.”

(Reporting by Mimi Dwywer in Phoenix, Joseph Tanfani in Philadelphia, Nathan Layne in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Maria Caspani and Jonathan Allen in New York, Katanga Johnson in Atlanta, Brad Brooks in Las Vegas, Gabriella Borter in Milwaukee, Michael Martina in Detroit, Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles and Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Writing by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Peter Graff)

Philadelphia police probe alleged plot to attack vote counting venue

By Kanishka Singh

(Reuters) – Philadelphia police said on Friday they were investigating an alleged plot to attack the city’s Pennsylvania Convention Center, where votes from the hotly contested U.S. presidential election were being counted.

Local police received a tip about a Hummer truck with people armed with firearms driving toward the vote counting venue late on Thursday, a Philadelphia Police spokesman said in an emailed statement.

Police arrested two men and seized their firearms as well as the Hummer truck about which they had received the tip, the spokesman said, adding the probe was being conducted by the police and the FBI.

“The males acknowledged that the silver Hummer was their vehicle, and an additional firearm was recovered from the inside the Hummer,” the spokesman added.

No injuries were reported and no further details about the alleged plot were disclosed.

Video footage broadcast by Action News, an ABC affiliate, showed a number of police officials at the scene late in the night.

On Thursday, supporters of both Republican President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden held rallies in Philadelphia as election staffers slowly counted thousands of mail-in ballots that could decide Pennsylvania’s crucial 20 Electoral College votes.

A state appellate court ruled on Thursday that more Republican observers could enter the building in Philadelphia where poll workers were counting ballots.

The U.S. Postal Service said about 1,700 ballots had been identified in Pennsylvania at processing facilities during two sweeps late on Thursday and were being delivered to election officials.

Trump has said repeatedly without evidence that mail-in votes are prone to fraud, although election experts say that is rare in U.S. elections.

A federal judge in Philadelphia denied an emergency request from Trump’s campaign to stop ballot counting in Philadelphia so long as Republican observers were not present. The campaign had sued Philadelphia County’s Board of Elections on Thursday to seek an emergency injunction.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Jonathan Oatis)

In cities across U.S., dueling protests sprout up as vote-counting drags on

By Nathan Layne, Maria Caspani and Katanga Johnson

HARRISBURG, Pa. (Reuters) – A second day of sometimes dueling demonstrations over the integrity of the U.S. presidential election started early on Thursday in Philadelphia and other cities as ballot counting dragged on in a handful of states that would decide the outcome.

Some groups, mainly Democrats, rallied around the slogan to “count every vote,” believing a complete tally would show former Vice President Joe Biden had beaten Republican President Donald Trump.

Ardent Trump supporters countered with cries to “protect the vote” in support of his campaign’s efforts to have some categories of ballots, including some votes submitted by mail, discarded.

Both factions appeared outside a vote-counting center in Philadelphia on Thursday morning. A group of Trump supporters holding Trump-Pence flags and signs saying “vote stops on Election Day” gathered across the street from Biden supporters who danced to music behind a barricade. Similar rallies were planned later in the day in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania’s capital.

Scott Presler, a pro-Trump activist, said he organized the “Stop the Steal” rally in Harrisburg to ensure that only legal ballots are counted.

“I want to bring national attention for people to take action, for them to call their state legislators,” Presler said in a phone interview while en route to Harrisburg. “I want them to demonstrate and show up in force, that we are not going to allow this election to be stolen by any fraudulent ballots.”

In Washington, a procession of cars and bicycles, sponsored by activists from a group called Shutdown DC, paraded slowly through the streets of the capital to protest “an attack on the democratic process” by Trump and his “enablers,” according to its website.

Most demonstrations in cities around the country have been peaceful and small — sometimes amounting only to a few dozen people with signs standing in a city center — as Biden’s path to victory looks a bit more assured than Trump’s, even though either outcome remains possible.

On Wednesday, a few demonstrations led to clashes with police. The demonstrations were triggered in part by Trump’s comments following Tuesday’s Election Day in which he demanded that vote counting stop and made unsubstantiated, conspiratorial claims about voter fraud.

Police in New York City, Denver, Minneapolis and Portland, Oregon, all reported they had arrested some protesters, often on charges of blocking traffic or similar misdemeanors.

On the second floor of Atlanta’s State Farm Arena, county election officials sat at six tables steadily processing a few thousand remaining mail-in ballots on Thursday morning, some pausing only to order coffee.

Some Republican and Democratic ballot-counting watchers took notes as officials sorted each batch of 400 ballots one by one, ensuring signatures matched between envelopes and ballots.

Hoping to avoid Election Day crowds during the coronavirus pandemic, more than 100 million Americans submitted ballots during early voting this year, a record-breaking number.

The counting in Atlanta was far calmer than in Phoenix where a crowd of Trump supporters, some armed with rifles and handguns, gathered outside a counting center on Wednesday after unsubstantiated rumors that Trump votes were deliberately not being counted.

(Reporting by Nathan Layne in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Maria Caspani in New York; Katanga Johnson in Atlanta; Additional reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru and Michael Martina in Detroit; Writing by Jonathan Allen; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore, Peter Graff and Jonathan Oatis)