this is bbc news. i'm james reynolds. our top stories: donald trump again complains of electoral fraud in tuesday's presidential poll. he repeated his assertion — without evidence — that he won the vote. if you count the legal votes, i easily win. if you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us. joe biden insists the process is working properly and that every vote will be given the respect it deserves. each ballot must be counted. we have no doubt that, when the count is finished, senator harris and i will be declared the winners. the counting continues in some of the key battleground states. georgia, arizona, nevada and pennsylvania are among those still to declare.

welcome to our viewers on pbs in america and around the globe. donald trump has again complained of electoral fraud in tuesday's presidential poll as his lead in two key states — georgia and pennsylvania — continues to shrink as postal votes are counted. at a news conference at the white house, he said the system was corrupt but offered no evidence to back up his claims. if you count the legal votes, i easily win. if you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us. if you count the votes that came in late — we're looking at them very strongly, but a lot of votes came in late — i have already decisively won many critical states, including massive victories in florida,

iowa, indiana, ohio, to name just a few. we won these and many other victories, despite historic election interference from big media, big money and big tech. as everyone saw, we won by historic numbers and the pollsters got it knowingly wrong. they got it knowingly wrong. we had polls that were so ridiculous — and everybody knew it at the time — there was no blue wave that they predicted. earlier, i spoke to the bbc‘s north america correspondent peter bowes, who said mr trump's claims have so far been unsubstantiated. well, the president is making these claims without providing any evidence. he is complaining about voter fraud, complaining about illegal votes being counted, but those claims simply haven't been substantiated. he is threatening to go to the courts — he has, in some cases — he was successful in one case

with thejudge siding with the president, but it was in pennsylvania to get trump campaign observers sitting closer to the people counting the ballots in that particular state. he has also complained elsewhere about ballot papers being sent to people who are deceased, who are no longer with us, to people who have moved out of the state, in the case of nevada. but again, all of these claims have to be substantiated and for this to go the course in terms of the legal system here, through lower courts and potentially eventually to the supreme court, detailed evidence has to be provided and we simply haven't seen that yet. listening to the president, at one point, he was saying stop the vote in some states where he was ahead but in other states, count the votes. it is quite hard to work out the logic of that strategy on a first reading. is anything more behind that? well, it's a confusing message certainly, and if that is the kind of befuddled messaging that

prevails and it does eventually go to, let's say, the supreme court, a lot of legal scholars here are saying it is going to be a very difficult argument to win when, as you say, he is in one place arguing that the counting of votes continues and quite the opposite elsewhere. now, clearly, the logic is, as far as the trump campaign is concerned, is that he wants to continue counting in places he thinks he's going to win and perhaps stop the counting in places where he thinks he might not be successful. but again, to build a legal argument around that — perhaps the legal argument applying to different states where different things are happening and making a solid case out of that — it's going to take a lot of lawyers, i think, to make sense of that. are republicans lining up behind him? well, that's the interesting thing, there has been a sense in the trump camp from reporting — certainly from washington — that there is some anger perhaps leading republicans around the country, leading figures in congress, haven't necessarily been lining

up to back the president. and certainly, his comments — the first comments that he made very late on election night, it was quite striking that very few of his fellow senior republicans came out to support the president. and in the comments that we heard just a few hours ago, we haven't had a sort of raft of support of people coming out to say that yes, we agree with the president. the state of georgia is fascinating. this is a republican state, there's a republican governor, there's a republican legislature. and this is one of those states where, at the moment, if you look at the votes coming in, it is absolutely neck and neck between president trump and joe biden, so it will be fascinating to see ifjoe biden eventually is the winner in that state — or if he is at least projected to be the winner — what arguments come from the trump camp to perhaps deflect that and argue that some of those votes were fraudulent. peter bowes, thank you so much.

joe biden also addressed the media on thursday evening. he said he was confident that he would win, but called for patience. we continue to feel, the senator and i, we continue to feel very good about where things stand. we have no doubt that, when the count is finished, senator harris and i would be declared the winners. so i ask everyone to stay calm, all the people to stay calm. the process is working, the count is being completed, and we will know very soon, so thank you all for your patience, but we have to count the votes. god bless you all and may god protect our troops. thank you. our correspondent barbara plett—usher is in delaware atjoe biden‘s hq, who explained what the message was behind biden‘s latest speech. well, he is presenting a sharp contrast to president trump and i think also responding to what he sees as attacks on democracy. so he's reassuring americans that the voting system can be

trusted and that it is voters who will choose the president, not anyone else. but he is also reassuring his supporters that he believes he's on a path to victory and that when all those votes are counted, he will be president. and i think he's also building momentum to declare victory when and if — if the news organisations call states in his favour and declare mathematically that he is president—elect. that he will declare it to be so and probably start to act like one because if that does happen, his advisers don't believe that president trump would concede. are the campaign team and biden supporters nervous or is this now for them a steady climb to victory, as they would see it? well, i spoke to some supporters on the night of the election when they had a bit of a drive—in rally here and they were hopeful, but also nervous at that point. i think now, especially in the campaign, they are pretty confident, even as president

trump was speaking, i think theyjust had their eyes glued to the figures during that time, watching mr biden‘s gain on mr trump in vote counting in places like georgia and pennsylvania. and they are actively preparing to hold an event here when — they believe it will be when but let's say if — mr biden is declared a winner in those states. now that doesn't look like it will happen tonight but we have seen them making preparations, tinkering with the sound system and with the light show, flashing red, white and blue. and so i think they are hoping to put that into action within the next 2a hours. barbara plett usher at joe biden‘s headquarters in delaware. the bbc‘s michelle fleury is in philadelphia in pennsylvania, one of the states still to declare. what we understand, the latest update we got from top election officials in this state, is that the majority of the ballots have now been counted but the race is still too close to call.

donald trump has had a lead here in the keystone state, but it has narrowed. even in the last few hours, it has shrunk. it was, in some ways, what people had been expecting, and let me explain by what i mean by that. in—person votes tended to favour republicans. you may recall donald trump had urged his supporters to vote early. democrats, who tended to vote by mail, they're accounting for about two—thirds of the postal votes going for biden — that's why you're seeing this late swing, they take longer to count. to reinforce the point that we have been making, michelle — i'm sure you've heard this a lot — if the state is called forjoe biden, he is over that 270 number. so what almost everyone at home will be yelling at me to ask you is when, when, when? chuckles. that is the million—dollar question! and you know, earlier today there were about 100,000 postal votes left to count in this building. that is enough to put biden

in the lead in pennsylvania. you're talking about what is going on inside there potentially deciding this race. but because it is so close, because, as you say, it does essentially getjoe biden to the magic number, officials here are being very cautious. i think you're going to see that both from the media not wanting to call things too early but also, as i say, officials, given the significance of pennsylvania, the last big battleground state — those 20 electoral votes — they could decide the future direction of this country. what about any legal challenges from the president and his team? yeah, i mean, we've seen a number of the trump team actually out here earlier today. pam bondi and corey lewandowski were here to tout one of the legal victories they've had. you may recall in that press

conference a short time ago from donald trump that he talked about observers being blocked from seeing the votes counted. well, a judge here said that they could move closer, essentially. but then somewhere in the process, the voting stopped in this building as corey lewandowski and pam bondi and others tried to sort of go in and force their way in to observe. then we had the philadelphia board of election trying to appeal to pennsylvania's highest court. that matter is still outstanding but for now, the counting goes on and on. yes, it does! pennsylvania has 20 electoral votes. let's carry on our tour. 0ur correspondent james clayton is in las vegas, nevada. it has six electoral votes. he explains how close we are to a result there. well, nevada is still on a razor‘s edge. it is just far too close to call — there's only about 10,000 votes betweenjoe biden and donald trump. and if you want to know who is going to win this election, well,

you need to come to tjhis —— this election, well, you need to come to this place, the clark county election center, where the vast majority of those who haven't been counted are being counted. because clark county is where 70% plus of all of the nevada residents left. it's the county that contains las vegas and there are lots of votes still — about 190,000 votes — that we still don't know about. we don't know which way they've been cast. we believe we are going to get an update at about 10am pacific time tomorrow — that's about 6pm gmt. that may only be on about 50,000 votes. so it may well be the case that when it comes to knowing how this state has gone, we won't know that much more tomorrow. and actually, the registrar here has said that it may be saturday, sunday, even next week before we get a result here. and of course, it is possible that we don't get a result for the us presidential

election until we get a decision here. james clinton in the battleground state of nevada. stay with us on bbc news. still to come: where does america go from here? we've been finding out what people think of the election and how they can heal the country's bitter divisions. the israeli prime minister yitzhak rabin, the architect of the middle east peace process, has been assassinated. a 27—year—old jewish man has been arrested and an extremist jewish organisation has claimed responsibility for the killing. at polling booths throughout the country, they voted on a historic day for australia. as the results came in, it was clear — the monarchy would survive. of the american hostages, there was no sign. they are being held somewhere inside the compound and student leaders have threatened that, should the americans attempt to rescue, they will all die.

this mission has surpassed all expectations. voyager one is now the most distant man—made object anywhere in the universe, and itjust seems to keep on going. tonight, we prove once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but the enduring power of our ideals. this is bbc world news. the latest headlines: in only his second public appearance since tuesday's presidential election, donald trump has again insisted that he was the winner, repeating unsubstantiated claims of voterfraud. let's stay with this — earlier i spoke to republican strategist and federal court litigator, vikas bajaj. i started by asking him, if he thought the president's comments undermined the democratic process. i do not.

that's a very broad statement and there are a lot of issues underneath that umbrella. many of the legal challenges that the trump administration and campaign is raising in such states as georgia, wisconsin, pennsylvania, michigan, nevada, arizona — the pivotal states you just talked about in your segment here are righteous challenges to the process regarding having proper observers in the polling stations and having a bipartisan look at these. so the umbrella comment is i believe is misplaced. the litigation that has been started is well—placed and of course, some of the lower courts have made decisions already. including georgia, where a legal challenge was dismissed, a superior courtjudge dismissed a lawsuit that accused them of mishandling absentee ballots, dismissed. you could say the same thing about pennsylvania and georgia.

you have to look beneath a layer of the onion, georgia dismissed that without any comment. thejudge didn't analyse any of the legal arguments, it was just a moot court adjustment there and the decision was not a live issue and denied it without comment. similar to pennsylvania, nevada and arizona where both sides reached an agreement and therefore the courts found those were moot issues. a viewer might be shouting at me to shout at you, where is the fraud then? the fraud is in the inability to have observers actually witness and observe the polling stations which are the tallies of the counts of the votes there. by law in each one of the states in our union, there is a requirement that a bipartisan group is allowed to actually watch the tallying of the votes. that's been specifically denied in these states. cbs, our sister station, there are literally dozens of republican observers in philadelphia where absentee ballots are being counted. it is being live streamed and they

are welcoming all qualified observers, as are all pennslyvania counties. that's now, you're exactly right. the chronology matters. you're exactly right in pointing that out and the chronology comes after these lawsuits were raised, after there were agreements by both sides in front of the court and after the court found those issues to be moot because precisely of the agreements that can arise because what was observed. watching the president's statement, i'm trying to understand why he said in the same breath, biden catching up to him pennsylvania is potentially fraudulent but him catching up in arizona is fine? excellent question. a lot of people are thinking that. these are different issues. the issue raised in pennsylvania in the courts there is the inability for bipartisan poll observers which we just talked about has been established. in arizona however... that's a finished issue then! so why is it is now still a problem? well, because what we talk about in pennsylvania over and above

the state court and district court's decision that you're referencing is the circuit court decision recently about three weeks ago which gives the additional three days in which to count the votes. this is an issue that's unsettled by the higher courts and the supreme court, and this is an issue that we will see approach the united states supreme court. there are different issues in different venues. as you know butjust to inform our viewers, just because you approach the supreme court does not mean the supreme court will accept the case. if the president is talking about a conspiracy against him, isn't it a conspiracy of 72 million american voters or so who voted freely for his opponent and who outnumbered his own voters? that may be one way to look at it. that's called an election. the conspiratorial allegation is something that he has not really said but the allegation of... that was the strong, strong implication of that statement by the white house which has been condemned by a republican governor, and has been met with silence from most senior

republican officials in the country. that's right and of course, that is one interpretation but those words have not come out of his mouth. you talk about free votes, free voting means the votes are counted accurately and are actually honoured. free voting does not mean 4am dumps of 100,000 votes. i spoke to ronald hanson, national political reporter for the arizona republic and i asked him for an update on the vote counting. now it looks like donald trump has cut intojoe biden‘s led a bit further here in arizona. his margin remains still about 46,000 his margin remains still about 116,000 behind former vice presidentjoe biden. and there are more votes to count here. we are reaching a point they we re we are reaching a point they were like the democrats they see things level of. there is something called the sharpie incident, can you explain what thatis incident, can you explain what that is and why the state's attorney general has seen fit to comment on it? there was

some reports of people being handed sharpie is to fill out their ballots here in arizona in maricopa county, the most populous county in particular. there was some concern that the ink might lead through the ballot and disqualify some of these voters as they were casting their votes. the election folks here in maricopa cou nty election folks here in maricopa county so this is ok, we have tested them, they are good. the state's attorney general came out with an opinion later this evening to say, it's not really been of any consequence, thank you for bringing it to our attention. i have seen the secretary of state being pressed on tv to say when we might know about arizona. the secretary of state said potentially friday evening. i noticed another reporter say it could be the weekend before we could be the weekend before we could know. what is your best assessment? i think that by tomorrow we will have a much clearer sense of the shape of where the race stands with a

lot fewer votes to go. the folks who look at the way these ballots have come in expected the president to do well the last couple of days but it is the ones who basically come starting tomorrow where the president needs to continue to do well, but it seems in dispute whether he actually will. though there is that concern. the real question is whether it will even matter. if is sylvania and georgia consider on the pace they are written, it looks like arizona could become academic. written, it looks like arizona could become academiclj written, it looks like arizona could become academic. i don't know if you have been able to get out and about in the last couple of days but what have you seen? i haven't been out a whole lot, not nearly as much asi whole lot, not nearly as much as i would like what we have seen is some excitement for democrats that has been tempered because of the pandemic but there is a lot of folks on the trump side who had been out, vocal and really trying to make the case that they are concerned that somehow they are concerned that somehow the votes won't be properly counted here. there were some

media outlets that called the state of arizona forjoe biden relatively quickly. what do you make of those early calls? it was by fox and the associated press ? was by fox and the associated press? that's right on both of them have relatively good reputations on these things but clearly there was still a million votes to count on it looks like... however this turns out, it may not been as clear as it seems when those calls were made. they are not taking them back though. i see people keep on asking b fox experts if they are going to ta ke experts if they are going to take it back and they say no.|j take it back and they say no.” wasn't party to that, i couldn't tell you what went into their thinking but i think they have been very cautious about walking this back and we find ourselves where we are now where it is just a very close race. sending back a bit. the fa ct i race. sending back a bit. the fact i am talking to you about a close race in arizona is in itself a piece of news. the state has two democratic senators which hasn't had in a while. how is the state changing? you know, this is

really the of demographic change in arizona. we import a lot of people from all parts of the country, notably california and the rustbelt in america. we also have a substantial hispanic population which is very young and becoming of age to vote and they are becoming more politically engaged. we also had a little bit of secret sauce here that is unique to arizona in the sense that donald trump constantly antagonised john mccain and his family and that is a sore point with a fair number of republicans in arizona still. now, aleem maqbool‘s spoken to voters in wisconsin. even in quaint suburban america right now, in these fractious times, it's them and us. but there are those trying to come together. when tim had his biden sign stolen, his trump—supporting neighbour, josh, surprised him with a replacement. i knowjosh is a member of the republican party, and so, you know, for him

to come and do something like that was pretty outstanding. so, in the course of our conversation, i realised thatjosh is, you know, a regular person first and a republican second. but the situation nationally is causing tension. i think people's wicks are just a little bit shorter than they used to be. i think people are afraid. they're afraid of what the economy looks like, they're afraid of the unknown, and so that fear becomes anger. even outside the white house on election night, we saw radical elements on the left make an appearance. in recent months, far—right militia have also made their presence felt in many parts of the country.

antifascist activist vaughn mays has been arrested several times for alleged violence, but now predicts trouble from the other side. i live in a state where we saw armed protesters, trump supporters, storm the capital because they did not want to follow mask mandates, and they did not want their businesses to shut down. they wanted to be able get, in their words, haircuts. and so if they would go to those heights and those levels for mask mandates, it's definitely concerning what they would do if their president is not reelected, especially when he's been putting it out there that if he doesn't win, it's rigged, or it's some sort of conspiracy against him, and that they should fight back. there's little doubt that the angry rhetoric and political discourse at the top has led to more animosity, among some elements at least, on the ground. the fear is, because this has already been a contentious election and promises to be into the days and weeks to come, that will only lead to greater divisions in american society.

aleem maqbool, bbc news, milwaukee, wisconsin. do stay with us bbc news. hello there. it looks like the weather should even out a bit more, i think, for friday. certainly compared with thursday, where we had the wind blowing over the pennines, bringing some sunshine in durham and temperatures reaching 18 degrees. whereas across southern parts of england, when that fog formed, it lingered into the afternoon in some places and temperatures only eight or nine celsius. now, it's quite chilly early in the morning across more southern areas of the uk. where we have the clearer skies, a pinch of frost. further north there is more cloud around. but where we have those clearer skies in england and wales, there's some mist and fog, particularly towards the west country and the south—east of wales in the morning. it'll lift fairly readily, mind you, as the breeze picks up and we get sunshine developing widely. and that cloud, quite low cloud, moving northwards across scotland and northern ireland and some sunshine coming in here as well.

the winds picking up in the south—west through the day. temperatures not quite as high as they were on thursday, notjust to the east of the pennines but also in the north—east of scotland. but over the weekend, we're going to find milder air gradually coming in from the south on a southerly breeze. and whilst it's dry for many, there could be a bit of rain around, especially on sunday. but we start the weekend this time with the colder air and the lower temperatures across more northern areas of the uk, with the clearer skies. that's going to lead to some fog, particularly across the vale of york and perhaps in the central belt. that could linger into the afternoon as well. otherwise, we get some sunshine in the north away from that fog. further south, through wales, the midlands and southern england, it could be quite grey and cloudy through the day. a bit of rain in the far south—west later. but temperatures are beginning to recover across southern areas. where we have the fog lingering further north, though, it will be quite chilly. second half of the weekend, we've got lowering pressure to the south—west of the uk,

a southerly breeze. these weather fronts — pretty weak, mind you — are moving their way northwards. so it looks like there's a fair bit of cloud at least on sunday. there could be some patchy rain here and there, most of it i think running up through the irish sea towards northern ireland and later on into the south—west of scotland. many places are still going to be dry and those temperatures making double figures through the central belt of scotland, and again 16 degrees towards the south—east of england. those temperatures remain at those sort of levels really, i think, through monday and tuesday into next week. we've got some wetter weather on monday. but it should be dry but still fairly cloudy, i think, on tuesday. of our ideals.

this is bbc news.

the headlines: donald trump has again complained of electoral fraud in tuesday's presidential poll as his lead in two key states — georgia and pennsylvania — continues to shrink as postal votes are counted. at a news conference at the white house, he repeated unsubstantiated claims of voterfraud. joe biden has insisted the vote counting process is working properly. he's called for calm and patience and said democracy was sometimes messy but had "no doubt" he'd be declared the winner once counting was complete. he's 17 electoral votes short of securing the presidency. votes are still be counted in several key states, including pennsylvania, georgia, nevada and arizona. counting has been delayed largely because of the huge volume of postal ballots — most of which are expected to be in favour of mr biden. 0verall turnout is projected to be the highest in 120 years. now on bbc news, newscast.