donald trump has won the battleground states of florida , iowa , north carolina , ohio and pennsylvania , according to the associated press, narrowing hillary clinton <u+2019>s path to the white house and racking up a feat no republican nominee has accomplished since 2004. mrs. clinton<u+2019>s campaign chairman, john podesta, appeared at her campaign headquarters in new york shortly after 2 a.m. wednesday and told supporters the democratic nominee wouldn<u+2019>t appear. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s been a long night, and it<u+2019>s been a long campaign,<u+201d> mr. podesta said. <u+201c>but i can say, we can wait a little longer. were still counting votes, and every vote should count. several states are too close to call so were not going to have anything more to say tonight.<u+201d> mr. podesta appeared after the associated press declared republican mr. trump the winner of enough states to accumulate 265 electoral votes, five short of enough to win the white house. five states have yet to be called. mr. trump leads in all five of them, and mrs. clinton would need to win all of them to maintain a chance. as the night began, mr. trump was perceived to have a limited path to 270 electoral votes. but among competitive states, mr. trump carried one after another, leaving mrs. clinton needing to run the table of what remained. in florida and elsewhere, mr. trump won by driving turnout in rural republican-heavy counties. he beat the gop high-water mark in the last four presidential elections in 41 of the state<u+2019>s 67 counties, according to steve schale, a florida democratic operative who was a senior official in both of president barack obama <u+2019>s campaigns. mr. trump<u+2019>s victory in ohio comes after mrs. clinton brought a parade of celebrities to the state in an effort to boost her turnout in its urban centers. but mr. trump<u+2019>s popularity among the state<u+2019>s white voters combined with mrs. clinton<u+2019>s weak turnout from african americans meant a win for the republican in a state president barack obama won twice. mrs. clinton carried virginia , a state she was long expected to carry but a place where the results are narrower than expected. neither candidate visited virginia in the campaign<u+2019>s closing days, and mrs. clinton pulled her advertising from the state<u+2019>s airwaves for months before putting them back on in the final weeks. mrs. clinton so far hasn<u+2019>t carried a single state in which a republican senate candidate has won . she trails mr. trump in wisconsin, where gop sen. ron johnson has defeated democratic challenger russ feingold in a rematch of their 2010 contest. capital journal is wsj.com<u+2019>s home for election 2016 news. the election will be historic whoever wins: voters will either elect the first female president in u.s. history, who accepts the baton of leadership from the nation<u+2019>s first black president; or they will upend america<u+2019>s status quo by electing a political novice bent on radical change. another certain election outcome is that the next president will face a deeply divided nation that may take a long time to heal. state and municipal authorities reported high voter turnout in cities and small towns across much of the country, with lines of up to an hour or more to vote in many places. early polls of voters found deep unease toward both candidates. a majority of voters said they found neither candidate to be honest or trustworthy. neither won approval from more than half of the country. at the same time, voters cast a more skeptical eye toward mr. trump, with a large majority of those polled saying they didn<u+2019>t think he had the temperament to be president. mr. trump won big among voters<u+2014>around a third or so of those polled<u+2014>who wanted the new president to bring change, but then lost by large margins among those who said they were looking for empathy, experience or judgment. some of mr. trump<u+2019>s core campaign pitches also didn<u+2019>t resonate as much as his campaign hoped, early polls showed. his immigration platforms<u+2014>building a wall along the mexican border and threatening to deport illegal immigrants<u+2014>got the support of only a minority of voters. voters, meanwhile, were pretty much evenly split on the benefits or drawbacks of international trade. the candidates each began election day voting near their new york homes. after returning from an early morning election day rally in the battleground state of north carolina with rock stars lady gaga and jon bon jovi, mrs. clinton voted at 8 a.m. at an elementary school in chappaqua, n.y., joined by her husband, former president bill clinton. <u+201c>it is the most humbling feeling,<u+201d> she said afterward when asked what it was like to vote for herself. mr. trump voted later in the morning near his home in new york city, accompanied by his wife, melania, his daughter, ivanka, and her husband and young daughter. asked if he would concede the election if mrs. clinton is deemed the winner, mr. trump said: <u+201c>we<u+2019>ll see what happens.<u+201d> about 130 million americans were expected to cast ballots this year in one of the most unpredictable campaigns in modern history, with the future of the presidency, supreme court and control of the u.s. senate hanging in the balance. some voters expressed disillusion about the low tone of the campaign. <u+201c>neither party deserves to be president,<u+201d> said shawntell simmons, a 28-year-old waitress, after reluctantly casting her vote for mrs. clinton in houston on tuesday. <u+201c>i don<u+2019>t want to be set back 50 years if i vote for trump,<u+201d> she said. <u+201c>i don<u+2019>t want to have to go back to war if i vote for hillary.<u+201d> by monday, at least 42 million people had already cast their ballots, with key states such as arizona, florida and nevada setting records for pre-election day turnout. in florida, more than six million people voted early<u+2014>a 35% increase from 2012. in north carolina, about half of all registered voters cast ballots early, amounting to more than 3 million votes. a nevada county judge on tuesday rejected a trump campaign request for a court order to quarantine some ballots filed at several las vegas early voting locations filled with likely democratic voters. the complaint<u+2014>filed late monday and alleging county election officials unlawfully extended voting hours at some sites on friday<u+2014>tapped into mr. trump<u+2019>s claims that the election process is tilted against him. on the last full day of campaigning, the candidates revealed where they think the election will be won or lost and offered strikingly different closing arguments to their audiences. the republican candidate jetted to five states on monday as he searched for an unorthodox mix of wins that could provide the 270 electoral votes required to take the white house. mrs. clinton hit three states on monday and used her powerful bench of surrogates to stretch her reach, making a joint appearance with two of her strongest, president barack obama and his wife, michelle, in philadelphia. mrs. clinton, whose campaign has been heavily based on analytics and voter data, spent three of her four stops on monday in michigan and pennsylvania<u+2014>aiming to energize african-american and young voters who helped propel mr. obama to his historic victory in 2008. both candidates stopped in raleigh, n.c., the hub of a region home to a large population of black and college-educated voters whom mrs. clinton needs, and rural white voters who have powered mr. trump<u+2019>s campaign. <u+201c>to make every dream you<u+2019>ve ever dreamed for your country and your family to come true, you have one magnificent chance,<u+201d> mr. trump said in raleigh. <u+201c>there<u+2019>s never been a movement like this.<u+2026>it<u+2019>s not going to happen again.<u+201d> the last round of national polls showed mrs. clinton with a steady but narrow lead over mr. trump, ranging from 3 to 6 percentage points. in the wall street journal/nbc news poll released sunday, mrs. clinton led by 4 percentage points. <u+2014>rebecca ballhaus and scott calvert contributed to this article. write to reid j. epstein at reid.epstein@wsj.com , carol e. lee at carol.lee@wsj.com and beth reinhard at beth.reinhard@wsj.com
donald trump wins key battleground states, narrowing hillary clinton<u+2019>s path - wsj
reid j. epstein carol e. lee beth reinhard