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By Reuters 
3h ago
Washington – The outcome of the US presidential election was in the balance Thursday as five changing states continued to count their votes.
To conquer the White House, a candidate must accumulate at least 270 votes in the Electoral College. Most of the major television networks gave Biden a 253-214 lead in electoral votes on Thursday.
Results in Pennsylvania (20 electoral votes), Georgia (16), North Carolina (15), Arizona (11) and Nevada (6) remained uncertain, according to Edison Research.
ARIZONA
Biden’s lead narrowed Thursday night when nearly 74,000 votes were reported from Maricopa County, which includes densely populated Phoenix. Of those, Trump won 42,276 and Biden 31,700, reducing Biden’s lead in Arizona to 50.1% from 48.5%, with 90% of the votes counted.
There were at least 320,000 ballots left to count in the state. Maricopa County had more than 200,000 of the outstanding ballots, the elections department said.
GEORGIA
Trump’s lead narrowed to 0.1 percentage point Thursday night, or just 2,497 votes, with 99% of the votes reported.
NEVADA
Biden led Trump by 11,438 votes, or 0.9 percentage points, with about 11% of the votes remaining.
Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske said in a statement that about 190,150 ballots remained to be counted in the state, of which 123,554 were mail-in ballots or ballots returned at drop off sites. He said 90% of the ballots that have yet to be counted were in Clark County, the largest in the state.
All correctly received ballots will be counted up to nine days after the election, but the exact number that remains to be counted is unknown, Cegavske said.
Pending votes are votes sent by mail and those cast by voters who registered to vote at the polling place on Election Day, he said.
NORTH CAROLINA
Trump led with more than 76,000 votes, or 1.4 points, with about 5% of the votes not counting.
State officials have said the full result will not be known until next week. The state allows mail-in ballots postmarked Tuesday to be counted if received by November 12.
PENNSYLVANIA
Trump’s lead continued to decline in Pennsylvania. He led by 0.7 of a percentage point, or 48,854 votes, with 6% of the votes pending.
About 370,000 ballots were still in the process of being counted Thursday, according to the State Department website, giving Biden a chance to catch Trump if enough of them came from pro-Democrat areas like Philadelphia. Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar said she expected the “overwhelming majority” to be counted by the end of Thursday.
Philadelphia County reported more than 252,000 mail-in ballots were cast, but said how many remained to be counted.
A final count may not be available until at least Friday, as Pennsylvania can accept mail-in ballots up to three days after the election if they are postmarked Tuesday.
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