Anthony Zurcher
North America correspondent

Image source, Reuters

Hello from Detroit, Michigan, where Kamala Harris is beginning her day at the Greater Emmanuel Institutional Church of God in Christ.

At the moment, the minister is giving an impassioned sermon, accompanied by an organ and electric guitar.

As we entered the building, a gospel choir was in full song.

The black churchgoing vote has been the backbone of many a Democratic victory, not just here in Michigan but across the battleground states.

The vice-president’s expected to address the congregation soon.

As we reported earlier, Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance last night on the US comedy-skit show Saturday Night Live - its final edition before the election.

Brendan Carr, a Republican member of the media watchdog, the Federal Communications Commission, said Harris's participation on the NBC programme was "a clear and blatant effort to evade" its "equal time rule".

But a spokesperson for the FCC tells the BBC's US partner, CBS News, that it “has not made any determination regarding politically [sic] programming rules, nor have we received a complaint from any interested parties".

The independent government agency must first receive a formal complaint from a political candidate alleging that they have requested "equal time" and been denied it, in order to review whether the policy was violated.

The Trump campaign has indicated it did not receive an invite to the show but has not yet made a complaint.

Earlier this week, it sued CBS for $10bn alleging the network made a "deceitful" edit of a Harris interview.

Fact-checking Trump’s claim about 13,099 murdererspublished at 16:54 Greenwich Mean Time 3 November

16:54 GMT 3 November

By Lucy Gilder

Trump has just repeated his claim that there are "13,099 murderers" who have come to the US in the last three years.

This figure comes from data from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice).

It said there was this number non-citizens convicted of homicide on its database, as of July 2024, but not detained by them.

But the Department of Homeland Security DHS - which oversees Ice - has said the data “includes individuals who entered the country over the past 40 years or more, the vast majority of whose custody determination was made long before this administration”.

• BBC Verify has looked into this here.

Trump launches into many of his usual attacks, arguing that he is running to take down "a corrupt machine".

He says Democrats "ripped the election away from this poor, stupid guy", referring to President Joe Biden. "They ripped it away, like candy from a baby."

He then complains at length about the electoral process, from the duration of voting periods to false claims of non-citizen voting, before saying that pollsters "can make the polls sing".

Trump also responds a poll from Iowa last night, which suggested Kamala Harris was leading him by three points in the Republican-leaning state. He calls it "a fake poll" conducted by "one of his enemies".

For context: The poll, released by highly regarded pollster Ann Selzer, questioned 808 likely voters in Iowa. It's just one poll - so we should be cautious in interpreting the results. Iowa isn't regarded as a swing state - Trump won it by nearly 10 points in each of the last two elections.

America is a "crooked country", he continues. "They want to put you in jail because you want to make it straight", he says to approving cheers.

Image source, None

Donald Trump takes to the stage in Lititz, Pennsylvania - and begins with the question: "Do you like it better now or four years ago?"

Reiterating his closing message, he promises that, whatever the Biden-Harris administration "broke", he will fix and usher in "a new golden age".

Attacking his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, he says that she is offering policy ideas but "why didn't she do it in these four years?"

Helena Humphrey
Reporting from North Carolina

Misinformation surrounding election integrity has been sweeping through online spaces, shaping voters' perceptions in tangible ways.

In many swing states, a substantial number of Republicans still believe Trump’s persistent - and unfounded - claims of a stolen election.

In conversations with rural North Carolinians, some shared that they chose to vote early in person, driven by lingering doubts over the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s 2020 win and a desire to "walk in their vote" instead of relying on mail-in ballots.

In North Carolina, Barry Cheney, chair of the Catawba County Board of Elections, spoke to me about the precautions election boards are taking in the case of unrest.

“Some of the counties have had to go through some pretty lengthy processes. A couple of them have installed bulletproof glass in their offices,” he notes. “All we can do is be prepared and try to make sure nothing happens.”

Tom Bateman
Reporting from Lititz, Pennsylvania

We’re waiting outside Donald Trump’s big rally near Lancaster, Pennsylvania as his campaign hits this battleground yet again for the homestretch.

He’s due to show up in his Trump plane for thousands of fans waiting next to an aircraft hangar.

A stars-and-stripes flutters in the low hanging morning sun next to us, held by a gun rights campaigner about to go in.

The dawn queues stretched back at least half a mile as we arrived in this part of rural Pennsylvania. This is true Trump country. Rally-goers tell me they feel sure about Tuesday, most I spoke to said they’d been hit hard by inflation under Joe Biden. They’re confident.

But the polls still suggest a dead heat between Trump and Harris here - the biggest prize of all the swing states. The fact that both campaigns continue to pour money, resources and time into it shows just how tight the race is.

Image source, EPA

We're soon expecting Donald Trump to appear on stage at a rally in Lititz, in the key swing state of Pennsylvania.

And after that, he's immediately heading to two more swing state rallies in North Carolina and Georgia.

Last night, Trump addressed Kamala Harris's claim that as president he would restrict in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments - "I consider myself to be the father of fertilisation," he told a crowd in North Carolina.

The Republican nominee previously declared himself the “father of IVF”, a fertility treatment that many consider to be under threat following the US Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn the right to abortion and an Alabama court ruling against IVF earlier this year. Trump has also taken credit for his role in overturning Roe v Wade.

The Trump campaign said at the time that he was joking, while the Kamala Harris campaign argued it was further evidence he did not take reproductive rights seriously.

Ione Wells
Reporting from Michigan

Kamala Harris is in Michigan today for a campaign tour of the state, which will end with a rally at Michigan State University in East Lansing.

Lansing is a pretty solid Democrat heartland - the party won here comfortably in recent elections. It has a large population of students, government and union workers, and increasingly a young and diverse population.

So, for Harris this rally seems aimed at firing up some of her “core base” and making sure they turn out.

She can’t rely on the party’s traditional “base” everywhere in Michigan anymore. As we’ve been reporting, once Democrat areas like the Arab-majority city of Dearborn and the predominantly working-class, heavily unionised county of Macomb have been shifting away from the Democrats for different reasons: from the war in the Middle East, to Trump’s appeal to socially conservative values and his economic and trade policies.

• Hear more about that, and from voters, on this week’s episode of The World This Weekend.

Image source, Getty Images

Unlike his opponent Kamala Harris, Donald Trump was not invited to appear on comedy show Saturday Night Live.

That is "a clear and blatant effort to evade" the Federal Communication Commission's "equal time rule", according to Brendan Carr, one of two Republican leaders on the media watchdog's five-member commission.

The "equal time rule" requires US broadcasters to treat political candidates equally in terms of air time, and Carr writes on X that its purpose is "to avoid exactly this type of biased and partisan conduct - a licensed broadcaster using the public airwaves to exert its influence for one candidate on the eve of an election".

Asked about it on Fox News a few moments ago, Trump's son Eric says "we've dealt with this from day one".

"You saw what happened in the debate, where it was three on one, and you've seen that every single time. And so does this surprise us now? Does it surprise us?" he asks.

Image source, Reuters

As we reported earlier, Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance on US comedy sketch show Saturday Night Live yesterday, playing herself alongside actor and comedian Maya Rudolph... who also played the vice-president.

The two-minute skit saw Harris give herself a pep talk in the mirror - "keep calm-ala and carry on-ala" - and follows other presidential candidates who have appeared on the show.

As part of his 2016 presidential bid, Donald Trump delivered a monologue, flanked by two Trump impersonators.

Hillary Clinton also went on during her 2016 presidential election campaign, while during the 2008 election campaign, former president Barack Obama and Republican candidate John McCain also made an appearance.

Image source, Getty Images

US actor Harrison Ford says he's voted for 64 years but "never really wanted to talk about it too much".

In a video shared by Kamala Harris's campaign on Saturday, though, the Indiana Jones star makes a rare political statement.

"When dozens of former members of the Trump administration are sounding alarms saying ‘for God's sake, don't do this again,’ you have to pay attention. They're telling us something important," he says.

Ford, 82, notes that many Republicans are for the first time casting ballots "for someone who doesn’t have an R [for Republican] next to their name, because they know this really matters”.

"I've got one vote, same as anyone else, and I'm going to use it to move forward. I'm voting for Kamala Harris."

James FitzGerald
BBC News

With just two days to go, election day is nearly upon us.

After months of second-guessing what the American public will decide, we'll get a glimpse into their thoughts and motivations as the first batch of exit poll data is released on election day - Tuesday - at 17:00 EST (22:00 GMT).

Exit polls in the UK provide a projection of the final result as soon as polls close, but American ones are very different.

Rather than predicting the result, they give an insight into people’s priorities and opinions - and later, into how different demographic groups voted. Pollsters combine election-day interviews with telephone polling both nationally and in the seven swing states.

Throughout the night, expect experts to talk a lot about these states - Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin - where voting is hard to predict and can lean Republican (red) or Democrat (blue).

• Check our full guide to the night here

Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America correspondent

Image source, Reuters

When Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden in 2020, it seemed to be the death knell of his political career.

His first term in office ended in chaos and condemnation - even from members of his own party - after he unsuccessfully tried to contest the election results and his supporters rioted at the US Capitol.

If he wins the election on Tuesday, it will be only the second time anyone has ever returned to the White House after previously losing a presidential re-election bid.

“He gets knocked down and gets up twice as focused,” said Bryan Lanza, who has been a political adviser for the former president since Trump launched his 2016 campaign. “I don't think anybody should be surprised about this comeback.”

Such an extraordinary reversal of fortune for the 78-year-old former president would also vault him back into the White House as a man who seems politically bulletproof, with a detailed plan of action and ranks of loyalists behind him.

• You can read more from Anthony Zurcher's report here.

Lily Jamali
San Francisco correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

Just over three months ago, Vice-President Kamala Harris walked up to a microphone to make a speech that would define both her past and her future.

A day before, President Joe Biden had dropped out of the election race and endorsed her to succeed him as Democratic candidate. With only a short period of campaigning ahead of her, Harris had no time to waste.

There is a saying in politics: define yourself or be defined by your opponent. And in that moment, when Harris made her first pitch to the American people, she defined herself not just in terms of her record in the White House or as a US senator, but the years she spent as a California prosecutor.

“I took on perpetrators of all kinds - predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So, hear me when I say: I know Donald Trump's type,” she said of her Republican challenger.

But a look back at Harris’s time in and out of California's courtrooms reveals her enduring struggle to define herself, what her opponents say is a history of pivoting on issues depending on the political weather, as well as her uncanny ability to seize the moment when others have counted her out.

• You can read more from Lily Jamali's report here.

Mike Wendling
Reporting from Chicago

Rumours, misleading allegations and outright lies about voting and fraud are flooding online spaces in unprecedented numbers in advance of the US election.

Hundreds of incidents involving purported voting irregularities are being collected and spread by individuals, as well as both independent and Republican-affiliated groups. A small number of posts are also coming from Democrats.

In nearly every case, the posts support the Trump campaign’s false claim that the former president won the 2020 election and suggestions that he will potentially be cheated out of victory again on 5 November.

This week, Trump himself claimed widespread fraud in a key swing state.

“Pennsylvania is cheating, and getting caught, at large scale levels rarely seen before,” Trump posted on his Truth Social network. “REPORT CHEATING TO AUTHORITIES. Law Enforcement must act, NOW!”

The allegation followed officials in three Pennsylvania counties saying they were working with local law enforcement to investigate some voter registration applications for potential fraud.

The state's top election official, Republican Al Schmidt, has urged caution and warned voters to be aware of "half-truths" and disinformation circulating on social media.

“This is a sign that the built-in safeguards in our voter registration process are working,” he said

• You can read more about the allegations the BBC has seen on social networks, message boards and chat groups here.

All is quiet on the campaign trail while the US is asleep - but both teams will be haring across the swing states later today. Here is what we know to expect so far:

• Republican nominee Donald Trump will hold rallies in Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia
• His Democratic opponent Kamala Harris will hold a rally in Michigan

• Meanwhile, First Lady Jill Biden will also be out and about in the key state of Pennsylvania, while former US President Bill Clinton is expected to appear at an event in Georgia
• Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance is due to hold rallies in Florida, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire

Earlier, this post said Harris would also be in Pennsylvania today - she won't be, but other Democrats including her husband Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff and First Lady Jill Biden will be.

There are 50 states in the US and most of them vote for the same party - Democratic or Republican - at every election.

That leaves just a handful of states where either candidate could win. At this election there are seven.

They are known as the swing states and can be divided into two groups: the Sun Belt (Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia ) and the Rust Belt (Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania).

Across the entire US there are a total of 538 electoral college votes up for grabs and the winner will be the candidate who gets 270 or more.

In all but two states, the presidential candidate with the most individual votes from the residents there wins all the state’s electoral college votes.

Both candidates will need to win at least three swing states to get them over the line.

• You can read more from the BBC Visual Journalism team's interactive guide on the 2024 US presidential election here.

As we just reported, the new poll in Iowa - that questioned 808 likely voters in the state - was released by pollster Ann Selzer.

Trump won Iowa by nearly 10 points in each of the last two elections.

This particular poll suggests that Kamala Harris will carry the state with 47% to Donald Trump's 44%.

Selzer spoke to BBC News about the findings.

Mike Wendling
Reporting from Chicago

A new poll of voters in Iowa suggests that Kamala Harris will carry the state with 47% to Donald Trump's 44%.

The survey was released by the highly regarded pollster Ann Selzer, who regularly carries out surveys for the Des Moines Register newspaper., external

The poll questioned 808 likely voters in Iowa and said Harris's lead was driven by women and independent voters. But it is still within the margin of error, 3.4 percentage points.

It's just one poll - so we should be cautious in interpreting the results.

"You'll note that neither of the major candidates gets to 50%, so there's still a little squishiness in what could actually happen come Tuesday," Selzer told BBC News in an interview earlier this evening.

For context, Trump won Iowa by nearly 10 points in each of the last two elections. It’s not one of the seven key battleground states – almost nobody thought it would be very close.

Iowa is not itself a big prize – just six electoral votes – but demographically, it resembles other states here in the US Midwest, such as Wisconsin and Michigan.

The Iowa poll will likely be celebrated in the Harris camp, but is already being dismissed by the Trump campaign.

When asked about the Selzer poll, Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller said that, in every election cycle, there is one "idiotic survey". He referred journalists to an Emerson poll, external that has Trump up 10 percentage points in Iowa.

• You can read more about who is leading in the polls here.