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It’s official: As of Thursday night, one Texas county has surpassed its entire voter turnout from the 2016 election, according to our partners, CBS News. Harris County clerk Chris Hollins said about 1.3 million votes were cast in 2016 but nearly 1.4m votes have already been cast so far this year, the most in the county's history.

"This November, Harris County voters have had more access to the polls than ever, and I'm thrilled to see this record-breaking turnout,” Hollins said. "There's still time for voters to vote early, deliver a mail ballot in person... or have their voice heard on election day." This from last night:

Tropical Storm Zeta swept through the state of Georgia on Thursday, disrupting voting at some sites after causing power outages.

Civil rights groups are asking Republican Governor Brian Kemp to extend voting hours in the battleground state. Friday is supposed to be the final day where residents can cast their ballot early. The governor is being asked to extend the hours until 21:00.

Some 15 counties were affected by the disruption, Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger said. At least one county said it could not hold any voting at all on Thursday.

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Stephen Miller, Donald Trump's White House and campaign adviser, has said Donald Trump is planning to expand the US travel ban on immigration from some countries, crack down on cities friendly to immigrants, and limit new work visas.

The aim is "raising and enhancing the standard for entry" to the United States, he told NBC News, external.

Keeping asylum for refugees low is another aim, Miller said. A second Trump administration would aim to expand deals with Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, which cut off pathways to the US for asylum seekers.

Miller said Trump is "100 percent committed to a policy of family unity" - he was asked about the controversial "zero-tolerance" policy that led to immigrant families being separated. Some children were kept in "cages" or fenced enclosures - a practice that began under President Obama, although children were only detained for 72 hours then.

Trump would also "aggressively" fight so-called sanctuary cities, such as San Francisco, which limit cooperation with government's attempts to enforce immigration law, in order to protect immigrants.

Miller said Trump would also aim to vet the "ideological sympathies or leanings" of people applying for visas to gauge their potential for recruitment by what the government deems to be radical groups.

Finally, Trump wants to change the work visa system to admit only workers who "contribute the most to job creation".

Trump made a number of pledges on immigration for his first presidential term. Read more about whether the rhetoric turned into delivered policies.

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Texas - a state with historically low turnout - is leading the nation in early voting.

The state usually struggles to persuade residents to come out and vote - but this year, in just over two weeks of early voting, Texans have cast 8.45m votes - that's 94% of the 8.97m million total votes cast there in 2016, according to the US Elections Project., external

That's despite significant restrictions on voting, which have been the subject of legal challenges. Earlier this month, the state's appeals court allowed Texas to limit drop-off points for postal ballots to just one per county. It gave residents of Harris County, home to more than four million people, one location to hand in their ballot paper.

Texas almost always votes Republican but its changing demographic means that Democrats are hopeful it could turn in their favour. This year the race is expected to be tight.

The US state of Georgia, along with several Southern states, has a history of suppressing the black vote - and critics say tactics to discourage certain groups from voting are still being used today.

Democrats accuse their rivals of purging electoral rolls and introducing strict identification laws, measures they claim disproportionately impact low-income and minority voters.

But Republican state officials, who did not agree to be interviewed for our video report (above), reject allegations of suppression - they say restrictions are needed to prevent voter fraud.

The dysfunctional primary elections held in Georgia this summer - when the pandemic exacerbated flaws in the state's electoral infrastructure - have increased concerns over the coming presidential vote on 3 November.

Georgia is considered a crucial battleground state.

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Donald Trump and Joe Biden are continuing their final push for votes. The focus today is largely on the Midwest, where they are competing for support in swing states Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Biden will address drive-in rallies in Des Moines, Iowa and in St Paul, Minnesota. He's also expected to talk about voting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in the evening.

And Trump is traveling from the White House to address rallies held at airports in Waterford Township, Michigan and in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Finally he plans to speak at a campaign event in Rochester, Minnesota.

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Nationally, Democrat nominee Joe Biden leads ahead of the Republican incumbent, Donald Trump.

But remember, it is not just about winning the popular vote. The candidates have to secure the individual states' electoral college votes - particularly in the so-called "battlegrounds", which could swing either way.

We have the latest national polls, aggregated by the BBC, as well as the latest numbers from the battleground states, all here in our election poll tracker.

Want a short reminder on the electoral college system? Watch below.

One of Donald Trump's advisers and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie has been tricked into appearing in a campaign video made by his rival party.

The election campaign for Democrat Mike Cooney in Montana sent a message to Christie using the app Cameo, which pays celebrities to star in personalised videos. The celebrities are told who to address in the video, but they do not normally know who the recipient is.

In the response clip, Christie addresses a man only named as "Greg", asking him to "come home to New Jersey" because Greg's family miss him. Christie extolls the virtues of the state:

“We got Taylor ham. We’ve got Bruce Springsteen. We’ve got Jon Bon Jovi. We’ve got the Jersey Shore. We’ve got the boardwalks.”

But Cooney - who is running for governor in Montana - then shared the video, suggesting it was aimed specifically at his rival, Greg Gianforte, the Republican nominee in the governor’s race.

Mike Cooney's campaign tweeted out the video on Thursday. The New York Times newspaper says that one message Cooney's campaign has pushed is that Greg Gianforte, who lived in New Jersey as an adult, is an outsider to Montana state.

Christie responded on Twitter, external: "Shame on @CooneyforMT, external. Same to @DemGovs, external," adding that he did the Cameo video to raise money for a women's charity in New Jersey.

"I SUPPORT Greg Gianforte for Governor-absolutely!" Christie said.

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Actor Paul Rudd was spotted greeting early voters who had waited in the rain in New York City on Thursday.

"I wanted to say thank you, for coming out and voting and doing your part," Rudd said in one video, as he handed a voter a cookie, external.

"Anyone who is waiting in line deserves to be thanked and encouraged," the Avengers actor told Now This news website, adding that it should be made easier to vote in the US.

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Donald Trump's Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, has written a Fox News opinion piece, or op-ed, praising his boss's foreign policy record., external

"We’ve restored American leadership on behalf of the American people and the free world, especially as regards China," he wrote about the government's "America First" approach.

Claiming successes in China, North Korea and Iran, Pompeo said threats to the US and its citizens had been reduced during Trump's presidency.

He also referred to Trump's controversial decision to move the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.

Read more about how Trump's presidency has changed the world.

Throughout the day, we will be bringing you explainers on the US voting system.

In response to the obvious risks in getting large numbers of people to polling stations during a pandemic this year, many states eased up on voting restrictions. This meant more Americans can vote early, in person or by mail, than ever before. But not everyone is on board.

There are currently over 300 lawsuits in 44 states concerning how absentee votes are counted, who is allowed to vote early and how mail-in ballots are collected.

For example in Arizona, a lawsuit filed by members of the Navajo Nation asked for extra time to get postal votes in, because there is just one post office every 707 square miles.

Republican-run states say restrictions are necessary to clamp down on voter fraud, while Democrats say these are attempts to keep people from exercising their civic rights.

You've seen the long queues, you've heard about voter supression, but what does it mean and why does it happen? Read our explainer here.

Speaking on Fox News on Thursday night, Donald Trump's eldest son claimed that deaths from coronavirus are now "almost nothing" in the US. On Thursday another 1,049 people were reported to have died from Covid-19, according to the Covid Tracking Project.

Donald Trump Jr was criticising the focus on the daily rise in infections - which reached 85,000 on Thursday - and said instead the US should focus on deaths. Currently 46,000 people are in hospital in the US with the virus.

A increase in infections is currently hitting the US, where more than 220,000 people have died from coronavirus.

Didn't have time to watch two hours of the candidates trading jibes at the Florida rallies yesterday? Watch our short catch-up video here, with all the standout lines.

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In an unusual move, Joe Biden has written an opinion piece for South Korean news agency Yonhap, external, laying out the reason why he should be the next US president.

He suggested he is a strong ally for South Korea and also committed to advocating for immigrants in the US.

American has a sizeable South Korean population - around one million immigrations from Korea, the vast majority from South Korea, live in the US, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Three swing states - Texas, Georgia and Pennsylvania - are among the 10 states with the largest populations of Korean immigrants, external.

Biden referred to his 2013 trip to the Demilitarized Zone, separating the South from North Korea.

"Words matter - and a president's words matter even more," he wrote. "As President, I'll stand with South Korea, strengthening our alliance to safeguard peace in East Asia and beyond, rather than extorting Seoul with reckless threats to remove our troops."

His rival, Donald Trump, formed an unlikely friendship of sorts with the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un during his presidency. Here is a video recap of that turbulent relationship...

Sophie Long
BBC News, Arizona

The Latino population has grown, and it’s grown in battleground states where the election will be won or lost.

It’s also younger, more diverse and appears to be more energised than it has been before.

Many young Latinos in Phoenix who’ve come of age since 2016 tell me they remember the fear they saw in their parent’s eyes when they were criminalised by the passage of SB1070 - the “show me your papers law” ten years ago, and how they had been too young to do anything about it. They tell me how they cried tears of anger when Donald Trump was elected, and again the frustration and powerlessness they felt at being too young to vote for someone different.

This time they do have a say and they’re determined to be heard. Many are equally determined to help older Latinos, some of whom haven’t voted before, to get out and do the same. They spend their evenings going door-to-door in neighbourhoods where turnout is low to encourage and inform. They will continue until the polls close.

Watch more about the significance of the Latino vote below...

Clips of Donald Trump jiving to the Village People classic, YMCA, are popular on social media. The song is often blasted at his campaign rallies. But the disco group's lead singer, Victor Willis, has told BBC News that he does not endorse the president - and has even asked him to stop playing their music.

Watch our interview with him below.

And read more about how Trump and Biden's playlists get their fans going.

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Early voting is not new in the US - many states allow residents to cast their ballot in advance for a range of reasons, including reducing congestion on election day or to give workers who cannot get time off the chance to vote.

But this year the numbers are dramatically higher due to the coronavirus pandemic. Voters are keen to avoid very busy polling stations, where there might be a raised risk of infection. At least 30 states made adjustments to make it easier for people to cast absentee votes.

Already this year, more than half the total 2016 election turnout have voted. We know some information about who is behind this huge rise. More than five million young people , external- classified as those aged between 18 and 29 - had cast early votes by 26 October, according to the Tufts University Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (Circle).

More African Americans are voting early too. According to analysis from data firm TargetSmart, external, more than six times as many black voters had cast early votes by 18 October this year, compared to the same point in 2016.

Read more about why Americans are voting early this year.

Photos of people queuing to vote, sometimes for hours, are not uncommon in the US. For days now, pictures have been coming in of hundreds of people waiting in line to cast their ballot. In the US, early voting can be by postal vote, or in-person at a polling station. Some experts are predicting this election will see the highest turnout since 1908.

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More than 245 million Americans are eligible to vote. In the last election in 2016, just under 140 million people did.

As of Thursday, more than 80 million had already voted early in this year's election - either by post or in person.

In Texas, 8.5 million people have voted - which is approaching the total turnout for the state in 2016.

California is next, where over 8.4 million people have already voted.

Florida has had more than 7.3 million early voters so far.

These tallies come from the US Elections Project, external, a tracking site run by Michael McDonald, a professor at the University of Florida who specialises in early voting.

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• Donald Trump and Joe Biden both appealed to the swing-state of Florida in rallies on Thursday night, where they are neck-and-neck. Biden told his supporters: "You hold the power. If Florida goes blue [Democratic], it's over." Meanwhile Trump said, "He's [Biden] going to lock you down", referring to the coronavirus pandemic
• Trump was supposed to continue on to North Carolina, but the rally was cancelled. He is heading to the Midwest today to campaign in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota
• Biden, meanwhile, will speak at a drive-by rally in St Paul, Wisconsin
• In Minnesota, a court has ruled that absentee ballots that arrive after 8pm on election day must be separated, external from other ballots, raising fears that they may not be counted. It's another move in a series of legal wranglings in states over postal ballots
• Coronavirus infections in the US are now pushing nine million. Around 800 people are dying each day, with cases rising quickly in the Midwest states

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