The first Election Day result was in a small New Hampshire town with just six voters. Here’s how it went
The midnight voting tradition began as a way to accommodate rail workers who had to start their shifts before the polls opened
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Your support makes all the difference.The US 2024 election results are in for one tiny New Hampshire town - and it’s a tie.
The six residents of Dixville Notch, near the Canadian border, waited for just 12 minutes to learn the results of their midnight vote.
Much like the rest of the country, the result was deadlocked; three votes for Donald Trump and three for Kamala Harris.
Four years ago Dixville cast five votes and all went for Joe Biden, even though four of the residents are Republicans. This year three of the four Republicans voted for Trump, and one switched sides to vote for Harris.
Dixville Notch began holding midnight votes as a continuation of a tradition started in nearby Hart's Location and Millsfield, The Guardian reports. Those towns' midnight vote was implemented to accommodate rail workers who had to be at work before normal voting hours began.
The tradition began in Dixville Notch in the 1960s, when local hotel owner Neil Tilotson hosted the early-morning vote at his business, inviting journalists to stay the night and use his phones to report on the results. All six of the residents who voted early Tuesday live in the former hotel.
Dixville Notch's residents picked Hillary Clinton 4-2 to beat Trump in 2016 and went all in on Biden in 2020, but this year Trump actually picked up support in the township.
One resident, Scott Maxwell, told the New York Times that he didn't see a split vote coming this year, and said that even he was surprised that he voted for Trump.
Les Otten, another resident, was the Republican who flipped to cast a vote for Harris.
The 75-year-old told CNN before the vote that he felt as though Trump wanted Americans to pledge allegiance to him.
“Nowhere in the Pledge of Allegiance does it say anything about pledging your allegiance to a person,” Otten said. “And I think at the end of the day, Trump has made it clear that you need to pledge allegiance to him, and he alone can fix this, and that is as anti-democratic as I can understand.”
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