The Straits Times says

An American vote of global note

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Only five times in its history has the US had a president who has lost the popular vote but won the election. Mr Donald Trump was one of them in 2016. As he seeks to be re-elected, in just over a week from now, opinion polls once again show him trailing his Democratic rival Joe Biden, by around 7 points on an average, although the race in some key swing states is tighter. Until the Covid-19 pandemic struck, Mr Trump's strongest case before voters was that he had delivered on his promise to bolster the US economy. The gross domestic product was rising, unemployment dipping and his pitch to bring back manufacturing to the US, principally by waging a trade war against China, seemed to have won some support.

The pandemic waylaid the economy and cast his leadership into headlines as the United States became the country with the world's largest number of Covid-19 cases as well as deaths, last week recording the highest daily count of over 80,000 cases. The shadow of the pandemic is looming over senior citizens - the group most vulnerable to Covid-19 - as well as suburban white women who have turned critical of Mr Trump's crisis management. In battleground states like Florida, where seniors are a decisive chunk of voters and where Mr Trump cast his own vote last Saturday, the race is on a razor's edge. Other states that must figure in a Trump win - like Arizona, Iowa, North Carolina, Michigan and Wisconsin - are also close contests.

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