Road to White House Passes Through Security Authorities Gate

US presidential election has seen a dramatic shift in the last hours. As polling centers are preparing to receive voters on the eighth of November, to elect the 45th president of the United States, the FBI began to work on more than one file to determine the reality of alleged links between Russia and the Republican candidate Donald Trump, or his campaign and supporters. So far, no evidence was found on a criminalized relationship between the two sides.

    News on referring Trump campaign's file to the FBI came few hours after the poll conducted by ABC news and showed Trumps outweigh of his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton with 1%.

    The poll result was surprising, but observers attributed that to the deliberate announcement by the FBI of reopening the investigation in the case known as the "Clinton Mail," an announcement that received heavy criticism from Clinton's electoral campaign.

    Previously, US officials publicly accused high-level Russian officials of being behind acts of piracy and the publishing stolen sensitive files on the Internet. These accusations include attempts to interfere in the presidential election. Washington, however did not accuse Russia of trying to support a presidential candidate over the other nor did accuse officially Russia of involvement in hacking the email of the manager of Clinton's campaign.

    The election of President and Vice President of the United States is, formally, an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty states or Washington, D.C. cast ballots for members of the US Electoral College, known as electors. These electors then in turn cast direct votes, known as electoral votes, in their respective state capitals for President and Vice President. Each of the states casts as many electoral votes as the total number of Senators and House Representatives in Congress, while Washington, D.C. has three votes. A candidate needs 270 votes of the total 538 votes of the US Electoral College, being 435 representatives and 100 senators.

    There are six states with the most electors, comprising 35% of the total votes, these are California (55), Texas (38), New York (29), Florida (29), Illinois (20) and Pennsylvania (20) votes.

    Electoral atmosphere reflected on various aspects of life in Washington D.C., where restaurants and cafes are offering menus for the Republicans and others for Democrats or drinks bearing the names of candidates and have the red and blue colors referring to the Republican and Democratic parties. 

    The US electoral system dates back to 1787 when the Constitutional Convention used the Virginia Plan as the basis for discussions, as the Virginia delegation had proposed it first. The Virginia Plan called for the Congress to elect the president. Delegates from a majority of states agreed to this mode of election. 

    The election process begins with the primary elections and caucuses and moves to nominating conventions, during which political parties each select a nominee to unite behind. The nominee also announces a Vice Presidential running mate at this time. The candidates then campaign across the country to explain their views and plans to voters and participate in debates with candidates from other parties. 

    Before the general election, most candidates for President go through a series of state primaries and caucuses. Though primaries and caucuses are run differently, they both serve the same purpose; to allow the states to help choose the political parties' nominees for the general election. 

    During the general election, Americans head to the polls to cast their vote for President. But the tally of those votes the popular vote does not determine the winner. Instead, Presidential elections use the Electoral College. To win the election, a candidate must receive a majority of electoral votes. In the event no candidate receives the majority, the House of Representatives chooses the President and the Senate chooses the Vice President. 

    During presidential elections in the United States, it has become customary for the main candidates (almost always the candidates of the two largest parties, currently the Democratic Party and the Republican Party) to engage in a debate. The topics discussed in the debate are often the most controversial issues of the time, and arguably elections have been nearly decided by these debates . Candidate debates are not constitutionally mandated, but it is now considered a de facto election process. The debates are targeted mainly at undecided voters; those who tend not to be partial to any political ideology or party.

Source: QNA