"I checked my phone four times through the night; it's sort of like waiting for a terminal illness diagnosis."
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
That's how American Inverell resident Michèle Jedlicka described how she's feeling as the voting continues in her home country in the race to the White House.
As of 11.30am Thursday (AEDT), Joe Biden was leading the race to become the next president of the United States, with 264 electoral votes compared to Donald Trump's 214.
Biden has won two key northern states - Wisconsin and Michigan - while several key battleground states including Pennsylvania remain unclaimed in the US 2020 election, as the world awaits a conclusive result.
As a fierce democratic, Ms Jedlicka, an American citizen originally from Chicago Illinois, cast her vote months ago for Biden and on Thursday morning said she was feeling hopeful after months of anxiety leading up to the election.
READ MORE: Fear and hope on the eve of the election
"We're all feeling hopeful at the moment," she said, as Biden leads the vote count.
Ms Jedlicka is also encouraged by the number of people who turned out to not only vote this year, but have been activated to learn about how the government works and the voting system.
"Now there's so much at stake that people are taking the time to learn which is good," she said.
"It was a historic turn-out in the US which shows people care about having their voices heard.
"But now Trump is going to challenge those votes."
Ms Jedlicka said it is concerning, but not surprising, that Trump is now claiming electoral fraud and has threatened to go to the Supreme Court to stop all voting.
The Trump campaign has demanded a recount in Wisconsin and filed lawsuits to halt counting in Georgia, Michigan and Pennsylvania after the President repeatedly claimed - without proof - that Biden's gains were the result of electoral fraud.
"It's crazy," Ms Jedlicka said.
"Trump is trying very hard to spread disinformation. If those votes were all for him, there'd be no question.
"It is very discouraging. It could cause unrest and violence which is scary.
"It's distressing, it's unsettling.
"The division in the country and my family - I have a house divided; one parent would have voted for Trump and one is a die-hard democrat - all because of this man.
"He stood up there at 2 in the morning lying to his voters saying he'd won, but states hadn't been counted. It's a real stain on democracy.
"I'm here watching it unfold, on the first day of over 100,000 new coronavirus cases. It's a bit of a mess."
Fellow American-born North West resident, Moree's Linda Woodbridge, has also been following the election closely.
Although she's been living in Australia for 50 years, she still has strong ties to her birth country with both her sisters and their families still over there.
"The disappointment I feel to see the country I grew up in and seeing now what's happened to it," she said.
"It's just a mess."
Ms Woodbridge, who is from California where twice as many people voted for Biden than Trump, said she's particularly concerned about the aftermath of the election.
"If Trump doesn't win, he's trying to take it to the Supreme Court," she said.
"But he's packed the Supreme Court with conservatives.
"He's a miserable, miserable person. I'm sorry that this has had to be a part of our world's history.
"I pray to God that [there won't be riots after the election]."
