Clinton wins first battle

The US presidential election got under way -- on a small scale -- with the seven voters of a tiny New Hampshire village who cast the nation's first ballots at the stroke of midnight.

Dixville Notch has had the honor of launching the voting, symbolically, since 1960.

Clay Smith was the first of the seven residents, including five men and two women, to vote as Tuesday's long awaited election day began. An eighth person voted by absentee ballot.

The tally was announced in a matter of minutes: the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton beat out her Republican rival Donald Trump, four to two.

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson won one vote, and there was a write-in vote for Mitt Romney, the Republican who lost to incumbent President Barack Obama in 2012.

New Hampshire may be one of the smallest US states but Clinton and Trump worked until the last minute to woo voters here. Clinton held a rally in New Hampshire on Sunday, and Trump did so on Monday. They are neck and neck in New Hampshire as they battle for its four electoral votes.