Shockwaves felt around the globe as Republican surges to a shock win.



LATEST UPDATES
• President Barack Obama says he's instructing his team to make sure there is a peaceful transfer of power to Donald Trump.
• Hillary Clinton says she's "sorry" she didn't win the election, adding "this is painful, and it will be for a long time."
• Prime Minister John Key is now signalling there's little hope left for the Trans Pacific Partnership. "We'll work our way through it, it's bad in the sense that it's very hard to see TPP progressing now in the lame duck period, you'd have to be a real optimist to believe that," he told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking.
• New Zealand and other nations across the globe are waking up to the reality of a Trump presidency with shell-shocked political, business and military leaders attempting to forecast what his impact will be.

7.10am: Prime Minister John Key is now signalling there's little hope left for the Trans Pacific Partnership. Just last month he was saying he thought there was a 50-50 chance of the deal going through.

But he's saying different now. "We'll work our way through it, it's bad in the sense that it's very hard to see TPP progressing now in the lame duck period, you'd have to be a real optimist to believe that," he told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking.

6.45am: "It is no secret that the President-elect and I had some pretty significant differences," Obama said.

"I have instructed my team to follow the example that President Bush's team set eight years ago and work as hard as we can to make sure this is a successful transition for the President-elect."

Continued below.

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"We are all rooting for his success in uniting and leading the country," he continued. "I could not be prouder for her," Obama said of Clinton.

"Her candidacy and nomination was historic, and sent a message to our daughters all across the country that they can achieve at the highest levels of politics."

President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

6.30am: President Obama called Trump "to congratulate him on his victory early this morning" and invited Trump to meet him at the White House on Thursday.

6.27am: A philosophical Barack Obama said losses were inevitable in politics. "If we lose, we learn from our mistakes, we learn from our mistakes, we lick our wounds."

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6.20am: Outgoing US President Barack Obama has pledged to ensure a professional handover to President-elect Donald Trump. "We have some pretty significant differences... but remember, eight years ago, President Bush and I had some significant differences."

Obama said Americans were all one team: "We are patriots first... we all want what's best for Americans."

He hoped Trump, as president, would respect and honour that principle.

6am: A day after Donald Trump, against all odds, won election as America's 45th president, Hillary Clinton said the nation proved to be "more divided than we thought" but urged unity and told her supporters, "We owe him an open mind and a chance to lead."

Standing before a crowd of crestfallen but cheering supporters, she said, "This is painful and it will be for a long time."

Trump's triumph over Clinton, not declared until well after midnight (UST), will end eight years of Democratic dominance of the White House.

He'll govern with Congress fully under Republican control and lead a country deeply divided by his rancorous campaign against Clinton. He faces fractures within his own party, too, given the numerous Republicans who either tepidly supported his nomination or never backed him at all.

As he claimed victory early Wednesday, Trump urged Americans to "come together as one united people."

5.51am: Hillary Clinton: "This loss hurts... but please never stop believing that fighting for what's right is worth it."

5.43am: Hillary Clinton: "This is painful and will be for a long time. Our nation is more deeply divided than we thought. Donald Trump is president... we owe him an open mind and a chance to lead."

5.40am: Hillary Clinton, flanked by husband Bill, thanks her supporters. "Last night I congratulated Donald Trump... I hope he will be a successful president for all Americans. This is not the outcome we wanted."


5.30am: Clinton's running mate, vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine: "My wife and I are so proud of Hillary Clinton... she has made history. Last night she won the popular vote of Americans."

5.10am: Hillary Clinton is finally about to take the stage in New York to speak publicly following Donald Trump's stunning ascendancy to the White House. Clinton failed to show at her own campaign party last night. Stay with us for live coverage.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican, says it's the most stunning political achivement that he's witnessed in his lifetime. "Donald Trump heard a voice in this country that no one else heard...he turned politics on its head."


EARLIER


Anxiety and disbelief mounted among United States allies, but Europe's far-right exulted yesterday, as Donald Trump took a shock victory in the US presidential race.

Nowhere was the result felt more keenly than in Mexico, as the peso crumbled on a night of lightning bolts and thunder in the country's capital.

"It feels like our nightmare is here," tweeted Jorge Guajardo, who was Mexico's ambassador to China from 2007 to 2013.

Trump's disdain for Mexican immigrants and his pledges to build a wall along the Mexican border and renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement have made him a figure of hate for many Mexicans.

Anxiety also mounted in Japan and South Korea, key US strategic allies in Asia.

In Europe, there was never any secret about the continent's overwhelming preference in advance of the US vote. Among major US allies across the Atlantic, leaders spoke openly of their contempt for Trump and their fear of the consequence should he be elected.

But Europe's far-right began to cheer yesterday, sensing an opportunity for themselves. Britain voted to leave the European Union over the northern summer, and far-right parties are surging in France and Germany.

"The people are taking their country back. So will we," wrote Geert Wilders, the leader of a surging Dutch eurosceptic party who has pushed for hard barriers against immigration.

In Japan, financial authorities called an urgent meeting to discuss a fall in the country's stock market in response to Trump's strong showing. Experts said Americans had shown their dissatisfaction with politicians and with globalisation -- a concern for exporters in Japan and South Korea.

"Trump is a protectionist in trade," said Hasung Jang, a professor of finance at Korea University in Seoul. "Trump's victory will be a very negative change for South Korea because we have an export-oriented economy. There's a possibility South Korea will become geopolitically closer to China if Trump wins."

A Trump victory could also heighten tensions between North and South Korea, Jang said, predicting the already-bad relationship would get worse. "The current situation seems like the beginning of the US's decline and a beginning of the failure of democracy," Jang said.

In China, by contrast, state media celebrated even before the vote what they saw as the gradual demise of American power and of its democracy. A commentary in the People's Daily, the Communist Party mouthpiece, said the election revealed an "ill democracy", while the China Daily branded the race a "chaotic political farce". The nationalist Global Times said the US and China might have more frictions over the economy and trade under a Trump presidency -- and experience fewer strategic and geopolitical obstacles -- but argued that the overall situation would not change much.

US ambassador to China Max Baucus also argued that the "world's most important relationship" would remain stable and played down Trump's threat to impose a 45 per cent tariff on Chinese goods.

"People say a lot of things in the heat of a campaign that are not quite as feasible as they think when they are elected," he said, according to the Associated Press.

Shen Dingli, a professor in international studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, said Trump could cut American military support for Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, which would benefit China's geostrategic interests. But he argued that Trump would not necessarily damage trade ties.

"He is very practical in doing trade," he said. "He does business with China himself, he would not be stupid enough to stop the United States doing business with China."

On social media in China, opinions ranged from prediction of a world war to assurances that there was no need to worry.

"America has a constitution, Supreme Court, federal Government and right to bear arms," one user posted. "Trump will not get too far. Even if he truly cannot do his job, he will mess up on stage for four years. If he has big faults, Congress can start a legal investigation or impeach him."

But David Schlesinger, managing director of Tripod Advisers in Hong Kong, posted on Facebook about his concerns over the power Trump could wield.

"If president, house, senate and court go one way, that leaves only the press -- now horribly discredited and disbelieved -- as a check," he wrote.

Despite the bitter presidential race, some Chinese Netizens said their own country still did not compare favourably with the US.

"Although the US Government is good for nothing, it is elected by citizens," one user pointed out.

"I don't know what voting is," another user commented. "I have never even been able to vote for my village chief."

A third user took a similar line. "It is not important whether Trump wins or Hillary wins. The important thing is that Americans have the right to praise, criticise, and impeach a president."

In the Philippines, the mood was sombre at the US Embassy's election party in Manila, with a crowd of Filipino-Americans and students eager to study in the US expressing fear, shock and disappointment.

"The US is known as a country for immigrants, as the land of the free, but he wants to build a wall," said Carlos Llamas, a 19-year-old college junior studying consular and diplomatic affairs. "As president you are chief diplomat for your country, but he doesn't act like that."

Classmate Bria Tamayao, 18, wondered how two men known for posturing and tough talk -- Trump and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte -- could work together.

"I don't know what will happen to the Philippines and the United States," she said. "This kind of unpredictable behaviour is not good for the world."

Protocol normally calls for foreign leaders to maintain strict neutrality in the internal affairs of their allies. But that didn't stop French President Francois Hollande from declaring before the vote that some of Trump's policy positions made him want "to wretch". The British Parliament even debated banning the New York billionaire from British shores.

The European public seemed to share the anti-Trump views of their leaders. A survey of seven European nations by the polling firm YouGov last month found support for Trump generally mired in the single digits, with Clinton receiving overwhelming majorities.

Majorities in nearly every European country surveyed also said that their dominant response to a Trump victory would be to feel "afraid". The exception to the anti-Trump sentiment in Europe came from far-right leaders and other anti-immigration populists.

British Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage cheered Trump's rise and appeared alongside him at US rallies, urging America to stand up to the establishment in the way that he said the British public had with its June EU referendum.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who built a fence to block migrants amidst the refugee crisis, was among the few governmental leaders in Europe to back Trump.



- Washington Post