Thanks for joining us on our rolling election coverage tonight.

We're heading over here to start a new blog for Friday (AEDT), when president-elect Donald Trump will visit Barack Obama in the White House.

Oh the excitement!

Making America Great Again

President-elect Donald Trump has his new website – greatagain.gov – live and kicking (though the first post was optimistically uploaded on November 2 – a good six days before the election).

The website has various policy overviews – yes, he's building the wall but no detail on *how* he'll build it or how much it'll cost. It's bye, bye Obamacare, there's a full section on regulatory reform, and a big emphasis on coal, gas and oil in the energy sector.

"We will end the war on coal, and rescind the coal mining lease moratorium, the excessive Interior Department stream rule, and conduct a top-down review of all anti-coal regulations issued by the Obama Administration," it reads.

"We will ... scrap the $5 trillion dollar Obama-Clinton Climate Action Plan and the Clean Power Plan and prevent these unilateral plans from increasing monthly electric bills by double-digits without any measurable effect on Earth's climate."

Eek.

There's a bio of Trump (no mention of lawsuits, bankruptcies, or groping allegations), plus a section on the future first lady. She has apparently "focused her platform on the problem of cyber bullying".

I'll leave that last one right here.

Reports of attacks on Muslims

We posted earlier about Donald Trump quietly removing references to deporting Muslims from his campaign website (you can read a cached version here). 

Reports are now filtering in of Muslims in the US being abused by people claiming to be Trump supporters.

A Muslim student at San Diego State University was robbed on Wednesday by two men who made comments about Trump and Muslims, according to police and university officials, who called the attack a hate crime.

The woman was walking to her car around 2.30pm local time when the two men grabbed her in the stairwell of a campus parking lot. They took her purse, backpack and car keys. The car was gone when the woman returned from reporting the incident to police.

In a separate incident on Wednesday, a female student at the University of Louisiana was beaten, robbed and had her hijab ripped off by two men, one of whom was wearing a "Trump" hat.

The San Diego State University Muslim Student Association is already planning a demonstration next week to protest against Trump's victory, saying his campaign has encouraged anti-Muslim sentiments.

 

Trump vowed throughout the campaign to ban, deport or use "extreme vetting" against Muslims entering the country. 

The Washington Post

Protesters cleared off LA freeway

The 101 freeway has been cleared of protesters several hours after they milled onto the road, cutting traffic in both directions.

At least 13 of the demonstrators were arrested.

Though the road was cleared just before 1am local time, officials expected it to remain closed to traffic for several hours as road crews cleaned it up and made repairs

Trump will be 'a little less scary' than expected: Howard

John Howard says he doesn't believe Donald Trump's presidency will be as "scary" as initially expected.

Earlier this year, the former Prime Minister said he trembled at the thought of a Trump presidency.

However, on the ABC's 7.30 on Thursday night, Mr Howard said the result had to be respected.

"We must accept and respect it and get on with it, and not say, how on earth did this happen?" he said.

"We have to accept he's been elected and wait and see what occurs.

"My judgement is it will turn out to be a little less radical and a little less scary than many people have suggested."

Mr Howard said there was a lesson in the result for Australian politicians - that they must embrace disenfranchised voters and find a better way of explaining issues such as globalisation to them.

Paul Keating: Australia should 'cut the tag' with US

Former Prime Minister Paul Keating has called for Australia to distance itself from the US following the election of Donald Trump.

Speaking to the ABC's 7.30 program, Mr Keating said Australia was "a better society" than the United States, and no longer needed to act sycophantic and subordinate.

"In foreign policy terms, we're getting the message from president-elect Donald Trump that he's a big-power guy and he's not for alliances. Like, wink wink, you may be on your own," Mr Keating said.

"What we have to do is make our way in Asia ourselves, with an independent foreign policy."

He said Australia's future is in "the region around us" and we could either branch out or "stay in a crouch, saying Hail Marys to the alliance".

"We've had more or less a tag-along foreign policy, tagging along to the United States," he said,

"It's time to cut the tag. Time to get out of it."

Protesters arrested

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) says people have been arrested in anti-Donald Trump demonstrations in the city.

LAPD Officer Tony Im told the Los Angeles Times that "at least 13" people were under arrest.

Earlier, the crowds had flooded onto the 101 freeway, blocking traffic.

That Trump effigy we saw earlier, which was carried at a protest in Los Angeles, was eventually set on fire.

This photo set from Los Angeles Times photographer Marcus Yam shows the giant head was dropped to the ground as it was consumed by flames.

Julia Gillard 'disappointed' for Hillary Clinton

Former Prime Minister Julia Gillard has said she is "disappointed" in Hillary Clinton's "gut-wrenching" electoral defeat.

Speaking at an event in Sydney on Thursday, Ms Gillard said she, like many, watched the results come in.

"I think all of us did want to see that big glass ceiling shattered. We did want to see President Clinton and we did want to have that moment of celebration today," Ms Gillard said.

"I am disappointed. I am disappointed personally for my friend Hillary."

Ms Gillard was joined by former colleague Tanya Plibersek in paying tribute to Clinton.

Plibersek, the deputy Labor leader, wrote on Twitter: "Thank you".

ABC News in the US has taken this video that shows the sheer number of protesters who gathered outside Trump Tower in Chicago.

This was the protest where people were chanting slogans like: "No Trump! No KKK! No racist USA."

There were no reports of violence or arrests.

Protests continue across US

Protests against president-elect Donald Trump have continued in the US.

A lot of spontaneous demonstrations broke out directly after Trump's victory speech, now it appears people have gathered in larger numbers.

Thousands of people took to the streets in New York, Chicago, Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston and Portland, Oregon.

In Los Angeles, demonstrators moved from a protest at City Hall and spilled onto the 101 highway, where they stopped traffic in both directions as they chanted "not our president" and other slogans.

The Californian city of Oakland was also gripped by protests, with an estimated 6,000 people blocking traffic, burning trash in the middle of the road, and setting off fireworks.

Thousands of Americans research moving to New Zealand

Thousands of Americans have registered interest in living in New Zealand after Donald Trump's victory, the Washington Post reports.

According to the Post, the government's immigration department site received 56,300 visits from the US in 24 hours to Thursday morning, up from its usual 2,300 visits.

Greg Forsythe from Immigration New Zealand told the paper that another website, which has information about living, working and studying in New Zealand, was visited from the US 70,500 times in the same period.

Of these visitors, 7,287 Americans formally registered their interest in moving to New Zealand 

Read the story here

 

Magazine pulls issue declaring Clinton 'Madam President'

American magazine Newsweek has pulled thousands of copies from circulation after it incorrectly guessed Hillary Clinton would win the election.

The magazine went to press with its election edition several days before voting began. Soon after, photographs of the front cover began to emerge on social media, stoking conspiracy theories that the election was "rigged".

Its cover declared "Madam President" and promised to chart Clinton's "historic journey to the White House".

Following Donald Trump's victory, editors scrambled to send out a replacement edition.

The CEO of Topix Media, which produced the magazines, told the New York Post: "Like everybody else, we got it wrong."

The election of Donald Trump is a "huge opportunity for middle America", writes Georgina Downer.

"It is a rejection of liberal internationalism, political correctness and the progressive politics of urban elites in favour of traditional American values – love of country, family and, for many, faith," she says.

"Like Brexit, it heralds a return to the pre-eminence of the nation state, of national sovereignty and democracy."

Read more here

Investors embrace the president-elect

Markets initially slumped when Donald Trump was elected, but they have since rallied in "one of the most incredible reversals in history".

Australian Associated Press reports the rebound came after Trump's conciliatory victory speech, where he avoided mentioning his more contentious policies.

"The US dollar and its Australian counterpart fell more than 100 basis points against the major currencies including the yen, euro and the British pound," AAP writes.

"But then a remarkable turnaround followed: US shares surged in their Wednesday session to finish more than one per cent higher, while on Thursday morning in Australia the benchmark S&P/ASX200 posted a 3.1 per cent intra-day gain.

"Asian shares followed the same path of post-election result slump to jump. Meanwhile, the greenback and the Aussie both completely recovered from their losses."

with AAP

Trump quietly revises Muslim stance

Donald Trump is no longer calling for a "complete shutdown" of Muslim migration to the United States.

A page on Trump's website, which had advocated the ban since December 2015, was quietly pulled down overnight.

Attempts to access the page redirected to the homepage of Trump's website, but a cached version remains available.

The page had read: "Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on.

"According to Pew Research, among others, there is great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim population."

The page quoted Trump as saying it was "obvious to anybody the hatred is beyond comprehension".

"Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad," he said.

As recently as November 6, Trump continued to say at rallies that he would suspend the Syrian refugee program to stop "radical Islamic terrorism".

The vision shot from higher vantage points at these protests have been pretty incredible at capturing the vast crowds. 

Thousands of people are marching through the streets of San Francisco, as shown in the video below, as well as in Manhattan, Seattle, Portland, Austin, Chicago and Pennsylvania. 

Shooting not related to the protests

Seattle Police have confirmed on Twitter that the shooting a short time ago was not connected to the protest. 

The Seattle Times has reported the shooting occurred about 7pm local time at Third Avenue and Pike Street. 

The anti-Trump protest started nearby at the Westlake Mall before turning into a march. 

It is still not clear how far away the protesters were from the shooting. 

The gunman is still at large, The Seattle Times reported. 

 

Five people shot in Seattle

Five people have reportedly been shot in Seattle, where Trump protesters are still on the city's streets.

Seattle police said on Twitter on Wednesday night that they were investigating a report of a shooting with "multiple victims" near the scene of protests. 

The Seattle Fire Department said on Twitter that crews were treating five patients with gunshot wounds, two of them with life-threatening injuries.

It was not immediately clear if the shooting was related to the demonstrations. Seattle police said on Twitter that more details would be released "as they become available."