CHICAGO — After a long and divisive campaign, Republican Donald Trump shocked the world by being elected the next president of the United States, beating former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The Associated Press called the race for Trump just after 1:30 a.m. Wednesday, with Wisconsin's 10 electoral votes putting him over the needed 270 to win. Trump spoke with Clinton, who called to concede, soon after. He then addressed ecstatic supporters in Manhattan with his wife, children and key supporters at his side.
"I promise I will not let you down," Trump said to cheers. "I love this country."
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Even as Trump rode an unprecedented wave of support from white residents of rural America, Democratic presidential nominee Clinton held on to a slight lead in the popular vote early Wednesday.
As Trump’s chances of victory climbed throughout the night, shocking political observers and upending most projections, early estimates projected the stock market was projected would open down more than 800 points the following day. But by Wednesday morning that gap had closed, with CNBC reporting that Dow futures were down less than 200 points.
On Wednesday morning Clinton told supporters, "Donald Trump is going to be our president. We owe him an open mind and a chance to lead."
"Let us have faith in each other. Let us not grow weary. Let us not lose heart. For there are more seasons to come and...more work to do,” she said.
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In his acceptance speech, Trump promised to reach out to those who did not support him.
"I pledge to be president for all Americans," Trump said. "America will no longer settle for anything but the best."
Trump said he would focus on the "urgent task of rebuilding our nation and renewing the American dream."
Trump promised to "fix inner cities" and rebuild America's infrastructure.
“It will become second to none, believe me," Trump said.
Vowing to double economic growth, Trump said America would have the strongest economy in the world.
Before launching into a list of thank you's to his family and staff members, Trump mentioned foreign policy only briefly, saying America would "get along with other nations who get along with us."
Trump’s victory could be bad news for Chicago, where the mayor and all but one member of the City Council are Democrats.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel — who criticized Trump as unfit to lead America — is unlikely to find willing partners in a White House controlled by the businessman-turned-politician.
Trump may decide to exact some revenge on Chicago officials, who ordered early this month that a street sign honoring him outside Trump Tower be taken down as soon as possible and blasted him as a racist who should not be allowed to occupy the White House.
Trump has written in his books and said often that he is driven by revenge and that it is a basic tool he uses in business.
Ald. Patrick O'Connor (40th), Emanuel's floor leader in the City Council, told the Sun-Times that it was a mistake to pick a fight with Trump.
"It will be a terrible thing for us personally in Chicago if he were to become president,” O'Connor said.
The lasting legacy of the campaign for Chicago might be the time it spent at the center of the spotlight created by the presidential election.
Chicago was held up by Trump as the embodiment of all that is wrong with urban America — a "war-torn country" rife with voter fraud and consumed with violence and poverty, he said.
"It is terrible there," Trump said in the first presidential debate.
Beginning in the Republican primary election, Trump singled out Chicago for criticism, decrying the number of people shot in Chicago during Obama's presidency.
There have been about 4,000 murders in Chicago since Obama took office on Jan. 20, 2009.
Trump repeatedly criticized the city and its gun control laws, but activists have said he doesn't care about Chicago, and a rally for him was canceled in mid-March as protesters spoke out against him. Several times, Trump has called for stop-and-frisk to be used to reduce violent crime in Chicago.
But a state law that requires officers to have reasonable suspicion before pulling someone over, and the Chicago Police Department's ACLU-approved policy calls for officers to document nearly all investigative stops, which are then to be reviewed by an outside agency.
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That new policy, however, was blamed for a huge drop in street stops, depressing morale among officers. Amid that morale drop, Chicago saw a surge of violence that claimed 78 lives in October alone, a 278 percent increase from last year.
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