US President Donald Trump has vowed to continue his legal fight as his Democratic rival Joe Biden edged closer to securing enough votes to win the presidency and was expected to give a prime-time televised address.
"We will pursue this process through every aspect of the law to guarantee that the American people have confidence in our government. I will never give up fighting for you and our nation," Trump said in a statement released by the White House.
"This is no longer about any single election. This is about the integrity of our entire election process," Trump said.
Trump now says he wants every legal ballot to be counted but that illegal ballots should not be counted.
There is no objective sign of major ballot fraud.
Biden's campaign said he will give a speech during prime time on Friday but did not disclose where or what he plans to say.
Biden took the lead over Trump in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Georgia for the first time on Friday, putting him on the verge of winning the White House.
Three days after polls closed, Biden has a 253 to 214 lead in the state-by-state Electoral College vote that determines the winner, according to Edison Research.
Winning Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes would put the former vice president over the 270 he needs to secure the presidency.
Biden would also win the election if he prevails in two of the three other key states where he held narrow leads on Friday: Georgia, Arizona and Nevada.
Like Pennsylvania, all three were still processing ballots on Friday.
In both Pennsylvania and Georgia, Biden overtook Trump on the strength of mail-in ballots that were cast in urban Democratic strongholds like Philadelphia and Atlanta.
Trump's campaign is pursuing a series of lawsuits across battleground states that legal experts described as unlikely to succeed in altering the election outcome.
The campaign's general counsel, Matt Morgan, asserted in a statement on Friday that the elections in Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania all suffered from improprieties and that Trump would eventually prevail in Arizona.
"This election is not over. The false projection of Joe Biden as the winner is based on results in four states that are far from final," Morgan said.
Election officials in those states have said they are unaware of any irregularities.
In Pennsylvania, Biden moved ahead of Trump by 13,371 votes at midday on Friday while in Georgia he opened up a 1579-vote lead.
Pennsylvania officials estimated on Friday they had 40,000 ballots left to count while Georgia officials said on Friday morning there were about 4000 regular ballots remaining.
Both margins were expected to grow as additional ballots were tallied.
Biden would be the first Democrat to win Georgia since Bill Clinton in 1992.
In Arizona, Biden's lead had narrowed on Friday to 41,302 votes and in Nevada his margin jumped to 20,552.
Officials in Georgia indicated on Friday there would be a recount in the state.
"Right now, Georgia remains too close to call ... With a margin that small there will be a recount in Georgia," Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said.
Another top election official said Georgia may not be able to certify its results until the end of November.
Australian Associated Press
