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Election Day: News, headlines from across B.C. and Canada

Results: Justin Trudeau and the Liberals have won a majority government, and are projected to win over 180 seats.
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The federal election is today


(The video above is a recap of the highlights of this election campaign, which officially began on August 2 and ends with voting today – October 19, 2015. Video: The Canadian Press)

Updates from election night across Canada, via Twitter:

The Canadian Press's interactive map shows the results and a wave of red in Toronto, Canada's largest city:

With a Liberal majority all but confirmed by the election's conclusion, the Canadian Press reports that outgoing Prime Minister Stephen Harper will resign from his post as leader of the federal Conservatives:

The Green Party watches Justin Trudeau's victory speech (photo via Randene Neill, Global):

Above a sea of cameras, incoming Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to his supporters in Montreal (photo via Sean Leathong, CHCH in Hamilton):

Liberal supporters wait for incoming Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to take the stage, victorious (via Sean Leathong, CHCH in Hamilton):

At its height, the Canadian federal election was out-trending Major League Baseball and the Toronto Blue Jays (who won 11-8, by the way) on Google:

Justin Trudeau celebrates with his wife Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau, after he and his Liberals are declared the winners of this federal election:

It appears Abbotsford Conservative MP Ed Fast will re-win his riding in the Fraser Valley, reports the Abbotsford News's Tyler Olsen:

Reporting from South Surrey-White Rock, the Surrey Leader's Boaz Joseph snaps a photo of MP candidate Judy Higginbotham, and her reaction to Justin Trudeau being declared Prime Minister:

The Surrey Now newspaper quotes Liberal candidate Randeep Sarai, who's running in Surrey Centre:

The scene from Liberal headquarters, via the Globe and Mail:

Okanagan reporter Megan Turcato films from the Liberal office in Vernon, B.C.:

Global News interviews former Liberal leader Bob Rae, after projecting Trudeau as Canada's next Prime Minister:

Hamilton-based TV reporter Sean Leathong reports from Liberal headquarters, which started "filling up" after Justin Trudeau was declared the winner, before 10 p.m. Eastern time:

Just after 6:40 p.m. (PST) on Monday night, before voting had even closed in British Columbia, Global News projected a Liberal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:

Photo via Olivia Bowden, showing Conservative supporters faced with federal defeat:

Photo via Global Okanagan reporter Kimberly Davidson, from Karley Scott's election night headquarters in her riding of West Kelowna:

Globe and Mail editor Matt Frehner posted this interactive map, showing the difference between election results in 2011 and the early results from 2015, in Atlantic Canada:

CBC host Harry Forestell watches the election with students at St. Thomas University, in Fredericton:

Global tracks social media activity – specifically in comparison with tonight's Toronto Blue Jays game – during the election:

Some updates from the federal candidates for Prime Minister, and their parties, via Twitter:

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau voted with his family – with wife Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau in the background – in Papineau:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and his wife Laureen, vote in the incumbent's riding of Calgary Southwest on Monday:

NDP leader Tom Mulcair, in his riding of Outremont (Quebec) on Monday morning:

A crowd of NDP supporters in Oshawa (Ontario) on election day:

Trudeau finishes his weekend campaigning in North Vancouver...

... and in Surrey:

Mulcair takes the stage in Montreal, in front of "2,500" supporters, on Sunday:

Story originally posted at 8 a.m. on Monday morning:

Doors opened this morning in B.C., our province's polling stations joining the over-66,000 total across the country on Monday, October 19 – the final day of the 2015 federal election.

Voting opened at 7 a.m. and close at 7 p.m. That means voting in Canada's western-most province closes a half-hour after booths close in Ontario.

(Go to Elections Canada's website for answers to any Frequently Asked Questions about today's election, including information about your riding and where you must go to vote, based on your postal code.)

What's happening out there?

Here are the headlines from around the province and around the country, with news and updates from Black Press's papers across B.C., and other reporters/outlets across Canada:

  • The Abbotsford News is covering today's action at its polls, and the papers reports that more than 9,000 people already cast ballots in advanced polling a week ago, in both the Abbotsford and Mission-Matsqui-Fraser Canyon ridings.
  • Voters were lined up early in the Kelowna-Lake Country riding, before doors opened at South Anglican church hall at 7 a.m. this morning. "Of the approximate staff, five were under 25 years age," reported the Capital News in Kelowna.
  • Prime Minister Stephen Harper concluded his campaign in Abbotsford on Sunday night, warning his supporters of what he called the "economic risk" of voting for the NDP or the Liberal Party.
  • On Saturday, the Mission City Record reported voter frustration in the riding of Mission-Matsqui-Fraser Canyon, as those who live on the border of nearby Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge are being forced to drive "more than half an hour" to the nearest voting station.

Here are some bulletins from Elections Canada's official Twitter account:

Other notes and complaints from voters across Canada, about personal hassle they've faced – or are reporting – on election day:

NOTE: Use the hashtag #pollwatch on Twitter to report or post your own experiences with voting today.

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A review of the preview

When the ballots are counted and the results are released, that will end the longest election campaign in modern Canadian history. And the leaders of the country's three contending federal parties – Justin Trudeau with the Liberals, Tom Mulcair with the NDP, and defending champ Stephen Harper with the Conservatives – all have a legitimate chance to lead a minority government, perhaps a majority for Harper and Trudeau (as pre-election polling indicates), and to almost evenly divide Canada's 338 seats and districts among them.

A final Ipsos Reid poll, released over the weekend, hints at a Liberal minority federally – with several ridings listed as too close to call, and with Trudeau's party winning 38 per cent of the vote and 140 seats to the Conservatives' 115 seats. The NDP, in the poll, has been predicted to win 79 seats.

"It looks like the Liberals are going to win," said Ipsos CEO Darrell Bricker, in and interview with Global News last weekend. "We're going to have a Trudeau at 24 Sussex again; the question is how big will they win? ... Right now it probably looks like a minority but it's all going to come down to turnout and actually getting those votes in the ballot box for the Liberals."