Inside the Arizona county rattled by bomb threats, where armed men guard the ballots and snipers are on the rooftops

Flashing blue lights lit up the dark streets of downtown Phoenix. Police tape cordoned off sections of road as a drone hovered high above. Police combed the scene, investigating a bomb threat in the heart of Arizona .

These were the scenes in Maricopa County last night as the votes rolled in, the air thick with suspicion, anxiety, and fear.

This county has long been seen as a tinderbox in a country smoldering with political resentment and division. It was ground zero for Donald Trump 's 'big lie' — the false claim that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen — where, four years ago, an armed mob took to the streets attempting to overturn Joe Biden 's victory in the state.

America was on a knife edge last night - and this morning, despite Donald Trump's sweeping victory, the US remains dangerously divided, with rival Republican and Democrat camps accusing each other of violent rhetoric... and worse.

So tense was the atmosphere in the city that minutes before the end of last night's polling, there were snipers on standby in case trouble kicked off.

Maricopa is America's fourth-largest county with a population of 4.5 million and was previously staunchly Republican. Biden was the first Democrat to win it since Harry S. Truman in 1948.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Trump was reported to be nearly four percentage points head, with about 60 percent of the votes counted.

Officials have warned it might take up to two weeks to count all the votes in a county that could decide which way Arizona tips.

Nearly 160 pairs of counters, one a Republican and the other a Democrat, are working in three shifts round the clock to deliver the results from the 249 voting centers when the ballot boxes – delivered by armed guard – are emptied out.

Meanwhile, the alert in Maricopa County – which targeted the Superior Court Building – was just one of five bomb threats made by email in the Grand Canyon State yesterday.

In a news conference, Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said the emailed bomb threats were false – and, though they came from an email address associated with Russia, they didn't necessarily originate overseas.

'The motivation appears to be to invoking chaos, not to impact any political outcome,' he said. And, in a place like the crucible of Maricopa County, that goal was certainly achieved.

Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, one of the senior officials tasked with the smooth running of the poll, had particular reason to be concerned.

It was his office – contained within the county supreme court building – that was targeted.

Richer worked closely with county supervisor Bill Gates, a man administering his final election after deciding to quit following a PTSD diagnosis, itself the result of sickening death threats four years ago.

Back then, armed men massed outside Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center, where votes are counted, egged on by conspiracy theories after Trump lost to Joe Biden by a tiny margin, fewer than 11,000 votes.

One anonymous caller later threatened Gates with 'execution' by firing squad. Another said they would rape his daughter. Richer, too, received death threats.

The mood of the county's 2.6 million active registered voters remains charged, which is why the authorities took no chances this year.

County sheriff Russ Skinner promised to use snipers and SWAT teams should law and order break down.

'We are on high alert... we have a lot of resources out there, a lot of staff, a lot of equipment,' he warned. 'We hope people do not cross the line. It will be zero tolerance to anything related to criminal activity...

'As far as snipers go, all my staff are on call. Do I have snipers on standby? Absolutely.'

There was razor wire at the rear of the election center. New fencing surrounded the compound and concrete blocks prevented vehicles from smashing their way in.

Anxious voter Scott Eller cast his ballot at the Burton Barr library voting center in downtown and appealed for calm and common sense.

'I believe in the Second Amendment, so I know very well how to protect myself. But I am not willing to fight for either party in an extreme way like that,' he told us.

'So, I just have to hope that common sense wins and we can all just have a smooth transition of power or retention of power. But I have no idea if that will happen, or what will happen here.

'Let's hope cooler heads will prevail. We should be appealing for calm right now. The state of division in our country had gotten to an extreme level. Our politicians have pushed it to a level that doesn't feel healthy.'

Eller, a 51-year-old pet food company boss, declined to say who he voted for.

'I live here in a swing state and my views probably tend to be a bit liberal, but yet I'm from the rural south in North Carolina,' he continued.

'Most of my family is on one side of the aisle. I'm more somewhere in the middle. Most of my friends are on the opposite side of that aisle.

'So, I spend lots of time with people with extreme positions on both sides and I often feel like the odd man out. But I can see the very real frustration on both sides.'

Last night in his victory speech, Donald Trump promised to 'heal' a divided America. Citizens of Maricopa County – and elsewhere in the Republic – are praying he succeeds.