Donald Trump has won the presidency

Donald Trump marked his world-shaking victory over Hillary Clinton early this morning with a dramatic peace-making gesture, saying: 'We owe her a debt of gratitude and I mean that very sincerely.'

After he sensationally won the White House race, Clinton phoned him at 2:30 a.m. to concede she had lost.

She made the private call shortly after sending her campaign chairman to give her supporters exactly the opposite message, that it was not over – a humiliating and bizarre end to a political career which had put her on the verge of being the first female president.

Instead a jubilant Trump Election Night headquarters party erupted in cheers as the news broke.

Trump accepted the mantle of leadership with uncharacteristic humility nearly three hours after Election Day was over.

'Now it's time for America to bind the wounds of division,' he began his victory speech just before 3am. 'I pledge to every citizen of our land that I will be president for all Americans – and this is so important to me.

'For those who have chosen not to support me in the past - of which there were a few people - I'm reaching out to you for your guidance and your help, so we can work together and unify our great country.'

'I promise you that I will not let you down,' he said.

He thanked his parents, saying they were 'wonderful in every regard'. He thanked his sisters, his brothers, his wife and children 'for putting up with all of those hours. ... This political stuff was nasty and it was tough'. He even thanked the U.S. Secret Service.

And in a twist nearly as bizarre as the sum of Campaign 2016, he thanked Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, who had called him minutes earlier to concede the presidential race after declining to do it from the stage of what was to be her own victory party.

Instead of bluster about her classified emails, Trump brought a gracious acknowledgement of her decades of government service.

'She congratulated us – it's about us – on our victory,' he said. 'And I congratulated her and her family on a very, very hard-fought campaign over a very long period of time. We owe her a debt of gratitude and I mean that very sincerely.'

'I mean, she fought very hard. Hillary has worked very long and very hard over a long period of time, and we owe her a major debt of gratitude for her service to our country.'

No one yelled 'Lock her up!'– an aggressive rallying cry from Trump's hundreds of rallies and the Republican National Convention in July.

CLINTON'S BIZARRE ENDING – SHE HAS STILL NOT APPEARED IN PUBLIC

Clinton has yet to concede the race publicly. Her campaign chairman John Podesta mad the trek from a Manhattan hotel to the convention center where confetti cannons were at the ready.

'Several states are too close to call,' he said at the time, 'so we're not going to have anything more to say tonight.'

'Everybody should head home,' Podesta told a ballroom brimming with thousands of hopeful Democrats. 'You should get some sleep. We'll have more to say tomorrow.'

Clinton, he said, 'has done an amazing job, and she is not done yet.'

But she was done, and Trump's crowd knew it the moment their hero spoke.

Bringing all his family members and key staff on stage with him, Trump thanked his senior aides one by one.

Campaign director Kellyanne Conway waved and smiled. She curtsied and held both thumbs up, and then stuck around to talk to TV camera crews until nearly 4 o'clock in the morning.

Dr. Ben Carson, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus and even the 'Bridgegate' scandal-plagued New Jersey Gov Chris Christie got a mention from America's most improbable president.

Priebus, he said, is 'a superstar.' The two men embraced, and then the RNC chief pronounced Trump 'the next President of the United States.'

At 3:08 a.m., with Clintonworld in ruins, Trump descended to the stage into a hotel ballroom and mingled with invited guests and supporters.

Red caps flew in the air. The Rolling Stones played 'You Can't Always Get What You Want,' perhaps a subtle dig at the Democrats or the press.

And Vice-President-Elect Mike Pence, the governor of Indiana for another 73 days, beamed.

'I come to this moment deeply humbled, grateful to God for his amazing grace,' Pence said as he introduced the man who had vaulted him into the national spotlight.

'The American people have spoken and the American people have elected their new champion,' Pence declared.

'America has elected a new president, and it's almost hard for me to express the honor that I and my family feel, that we will have the privilege to serve.'

When Trump emerged on stage along with nearly 50 aides and family members, he apologized for putting the crowd on pins and needles while the evening's drama played out.

'Sorry to keep you waiting. Complicated business,' he said.

The love-fest continued with his most bitter Republican primary rival, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, offering his unqualified congratulations.

'Americans have resoundingly rejected the Obama-Clinton agenda of bigger government, intrusive regulation, executive overreach, and lawlessness that is killing innovation and jobs, squandering opportunity for working men and women, marginalizing our freedoms, and compromising our security,' Cruz said in a statement.

'This election astonished the pundits. This was a change election. Americans voted for Republicans because of a promise to go to Washington to reverse our current course, and end the Washington cartel – a promise to drain the swamp. Now is the time to follow through on those words with action. We cannot wait even one day to begin implementing a conservative agenda that fulfills those commitments.'

The bizarre ending to Clinton's political career came after Trump confounded pollsters at every turn, capturing one 'swing' state after another in a line of toppled dominoes that stretched across three time zones and now ends at the White House.

The last to fall was the Keystone State – after Florida, North Carolina, Georgia and Wisconsin all went to the Republican. That gave him 274 votes in the electoral college; the winner is the first to reach 270.

He was also winning the popular vote by more than a 1 per cent margin.

Clinton is contemplating a ruinous end to her career, the potential of a renewed investigation into her and Bill's charity and personal riches by a special prosecutor, and the Democrats bring locked out of not just the White House but both houses of Congress.

There will also be a Republican lock on the Supreme Court which could last a generation.