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CNN Live Event/Special
Election Night in America; CNN Projects Results for Kansas, Texas, Mississippi, the Dakotas; GOP Projected to Keep Control of House of Representatives
Aired November 06, 2012 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I want all of our viewers to get ready right now. Here they come.
And let's start with all these states. We project winning states for Mitt Romney will begin in Kansas and the six electoral votes in Kansas. We project Kansas will be won by Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee. Continuing, other states, Louisiana in the south, eight electoral votes, Mitt Romney will carry Louisiana, we project another win for Mitt Romney.
Nebraska, we project he will get three of the five electoral votes. They allocate by congressional district. Right now we can project three, three going for Mitt Romney. In North Dakota, another three electoral votes, all of them in North Dakota going for Mitt Romney.
Staying in the Dakotas, let's go to South Dakota right now. Three electoral votes, we project those three electoral votes will go for Mitt Romney in South Dakota. Look at this. Texas, 38 electoral votes all going for Mitt Romney. He wins the state of Texas. That was expected, a big win.
From Texas to Wyoming, three electoral votes, they go for Mitt Romney as well. But not only in Wyoming but let's stay Mississippi. Six electoral votes, Mitt Romney carries Mississippi as well.
We cannot make projections right now in several states but we can make projections for President Obama. In Michigan, right now, Michigan, look at this, it was supposed to be close but right now the polls have just closed in Michigan. We are already able to project that Michigan, Michigan, the home of the U.S. auto industry, will be in the president's column, 16 electoral votes. We know some Republicans thought they had a shot there. Doesn't look like they had much of a shot. Sixteen electoral votes going for Michigan.
New York state, another big prize. We anticipated New York state, always heavily Democratic in presidential contests, would go for the president. The president picks up all 29 electoral votes in New York state, and he does in New Jersey as well. Fourteen electoral votes, we project all of them will go for the president of the United States. They had severe weather problems in New Jersey and New York. But we've made those projections. All right. Here's where we stand right now. At Obama headquarters, by the way, they're cheering right now. I think we've got some live pictures. Let's show our viewers what's going on over at Obama headquarters as they watch what's going on. I guess they're pretty happy about Michigan specifically.
No projections right now in Arizona, Colorado, Minnesota, New Mexico and Wisconsin. We need more information before we can make projections in those states. We're watching them.
The road to 270, here's where it stands right now, just after 9:00 p.m. on the East Coast. Mitt Romney is ahead. He has 152 electoral votes compared to 123 for the president of the United States. Two hundred and seventy are needed to win the White House as you know.
And as we wait for more real votes to come in, we want to share with you what our exit polls are revealing. Remember, these are estimates, they're based on interviews with a sampling of voters as they left select polling stations today and phone interviews, by the way, with a sampling of people who voted early.
Here are the exit poll estimates we can share with you. In Arizona, we have not made a projection but the estimate is from the exit poll, 52 percent for Mitt Romney, 46 percent for the president. Look how close it is in Colorado. Based on our exit poll information right now, 48 percent to 48 percent, doesn't get any closer than that. Colorado, a key, key battleground state.
In Minnesota right now, the president, 50 percent, Mitt Romney 47 percent in our exit poll estimate.
Remember, these are estimates only that reflect the votes of the people we interviewed at select polling places. Early voters we interviewed on the phone. It may not necessarily reflect the actual outcome in a particular state once we get the final vote.
We have some more exit poll information, by the way, I want to share it with you. New Mexico right now, 52 percent for the president, 43 percent, 43 percent for Mitt Romney in New Mexico. We have not made a projection.
Wisconsin, the home state of Paul Ryan, the Republican vice presidential nominee, the exit poll shows 52 percent for the president, 46 percent for Mitt Romney.
Both of these states, New Mexico and Wisconsin, went for President Obama four years ago.
Anderson, these are a lot -- a lot of states coming in, a lot of projected states, lot of states that we cannot yet make projections.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We saw the crowd reaction at the Obama headquarters. Let's check in with Jessica Yellin who's at Obama headquarters and also Candy Crowley at Romney headquarters.
First, let's go to Jessica -- Jessica.
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Anderson. Well, it's just gotten significantly noisier here since we made that projection. I know. You saw how the room went wild when we called Michigan. That is a sign to people here and at Obama's headquarters as well that the auto bailout, no doubt, made a huge difference for the president for voters in Michigan and they no doubt will read it as a sign that he could score very well with voters in Ohio. Still of course too close to call.
I can also tell you that they feel good about Colorado. They think that they are on track with where they were headed into Colorado based on their 2008 model, and that that is a state that they know as well as any state because they have the same person working that state who mapped out Democratic Senator Michael Bennet's campaign there. He waged a bitterly fought battle in 2010 against a Tea Party candidate and eked out a victory when most other Democrats didn't, and that person also helped President Obama plan his campaign strategy in Colorado and they think they will win it tonight -- Anderson.
COOPER: We'll be watching that, obviously, very closely.
As I said, Candy Crowley is standing by at Romney headquarters.
Candy, reaction that you're getting there?
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, actually, what they're doing right now, and what they've been doing over the course of this night is they beam people in from other states. Senator Kelly Ayotte from New Hampshire right now, we're listening to Governor McDonnell from Virginia. They all are kind of reporting upbeat numbers to this crowd saying hey, we're looking good here, they are encouraged. Behind closed doors with the high turnout.
But it would be wrong to say that they aren't nervous because, obviously, looking at these numbers closing in in Florida, this is something that Mitt Romney, they would say that is really very close to a must-win. Virginia looking good for them. They feel strong in Virginia. Ohio, they continue to publicly be bullish about their chances in Ohio. They say look, we're coming in with big numbers in the places where we have to have the big numbers.
But of course, if President Obama is doing that as well, you're kind of back to the drawing board at square one. So, again, sort of a high tension, I suspect, behind closed doors but publicly, they are still very bullish about their chances in all these swing states.
COOPER: High tension. It looks like a lot of mobile devices people are on right now.
Candy, we have another projection I think Wolf can make. Let's check in -- Wolf.
BLITZER: Anderson, thanks very much. A really major projection we're going to make right now. And CNN projects the Republicans will maintain their majority in the House of Representatives. We know Nancy Pelosi, the minority leader, thought they had a shot at winning 25 seats. They needed to get the Democrats in the majority. That is not happening. The Republicans will keep control of the House of Representatives.
John Boehner, the speaker of the House, the speaker of the House, will be very happy to hear that we are projecting the Republicans will retain the majority in the House of Representatives.
I want to bring in our political director, Mark Preston, who has been reviewing all of the information as far as the House of Representatives is concerned.
How can we make that projection, Mark?
MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, you know, Wolf, 20 of the most competitive House races were in states where the polls closed at 8:00. We've seen enough raw data in these races to tell us now, in fact, that House Republicans will hold the House or rather, House Republicans will hold the House majority in those races. We see that the Republicans are ahead in 12 of them. Democrats are ahead in three of them.
There's just not enough races out there, competitive races, for Democrats to get to 25 seats that they need, the net seats that they need, to take back the House of Representatives -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. Thanks very much. Mark, John Boehner will be the speaker of the House once again.
Anderson, so the House stays in Republican control. We don't know about the Senate yet.
COOPER: Yes. And that's something we've been watching very closely, Dana Bash, you and I.
DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. And when you're talking about the House, though, what is most fascinating is Mark talked about the fact the Democrats needed a net 25 to take the majority. Going into tonight and even tonight talking to my Democratic sources, they think it's possible by the end of the night when we get the west coast results that Republicans will actually pick up seats. Never mind the Democrats not getting the majority. Republicans may have a net gain of a few seats.
And what I'm also hearing from Democratic sources, a lot of frustration with the president of the United States because he may -- you know how many robocalls he made for Democratic candidates?
COOPER: How many?
BASH: One. One in -- for Tammy Duckworth, the Democratic candidate in suburban Chicago. It's pretty easy to record a robocall. And --
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: And also there have been critics who said that when the president goes to a place, traditionally they'll have the --
BASH: Yes.
COOPER: The congressional candidates on stage. The president doesn't do that.
BASH: One senior Democratic source told me that California, for example, it's one of those orphan states, meaning there was no real presidential race there, but there were a lot of critical battleground House states, that he went to California and used it as an ATM machine, meaning he raised a lot of money and he never helped out some of the really, really critical races that could have helped Democrats.
(CROSSTALK)
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: So are there any big coattails? I mean, or is there going to be reverse coattails here?
BASH: Well, what I'm hearing is that that's part of the problem, there might be reverse coattails. The other thing that a lot of Democrats saw in polling in these key House races is when the president blew it in the first debate, the bottom dropped out in a lot of the races, and some of the more red states, because Republicans really got their enthusiasm up.
COOPER: David?
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Anderson, if you look at it, as Dana has already been reporting, it looks like the Senate is going to stay Democratic. Now at least one state has already flipped to the Democrats. And looks like one more may.
And you -- I think we're going to be talking more about this over the course of the evening because if President Obama wins this, it's clear that we spent $6 billion and we came back to a status quo election.
COOPER: Right.
GERGEN: Nothing changed.
BORGER: Right.
COOPER: Right.
GERGEN: But B, it's also clear with this close an election, the Democrats in the House not happy with him, Republicans retaking the House, it's going to be tough to govern when this is over. We ought to talk more about that.
(CROSSTALK)
BORGER: We're where we left off. COOPER: We're going to be talking a lot about that. Yes.
GERGEN: What's that?
BORGER: It's where we left off.
GERGEN: Yes.
COOPER: We want to talk about that coming up. First, let's check back with Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. Let's take a look at the numbers. The actual numbers that are coming in in two key battleground states, Florida and North Carolina. And look at this. Seventy-four percent of the vote is now in in Florida. The president has 50 percent, Mitt Romney has 49 percent. More than six million votes have been counted, 6,500,000, approximately. There is a difference between these two candidates of only 16,226 votes.
Seventy-four percent of the vote is in. It's close, close in the state of Florida. Twenty-nine electoral votes at stake. And look at this. It just changed as we were speaking. It's now 50 percent to 50 percent, 3,329,000 for Barack Obama, 3,330,000 for Mitt Romney.
Mitt Romney, look at this, is slightly ahead by 1,288 votes, 1,288 votes in Florida. Wow. This is pretty close, as you can imagine. We still got some votes to count.
North Carolina, look at how close it is in North Carolina right now as well. Sixty-six percent of the vote is in. Mitt Romney slightly ahead in North Carolina, 50 percent to 49 percent. Mitt Romney, three million votes have been counted. 47,000 vote advantage in North Carolina. And its 15 electoral votes.
Let's take a look at some other votes that are coming in right now. In Virginia and Ohio. First, Virginia, 41 percent of the vote is in. Mitt Romney maintaining a lead, 54 percent to 45 percent. It just changed. Still 54-45 but that's a significant lead of 1,500,000 votes have been counted. He's got a lead of 138,000 votes in Virginia. Thirteen electoral votes at stake.
And look at Ohio right now. Twenty-seven percent. That's a significant number, 27 percent of the vote in Ohio are in right now. They have been counted. The president has an advantage, 55 to 44 percent, an advantage of about 180,000 votes in Ohio.
If he continues to hold Ohio, that's very good news for the president because no Republican has ever won the White House without Ohio.
We have some more votes coming in, real votes right now. Let's take a look at Colorado. And New Hampshire. First, Colorado. Early 9 percent of the vote is in but Mitt Romney maintains a lead, has a lead of 62 percent to 36 percent, an advantage of 60,000 votes. Only 9 percent of the vote in Colorado is in. Nine electoral votes at stake in Colorado. In New Hampshire, 30 -- 13 percent, I should say, 13 percent of the vote is in. The president has a lead, 56 percent to 43 percent, 12,841 lead. Four, four electoral votes are there at stake in New Hampshire.
Let's take a look, let's check in with some of our battleground reporters right now. We've got several who are watching what's going on.
Let's go to Boulder, Colorado, first. Paul Vercammen is standing by.
What are you seeing there in Colorado because it's close there?
PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN SENIOR PRODUCER: Well, Wolf, this is what's happening here at Boulder County. The Republicans' strategy here was, we cannot get beaten as badly as we did in 2008 when Obama won 72 percent of the vote. And Republican strategists here on the ground said the target for us is about 60 percent. We know we're going to lose the county but let's get that down to 60 percent so we can take the rest of the state.
And so far, out of Boulder right now, President Obama 38,080, that's 70 percent. So that's far ahead of that 60 percent number. Romney, 15,299. So so far here in Boulder County, again, this is expected to go heavy for Obama but maybe at this point, going much more for Obama than the Republicans had hoped for here -- Wolf.
BLITZER: Paul Vercammen in Boulder, Colorado, a key battleground state. Let's check in with Erin Burnett, she's in Columbus, Ohio, the state capital of Ohio.
What are you seeing there, Erin?
ERIN BURNETT, ANCHOR, ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT: All right, well, Wolf, the secretary of state has just been briefing reporters gathered here to try to figure out which way this swing state will go.
Right now, though, we're getting some new numbers out of Cuyahoga County. As you said, right now, with the number that we have reporting so far, we've got an 11-point lead for the president but that's just what we have reporting so far and we have a long way to go. There are some new numbers, though, just coming out of Cuyahoga County and Cleveland, which is so crucial for the president, where Mitt Romney needs to close that margin.
Marty Savidge has those numbers. And Marty, what is the latest that you're hearing?
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Erin, right now, the new numbers show that the president has 188,049 votes to Mitt Romney's 80,020 votes. That would indicate that President Obama is actually increasing his lead here in Cuyahoga County.
I should also point out provisional ballots. There is a concern now that the number of them being used, especially in this county, may be on the rise. I was just talking to Jayne Planton, she was telling me, she's the director of the County Board of Elections here. There were two, maybe three precincts towards the end of the day that actually ran out of those provisional ballots. They had to send more over there. There have been reports of them being used frequently. The problem we know if this race is close here in the state of Ohio, those ballots could make all the difference. The problem, though, they aren't counted for 11 days. When they come in, they'll be handled by the people right behind me -- Erin.
BURNETT: All right. Marty, of course, Wolf, as we have heard, this again from sources, secretary of state's office told me earlier they would not be surprised to see provisional ballots in this state of anywhere between 200,000 and 250,000. So again, if your margin is narrower than that, then those ballots could really matter here in Ohio and as Marty said, they don't start to be counted for another 10 days.
BLITZER: Thanks very much, Erin. Thanks to all of our reporters.
John King, Florida, let's talk about Florida a little bit right now. It's amazing how close it is, 78 percent of the vote is in, 50- 50. Look how close this is. What is this? We have 300 votes basically.
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's called wow. That's what you call that in American politics. You call it wow. And you watch the map starting to fill in, you're saying OK, so we've got 78 percent of the vote, what's out? In this close. What's out? So you see up here in the panhandle, couple of very small counties out. Mitt Romney will win these counties.
Let's look at their neighbors. He's winning these neighboring counties about 74 percent. So we come over here and we look over here. Again, this county is out but again it's a tiny percent of the population. Roughly, you know, smaller than this county, he's winning 58-41. So Romney is going to get some kind of an advantage up here. It's not going to be mathematically significant.
Here's a big factor in this down here, though. In Palm Beach County, 95 percent of the vote's in. So the president is not going to get too much more of a pad here. However, as you move to the south, only 24 percent of the vote in in Broward County, that's 10 percent, Wolf, of the population statewide. So --
BLITZER: That's 400.
KING: Right. So the president is going to get a boost here if these numbers hold up. Now we don't know which precincts are out. So there's a chance Governor Romney will close the gap but this is very Democratic territory. This is blue, reliably blue, so Governor Romney will get some votes but you would expect in this area, when we get the rest of the vote, that the president will stretch a bit, get -- add to his advantage.
The you move down to Miami-Dade, same thing here. It's a Democratic area, only 15 percent of the vote in. It's a big chunk of the state population. So when you come back and you look at 78 percent of the statewide vote in, and you're missing so many votes from Miami-Dade and you're missing so many votes from Broward County, advantage to the president in terms of running up some of the margins there.
However, however, you start hunting the map and you look for other places, 95 percent in here. The Republican area. Governor Romney will pick up some, but, you know, Lee County, about 3 percent here, Governor Romney will manage to pick up some. It's not as big a population center.
So this is what you have to do at this time of night. You search the map for counties. Governor Romney likely to pad some here. Again, not a major population center. I'm making my way up here on purpose. Hundred percent in here, nothing to be gained. Hundred percent in here, nothing to be gained. And this is where you get -- you have to do some business. Eighty-five percent of the vote in, the president leads at the moment. Let's see what precincts are out here.
BLITZER: All right.
KING: Governor Romney needs to --
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Let's take a look at Pennsylvania right now because we know the Republicans, we know Romney made visits. They thought in the last few days maybe they had a shot there.
KING: Only 8 percent of the vote in. But you see what's happening so far. Our exit polls suggest the president has a smaller lead than that, but that the president has the advantage. As you watch the map fill in, the map is filling in at the moment as it's supposed to. One of the key questions is what do you get down here from Philadelphia County and Philadelphia City. Eighty-four percent, that's only 36 percent of the vote.
If the president runs up a big lead here, this is largely African-American turnout in Center City Philadelphia. You heard Jessica Yellin earlier saying they were happy about that. That was one of the concerns. Early on people thought Pennsylvania was over, Romney makes a late play with the voters here, get the message that they needed to come and turn out. There's not a lot of early voting. No significant early voting here so you have to do this on Election Day. That's a good number for the president out of Center City, Philadelphia.
We need these suburban counties to fill in here. This is a huge contested area here. If you go back in time, these have become, these used to be the Republican color counties outside of Philadelphia. They have become Democratic color counties. If you go back here, we have -- George Bush carried one of them, John Kerry, go back in time here, same difference. So as we watch this fill in, you have to say it's only 8 percent, but this is a Democratic area, it's filling in blue. This is the Republican area, again, much smaller from a population standpoint, filling in red.
Governor Romney was out in this part of the state today. At the moment, Allegheny County coming in pretty strong, union voters here. If you look at the early map, again, let's count them but I would be --
BLITZER: Yes.
KING: You look for surprises. This is the -- among the deepest blue DNA in presidential politics.
BLITZER: Yes.
KING: I wouldn't look for it to change.
BLITZER: OK. (INAUDIBLE) are always tempted by it but usually they don't go very far.
Let's go Virginia right now, see where we stand right now. Forty-five, almost 50 percent of the vote is now in. Romney continues to maintain a slight 51-47 percent advantage.
KING: He has. And again, he's doing what he needs to do out here in terms of filling it in red. There's been some questions about -- yes, you heard earlier, our Peter Hamby sent a note about this. One of our correspondents down there. I think it was James Carville across the room talking about this.
This is not as big of an edge in Chesterfield County just south of Richmond. It's Republican territory. We'll go back in time. Look at the 53 percent over there. We go back in time with 54 percent for John McCain but much higher for George W. Bush. When -- when you need to run up margins, this is what you need in a Republican county. When you know northern Virginia's a problem, you got to really run it up in your Republican counties, and you don't see that here.
However, I want to make this point here. If you come into Richmond City, all right, let's come up to this campaign, if you look into Richmond City, 76-22 percent, so the president is doing what he needs to do right here. If you go back in time and match that up, that's about the same. So the president is getting his vote in the inner city. That's down just a little bit. And so what's going to happen?
If all of this plays out as it normally plays out, this election will be decided, Wolf, up here. And at the moment, at the moment, that's only 10 percent. At the moment, Governor Romney is doing better on the percentages. That's Fairfax, 54 percent to 45 percent.
You come over here, Governor Romney is doing a little bit better in these big population centers.
BLITZER: Yes.
KING: He's doing a little better here. And he's doing a lot better out here. We'll see. He's in play in Virginia. We're going to be counting for awhile.
BLITZER: We're not ready for -- to make any projection in Virginia right now. But we are ready to take a look at what's going on in the United States Senate. Anderson is back with that.
COOPER: Yes, we've got another -- a number of projections we can make in the Senate.
BASH: That's right. Let's start with Democratic wins. Debbie Stabenow, the incumbent Democratic senator from Michigan, CNN is projecting she is going to win another term. Same goes for Amy Klobuchar, the Democratic senator from Minnesota.
Let's go to Pennsylvania. Bob Casey, he is going to win his second term, CNN projects. You remember six years ago he's the one who beat Rick Santorum.
COOPER: Right.
BASH: At the end of the day, Republicans tried to put a little bit of money here, they thought they could make a play for it, it didn't happen. New York, Kirsten Gillibrand is actually going on to win her first full term after a few years ago, replacing Hillary Clinton.
COOPER: And there are a number of races yet we cannot project.
BASH: That's right. And before we get to that, let me just give you the Republican wins because there are a few of them.
COOPER: OK.
BASH: Ted Cruz, he is -- been elected, a Republican in Texas to replace retiring Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. In Wyoming, John Barrasso is a senator there, is going on to win re-election and the same goes for Roger Wicker in Mississippi. By the way, you might see that defeats Al Gore there, that is not -- that's a different Al Gore. No relation.
COOPER: Right. Yes. And in terms of the races we cannot project.
BASH: Yes. OK. So let's go to that because there are really some nail-biters here. Indiana, look at this. Remember we talked about this being an early bellwether about whether Republicans can take the Senate, 63 percent reporting, Joe Donnelly is just two percentage points ahead and in fact --
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Tightening.
BASH: It is tightening, with 46,000 points. We're just watching that to see if Republicans can hold on to that seat that is now held by Richard Lugar. Massachusetts, again, this is the marquee race of this year. The incumbent Republicans Scott Brown has 48 percent. Elizabeth Warren, the Democrat, is beating him by over 31,000 votes but only 23 percent reporting.
And Virginia, look at this. This is so close, 51 percent to 49 percent. About 46 percent reporting. Again, just a reminder here, this is the Democratic seat here that Republicans really want to capture, and George Allen, in particular, wants to get his old seat back. He was defeated six years ago.
COOPER: And so far does this affect the balance of power?
BASH: It doesn't but look at what we have here.
COOPER: Right.
BASH: I mean this is a good indicator of how close things are, 41 Republican seats, 41 Democratic seats. Again, we want to remind our viewers that these purple seats here are -- reflective of the independent senators. Bernie Sanders from Vermont, he caucuses with the Democrats. The newly elected senator from Maine, Angus King, is here. We put him towards the middle.
And these white seats here, these are the ones that we don't have projections yet. But again, nobody has the 51 needed for an outright majority in the Senate.
COOPER: Yes. And obviously we're watching these numbers in Colorado very closely.
Wolf, let's go to you for that.
BLITZER: Let's take a look and see what's going on in Colorado right now. We've got new numbers from Colorado, 22 percent of the vote is now in in Colorado. The president has an advantage, 53 percent to 45 percent. About 600,000 votes have been counted almost, 51,000 vote advantage for the president. Nine electoral votes at stake in Colorado.
We're watching that state very, very closely. We'll see what happens. Only 22 percent of the vote is in.
We're also watching, get this, the top of the Empire State Building turned Romney red and Obama blue based on CNN's election results. We're about to figure in our latest electoral vote projections. Here it goes.
There it is. And stay right here to see the colored columns rise higher as each candidate gets more electoral votes on this, ELECTION NIGHT IN AMERICA.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Live picture from Los Angeles. Grant Park in Los Angeles, another watch party. They're watching CNN. They're watching this important ELECTION NIGHT IN AMERICA.
Let's show you what we know right now. The electoral college map, we'll put it up on the screen. First, right now on the race to 270, that's the number you need to be elected president of the United States, Mitt Romney has 152 electoral college votes. That's based on our projected estimates right now. Our projections. The president of the United States has 123 electoral college votes. The yellow states, those are states where we have not been able to make projections. The red states are Romney states. The blue states clearly Obama states.
Let's take a look at some votes, real votes, where they stand right now in states where we have not yet been able to make projections.
Let's begin in Virginia, where almost half the vote is in. Mitt Romney maintains a lead, 51 percent to 47 percent, 80,000 vote advantage. Take a look at that. Just moved up a little bit.
In North Carolina and 15 electoral votes, 51 percent for Mitt Romney, 48 percent for the president, 73 percent of the vote is in.
In Ohio, more than a third of the vote is now in. The president maintaining his advantage, 53 percent to 46 percent, just changed a little bit. He's got 162,000 vote advantage over Mitt Romney right now.
In Florida, look at this. Look at this. Seven million votes have been counted and Mitt Romney has an advantage of 636 votes, 81 percent of the vote is in. It's 50-50. Is this a repeat of 2000, when Al Gore lost Florida by 537 votes to George W. Bush? Right now, 636 votes.
Mitt Romney is ahead of President Obama with 81 percent of the vote in Florida. We thought it was going to be close, I got to tell you, I didn't think it would be this close. But it is close. Still 19 percent of the vote outstanding. That's Florida for you.
Let's move on from Florida right now to Missouri. Missouri has 10 electoral votes. Mitt Romney has an advantage right now, with only four percent of the vote counted, 53 percent to 45 percent. Wisconsin also very, very early. Only one percent of the vote is in. Mitt Romney has an advantage 57 percent to 42 percent.
In Colorado, a third of the vote is in. The president has an advantage, 52 percent to 46 percent, an advantage of 57,000 votes as of right now; 33 percent of the votes in. Twenty two percent of the vote is in New Mexico. The president has an advantage there, 55 percent to 41 percent. Five electoral votes in New Mexico. The president leads by 25,000 votes.
But the story right now, John, got to be Florida, Florida, Florida. Can you believe what's going on in Florida?
KING: Six hundred votes. One quick point on the electoral college map, Governor Romney's leading at the moment, as you just said. Significantly though, only one take-away so far. Only Indiana taking away from what Barack Obama won four years ago.
So we need to look, that's not enough for Governor Romney. He has to take away some others, including the state you just mentioned. Let's go there, Florida. Let's pull it up at the moment here. You look at the map. The president has actually pulled ahead in this math up here. But, again 1,00 votes, less than 1,000 votes up here.
As you watch it fill in, we're at 81 percent of the vote. To our viewers at home, sometimes the feed into this wall is a little slower or faster than the feed into that wall. But we're in the ballpark. We'll update you with the numbers.
Now let's watch and see what's out. When you're this close, inside 1,000 votes, somewhere in there, you are looking to see what's out. Ninety five percent in Palm Beach County. Governor Romney running a little better than John McCain four years ago there. But you can expect the president to add a few votes to his total there.
Let's move down, 57 percent in now in Broward County. This is significant. Because, remember, a while ago, it was a lot less than that. The president running ahead here. Just want to double-check in '08. Look at the president at 69 there. In '08 he was at 67. So the president is over-performing by percentages his numbers here from four years ago.
Now we drop down to Miami-Dade, notoriously slow reporting, at 40 percent right now, 62-38. So when you look at some of the vote that is still out here, as we look for others, the president is going to add to his vote totals a bit. Some of the vote out here, we have a whole county with no votes in, very tiny county. Governor Romney will carry this county. I'll bet the ranch on that.
The question is, you know, it's not a lot of votes. If it could be somewhere in that ballpark and he could add 20,000 or 30,00 votes to his there. Then we do the math. But look at that. I mean, it is just -- wow. It is just wow. I have been e-mailing with some people in the Romney campaign. They say they are confident. They say their people on the ground say they are going to pull this out.
But the Obama people say just the same. We're going to count this one a little bit.
Let's move over to Colorado. Because if Romney can win Florida, he needs Virginia. He needs Ohio. And then he needs something else. If he doesn't get Ohio, he would have to make it up somewhere. If you come right here, 51 to 48, the president is winning at the moment. This is critical, Jefferson County. But Governor Romney is holding his own in the suburbs.
(CROSS TALK)
BLITZER: I want to just go to Kyung Lah. She's on the scene for us. Kyung, What are you seeing?
KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, Arapahoe County very, very important for the president if he wants to hold on to Colorado, because he won it in 2008. Arapahoe County very much seen as a bellwether.
With me is Nancy Doty (ph). She's the county clerk of Arapahoe. Tell me how the numbers are looking right now. We're just getting these numbers in.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Barack Obama, 107,005; Romney, 93,580; 62.3 percent --
LAH: Fifty two point two eight.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- to 45.7 percent.
LAH: So President Obama leading 52 percent over Governor Romney, 45 percent. Thank you, Nancy.
So the reason why we're paying attention to Arapahoe, Arapahoe and Jefferson County, two key swing counties in this key swing state. Right now, the president appears to have a slight advantage in both.
BLITZER: Colorado's an important state, Kyung. I think some people thought it could be a decisive potentially important state.
KING: It could be. It could be. When the race is so close, any one of these smaller battlegrounds -- Colorado has nine electoral votes -- could be decisive. Kyung just said the president has an advantage. But I want to make a key point. One of the things we need to watch closely here, he is winning. She's in Arapahoe County, 63 percent of the vote in. The president is winning 53-47.
You say wow, that's good. But remember, you have to go back in time. Look, it was 56 percent last time. This is an area the president needs to run up the margin. He's under performing 2008.
Let's come over to Jefferson County. He was at 54 percent there in 2008. He's at 51 percent right now. So the under performing matters if Governor Romney -- look what's missing. Look what's missing. This is conservative country. Let's go back in time. A lot of red out here. What will the margins be in here?
We go back even further, you look here, a lot of this is red down here. If Governor Romney can run up the totals here and here, where he's winning 61 percent, that's what keeps this state in play. As you pull it out right now, 51 to 48, still in play when you look at so much conservative territory yet to be counted.
BLITZER: Still going to be very, very close in Colorado. What about New Hampshire? Four electoral votes, but they could be decisive as well.
KING: Another tiny one. Again, this is a state, if you go back in time, lot of it still out. Only 16 percent of the vote in. Everything up here, you see a little blue, little red. Not a lot of people live up here.
Let's come down here. This is the capital of Concord right here, little more than three percent. That's what you expect the president to be doing there. Ninety percent of the vote is here in a Democratic area. So the president doesn't have too much more to add to the cushion here.
But what's out? You come down here. This is the biggest piece that's out right now, Nashua --
BLITZER: Funny you mention Nashua. Hold that thought for a second. Brian Todd is in Nashua right now. What are you seeing, Brian?
BRIAN TODD, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, a tightening race here in Nashua and Hillsborough County. They're still counting absentee ballots and other hand-counted ballots behind me here in precinct three. That's the moderator, Skip Barrett, right there, the gentleman sitting with the blue blazer, sitting there counting absentee ballots there with his aides.
Other hand-counted ballots going on right to the left there. They're counting other hand-counted ballots. Then they are going to post those results, in addition to the results from that tabulator there, on to a tape. We'll be the first people to know the results of this precinct three in Nashua.
Right now in Hillsborough County, Wolf, a very much tightening race here. With about 10 percent of the vote in, President Obama has a lead of only about 200 votes. Latest numbers we have in Hillsborough County, 9,596 for the president; 9,385 for Mitt Romney. Tightening race here in Hillsborough County. The president also has a slight lead in the more -- in the populous Merrimac County. So the president looking good but not by too much here in the populous southern counties in New Hampshire, Wolf.
BLITZER: Brian, thank you. You and I know New Hampshire quite well. We go there a lot every four years or so. What do you make --
KING: As Brian just said -- remember, he just said -- Now this hasn't filled in for us yet. He's getting results on the scene. He said the president is leading but not by much. Again, you go back in time and look, this was 56 to 43 territory down in this part of the state last time. So the president has to win by much down here. Not by much means a key state looking forward.
But you pull it up here and you see where does Governor Romney need to win? Manchester, again, big population center, this is a tough one. Remember in the New Hampshire primary back in 2008, this is where Hillary Clinton came back and beat Barack Obama. Early on that night, it looked like Barack Obama was going to win the New Hampshire primary after the Iowa caucuses.
This was Clinton territory, blue collar Democrats. It's pretty close right now, 25 percent of the vote in. The president with a 51 to 48 percent lead. Again, we want to go back in time and take a look, 55 percent in this county four years ago.
So as this starts to come in, we will wait for more of it. That's four years ago. Let me come forward. We are very early on in the state of New Hampshire, Wolf. But again, in some of the key places the president is under performing a little bit. That means it will be closer. The question is, is it enough for Governor Romney to get over the top. BLITZER: John, thank you. Our battleground reporters are standing by in Florida, the squeaker contest right now. We are going to have a live update. That's coming up. And we are counting down to the top of the hour, when polls will close in the swing states of Iowa and Nevada.
Right now, in the Las Vegas strip, folks are watching the results on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Another major, major projection. CNN now projects Pennsylvania will be won by the president of the United States. Pennsylvania has 20 electoral votes. More than a quarter of the vote, the actual vote, is in. Look at this, the president at 60 percent to Mitt Romney's 39 percent. That's an advantage of more than 329,000 votes.
We project that Pennsylvania, a state that Mitt Romney visited today -- he was in Pittsburgh -- will go to the president of the United States. They're watching CNN over at Obama headquarters in Chicago right now.
Jessica Yellin is on the scene for us. Go ahead, Jessica. They must be pretty excited about Pennsylvania.
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Wolf. Well, this is thrilling for them, obviously, because this was a state the president was determined to hold, where Mitt Romney made a late push to take it away from the president. To them, this is a sign that their campaign is on track to do what they planned to do.
There is also something telling in these numbers. According to the sources, the senior campaign officials I have been talking to throughout the day, part of the reason they did well in Pennsylvania is because of the high turnout by African-American voters. And that is a pattern they said they've seen in a number of states today. And if that holds, it will be a story of this election.
Just -- they said to date, they see that the African-American turnout in Pennsylvania, around Philadelphia, in their evidence, exceeded what it was in 2008. And it's a changing electorate. And it could say something about what the president should be doing in a second term if he gets one. That will be all something we would discuss if that happens.
And another point I would make, David Axelrod, one of the president's senior advisor, bet that if they lost Minnesota, Michigan and Pennsylvania, he would shave his mustache. It looks for now his mustache is intact.
BLITZER: Mustache will be there. He's headed for 40 years. He may have it a little longer. We'll see. Let's take a look at where we stand on the road to 270 electoral votes needed to be president of the United States. Mitt Romney maintains a slight advantage right now over the president, 152 for Mitt Romney, 143 -- we added in Pennsylvania -- for the president of the United States.
It's very, very close, the contest on the road to 270. You see those yellow states. Those are states we have not yet been able to make projections on. Let's take a look at some votes in some of those states where we have not made projections yet. Here's where we go.
Let's go to Missouri right now, 10 electoral votes at stake. Romney has a lead, 55 percent to 43 percent. Only 10 percent of the vote is in. Ten electoral votes at stake. No projection in Missouri yet.
Similarly in Wisconsin, Mitt Romney right now, with only six percent of the vote in -- Mitt Romney has a slight advantage, 56 percent to 43 percent. But it's very, very early in Wisconsin, Paul Ryan's home state.
In Colorado, half the vote is now almost in. The president has 51 percent to Mitt Romney's 47 percent. He's got a 46,000 vote advantage in Colorado. In New Mexico, 23 percent, almost a quarter of the vote, is in. The president has an advantage of 54 percent to 42 percent, 23,471 vote advantage for the president in New Mexico. Five electoral votes at stake.
Let's go to Virginia right now. In Virginia, 57 percent of the vote is in. Mitt Romney continues to maintain a slight advantage, 51 percent to 47 percent, almost 100,000 vote advantage in Virginia for Mitt Romney right now.
In North Carolina, Mitt Romney also has an advantage; 78 percent of the vote is in, 51 percent for Romney, 48 percent for the president.
In Ohio, look at how close it is; 42 percent of the vote is in, 52 percent for the president, 47 percent for Mitt Romney. Forty two percent of the vote is in, as I said, an advantage for the president.
In Florida, it's close, very, very close. But right now, with 84 percent of the vote in, the president has built up a little bit bigger of a cushion. He's got 50 percent to Romney's 49 percent, almost 20,000 vote advantage. A little while ago, it was about 500 votes that separated these two candidates. Now the president has almost a 20,000 vote advantage.
Let's check in with Anderson and Dana. They have another projection to make in the U.S. Senate.
COOPER: That's right. A major projection, in fact, in the race for the Senate.
BASH: That's right. We have two big projections, two pieces of bad news for Republicans. Let's take a look. In the state of Massachusetts, CNN is projecting that the Democratic candidate Elizabeth Warren has unseated the Republican incumbent, Scott Brown. This was a very hard-fought race. Everybody remembers when Scott Brown had a surprise win a few years ago to replace Ted Kennedy. That really messed things up in Washington with regard to the health care debate. And he has now lost this race to Elizabeth Warren.
Indiana, another big upset for Republicans, a huge upset, really. Because Joe Donnelly, the moderate Democrat who is now in the House -- he is going to move over to the Senate. CNN is projecting he has won that seat. He beat the republican candidate, Richard Mourdock. You remember Richard Mourdock beat the incumbent Republican, Richard Lugar, who has been in the Senate for three decades. There was no way that he was going to lose the seat. But when he lost the primary, Richard Mourdock was in the general election. And he made a big blunder a few weeks ago when he said that pregnancy resulting from rape was a gift from God. And he plummeted in the polls.
This -- big picture, huge wins for Democrats. Very bad news for Republicans. It is not impossible, but virtually impossible at this point for Republicans to take back the Senate.
COOPER: Do we have any Republican calls? Are we going to look now at no-calls?
BASH: We're going to look at really one no-call, because this is also a very important race. This is a potential piece of good news, although we have to be very cautious, because close to 60 percent reporting. But at this point, George Allen, the Republican candidate, is a little more than 35,000 votes ahead of Tim Kaine. This, of course, is a Democratic seat right now. This could potentially be one Republican pickup. But look how close it is.
COOPER: That would obviously be good news for Republicans.
BASH: It would be very good news for Republicans. But they're going to need a lot of good news tonight to make it the ultimate good news.
COOPER: The balance of power?
BASH: Let's take a look at that now. Right now, Republicans have 41 seats. You see they're being filled in here more, particularly on the blue side, the Democratic side; 43 Democratic seats plus two independents -- maybe we should just say one independent this time. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator, he caucuses with the Democrats. We have the newly elected senator from Maine, Angus King, sort of more towards the middle. He has said that he is an independent. He will not say where he will caucus until he comes down here.
But nobody thinks that he will actually caucus with Republicans because they spent about three million dollars to try to defeat him. But nobody has the 51 for an outright majority so far. But boy, we still have a lot of really, really close races we're watching.
COOPER: Certainly good news for the Democrats in the Senate race there for those two races we just told you about. Wolf, John?
BLITZER: Yeah. The balance of power in the Senate is going to be interesting to see what happens in Indiana. Bet you a lot of Republicans wish Richard Lugar would have gotten that Republican nomination. He probably would have had a much better chance of maintaining that Republican seat.
KING: You are channeling your inner Mitch McConnell, who clearly wishes that right now. Look, Indiana, Dana just mentioned, the big Senate pick up for the Democrats. That's the only pickup for Mitt Romney so far in the electoral college.
I want to go through this, because we show Mitt Romney ahead at the moment. But Mitt Romney has to have more take-aways than just Indiana and its 11. So let's play a little hypothetical here, Wolf. Look, we're pretty confident about this. We will wait for the votes to come in, but these west coast states have been reliably Democratic for a very long time.
So let's, for a hypothetical, give them to the president. It would put him up to 217.
BLITZER: Don't forget Hawaii.
KING: Hawaii as well. Let's go down and do it, right down here. OK. There we go. Nope. Got to make it blue. We can do that. It's hard to get. Alaska, we think that is going to go red, right? We think if we come out here in the prairie and we do Idaho and we do Montana, and we come through her -- let's not touch Colorado. Let's do Arizona. Let's just, for the sake of argument, we do this.
Let's say, we think that will go that way. Now we're back to our battleground states. I'm doing this on purpose, for a reason, to see Governor Romney has only picked up this. As we come this way now, if these go as we think they will go, what happens? Can he get there?
Which is why this is so important. Because when you start to think through these states, even if North Carolina, where he's leading, stays that was, even if Virginia, where he's leading at the moment, stays that way, 226/217. This is traditionally a blue state. If they prove us wrong, they prove us wrong. The Obama campaign -- Romney early results have him ahead here. The Obama campaign is very confident about this.
But we'll watch these 10 right here. But when you get into this kind of a map -- Latino votes, let's assume that goes way thaw way. You're in a position now where he can't win without this and without this. And so when you come back to the map here -- and look, unless something jarring happens tonight, this is a state right now where Governor Romney is just behind -- just behind.
So you say it's close, it's in play. But, Wolf, with 84 percent of the vote out, the question is what's missing? What's missing is a bit of the vote here in Broward County, a good chunk of the vote here in Miami-Dade County. And when you're looking at 84 percent state wide and you're missing so much of the vote in Miami-Dade and a decent chunk in Broward County, guess what? Most of the vote you're missing is in big Democratic areas.
So when you look at it now, and we'll count them as they come in, history tells you this is a number, as close as it is, with 84 percent in, that favors the president. BLITZER: At least right now. We'll se what happens. But those three counties in South Florida usually heavily Democratic.
KING: We can go back in time and you can watch them; '08, '04, '00, '96, History does repeat itself down there.
BLITZER: Let's see what happens. All right, Anderson. Back to you.
COOPER: Yes. All eyes on Florida. All eyes on Ohio. Still, it's almost the top of the hour. That means more presidential election results. We are counting down the results in the battle ground states in Nevada, as well, and Iowa. People are watching the vote tallies come in downtown Chicago right now. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We're live in Boston at Fanneul Hall Marketplace right now. People are stopping to watch election results on CNN as we get closer to another important round of results.
We're back here at the CNN election center. I'm Wolf Blitzer. We're counting down to poll closing in four more states at the top of the hour, the battleground state of Iowa, as well as Montana and Nevada, another swing state, and finally Utah. Together, those states have another 21 electoral votes. Every vote I believe is vital to getting to the winning total of 270.
Both presidential campaigns are prepared for a long night. Let's check in with Jessie Yellin over at Obama headquarters in Chicago and Candy Crowley at Romney headquarters in Boston. Jessica, first to you. What's going on over there?
YELLIN: Hi, Wolf. Well, the energy here has picked up as we made those projections. Still a long night ahead, they know. But they are excited. Iowa and Nevada, two battleground states that the Obama campaign has felt good about. Nevada largely because of the Latino vote and their work organizing there. Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, has a great organization.
Iowa, because they were 18 points ahead, Obama campaign was in the early vote, heading into today, Wolf.
BLITZER: All right, Jessica. Let's go to Boston. Candy, what's it like over there?
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN ANCHOR: Well, they are still waiting. I have to tell you that, again, a number of people are showing up, either, you know, via Skype or on the stage to talk to folks here. We just heard from Rob Portman, who you know is almost the wingman for Mitt Romney through Ohio, said he was feeling pretty good.
We heard from Ed Gillespie, who came out here to the podium and said to the crowd, hey, we feel very confident; we feel optimistic. He's the senior adviser, of course, to Mitt Romney, with a long history of political experience. So in public, obviously, they are still optimistic and confident. But they're watching these numbers as well. It has to be nerve- wracking behind closed doors.
BLITZER: I'm sure it is nerve-wracking for both of these campaigns right now. Let's go to Anderson. Anderson?
COOPER: Yes. Obviously, we are watching these numbers very closely. We're keeping an eye on the clock for the next round of poll closings, including the battlegrounds of Iowa and Nevada. Republicans won Nevada in eight of the last 11 elections. It went for President Obama just four years ago.
Miguel Marquez is in Las Vegas for us. First, let's go to Poppy Harlow in Des Moines, Iowa. Poppy.
POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, the polls about to close here. We're in Polk County, the biggest county in Iowa. But I've been talking to counties across the state. The turnout is so huge here, bigger than 2008. Some of the counties have run out of ballots. What they're doing, photo copying ballots. But all of those all going to have to be hand counted.
That could mean we might have to wait a little bit longer for the final count here in this battleground state, Anderson.
BLITZER: And Miguel Marquez in Las Vegas. Miguel.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, this is Clark county. This is exactly where all the votes will be counted here. In a few minutes, the polls will close, and those first ballots, 700,000 early and absentee ballots, will be reported. But -- there is a big but in Nevada. They will not be reported until the secretary of state confirms that all voters have voted in the state. It could be a while, Anderson.
BLITZER: We are watching obviously every state and every vote. Let's go to John King at the magic wall. John?
KING: Anderson, when you list these two battlegrounds, Nevada and Iowa, the Obama campaign says we can win them both. The Romney campaign says, not so fast. We'll be in play in Iowa.
In Iowa, born-again Christians are critical for the Obama constituency, 38 percent -- 40 percent -- nearly four in 10 of Iowa voters describe themselves as Evangelical Christians. We'll see how that one plays out for Governor Romney, as we go through here.
Who would better handle the economy? Roughly an even split, a slight advantage for the president in the state of Iowa, 49 percent to 46 percent. Some of the farm states, including Iowa, not doing -- not having as rough a time as the rest of the country. An even divide there.
Let's move out to Nevada. This is potentially very significant: 65 percent of the electorate is white, but 18 percent of the electorate today in Nevada Latinos. That's up from 15 percent four years ago. This a growing dynamic, growing diversity, helps President Obama.
It's a long-term problem for the Republican party. We'll see how that one breaks. And vote by party idea, we're seeing more of this as we go across the country. Essentially an even divided electorate. Slightly more Democrats here than Republicans, a third of the electorate in the state of Nevada describing themselves as independents.
Again, Wolf, when you ask both campaigns late in this campaign, because of the Latino vote, even Republicans privately concede Nevada they assume will go blue. Iowa could be a much more contested battleground. Mitt Romney might need it.
BLITZER: Every vote is critical right now. Every vote on the race to 270 electoral votes so important. We're about to see more states close at the top of the hour. Seconds away from now. And get ready for a projection.
