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Biden's Lead Grows; Biden On Cusp Of 270, With Only Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada And Pennsylvania To Be Called. Aired 6-7p ET
Aired November 04, 2020 - 18:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[18:00:00]
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: It's gone down, 57,000 votes over Biden, 50 percent to 48.8 percent.
In North Carolina, with 15 electoral votes, 95 percent of the estimated vote is in, and Trump maintains a lead there of more than 76,000 over Biden, 50.1 percent to 48.6 percent.
Let's go over to John King and take a look at Arizona and Nevada.
Those are the two states. If we get results in the next few hours, potentially, they could put Biden at 270.
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Emphasis on potentially.
If Biden flips Arizona, which was a Trump state in 2016, holds Nevada which was a Clinton state in 2016. That would be enough to get him to the finish line. The if is the question.
And so let's start in Nevada, as we count the votes. You see this. This has been all day. We haven't gotten an update from the state of Nevada in quite some time, 7,647 votes, 49-49, if you round that up, 49.3, 48.7.
So, you have a very close race, which is why the Trump campaign says keep counting the votes. Again, a little inconsistency when you move to some other states in the East, but let's just focus on Nevada right now.
We're waiting hoping later today -- we will see -- might be tomorrow, we're told, but hopefully we get some more votes out of Clark County. This is Las Vegas and the suburbs around it. This is where you're going to get more than seven in 10. More than 70 percent of the votes cast in Nevada will come from here. It gets frustrating now.
In any event, you want to count the votes but even now, when we know how consequential Nevada and Arizona are going to be to the math, you want more votes. And we're waiting, 84 percent in Clark County, which means you have got a fair amount of votes still out, 16 percent.
If Joe Biden keeps that percentage, then Joe Biden's going to win the state of Nevada. We just don't know that until we see more votes. And then you come up here, Reno, Washoe County in the top half of the state here, the western part of the state, northwestern part of the state.
Again, it's a little closer here, 50 percent, 51, if you round up, to 47, if you round up. And, again, that's all Joe Biden has to do. You have the lead, you just need 50 plus one the rest of the way, right, 50 percent, a little more than 50 percent of the rest of the way. And you do it.
The question is, when will we get those votes? And we have reporters on the scene. And you just want to count them. And we have got a ways to go. So we have to wait and count those votes.
And so then you move here. This would be a pickup. This would be a flip, a Trump state in 2016, a state that has not voted for a Democrat for president since the 1990s and Bill Clinton with some help from Ross Perot back in those days.
But you see it right now, 51 to 48, if you round up for the president, so it's close. And we need to be careful here, 93,000 votes. Again, that's a pretty healthy lead. But we know, we know we have about 600,000 votes still out here. And we know about two-thirds of them are here in Maricopa County. This is Phoenix and the growing suburbs around it, one of the fastest-changing, most dynamic political places in America right now.
And we see, in Maricopa, it's 52.3 to 46. So, Joe Biden, if you just check it out, statewide at 51. This president has some support in the more rural areas. Goes up a little higher in Maricopa. The question is, we are going to get some of these tonight. We're told our Kyung Lah on the scene says two batches of votes will be released later, 9:00 hour here in the East Coast, midnight hour as we get into.
That would be into Thursday, right? Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, off we go. So we're going to wait for those. And that's what you want to see. Right? If, again, Joe Biden has the lead, if you pull out to the statewide numbers, about 93,000. So you have the lead, all you have to do from here on in is break even. Will he? We will see.
The trend lines tell you he will, but we have to count new votes to see if that happens. And so, Wolf, if you pull it out, we're still waiting on a couple of places. You see this map filled in. Every now and then, I want to do this just so, if you're watching at home, we have not called these states.
You pull them off and you see the gray. On this map here, we like to show you who's leading. But we're continuing to watch the votes here. There are other places as well. We're still watching the count in Georgia. We're still watching the count in North Carolina. We're obviously still watching the count in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
And you will see that has come down. That has come down considerably. It was over 600,000 late last night. It's come down considerably. Can Joe Biden make it up? He thinks he can. They're still counting votes here. But as they count in Pennsylvania, the reason those two states in the
Southwest, Arizona and Nevada, matter so much, now that we have projected Michigan and Wisconsin -- that's the big news of the day, two pieces of the three blue wall, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin. That is why Donald Trump is part of the United States. He flipped those states in 2016.
They had been in Democratic hands since 1992. Now that you have two pieces of the blue wall, plus you flipped the 2nd Congressional District in Nebraska, the math for Joe Biden is, if nothing else changed, you just get that, you get that, and you get to 270.
And then we would continue to do the math, we would not want to know how all these other states fill out, so we know the final tally of America's voice and vote. But once you get to 270, you're the next president of the United States.
So, Arizona and Nevada, the eyes of the country and the eyes of the world as we await those counts.
BLITZER: Does President Trump really have any significant hope in Arizona?
KING: You have to say yes just because of the math.
Again, I want to come back over here and look at it. Look, there's a -- there's a basic logic to vote counting. And you watch as it plays out, and you see the first votes come in. And then you watch the next batch come in. And you see, are we swinging all over the place, right? Are we getting, these are Republican precincts, these are Democratic precincts, and we're getting wild variations in the number?
[18:05:01]
In the votes we have so far, Joe Biden got out ahead, and he has stayed there. But it's been a long time now. It's been a long time since we got more votes.
So, when you have 600,000 votes out, you got 1.4 million, 1.3 million, that's a big chunk of votes. And so, yes, we want to respect the process everywhere, right? The president is saying keep counting the votes here. Again, there's an intellectual inconsistency to be polite, with saying stop counting here. Why did you count overnight here? Why did you count overnight here?
That's the president's argument, that somehow there was hanky-panky going on here, something fishy. There's not. They're counting votes. But he wants people to keep counting votes here.
We should respect the process, 600,000 votes still to count, obviously, 93,000-vote lead, plenty of votes to make that up. The trajectory of the state tells you, odds are Biden. But odds are doesn't matter. The math matters, and we will count the votes when we get them.
BLITZER: Yes, when we spoke with the secretary of state of Arizona, you and me, a little while ago, she made it very, very clear there are still plenty of votes outstanding in the Phoenix area. But that's an area where Biden has done a lot better than Trump.
KING: He has.
And the suburban shift in America is one of the defining political stories of the Trump presidency. I will tell you, Democrats did not get as much out of the suburbs when you look at Ohio, when you look at Texas, when you look at North Carolina, states that are the president -- the president's keeping. North Carolina is not done yet. We haven't finished the math there.
But, without a doubt, the reason that is blue is the growing suburbs around Phoenix, the Latino vote combined with suburban women and senior citizens, Joe Biden doing much better than Hillary Clinton among senior citizens.
So, the math in the vote we have so far here, Joe Biden has put together the right coalition. Again, we just want to respect the process and count the votes, with 600,000 more to go. When we see these later tonight, when we get a couple hundred thousand later tonight, then you watch the trajectory. Is it a steady climb? Does something glitch?
We will see.
BLITZER: We will see what happens when they release all those votes around 9:00 p.m. Eastern -- all right, Jake, back to you.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: All right, Wolf, thanks so much.
And while they are counting the votes in Nevada and Arizona and Pennsylvania and North Carolina and Georgia, let us go and check in with the Biden campaign.
Jeff Zeleny is in Wilmington, Delaware.
And, Jeff, how are they feeling there?
JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, the former vice president is feeling very confident, just because of those numbers that we're seeing and we have been talking about there that John was reporting.
But they do want to wait and see how the Arizona account goes. And they need to wait and see how the Nevada account goes. But I am told that he is feeling much more optimistic at the beginning of the day. But we did see the former vice president here at the Chase Center on the very stage where he delivered the acceptance speech for the Democratic Party's nomination.
But, today, he spoke with a presidential tone. And he said he would wait for the votes to be counted, but he walked just up to the line of declaring victory.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Now, after a long night of counting, it's clear that we're winning enough states to reach 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.
I'm not here to declare that we have won, but I am here to report, when the count is finished, we believe we will be the winners.
So, once this election is finalized and behind us, it will be time for us to do what we have always done as Americans, to put the harsh rhetoric of the campaign behind us, to lower the temperature, to see each other again, to listen to one another, to hear each other again and respect and care for one another, to unite, to heal, to come together as a nation.
I know this won't be easy. I'm not naive. Neither of us are. I know how deep and hard the opposing views are in our country on so many things.
But I also know this as well. To make progress, we have to stop treating our opponents as enemies. We are not enemies. What brings us together as Americans is so much stronger than anything that can tear us apart.
So, let me be clear. I, we are campaigning as a Democrat, but I will govern as an American president.
Every vote must be counted. No one is going to take our democracy away from us, not now, not ever. America has come too far, America's fought too many battles, America's endured too much to ever let that happen.
We, the people, will not be silenced. We, the people, will not be bullied. We, the people, will not surrender.
My friends, I'm confident we will emerge victorious. But this will not be my victory alone or our victory alone. It will be a victory for the American people, for our democracy, for America. And there will be no blue states and red states when we win, just the United States of America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[18:10:18]
ZELENY: So, it was clear that Joe Biden there was reaching across the aisle as well, extending an early olive branch to everyone who did not vote for him as well.
Now, we have heard many of these same words before from him, some of them verbatim, on the campaign trail. But, Jake, they carried significant -- more weight today, as he was delivering them here on the cusp of the outcome of this presidential campaign.
And I was struck by saying he's not naive. If elected, of course, he would be the oldest president ever to serve in the office. But this is a different time and a different climate. But he does, of course, want to unify and reach out. So that was his message. And, Jake, one person he did not mention, President Donald Trump --
Jake.
TAPPER: That's right, didn't mention him at all.
Jeff Zeleny in Wilmington, Delaware, thanks so much.
It is remarkable, Dana, when you think about the very different characters of these two men and the very different reactions that we have heard from Trump and from Biden today. Neither of them has been elected president. Both of them are short, as of right now, of the 270 electoral votes.
And what we have heard from Joe Biden is, count all the votes, and I want to unify the country. And what we have heard from Trump last -- early this morning or late last night, and then through his lawyers and on Twitter, is just a whole bunch of nonsense and conspiracy theories and lies and misrepresentations and claiming that he won, when he didn't.
And, I mean, it couldn't be more different.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: It couldn't be more different.
And what Jeff just said is so true. We heard versions of what Joe Biden said today along the way, frankly, starting at the beginning of his campaign. His reason for running was -- to give a speech like this was in the hopes of being a central president, like he just kind of illustrated with the speech that he gave today.
And what he is trying to do is to kind of embody that, is trying to say, I ran to be a different kind of person. I ran to be a president that brings people together, even people who didn't support me, and maybe who never will.
And the fact that he wants to kind of have a bookend, when he doesn't know, even though he's leaning into the notion that he believes he will win, but said explicitly he does not know if it will happen -- it hasn't happened yet -- is very interesting and very telling and very, very Joe Biden.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: And it could be reflective of what he must be seeing, because it's obvious what is potentially in front of us.
If there is a Joe Biden presidency, he would be a president in a deeply divided government, let alone country. The Democrats are likely to hold onto the House. But it also looks perhaps just as likely that Republicans could hold onto the Senate.
So you have got divided government in Congress. You have got a potential president who would have been fairly narrowly elected in some of these states after a protracted period of uncertainty. That is such a sort of a cauldron of real chaos for this country. And I think Joe Biden recognizes that and realizes that he has to
start trying to bridge those gaps early on, if he's going to make a convincing case to the American people that he can lead the country through that moment.
TAPPER: You know, we have talked a lot today about Wisconsin and Michigan, which we have projected for Joe Biden.
We're waiting to hear from Pennsylvania and Nevada and Arizona. But there's one other state that we're still waiting to hear from.
Wolf Blitzer has more on the latest from Georgia.
BLITZER: Yes, that's right, Georgia.
Georgia, it's a really important state, obviously, and look at this. That lead that the president has had, David Chalian, in Georgia has been shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. It's down to, what, 57,000. It was a few hundred thousand not that long ago.
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Not that long ago, indeed.
But more vote is coming in, and it's helping Joe Biden make up some ground. Right now, Donald Trump at the 50 percent mark in Georgia, you noted, Wolf, 57,000 votes ahead. Joe Biden has 48.8 percent. That's with 94 percent of the vote in.
But here's what we have learned about the outstanding vote in Georgia. Just a rough estimate. This is just sort of back of the envelope. We think there are about 185,000 uncounted votes in Georgia.
So, what we have done is try to do what the campaigns do and calculate for both Biden and Trump what they would need of that outstanding vote to win the state. So, look here. Joe Biden would need between 65 and 67 percent of that 185,000 uncounted votes in order to overtake Donald Trump, and actually flip the state of Georgia.
[18:15:06]
Now, I just want to note that, in all the vote counting that we have gotten today, since 6:00 a.m., Joe Biden's won about 71 percent of the vote count today, because, again, a lot of it is that absentee mail vote. And we know that that's a big Biden category.
So, that is within the range of what he still needs there. But that is something to watch.
Donald Trump, on the other hand, he only needs between 31 and 33 percent of that uncounted 185,000 votes in order to hang on to Georgia, keep it in his column, and not let it go to the Democrats. So, he -- that's not that big of a percentage, given the fact that, overall, he's at 50 percent of the vote.
So, he only needs 31 to 33 percent of that remaining vote to keep Georgia red -- Wolf.
BLITZER: Yes, and, of course, it depends on where that remaining vote in Georgia, John King, is right now.
Let's take a closer look at Georgia and see what's going on.
KING: So, you take a look. And, again, this is a much smaller lead, a shrinking Trump lead, shrinking lead for the president, in a state that the Democrats had hoped to make a battleground this time. They're certainly making it competitive.
Again, you look at the top line, 50-49, if you roll up -- if you round up, 57,266 votes. Where has the comeback come from? Well, the same place there are still votes outstanding. David Chalian just noted, we have told -- we have been waiting for Atlanta and the suburban collar around it.
You see this big store of blue right here. As David noted, Joe Biden needs about two-thirds of the remaining votes. And, again, if you look at the statewide numbers, you think, OK, well, there's no way he's going to get two-thirds of the remaining vote. But then you think, where are they?
Well, we know, there's still some more. They have done a lot of the counting today in Fulton County. One of the reasons the lead has narrowed, the presidency has narrowed, is because Joe Biden is getting 72 percent, on average, of the votes here in Fulton County. That has been some of the count today. And there are still some ballots out here.
Then you move over here to DeKalb County. Again, Joe Biden needs two- thirds of the remaining votes, ballpark. He's getting 83 percent in this county. And we know look, 89 percent. They're still counting votes here. So, if that trend line continues, it's possible that Joe Biden could make up that map.
You move around these red -- these blue suburban counties in the collar around Atlanta here, 58 percent, that's a little below two- thirds. So you got a few more votes to count here, 95 percent. We just have to watch this. It's a -- he's under, a little under what he needs here. But he's well over what he needs here. And they're still counting votes, and he's well over what he needs here, and they're still counting votes.
You move over to Cobb County. He's a little -- again, a little under. So, this is just math, and we have to wait and see where they come.
We didn't know earlier there were some votes still out too, as well, up here in Forsyth County, a place where the president is winning quite handily. Does that continue when they count -- there were 7,000 earlier today. They're counting as we go. We keep checking back every now and then to catch up.
Does that mean the president gets 66 percent of them? No, it doesn't. But it's just a place where you think, OK, we know that Joe Biden's making up math in Atlanta and the suburbs around it. Maybe the president's making up a little as well.
The bottom line is this, 57,266. There are enough votes outstanding, and we know a lot of them are in these blue counties, for Joe Biden to make it up. So, just as I just said, we need to respect the process, be open-minded about the possibility the president could come back out in Arizona, we need to respect the process and be open-minded about the possibility that Joe Biden could squeak back into it in the state of Georgia.
BLITZER: What's going on in North Carolina right now? Because it's still undecided.
KING: It is still undecided.
This is another one where, if you look at it, and you think about the statewide vote total, 2.7 million, 2.6 million, 50.1 to 48.6, so 50 to 49, if you round that up, 76,737, incredibly close, incredibly competitive. They're still counting votes. So everybody's -- the Biden campaign is open to the idea of let's keep counting in North Carolina.
But they're also -- they're more pessimistic about this state than they are about Georgia. They view Georgia as a coin toss. They view this one as, they would love to see that happen, but they're not anticipating it happening.
One of the reasons, if you come on in, look, there's a chance. We still have 94 percent here. There's still counting votes. Wake County in the suburb, look at the Biden lead. You come over here, Durham County, look at the big Biden lead. But you see that, 99 percent. They're about in there.
So, Wake County, they're still getting some. I want to check down here in Mecklenburg County, 95 percent. So, in the bigger counties -- this is number one. In the bigger counties, where Biden ran it up quite impressively, most of the votes have been counted.
So, if you talk to the campaigns, obviously -- we should say this about every state, even the non-battleground states where you might have somebody have a giant lead, whether it's Biden or Trump -- let's count all the votes and let's get a final total.
And if you look, if you come all the way out, Wolf, it is impressive when you look at the national vote totals, 70.5 million votes, 67.3, if you round up, a million votes. We want to count them all.
In North Carolina, of course, the Biden people are open minded to it. They don't think so. They just, if you talk to them, a candid assessment, they think that one stays red. But we will find out.
Georgia, they think it's more of a true toss-up and they want to count them all. Remember, there's two Senate races on the ballot in Georgia as well, plus local races. So you want to count them all.
BLITZER: The race for 270 continues. It's not over yet.
KING: Walk us through the path for Biden to 270 and the path for Trump for to 270.
[18:20:01] So, let me walk over here. And, again, the biggest news of the day, and it's critical news for Joe Biden, this was the centerpiece of his campaign, nominate me, I can get these blue-collar industrial states back.
The three were Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin. Today, he has scored two of them, Michigan and Wisconsin, 26, when you add them up, 26 electoral votes. That is what gets Joe Biden knocking on the door, 253.
So, if you go from here, also Joe Biden needs to do, he's leading here, he needs to hold it, he's leading here, he needs to hold it. That's 270. That's game over. You would like more than that. You would like to send a message to the American people that you won a big victory.
But the bottom line is winning. And 270 is winning. That would get Joe Biden there. So let's, just for the sake of argument, say, what if, what if the president did come back here? But what if the president took Arizona away? Then where does Joe Biden go, if he is going to win?
Well, then that would be here, or here, possibly in North Carolina, but the two leading options would be here and here. And that's why we continue to count votes.
Now, the Biden campaign is quite confident that this is going to go their way out here. Let me turn this off and come back. They're quite confident that this is going to materialize. That's why you saw Joe Biden come out today and say, I'm not claiming victory, but I'm quite confident. That's what they think.
So let's come at this from a different perspective. You come back to where we are now, how does the president get there? Well, we have not called this yet. And some people will think I'm doing the math backwards. But every one counts.
We have not called this yet, but the president is leading in Maine's 2nd Congressional District, that Maine, like Nebraska, allocates its electoral votes by congressional district. So the president could pick up that one there. Let's assume he holds that lead here. And let's assume he holds that lead here.
That gets the president up to 245. We anticipate, when we count the votes in Alaska, the president will get those there. So now you're up to 243 to 248, right? And so, again, if Biden holds this one, then you come back here, and the president of the United States can hold this one, then you're in a fight.
Then you're in a huge fight for Arizona, which is why, again, we think of this, it's the biggest prize, it's 20 electoral votes, it's still on the table. So this is what you're fighting for most here, as I bring these back here. Let me take this away and just make it a toss- up state right there.
Look at that map. So, this is why. If the Biden campaign can get this, you want to cushion. The Trump campaign essentially has to run the table, get Pennsylvania, and get that back.
BLITZER: Yes, if Biden gets Arizona and Nevada, it's game over, as you say.
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: David Chalian, let's take a closer look at Nevada for us, specifically where the outstanding vote is right now.
CHALIAN: Yes, as John said, mission critical for Joe Biden initially, hold those Clinton states. Then try to flip some of those Trump states.
Look here at the state in Nevada. Joe Biden has a 7,647-vote lead. He's got 49.3 percent of the vote to Donald Trump's 48.7 percent. And that's with an estimated 86 percent of the vote is in.
But here is what we know about the outstanding vote. We think there's roughly 200,000 uncounted votes in Nevada. And so calculating them, what Trump would need and what Biden would need to get Nevada in their column, look here. Joe Biden would need roughly 45 to 47 percent of that 200,000 lot of uncounted votes so far.
Just note, Joe Biden has 49.3 percent in the vote total. So his need range is a little lower than where his vote range is now. Donald Trump, on the other hand, would need 52 to 54 percent of that uncounted pot of votes of the 200,000 votes that we think are uncounted. That is well above his current 48.7 percent in the vote total, so a bit more of a reach right now for Donald Trump than Joe Biden.
But, clearly, with 200,000 votes still out, and only a 7,600-vote difference, there's more counting to do in Nevada -- Wolf.
BLITZER: There still is. There certainly is.
You know, let's take a closer look with John King right now in Nevada. Las Vegas, that area is the most populous part of the -- what, about 70 percent of the population live in the Las Vegas area.
KING: Right.
And so let's do it this way. So, you look at the size of the dots, that tells you the population centers. And it's not even close, right? Look at -- you look at the size of this. And then you get Washoe County up here, Reno, in Carson City, the more Republican areas. You see that just the red dots are a lot smaller. That tells you there many fewer people there.
And that's the challenge. So, when you break this off and you come on in, as David noted, the president needs to overperform where he is right now. He's at 45. He essentially needs to run about 10 percentage points higher than that. He has to come in about 54-55 in the rest of the votes.
When you get to 84 percent, eight times out of 10, when the rest of the votes come in there, they're within a point or two of that, right? So if you look at this, and you study the history of elections, it's unlikely the president's going to overperform that number by that much, by 10 percentage points.
It's unlikely. It's not impossible, which is why we count votes. So, we're waiting. Most of the votes will be here. Clark County is more than 70 percent. It'll be roughly around the -- by the time we're done counting them, it will be 70 to 73 percent of the votes cast will be right here.
And then you come up here. Again, you get more votes up here. And this will be about 15, 16 percent of the votes up here. And you see this one's a little closer. But if the president of the United States needs 54, 55, he's 47 in this county, and he's 48, 49 statewide.
[18:25:13]
He has to amp it up. Again, that normally does not happen. We don't live in normal times. We have a very close presidential election. Let's wait for them to count the votes and see, and see if something unusual happens.
It's about -- yes, they're -- the delays get frustrating, right, especially when you're so close, when Joe Biden's a 253. So he's knocking on the door. The president needs a comeback to reassure his supporters he's still in the hunt.
You would like to see Arizona, Nevada and these other states get to the finish line. But this is an election unlike any other, mail-in votes, in person early votes, Election Day votes. You wish the officials could count them quickly.
The officials' response to that is, we want to get it right. We're going to take our time.
BLITZER: Well, we will watch it all closely.
We're expecting more votes out of Arizona very soon. That state, along with Nevada, could push Joe Biden over the top in electoral votes. Will that happen? When will it happen, if it happens?
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:30:00]
TAPPER: Welcome back to CNN's coverage of election night in America continued. You see there on the big board, Joe Biden with 253 electoral votes. We projected Michigan and Wisconsin going to him today. President Trump has 213. Neither candidate has reached the magic 270 electoral votes as of yet.
There has been reaction to today's election news from the markets. Let's go to CNN's Julia Chatterley, who can tell us more. Julia, how have the markets reacted and what's behind it? JULIA CHATTERLEY, CNN ANCHOR: Optimistic, Jake, I have to say. You know, the one thing I would tell you, and it is an overused phrase, is that investors and markets dislike uncertainty. Well, the only thing I think we were certain about going into this election was that there would be ongoing uncertainty, and that's exactly what we've got.
So, what the markets reacting to here is effectively pricing out a blue wave. They're saying, look, we care less about who's in the White House than we do about what happens in Congress and what policy follows. And that's with jumping ahead of the counting here and saying, this result looks like a divided Congress and we're optimistic. Anything that was suffering under a black cloud of potential future regulations, so health care stocks, technology stocks soared today.
But there's two sides to every story, Jake, and you and I talk about this all the time. What's critical to the economy is financial aid. And all the challenges in split Congress that we've had over the past few months will likely carry on, financials. They tell you a story about the economy. They were weaker today because they're saying there's going to be challenges, ongoing challenges ahead to get critical money to ordinary Americans. That's what we're looking at. And, of course, it's just one day, plenty more uncertainty to follow.
TAPPER: All right. Julia Chatterley, thanks so much. Anderson?
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Jake, thanks very much. Let's check in with Michael Smerconish, Nia-Malika Henderson, Governor Granholm and Scott Jennings.
How do you anticipate what we hear -- we're going to hear more results, not complete results, but more results, we believe, from Arizona in the coming hours, also in Georgia. Nia, what are you expecting to change?
NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: No, it's unclear. We don't know. There are hundreds of thousands of votes out across these different states. The counting is continuing. We think of those folks who are participating in our democracy, and we just don't know. If the trends continue, it looks like Biden is closer to getting 270 than Donald Trump is. But we just have to count. We can be patient and let the workers do their jobs and we'll see later on tonight and into tomorrow.
COOPER: Scott Jennings, what are you expecting out of Georgia?
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, it looks like there's going to be some tightening. I think what Republicans are really concerned about, of course, is whether that David Perdue goes below the threshold for a runoff in Georgia. So, that's obviously something that's of real concern.
You know, on Arizona I think we're going to know a lot tonight because it looks like the -- based on what we've been told, there's going to be a huge number of ballots out of Maricopa County. And so if the Trump campaign's claims that they are going to gain a lot of ground or to come to pass, we might find out something about that tonight. And if they don't come to pass, we might know that as well. So we can see in the next few hours, Anderson, if what the Trump campaign says is true about the nature of the ballots left to count out there.
COOPER: Yes, we're told, Michael Smerconish, more than 600,000 ballots still being counted in Arizona. And as Scott said, most of them, some 450,000 or so, they're estimating in Maricopa County and may have been sort of delivered or dropped off in the day of the election and in the immediate days before.
MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So, I recognize that the race is certainly not over and, of course, all the votes need to be cast. But the trajectory really is on the side of former Vice President Biden. The president needs something upended in order to change the momentum shift.
And I have to say, Anderson, you know, last night was an awfully exciting evening. There were several momentum shifts during the course of the counting of ballots yesterday and last night. But in the end, when you step back, it really does fit a pattern that the political scientists were telling us was very likely, which was, that given the propensity of Democrats to vote more often by mail-in balloting, that there would come a point where as it was being tabulated, you would see a gradual overtaking of the president by the former vice president. And that seems to be what's happening.
COOPER: Governor Granholm, it's interesting, we heard from Joe Biden a few hours ago, did not hear from -- have not heard directly from the president today on camera, though he has, of course, been tweeting, does it surprise you? Do you think it's wise that he has not gone out there in front of cameras? Because, obviously, he did that last night or early this morning.
JENNIFER GRANHOLM, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Really, the damage has been done. No, he did do that last night. And there were Republicans who pushed back on him because he was so outrageous.
[18:35:01]
I'm glad he hasn't gone out. I'm glad it seems like his lack of being out front claiming victory, because, really, that's all he would do, right? He wouldn't go out and be gracious because that's just not in his DNA. He wouldn't go out and say, you know, let's let the vote be counted. He made that clear last night. So, keeping him off of the screen, I think, is a really good thing.
And can I say, you know, one other thing, you know, Anderson, I know that we've been talking about this COVID situation for months and months. And today, on November 4th,we have this unfortunate situation where -- not just unfortunate but tragic that we hit 100,000 cases of COVID for the first time in a single day. We are going to get back to this COVID thing. But, I, in the end when we evaluate all of this, I'm going to be really interested to see in the analysis how much the COVID situation played into the outcome of this election.
You know, I think a lot of Democrats were surprised that it wasn't more overwhelming because it seemed so obvious that the president was acting so utterly recklessly. We are going to get back to this discussion about COVID. He said that after the election, you know, COVID, COVID, COVID, they're not going to talk about it anymore. Of course, we are.
But I do think that in the end, people will be so glad to have a leader that is going to focus on this relentlessly and responsibly like Joe Biden will do. And it will be interesting to see how the president deals with it in a lame duck if, in fact, he loses this election.
COOPER: Yes. Nia, if Joe Biden does win, the next several weeks and months until an inauguration will be very interesting, to say the least.
HENDERSON: Yes. What does the president do? Does he -- if he ends up losing and not getting those 270 electoral votes, does he concede? What sort of mechanisms does he use in office, executive orders, to get some of his wish list done? Is there a stimulus package? You know, I think the markets would like that. And then families that are struggling around the country would like that as well.
I imagine it would be chaotic. You have from the Biden team they're already setting up their transition website. So they are looking like they think they're going to be in the White House. But it is going to be a very unpredictable next few weeks as the country grapples with this economic crisis as well as a health crisis.
COOPER: Scott Jennings, what would your advice be for the president --
JENNINGS: Anderson, on that front --
COOPER: Go ahead.
JENNINGS: Oh, sorry. Yes, I just wanted -- on that front about the next few weeks, Mitch McConnell in his press conference today in Kentucky said that he would like to see another COVID relief package before the end of the year. And so, you know, obviously Donald Trump will be president no matter what happens in the vote counting here.
But also the American people just spoke loud and clear. I mean, Democrats are going to lose seats in the House. It looks like Republicans, if it all works out for them, could still be the majority party in the Senate.
So I actually think, politically, Nancy Pelosi's hand has been weakened here by what the voters told us last night and it might strengthen what the Senate Republicans wanted to do, which was a more scaled-back but targeted package versus the bigger package that had been discussed just before the election between Mnuchin and Speaker Pelosi.
COOPER: And, Michael, what do you make of the stock market's response so far?
SMERCONISH: I think that the stock market likes stability. And from a divided House of Congress in light of perhaps Vice President Biden being the president, if it goes the way that it looks like it's going, that's probably something the market likes more than perhaps control by both houses by Democrats as well as the White House.
Can I just say that one of the interesting things that I'm going to pay attention to is the behavior of the president if it doesn't go his way? He's got a lot to be proud of in terms of the way he campaigned in the waning days of the campaign. He's got every right to fight for every vote that is rightfully his.
He defied the pollsters yet again. And, Anderson, if, in fact, it doesn't go his way, I wonder about his legacy. And if that's the reason that he wants to try and insinuate that there was fraud, dare I say that perhaps we've not heard the last politically from Donald Trump even if he loses this race.
COOPER: The electoral count stands at 253 for former Vice President Biden, 213 for President Trump. Arizona and Nevada could push Biden to the magic number of 270 electoral votes. We'll expect new Arizona results soon.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:45:00]
BLITZER: All right. Let's take a look at the all-important Electoral College count right now. Take a look at this. You can see Biden has 253 electoral votes. Trump remains at 213. You need 270 to win the presidency. Biden is getting closer and closer and closer. Let's get a key race alert right now.
In Arizona, with its 11 electoral votes, 84 percent of the estimated vote is now in. Biden still maintains a commanding 93,000-vote lead over Donald Trump, 51 percent to 47.6 percent. In Nevada right now, 86 percent of the estimated vote is in. Biden has a much smaller lead, 7,647 over Donald Trump, 49.3percent to 48.7 percent. Six electoral votes in Nevada right now.
Let's go over to David Chalian, who is taking a closer look. Let's take a closer look at Pennsylvania because that lead that Trump has is still impressive but it's shrunk.
CHALIAN: It is impressive and it has narrowed. Remember, Joe Biden has rebuilt two pieces of the blue wall, Michigan and Wisconsin. It's Pennsylvania where Donald Trump still leads. He's got a 266,000-vote lead right now in Pennsylvania with 86 percent of the vote in. It is Donald Trump, 51.5 percent, to Joe Biden, 47.2 percent. But you're right, Wolf, that lead in the wee hours this morning, that was like 600,000-vote lead.
[18:45:01]
CHALIAN: And here's what we know about the outstanding vote in Pennsylvania, what has not been counted -- some 1.1 million votes. That's a rough estimate. Not a precise number.
But we then calculated to see, well, what would each candidate need to have Pennsylvania in their column when all the vote is counted?
Joe Biden needs a pretty steep climb here. He needs between 68 percent and 70 percent of that outstanding uncounted 1.1 million votes if he's going to overcome Trump's lead, flip Pennsylvania and make it blue.
Now, that is not out of the realm of possibility given the way he's winning a lot of this absentee vote that's coming in. But Donald Trump has a much easier task here at the moment because he's in the lead. He only needs about 28 percent to 30 percent of that outstanding 1.1 million batch of uncounted votes so far in Pennsylvania.
I just want to stress, though, that 68 percent to 70 percent, it is high but it is in line with what we've seen Joe Biden winning with these absentee mail votes as they come in. So it is not out of the realm of possibility that he could possibly overtake Donald Trump and close that 266,000-vote gap. Not a guarantee at all. And that is why we have to continue to count the votes and wait, Wolf.
BLITZER: It won't be easy but we'll watch it very, very closely.
John, let's teak a closer look at Pennsylvania right now. What do you see?
KING: You see just what David just described, that Joe Biden faces a seep hill. But the math says it is possible. And that's why you keep an open mind and you count the votes.
But Joe Biden needs to be getting above 70 percent as David just noted, right? More than 2/3 of the votes. That's hard to do in a state where we know the president's very popular. However, the president's popularity is regionalized, if you will, within Pennsylvania.
Look at Philadelphia. So, Joe Biden needs 70 percent plus of the vote. Well, look in Philadelphia County, he's getting 80 percent of the vote.
So, we know a lot of those ballots are here. We can look at the turnout here, 457,000. We go back four years ago, you see 584,000. We expect the vote count out of central Philadelphia, the city itself and then the county around it will be higher than four years ago. That's what we're told to expect.
So you come back here and you say okay, there are votes to be counted in a place where Joe Biden is winning nearly 80 percent of the vote. He has to be above 70 percent. More than reasonable to think -- again, it's a steep hill. A lot of votes come in here. Joe Biden can make up some of that math.
It gets a little more dicey when you go to the suburban counties around it. Joe Biden needs a lot of that to come in in central Philadelphia and in the county. Over here if he needs above 70 percent of the vote, well, he's getting 62 percent of the vote. Are those mail-in ballots for Montgomery County even more disproportionately pro Biden? That's why you count them and find out.
But you see the steepest of the hill is underscored there. You move around to Chester County. Again, the suburbs around Philadelphia, the collar, now a big part of the Democratic foundation. If you're going to win in Pennsylvania this is where you need to run it up.
This one is a little more conservative. The president doing okay. 55 percent. Again, if the votes keep coming in here at 55 percent, that's under what Joe Biden needs, but we do know in the mail-in ballots we saw from today disproportionately for Biden as David said, they're coming in in that direction.
So then you move out here to Allegheny County. Again, we're still at 84 percent. This is Pittsburg, the suburbs around Pittsburgh. Joe Biden running at around 58 percent if you round up, below the metric he needs to meet to catch up. The question is, are these mail-in ballots, if you're doing 57 percent, 58 percent, are they more disproportionately Biden because we know Democrats want to vote by mail.
So let's just see. So you pull it out and you look again. This has been the president's -- the key state the president builds from Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin four years ago, 266,000 votes. You look at that and you say okay, that's a healthy number when you're up to 86 percent.
But as David noted late last night into the early morning hours, it was more than 600,000. So the trend is obvious. It's moving in Biden's direction. The challenge for the Biden campaign is with those outstanding votes, roughly a million, can you make it up?
Again, it's hard. But we know from what we've seen so far during the day, we have to keep it as a possibility because so far Joe Biden is meeting the metric he needs. The question is, will he continue to meet it as they count the rest of those ballots?
BLITZER: I'm just curious about Erie County in Pennsylvania, just south of Buffalo, one of my favorite cities out there.
KING: All politics is local.
BLITZER: But both Biden and Trump, they spent some time in Erie campaigning. How do d. These two candidates do there?
KING: And so, you look out here and again, you see, 83 percent, right? It's a nice call. We're waiting for more votes, traditionally, a blue- collar place. The former Governor Tom Ridge, this is where he lives. He was a congressman, then he was governor. He was for Biden actually, a moderate Republican for Biden. Fifty-two percent for Trump, 47 percent for Joe Biden.
If you round it up. If you go back in time to four years ago, you know, again, we had the third-party candidates did better. That's one of the stories of this year. The third-party candidates did not do as well. The president won it by two points, three points if you round up there, back in here.
It's about the same. Maybe a little bit more of a Trump lead. The question is, where are the rest of those votes, right?? So, here's what you have to do. Remember, the reason we need patience
to get through this process, everyone has to remember three different kinds of votes this year. People who voted by mail, they tended to be especially in Pennsylvania disproportionately Democratic.
[18:50:04]
We know that from the data. People who wait in line to vote early and people who vote on Election Day. And the Election Day vote, again, this is one of the states you have to give the president personal credit and the Trump campaign credit for the late campaign rallies.
I know there are Democrats out there say those are super spreaders, those are COVID events, we can continue that conversation. I mean in turning out votes on Election Day, it worked for the president. If you look at the polling in these states, he was behind, just like in 2016. The Trump rallies did bring turn out.
The question is, this is a great point as we watch Erie County come in, are the ballots yet to be counted? Are there Democrats who decided to mail them, or is it more of a mix? Because Joe Biden, again, has to greatly overperform that number, he has to overperform what he's getting statewide and now across the commonwealth.
But again, we're going to respect the count out in Arizona where the president says he can come back. And we'll see here, it's getting interesting as it narrows.
BLITZER: With Joe Biden on the brink of 270 electoral votes, we're going to ask a close personal friend and political ally how the former vice president is feeling at this truly pivotal moment. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TAPPER: Welcome to ELECTION NIGHT IN AMERICA, continued.
[18:55:02]
I'm Jake Tapper.
We are still waiting to hear on the election results in several key battleground states. I want to go right now to Gary Tuchman who's in Atlanta where we are expecting a press conference at any moment.
The vote in Georgia is narrowing, and Gary is in Atlanta, Fulton County, where we're expecting to hear more.
Gary, what can you tell us?
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Jake, we're in the State Farm arena in Atlanta, Georgia. Normally, the Atlanta Hawks will playing basketball this time of year here. Because of COVID, they're not.
The most exciting thing in the building is what's going on behind me. The vote counting, absentee ballot vote counting here in Fulton County. Now, earlier in the day, about 2:00 in the afternoon, we were told there are still 64,000 mail-in ballots that have to be counted. That number has not been updated. It's supposed to be updated in the next 10 minutes.
We can tell you based on what we have done earlier in the day in DeKalb County, they count between 5,000 and 10,000 ballots an hour. That was five hours ago. So, we're expecting they have counted 40, 50,000 ball lots since then.
There's 159 counties here in Georgia. What you're looking at is one of the biggest counties. The other three large counties that are Gwinnett, Cobb, and also DeKalb also have thousands of ballots that need to be counted.
So, these are counters. These are also adjudicators. Adjudicators are people who look at ballots that are kind of controversial, that may have been signed wrong, where it's not clear what the intent of the voter is and they decide, a Republican, Democrat, independent if that vote should be counted.
We can tell you based on what we saw a short time ago in DeKalb County, they counted 4,000 ballots in about 45 minutes, and of those 4,000 ballots, about 3,600 were for Joe Biden, about 90 percent. Joe Biden got about 83 percent earlier in the vote in that county, so he actually gained some.
So you can see why Democrats like what's happening here in a state like Georgia, the four largest counties, which are heavily Democratic, have a lot of Democratic voters, counting thousands of ballots, and because they're mail in, because they're early, the presumption is this will greatly help the Democrats. We should find out shortly how many more ballots need to be counted here in Fulton County, the largest county in the state of Georgia.
TAPPER: Gary, we're expecting this press conference at any moment. Is it actually possible mathematically for there to be enough ballots there so that Joe Biden would be able to win Georgia? Is that -- I'm not saying is it going to happen, but is it possible?
TUCHMAN: Right, the mathematical possibility is that when this day started, there were 235,000 ballots, roughly, to count in the entire state of Georgia, but I will tell you, included in those counts, it's not just Democratic counties. For example, Houston County, which is in the central part of Georgia, which is where Warner Robins, Georgia, is, which is a -- which is a military base, Republican county, smaller number of people but had tens of thousands of ballots to count there.
So, yes, there is a mathematical chance with the 235,000 votes that need to be counted that something could change in the race. But as you know, you have to be very careful with making that assumption.
TAPPER: Yeah, no, of course. It's not definitively going to happen. But Georgia, potentially 16 electoral votes, Joe Biden right now in our camp has 253 electoral votes, Donald Trump has 213. Those 16, both of those men need it to get to 270. Tell us what we're looking at right now, Gary, because most of us have
not ever been inside a voting room, a tabulation room.
TUCHMAN: So the ground rules I'm not supposed to walk that close. I'm going to take the chance and walk close and ask this woman. Can you tell me really quick, ma'am, what your job is right here.
OK. They don't want me to do that. But I can tell you what they do is sort the ballots, and this is what we learned in DeKalb County, they sort the ballots, count the ballots, and also in the room, in the back, those adjudicators, the Republican, Democrat and independent.
And a typical thing they look at, Jake, the most typical mistake they see on a ballot is a mistake that's not done -- that is done on purpose, and that is people sign Mickey Mouse or Donald duck in the write-in. So, they decide if that ballot should be accepted. So, that's a more common thing that we see in some of these counties.
We can tell you, this is an important thing to point out here in Georgia. If, and, of course, we just talked about this, if Joe Biden wins the state, it would be quite amazing politically because this is a state with two very conservative Republican senators, a conservative Republican governor. The last time a Democrat won the presidential race in the state of Georgia was 28 years ago when Bill Clinton won his first term. He didn't win in 1996 when he ran again.
And then before that was 1996 (ph), when Jimmy Carter in 1980 when Jimmy Carter ran for reelection. Jimmy carter a native son in Georgia, still lives in Plains, Georgia, which is south of Atlanta. So Georgia does not elect many Democrats for president, for senator, for governor, and most of the members of the House of Representatives are Republican.
So if there was a change, if the counting of the absentee ballots resulted in change, it would be a startling political story.
