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CNN Live Event/Special
CNN's Election Night Coverage as Votes for Biden and Trump Narrows; Republicans Claiming Observation Process was Violated in Vote Counting; State of 2020 United States Presidential Election. Aired 11p-12a ET
Aired November 05, 2020 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[23:00:00]
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Presidential votes are being counted into the night at some key locations as this cliffhanger election keeps getting closer and closer. I'm Wolf Blitzer, we are waiting to see a former Vice President Joe Biden takes the lead in Georgia after moving into a virtual tie with the president in the state Trump must win.
And just moments ago Biden cut deeper into Trump's lead in Pennsylvania, another battleground state the president needs to stay in the game. We're also watching those contests along with the races in Arizona and Nevada. As Biden aims for wins that would simply lock in a White House victory.
Get this, he's only 17 electoral votes shy of the 270 needed to become President-Elect. Trump trailing with 213, is launching desperate and very dangerous new attacks on the vote-counting process at the heart of our democracy.
Let's get a key race alert.
All right. Let's start in Georgia right now. Look at this. The president's lead over Biden has collapsed. It's only 1,775 votes. 1,775 votes separate Trump and Biden. 49.4 percent to 49.4 percent. 16 electoral votes at play, at stake right now in Georgia. Oh, so close.
In Pennsylvania where there's 20 electoral votes and 95 percent of the estimated vote is in, 49.6 percent for Trump, 49.2 percent for Biden. Trump is ahead by only 26,000-plus votes right now. That vote, John King, has collapsed over and over again. It's gone from a few hundred thousand now down to just 26,000 or so. Let's start in Georgia right now. Update our viewers.
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: All right. It's simply remarkable, and, again, this has been a methodical march for Joe Biden to cut into Donald Trump's lead in Georgia, once over 300,000 votes. And again, as we wait, we know, we know for a fact that there are still votes out right here in Clayton County and we may get them in the next hour or so. The executive there says they're trying hard to get the remaining votes done as soon as possible in Clayton County. We also know --
BLITZER: Actually, John, let me interrupt for a moment, because Pamela Brown got some new information on where that vote is.
PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, in fact we're just getting an update from the Secretary of State in Georgia. And here's where we are. 14,097 votes are still out. We're talking about Clayton. Look at this number. 4,355 votes is what they still have to get through and then you look at Gwinnett, 4,800.
The context of this is these are heavily Democratic areas. And you spoke to the clerk there in Clayton. They're continuing to update throughout tonight. So, we could be finding out more very soon.
BLITZER: Very interesting, John, 14,097 outstanding votes. And look at how close it is.
KING: Right. And so 4,800 of them right here in Gwinnett County. Joe Biden is getting 58 percent of the vote in the total count. Of that outstanding group, you said right there, Joe Biden needs, I believe, 57 percent is the threshold for Joe Biden to catch up and pass. As we've been counting votes throughout the evening today, he is consistently getting more than 70 percent of these mail-in ballots in these counties. Even in the Republican counties. He's getting higher numbers in the Democratic County.
So, you see 48 votes here in Gwinnett County. I'm going to move over here to Cobb County and pull this one out here and look at the list. 700 votes in Cobb County where the former vice president is getting 57 percent of the vote, but, again, in the mail-in ballots he's exceeding even that.
Pam just mentioned, and we talked to the executive earlier, this is Clayton County down here. The number in Clayton County, 4,355 ballots. Again, they've been coming in disproportionately Democratic. I want to pull out and show down here, not all of these counties are voting Democrat.
When you look at the total numbers, this is Taylor County down here. Look at the number, 456 ballots to be counted here. Now logic tells you if you watch this, the president is going to come out on top here. But that is simply not what we've been seeing.
We'll count those votes. We'll see if they're for the president, they'll get counted, obviously. But in these Republican counties, the mail mail-in ballots are still coming from Democrats who live in this Republican counties. We've seen that consistently throughout the days. So, we're waiting for those in Taylor County there.
There's another county here in central Georgia. Lawrence County has almost 1,800. 1,797 ballots. And again, at first glance you would think that will help the president's math and maybe it will. We'll count them when they come in. But consistently, again, because Election Day ballots are counted. That's how most Republicans voted? Democrats opted to use the mail-in, right? That's what they are counting today.
The Election Day count is already done. They're counting mail-in ballots now. We've seen consistently that even in ruby red Republican Counties what we're getting today are Democratic votes. And Joe Biden again, even though he's only getting 35 percent, when you take the whole county, in the mail-in ballots consistently getting high 60s, 70s, and some even Republican counties, higher than that. So when you look at that overall number, more than 14,000 votes to be counted. A 1,775-vote lead right now for the president of the United States.
Joe Biden has consistently been getting 60 percent, 70 percent, or more as we go county through county and count those votes. He needs about 57 percent to catch up and pass the president.
[23:05:09]
So, again, unless something dramatic changes from what has been happening for hour after hour after hour today, Joe Biden is on a trajectory to pass the president as soon as more votes come in. It doesn't mean it's over. Really very close. There are recount rules, there are provisional ballots, military ballots still to be count.
But when we were here Tuesday night Election Day into Wednesday morning, the president of the United States had a 343,000-vote lead. Somewhere in that ballpark was over 300,000. He thought this was inevitable, that he would carry Georgia again.
But, again, they're counting votes. On Tuesday they counted the election-day vote as we go Wednesday into Thursday, they're counting the mail-in ballots. It's perfectly fair, it's perfectly logical and its perfect math is what's happening today. And, again, to the point you made earlier, the Republican Governor, the Republican Secretary of State, they are just counting votes. They're doing their jobs. They're setting their partisan hats aside and counting votes.
BLITZER: Totally understandable during this coronavirus pandemic, a lot of people didn't want to have to wait in long lines on Election Day. They wanted to mail-in their ballots or drop them off in a drop box. Because that was simply safer. Especially older Americans. People with underlying health conditions. Look what's going on with the coronavirus pandemic. And as a result, so many people decided to use the mail-in system.
KING: Right. A combination of the more access to voting through the mail-in voting and intensity in the election. Look, both parties, voters in both parties wanted to participate. 73 million. 73.7 million votes for Joe Biden. 69.6 million votes for President Trump. Voters in both parties wanted to participate in this election. More Democrats, you're right, took advantage of early voting and mail-in voting.
Republicans turned out disproportionately on Election Day. It was high intensity in this election which is why as we go through the counts here, we should be celebrating increased turnout. We should be patient and let people count votes. We should not be as happened in the White House briefing room today attacking people who are doing the building blocks, you know, the nuts and bolts of the greatest democracy on earth.
BLITZER: As I often said, the president, a major blunder by telling his supporters don't trust the mail-in ballots, go show up and vote. And a lot of them did, a lot of them -- a lot of the Democrats didn't trust what the president was saying.
KING: I just pulled this up just to see, because at this point in the night we're waiting. Some of these states are doing this -- on the West Coast states, Nevada and Arizona, tend to be doing it on a schedule. These other, Pennsylvania and Georgia, votes are coming in as you get them. Again, 26,329 in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 3.2 million votes for each of these gentlemen as we count the votes right now.
And again, Georgia the lead was at one point above 300,000. It's now down below 2,000. That lead was about 600,000 if we went Tuesday into Wednesday. It is now 26,319 and it has been a steady decline throughout the night. Exact same dynamic as we see in Georgia.
Votes come in, there are mail-in votes being counted today, they are disproportionately Democratic and we have consistently seen the former vice president getting i70's or low 80 percent as we count those ballots. And again what we know that there is still ballots to be counted here. They're up to 91 now.
We started the day 80 percent in Philadelphia. They are up to 91, but that still tells you, look, 521,000 votes for Joe Biden, turnout is up in this election. Hillary Clinton got 584,000 votes in Philadelphia four years ago.
It doesn't mean Joe Biden going to match it, but if you use that as your target, right. Where Joe Biden at least match. Hillary Clinton's vote in Philadelphia? It would be 584. If it's close to that. That means maybe there's 50 or 60,000 votes there. Maybe even more. To be counted in the city of Philadelphia. I had a note earlier telling me how many they thought were left there. Let me see if I can find it.
We still think in Philadelphia, the votes we had, Joe Biden is 186 percent, the last time we counted votes there. And so there's more than enough votes. Just in Philadelphia, there are more than enough votes to overcome that 26,000 lead. Again, it doesn't mean they all come up for Joe Biden but they have consistently throughout the day 80 percent or higher.
BLITZER: And remind our viewers about Pennsylvania and Georgia, and they potentially both are about to flip in Biden's favor right now, but remind our viewers why they are both so important for Trump.
KING: Well, we can do that two ways. Number one, if Joe Biden wins that, he's the next president of the United States. He's at 253 electoral votes, Pennsylvania has 20. Do the simple math at home. 253 plus 20 gets you to 273. So, that would be a game over. If Joe Biden can do that, number one, he would put together the blue wall again. Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and he would show that the Democratic Party is beginning to change the map in the Sun Belt states.
Georgia, Hillary Clinton tried, came up short, about 3.5 point race four years ago. The Democrats have long wanted to do that. That would be a victory for the Democratic Party. And then again, more Sun Belt in the southwest, in Arizona and Nevada, the former vice president is leading right now. He could get in excess of 300 electoral votes. That's why it matters to him.
If you look at the president's math right now, he needs, if he wants to get to 270, he needs both of those. If he loses Georgia, wins that, he can get to 269. Which would be a tie. 269-269, you get a tie. This is the dream scenario for political reporters you hear every four years. It might happen someday. You know, we'll see. It's possible.
[23:10:2]
But if you think about Joe Biden leading out there, leading out there, it's most unlikely. I'm not raising it to cause any great drama. But that if the president of the United States loses that, the best he could do is 269. And so these are -- to get 270, the president needs both of these and as we speak, his lead is shrinking.
BLITZER: Its 269-269 goes to the new House of Representatives. One vote for each new delegate for each state delegation. So, that would be dramatic, indeed. All right. Anderson, over to you.
ANDERSON COOPER, BREAKING NEWS SHOW HOST: Yes. Wolf, John, thanks very much. As we're watching the votes continue to be counted, and Vice President Biden's deficit, well, getting closer and closer to overtaking President Trump in Pennsylvania, as well as in Georgia, we're starting to hear more from other Republican leaders. We've been wondering after the president's remarks what some would be saying.
Lindsey Graham was on Sean Hannity's program on Fox. He said that there's the process of -- process of observing an election has been violated, he said Philadelphia elections are as crooked as a snake, you're talking about a lot of dead people voting, he said Nevada people are not legal residents who are voting.
He claims Arizona's been run well because he likes the Governor and he trusts the Governor. That is, of course, a state where President Trump's deficit is actually narrowing and he's getting a little closer to Vice President Biden. Biden's in the lead right now. Says I don't trust Philadelphia, I don't trust Nevada, I stand with President Trump, he stood with us.
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, there are two different kinds of Republicans we're hearing from on this. One is the Lindsey Graham, I'm all in. I'm totally all in. So is Ted Cruz tonight on Hannity. He said, what we've seen the last few days is partisan political lawless, we have seen this -- we're seeing this pattern in Philadelphia, they're not allowing election observers in, et cetera, et cetera.
COOPER: It's interesting, they're not talking about Nevada. Like, Lindsey Graham isn't talking about Nevada either because there's a Republican Governor -- excuse me, not Nevada, Georgia, because there's a Republican Governor there.
BORGER: Right, they're all kind of in on the Philadelphia thing, and these guys I would say that there's more comments like that from Josh Hawley, DeSantis. You know these are people who might want to be president. DeSantis runs sometime, you want to keep Donald Trump on your team. But then there are the preponderance of elected Republicans who are saying this kind of stuff like count every legal vote cast.
I would include the vice president in that camp, by the way, because that's what he's saying. And that's what a lot of Congressional Republicans are saying, trying to kind of walk both sides of this, take Trump out of it. And just say, OK, count every legal vote. Without getting specific about I support what the president is saying and you need to pursue these particular legal actions without, again, like Lindsey Graham, giving any evidence --
COOPER: Also.
BORGER: -- whatsoever.
COOPER: Steve Bannon has been now permanently suspended from Twitter because Steve Bannon on his own program said that -- he suggested Thursday morning that Dr. Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray, that their heads should be put on spikes on the gates of the White House in a second Trump administration.
VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: That's just horrible.
BORGER: Well, there you are.
RICK SANTORUM, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: As you can imagine, I've been hearing a little bit from friends in the Republican world, and, you know, they're sending me lots of videos and other testimonials suggesting that there are -- there's, quote, widespread fraud and particularly point to Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.
And as I said when, right after the president's speech, if there are things to be investigated, the president has every right and in my mind should investigate those things. That's why he's deploying lawyers. You know, that's why Lindsey Graham's giving him $500,000 so they can go out and track these things down.
With social media, there is an endless stream of rumors as well as potentially legitimate accusations of improper activity and they should be pursued. But as you said, Anderson, you have to provide the evidence and my concern with what the president said was he didn't provide the evidence and said the things he said.
Now, he may have, again, being a Trump whisperer here, he may have known those things in his own mind. But I think it's important before you make that accusation, you track them down, you find out if they're valid and you pursue them. And so what I think what I'm hearing from the Trump folks is, you know, give us some time, we don't -- we can't dump it all out there now because we haven't had time to investigate, give us some time to investigate it, you know, let this thing play out a little bit. You know, if we're right, we'll prove it, if we're not right, we'll move on.
[23:15:00]
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: They don't want to dump it all out. President of the United States stood at a podium and he made -- SANTORUM: I agree.
AXELROD: And he said that there were examples of widespread fraud. And you're saying they need more time to investigate it. So he makes the allegations and then they go and investigate whether the allegations are true?
SANTORUM: I think --
AXELROD: Is that how it is supposed to work?
SANTORUM: That's the wrong order.
BORGER: Backwards.
JONES: I just want to talk about this from a different perspective. There's a lot of fear, there's been fear on the part of Democrats that if things got to a certain point that the Republicans would just start doing extraordinary things, taking extraordinary measures. One of the things that Lindsey Graham seemed to be indicating that the Pennsylvania legislature should just set aside the vote and appoint their own electors and just send their own electors at the Congress.
That is shocking. I actually did a Ted talk about this very scenario. There's a group called Hold the Line that's been talking about this, Choosedemocracy.us. This is a dangerous moment tonight in America. When you have elected leaders, the Senator, Lindsey Graham, one of the best-known Senators in America, suggesting that without evidence the votes of the people of Pennsylvania should be set aside. And that the legislators should send their own electors to Congress.
That starts to sound like a coup against democracy, starts to sound like a coup against at the will of the voters. Choosedemocracy.us has been warning about this. Hold the line has become sort of a guidebook that people have been passing around about this. We're getting into very scary territory. There is no evidence of significant fraud happening in Philadelphia or any place else.
And by the way, I just want to point out, Republicans, you don't have to do this. I just -- can we just talk about politics for a second, you already are going to have the Senate. McConnell is going to stop Biden from doing almost anything. You got the Supreme Court. You got your tax cuts. You got most of the governorships and state legislate -- don't burn down the House to give Donald Trump a better feeling about himself.
This doesn't make any sense. You're going to have people in the streets this weekend on the left and the right, if the elected leaders in the Republican Party keep going down this dangerous path. I hope that choosedemocracy.us people are wrong.
SANTORUM: I'll actually make the case, Van, that it's more dangerous if they don't pursue these claims.
JONES: Oh, I don't mind this going to court. Court is fine.
SANTORUM: I think it's important.
JONES: Court is fine.
SANTORUM: I think it's really important.
JONES: Senator, let -- I want you to respond to what I'm actually saying.
SANTORUM: OK.
JONES: I am saying that if you want to go to court with real evidence, please do.
SANTORUM: OK.
JONES: That is appropriate. That's what happens with --
SANTORUM: I know. I've heard -- that's not the only solution --
Some people are saying that it's dangerous for the Trump --
JONES: No, no, no. of course. Al Gore did that.
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: Some people have said that. Some are saying it's dangerous to go to court. It's not dangerous. It's the right thing to do. It's the only thing.
(CROSSTALK)
JONES: We agree on that. But do we agree on this? It would be dangerous for the state legislature, of the commonwealth legislature whatever, to set aside the vote of American people and go to Congress over their heads? That would be dangerous.
SANTORUM: I'm not watching Fox. So I -- but what I suspect Lindsey Graham said --
JONES: I'll tell what he said, he said everything should be on the table.
SANTORUM: He said, I'm sure he didn't say that unless there was proof that it was a fraudulent election to a scale where they can't redo the election. I'm sure that was he's saying that there's an alternative to, quote, redoing the election.
BORGER: Well, you know, he didn't -- he was asked, should they then invalidate this if they don't allow observers in, which as you know they are allowing observers in.
SANTORUM: Yes.
BORGER: So they're not talking about not allowing observers in when they are. OK. And then Graham, as Anderson said, said everything should be on the table and then went on and on about Philadelphia elections being crooked. This is the chairman of the judiciary committee.
JONES: He can't do that.
BORGER: In the Senate. He's a constitutional -- he's a lawyer, he's an attorney. Why is he doing this? I mean, we've asked that question about Lindsey Graham a lot.
SANTORUM: Emotions are running very, very high right now.
BORGER: But Don Jr. was complaining about Lindsey Graham a bunch of hours ago. Where was he? Suddenly Lindsey Graham is out there.
JONES: And it cost up $500,000 for the president and now he's calling for stuff that's scaring people. And by the way, all of them, --
(CROSSTALK)
-- about Philadelphia, by the way, I believe that Biden is doing pretty well, didn't he just win Scranton? Nobody's talking about Scranton. Didn't he flip Erie? Nobody's talking about Erie. It's all about Philadelphia, Philadelphia. This stuff is dangerous. It's beneath the dignity of Lindsey Graham.
Lindsey Graham knows better than to do this. And I'm going to tell you, I just want you to be very, very clear. The left is on tender hooks right now. Labor unions are getting ready for a general strike. I'm telling you, people are getting freaked out by the Republican leadership saying stuff like this. It's a dangerous moment in America. Back it up. Let's go to court. You got something, bring it. Let's stop making these kind of threats.
SANTORUM: Well, let me just say, first off, there's a Democratic Governor of Pennsylvania, so not --
[23:20:00]
BORGER: They don't trust any Democrats.
JONES: You can send two competing groups of electors to Congress. If this happens in Nevada, this is just not the way to do an election. Let's just do the election and go to court.
SANTORUM: Nancy Pelosi sitting in Congress -- this is not, I mean, first, it's not a credible threat, number one. Number two, I don't think -- look, I have a lot of friends in the Pennsylvania legislature and I don't think they have anything to be concerned about.
COOPER: A time like this, and I mean, I think, everybody -- we all should think about this, is just, it seems like at times, you tamp down rhetoric as opposed to throw gasoline on it on the left and the right. I mean, it would seem like --
SANTORUM: Again, I --
JONES: Do you trust (inaudible) that's good.
SANTORUM: I don't know what Lindsey said. So, I'm not going to categorize.
JONES: I put you in the tamping down rhetoric category, by the way.
SANTORUM: That is not tamping down rhetoric. But at the same time, if the campaign and Republican believes there is fraud going on out there, and there's all this evidence which I'm being thrown, they have every right to scream about it. they have every right to say it needs to be investigated and the Trump folks have every right to go out there and from my perspective they should be feeding it out there as much as they can to make sure that people understand that this is not just, you know, a witch trial.
BORGER: But it's, you know, Lindsey Graham clearly is -- this is I'm going to back Donald Trump because he backed me and he said, I don't trust Arizona as Anderson was saying, I don't trust Philadelphia, I don't trust what's going on in Nevada.
COOPER: Though he said he does trusts Arizona.
BORGER: He does, sorry.
COOPER: Even though he said that's legal (inaudible).
BORGER: Right, I trust Arizona. It's late. So everything should be on the table. Let's stand with President Trump.
AXELROD: Yeah.
BORGER: He stood with us.
AXELROD: How about standing up for the constitution --
BORGER: Exactly.
AXELROD: How about standing up for America. How about standing down at this moment and allowing the process to work.
COOPER: Yeah.
SANTORUM: Yeah. I agree. And Georgia, for example, there's potentially 9,000 military ballots that could be sent in.
JONES: Right.
SANTORUM: That can be a game changer.
COOPER: Sure. But according to the president, those votes should not be accepted.
SANTORUM: Yeah, I hope not.
COOPER: And the president is saying don't accept the votes of service members --
SANTORUM: No, this is --
COOPER: -- overseas.
SANTORUM: Remember he's OK with late ballots. He's OK in Arizona.
COOPER: No, these are late ballots that are just going to pop up. They're just going to --
(CROSSTALK)
In fact people can still vote in the military. Watching this. They can still send their ballots in for 10 days I think in Pennsylvania, no?
JONES: I think Axelrod is actually pointing us in the right direction. And I think it's correct. Let's stand with the constitution, let's stand with the American people. Most people are not, you know, saying extreme things on either side. Most people are waiting to see how this works out. Most Americans, again, and we said over and over again, tonight the most beautiful thing, you have Republicans and Democrats, regular people, in gymnasiums standing shoulder to shoulder counting and watching together.
SANTORUM: Yes.
JONES: So that's -- everybody needs to actually support those American, let's get together behind those Americans. There are cameras in these places, there's people in these places, and trust this process. If somebody's got something real, don't throw it out there as a bomb. Go into court. And let's stay together, let's stay together as a country.
SANTORUM: I agree with you. But that's why I've been for now three days complaining about what the Secretary of State in Pennsylvania did. Not because I necessarily think it's going to be a huge impact on the election, although it might. Given the size. Because it creates the perception of -- not the perception, the reality -- that they're changing the rules of the game to help them. And the fact is that Philadelphia didn't allow them in for two days. And so --
JONES: They did allow them --
SANTORUM: They did now. But they let them hundreds of feet away. You can't observe if you need binoculars.
BORGER: What you're saying is different from what the president is saying. The president is saying they're changing their votes and --
SANTORUM: And, again --
BORGER: And it's almost as if he didn't --
COOPER: We should also point out in that incident in Philadelphia, and anything that was done improperly should -- that's idiotic and wrong and whoever should be punished but they did go to court and that was reversed is my understanding.
SANTORUM: Right, but they had two days where they were counting ballots and so that's -- COOPER: But there is a process for it and the process did rectify it.
SANTORUM: It did. It did. But that's why Lindsey said, hey, they counted all these ballots in the dark.
JONES: By the way, this is not exactly right. There was an extra set of observers that were held, I think too far back and they were allowed to (inaudible). But it's not like there were people who were space aliens or only from one party behind a door someplace. There's a process there and there's extra stuff. So, I just want to point out --
SANTORUM: No, I think when they're counting the ballots, that's the case when they're validating, their canvassing. But I think, again, I could be wrong on this, but when they're counting ballots, just city employees who are in there counting. I mean, there's nobody overseeing them counting. There's no Republican and Democrat watching them count.
JONES: My point about it is, this is the normal process.
SANTORUM: It is a normal process.
JONES: It's a normal process and they wanted more observation and they got more observation.
SANTORUM: They want legitimate observation. I mean, let's just be honest. I mean, Philadelphia was not being transparent. And you didn't see them complain about any other county in the state. Why? Because the other counties said, yeah, come in, you can watch. But Philadelphia didn't. And what does that do? That raises suspicions.
[23:25:05]
JONES: Can I tell you why? Because you also don't forget in Philadelphia, you had these threats. And don't forget, there's a higher level of concern about people coming in with guns. About people coming in -- all these poll watchers. And so there was -- yes, listen --
SANTORUM: You live in your world --
JONES: -- and I live in my world.
SANTORUM: -- (inaudible) walking in with guns.
JONES: You live in your world, and I live in my world. But the idea that you'd going to have a bunch of people coming in there was very scary in Philadelphia. Now, that's a part of it. So, again, you say it's about fraud. I say it about security.
SANTORUM: You say that people who are supposes to work for the city of Philadelphia, they are scary too.
(CROSSTALK)
AXELROD: This is not about the integrity of the system. OK? The president has been saying for months before there was any voting or any evidence of anything that this was going to be a fraudulent process. He's been teeing this up. He stands up tonight, he makes charges. You know, and then everybody says, well, now we're going to get the evidence. This is -- this is -- what's happened is the American people are speaking and it looks like they're saying that they are ready for change and the president doesn't want to accept that and Lindsey Graham apparently feels like he has a higher obligation --
BORGER: Yes.
AXELROD: -- to the president of the United States.
BORGER: So we see --
SANTORUM: One final point I'd like --
(CROSSTALK)
BORGER: Wait a minute. We see the narrative now is being spun out on Fox by -- by Graham and Cruz. And you see what it's going to turn into. This is the narrative, which is the election is being stolen. Here's what happened. They didn't follow the rules. And Donald Trump would have won otherwise. When we know very well that we all expected the vote count to go this way because of Republican legislatures and Democratic legislatures who said count the mail-in ballots later.
COOPER: Razor-thin margin in Georgia, a shrinking lead in Pennsylvania. As votes keep coming in and they continue to be counted. We have a lot more as election night in America continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:30:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We are watching what is going on in Georgia right now. John King is here at the magic wall. You know, Georgia, 1,805 vote lead for Trump right now. It's a shrunk. It went up a tiny little bit, though.
KING: It was 1,775. The president has actually gained 30 votes in that lead. And we told you, Joe Biden has consistently been cutting into it. This is the first time in some time where the president has gained votes.
Now, that's a very modest 30 votes and we know most the other counties still to come in are expected to be democratic. But we told you, we would tell you if the president stopped what had been a march, this may just be a pause, but I just want to show you what happened.
It is Forsyth County. These votes came in just a short time ago. Again, it is pretty modest. The president is in a new install, they're counting mail-in ballots. He got 673 and Joe Biden got 643. So it's a net gain of 30 votes for the president. This is 49 percent if you round up, 49 percent if you round up. This is 47 percent if you round up. It is 48.9 and 46.8. But again, we're going through this county by county. You're getting instalments of votes that they're counting. The mail-in ballots, sometimes they come in big chunks, sometimes they come in relatively small chunks. But this is the first time in hours, it's only 30 votes. We are just trying to be fair to the president. We are showing the people the county votes out there. And this is what happened.
So just in Forsyth, we got this count, a net gain of 30 for the president. So when you pull it out, now it is 1,805. Again, the trajectory here is not good for the president. That's being very polite.
BLITZER: Take a look at Pennsylvania right now, John, because the numbers keep shrinking for the president. Look at this. Trump is now leading by only 24,484. Ninety-five percent of the vote is in. We're told this happened. The vote just shrunk for Trump in Delaware County.
KING: So in Delaware County, you're going to come down here, outside of Philadelphia, and there you go, Delaware County, we're up to 91 percent. So it's important. You just said we got new votes in Delaware County. It's shrinking the president's lead, and we still have more votes to count from Delaware County.
BLITZER: Let me give you the numbers --
KING: Sure. I want to bring this up.
BLITZER: -- that just came in from Delaware County.
KING: Give me one second to bring this up for you and fire away.
BLITZER: Biden got -- take a look at this -- 2,819. Trump in Delaware County got 984. So, 72.9 percent for Biden.
KING: Right. And so this, again, consistently we've said throughout the day Joe Biden needed -- it started out earlier close to 70 percent then it was 67 percent of the votes. Joe Biden needed to catch up. He is consistently coming in above the metric he needs to continue the march toward erasing the president's lead.
And this is, again, consistently what we've seen. It's just important, they're counting mail-in ballots now, so in the overall vote in Delaware County, democratic-leaning suburb of Philadelphia, Joe Biden is getting 63 percent when you round up. The president is 37.
But the mail-in ballots are disproportionately democratic. So you see he's outpacing his margin countywide in these ballots they're counting today which are mail-in ballots. The overall totals include the Election-Day total. So we're just seeing this consistently, which is why you get these margins and they're higher.
Biden has been consistently overperforming his full vote, the total vote, in the mail-in ballots that they're counting today. So there's yet another example. And again, we've seen this consistently, and you pull out, now it's 24,000. We know, we know that there are well in excess of that still to be counted just in Philadelphia.
BLITZER: Yeah.
KING: Just in Philadelphia. We also know that there are, I believe, 36,000 was the number, to be counted starting tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. in the east here in Allegheny County, Pittsburgh, and the areas around there.
So there are more than enough votes outstanding, some 165,000 or so, maybe a little higher than that. The state website says 175,000 as of a while ago. We just reported a few more votes, so somewhere in the ballpark of 165,000, 175,000 votes.
The president has a 24,000-vote lead, 24,484 to be exact. And consistently throughout the day, Joe Biden has been cutting into this in chunks, sizable chunks to tell you exactly where the trajectory --
BLITZER: There are still tens of thousands of votes outstanding in Pennsylvania right now.
[23:35:00]
KING: Right.
BLITZER: Ninety-five percent of the vote is in. Five percent is still out. Let's check in with Jake, Dana, and Abby.
TAPPER: Thanks, Wolf. And boy, what a nail biter, as I said before, and now votes are coming in that are allowing a net positive gain of votes for Donald Trump in Georgia, and this really just gets to the bottom line of what we're witnessing here, which is democracy. The American people voted, tens of millions of them, and their votes are being counted.
And Dana Bash, it is -- I mean, it's just astounding to watch people on the Trump team try to claim as if the counting of votes, the normal democratic function, that there is some malfeasance when there is no evidence of malfeasance.
And in fact, the counting in some cases, certainly in Arizona, but also in Georgia as we're seeing, is helping Donald Trump. We just saw Donald Trump extend his lead in Georgia because of the counting.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. I mean, now, you're even, despite the fact that because Donald Trump, Jr. shamed some of the president's allies into going on Fox and saying things that really don't have any evidence to back them up, others like Kellyanne Conway and Chris Christie have gone on TV and said, if the Trump campaign believes that there really is malfeasance, show us the evidence, and we haven't seen any.
What we have seen is, people in each of these four states counting votes and election officials in each of the four states saying that they see no evidence of fraud.
TAPPER: Democrats and Republicans --
BASH: Correct.
TAPPER: -- observers in all of those rooms.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: This is all just so incredibly short-sighted on the part of the president and of his allies on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.
The president is in a situation where the best thing that he can do is just to wait for the votes to be counted because anything other than that is a complete hail, Mary pass that is highly unlikely to work.
He has a lot of problems on this map right now, Jake. It's not just Pennsylvania. It's not just Georgia. Yes, he is closing the gap in Arizona, but he is trailing in Nevada still. And he absolutely has to win in both Pennsylvania and in Georgia in order to have a chance at getting to 270 electoral votes.
So it's not going to work to simply claim there is widespread fraud coast to coast and hopes that the Supreme Court steps in in five states. That is not going to work.
TAPPER: And --
PHILLIP: And so I -- at the end of the day, yes, we need to wait for the votes to be counted, but the strategy makes no sense. It is a strategic blunder on their part because this is not -- there's no argument to be made that in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, and in Nevada, there was so much fraud that the Supreme Court has to step in and hand this back to Donald Trump should he lose it fair and square, if that's what the votes --
TAPPER: And -- right, there's no evidence of that. And we are yet -- we are seeing some of the president's most obedient servants, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, the house minority leader Kevin McCarthy from California, go on TV and say things that are not true, say things that there's no evidence for, talk about electoral fraud.
This is not accurate. This is not what is actually going on. The American people are having their votes counted. The last thing that needs to happen is for the Republican Party, which has enabled the very worst impulses of this president, so as to benefit from the policies they like, the last thing that needs to happen is for them to do this at the expense of the American people and our right to vote, our right to vote.
My mom lives in Philadelphia. She is in her late 70s. She does not want to get coronavirus. And she voted by mail. Her ballot is among them. She's an American citizen. She gets to have it counted. And the idea that Republicans are helping to disenfranchise millions of Americans is disgraceful.
You know, in August 1974, three Republican leaders went to the White House and told President Nixon that the Republican Party was not going to stand by and they were not going to support him. And Nixon resigned the next day. Those three Republican leaders, two of them were from Arizona and one of them was from Pennsylvania, two of the four states that were waiting to hear from today. Let the people, let the American people have their say.
President Trump's leads are shrinking. Everyone is on the edge of their seat. We're bringing it all to you as it happens. "Election Night in America" continues next.
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[23:40:00]
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COOPER: And we continue to watch the votes being counted in a number of states throughout the country. It has been a fascinating night to say the least.
David Axelrod, for Joe Biden watching all this, I mean, tomorrow, what does he do?
AXELROD: Well, I think he -- maybe he'll appear as he did again today in some form of fashion. First of all, let's -- I think that they know, both sides kind of know where this thing is and where it's going, and I think he's signalled very much that he's content to wait for the process to play out. And -- but --
[23:45:00]
COOPER: Both teams -- I mean, lawyers are being assembled.
AXELROD: Oh, my, gosh. I think lawyers have been -- this is not unexpected. What is happening right now is not unexpected because the president has been signalling the play for months.
So I know Bob Bauer, the former White House counselor, senior adviser to the campaign and their lawyers, they've been assembling legal resources for months in anticipation of this kind of a tactic. I expect, they're in good shape there.
But for Biden himself, I think he is carrying himself right now as a guy who is going to be president and he's trying to play that role, and reassure people -- and reassure people about the integrity of the process.
COOPER: So if Georgia is called, you know, late tonight, tomorrow, if Pennsylvania is called tomorrow at some point and it's clear that Joe Biden will be the next president, he then, what, begins assembling a team, assembling a transition team?
BORGER: He has a --
AXELROD: Well, he has a transition --
COOPER: He already has a transition. BORGER: Yeah.
AXELROD: I think all of these things have been in formulation. He's had people think about the transition for months. And as, you know, as we said earlier, this is no ordinary transition because of the, you know, you mentioned we're record COVID cases. We don't know where that --
COOPER: More than 120,000 today.
AXELROD: Yeah. I mean, there's plenty to think about and, you know, I think he's going to signal, I'm focused on what you guys are hiring me to do, and that's the right thing to do.
BORGER: And, you know, these people who have been with Biden in many cases for decades have also been in the White House. They've -- you know, they've been in government. They worked with him when he was vice president. So, they understand how government works. They understand their job that they need to do and they've been working on a transition for quite some time.
Biden is a superstitious, so he doesn't like to talk about that too much right now, even internally, but it's clear, that's what they're going to do. If he wins, if he says, OK, I have 270 votes, I do expect that he will come out and say that we've, you know, we've won.
I don't expect him to start litigating ballot watchers in Philadelphia, et cetera, et cetera, but I do think he will say that it was a fair election and then, you know, you'll see what Donald Trump says. I do not expect Donald Trump to concede. That's the real question.
JONES: Well, I think we have some good news tonight. First of all, a lot of Republicans did come out. We talked about the ones that came out, I think, in the negative way and threw some gasoline on the fire. But a lot of Republicans came out and said what the president said is not appropriate. I think that's very important.
I also think the people trust our institutions. You don't stand in line for five hours if you don't believe in something. You don't work as hard as people work in the middle of the pandemic to -- so the people trust our institutions. The politicians need to trust them, too. That's all.
If the people -- if the politicians would just be as good in both parties as the American people, we're going to be okay. So, I just think we got to hang together. This thing is going to get worked out in the next 24, 48 hours, I hope. But I --
COOPER: You think it will be -- you mean worked out in terms of votes?
JONES: In terms of votes, in terms of votes. There will be court and all that stuff. But I just think -- I think we should take encouragement from the American people. The people are on the whole good. We don't have a bunch of unrest. We have some yahoos. I think if the politicians can trust the system as much as the people, we'll be all right.
SANTORUM: I just want to allay Van's fears here a little bit. I just was communicating with the Senate majority leader in Pennsylvania, the state Senate majority leader, who says -- quote -- "The PA election code says electors go to the popular vote winner. The legislature has no ability to appoint electors."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good.
SANTORUM: So according to Majority Leader Jake Corman from the state Senate --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good.
SANTORUM: -- that's not an option that Lindsey can pursue. So, look, I think what we're seeing on -- if people, again, passionate, they put everything into this thing.
And, you know, what I'm hearing from a lot of folks are, well, you guys didn't get over the last election, you know, came the Russia investigation, all this stuff, you never considered legitimate.
And I said, well, you know, we complained about it because we thought it was a horrible thing that Democrats were doing to try to invalidate Donald Trump and they continue to go after him, you know, because they didn't think he was a legitimate president.
Do we want to keep this up? Do we want to keep up every time we elect a president we're going to just --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SANTORUM: -- by the way, I'm not saying they shouldn't. Let me just repeat. They should follow the evidence and if they have legitimate claims, go to court.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sure.
SANTORUM: -- prosecute them, get them out there --
BORGER: Absolutely.
SANTORUM: I'll be --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'll be with you.
SANTORUM: I'll be with you 100 percent of the time.
JONES: I'll be with you if they got real stuff.
SANTORUM: If they got real stuff, let's do it.
[23:50:00]
SANTORUM: But we can't -- I mean, at some point, and I think, if it's not next week, they don't need to find it tomorrow, all right? That's the other thing. Let's give folks time to get their case together, to get the evidence, to do the work, and make their case. And then either make your case. If you can't make the case, then at some point, move on.
That is something I have said for a long time. And lots of Republicans said the Democrats never did in 2016. We can't -- we can't just repeat that again unless we have a reason not to.
AXELROD: Anderson, I just want to -- I mean, if I misunderstood your question, let me make clear, if Pennsylvania is called, certainly I think Georgia is not going to be called for a while just because it's going to be very close.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah.
AXELROD: Clear it's going to be very close and there are all kinds of other ballots that are probably -- they're including military ballots.
COOPER: Right.
SANTORUM: Provisional ballots, yeah.
AXELROD: But if Pennsylvania --
COOPER: The projected winner.
BORGER: Yeah.
AXELROD: -- has significant margin, that puts Biden over the top. And he --
BORGER: Yeah.
AXELROD: -- he should. I expect that he will declare himself the winner and move on and whatever the president does. That would be appropriate. And, you know, if it comes tomorrow, the next day, I expect we will see that.
BORGER: Yeah. I thick he would thank the American people. You go out there and you thank your supporters and then you tell everyone you're a president for all of America, which is what he has been doing. I would expect him to do that. It doesn't matter what Donald Trump says, really, he won't concede. We know that. But If I were Biden, I would just go on and proceed.
JONES: There is one thing tomorrow that if you're a Georgia voter, check your absentee ballot, if it was rejected for any reason, you can cure it as late as tomorrow, I understand. So, again, it is just normal stuff.
COOPER: Now you're just pushing it, Van.
(LAUGHTER)
SANTORUM: In Pennsylvania --
COOPER: Now you're just stirring the pot.
(LAUGHTER)
SANTORUM: Pennsylvania says you cannot cure your ballot in Pennsylvania, but calling you and telling you to cure, you're not allowed to do that.
JONES: And in Georgia, you can. In other words, by the way, in every state, it's not just Georgia, every state they're still counting votes. They're still doing this stuff. This is normal. I just think people, oh my god, this is so crazy.
SANTORUM: Look at North Carolina. I mean, North Carolina --
JONES: North Carolina still doing stuff.
SANTORUM: Two days.
AXELROD: Right. The president hasn't mentioned that.
JONES: Yeah, exactly. The stakes that we're talking about are not the only states where people are still curing ballots. People are still counting. There's still legal stuff. This is just the normal process. And as long as we stay in the bounds of the normal process, including going to court when somebody does something bad, if they do, then that's fine/
It's when we go outside of it and you're whipping up people and you might have protesters and armed people and people who go after the voters, it's where we're in real trouble. Let's stay away from that. Let's trust the system.
AXELROD: One thing on Pennsylvania, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, mail-in voting has not been used.
SANTORUM: We had over 10 times more mail-in votes than we've ever had in the history of ours.
AXELROD: Right. And so that's another reason why this is different than the normal --
SANTORUM: Not normal procedures.
AXELROD: Same people -- many of the same people voted but voted in a different way.
SANTORUM: One of the things I said on CNN many, many times was I was very concerned about particularly the courts late in the game stepping in and changing the game, about how votes -- whether mail-in votes or change it.
Because there's already a suspicion that the president has put forward and others that said, you know, there's going to be massive fraud. You combine that with late changes to the election system where there's going be more mistakes because they've never done it this way.
AXELROD: In fairness, the reason it happened in the first place is because we're in the middle of a pandemic.
SANTORUM: I get that. I get that. But just you understand, that's not why Pennsylvania did this. Pennsylvania changed their election law in October of last year. So this mail-in provision, the absentee ballot provision, was not because of COVID.
BORGER: They were pressured.
SANTORUM: It was October of last year. And they changed it because they made a deal. They made a deal with the governor that we would allow more -- what they call non-excuse absentee voting. Anybody can apply for one in exchange for getting rid of the straight-line ballot.
BORGER: Right.
SANTORUM: So in Pennsylvania, they used to have little blocks. You can vote straight R, straight Republican, straight Democrat.
BORGER: Right.
SANTORUM: You can't do that anymore. Now, you have to go down and check each one. This is why, again, everybody thinks -- everybody cares about the president. If you're a state legislator, you care about yourself and your chamber.
BORGER: Right.
SANTORUM: And so what they were doing, no offense to my good friends, I have a lot of good friends in the Pennsylvania legislature, they were saying, look, we don't want to be swept away by whatever the top of the ticket is, we want people to vote for us and have to vote for us individually because we want them to look at our name, say, oh, yeah, I know that guy.
And so they were willing to trade what they thought was a good trade for them. Not necessarily a good trade for the top of the ticket but it is a great trade for them.
BORGER: So here is my question.
[23:54:56]
BORGER: Why are the Trump folks only finding fraud or saying they found fraud in places where Donald Trump --
SANTORUM: Why would you look anywhere else? Why would you spend resources to look anywhere else?
BORGER: Wait a minute.
SANTORUM: There's only so many resources.
BORGER: OK. Let me finish. I'm sure that the Democrats have seen things that they find questionable in states that they did not win, but you're not hearing a lot about that.
SANTORUM: Because they're going to spend the resources defending what Trump is doing.
BORGER: Because they think they're winning with votes. That's why.
AXELROD: Or else they just -- there's just not a lot of fraud which has been the history of voting.
BORGER: That's true, too.
COOPER: CNN's election coverage continues right after this break.
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