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CNN Live Event/Special
CNN Election Night In America: CNN Presents Results For Key Senate, House And State Races. Aired 11p-12a ET
Aired November 08, 2022 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[23:00:00]
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So, in a highly competitive state, Ron Johnson is taking a narrow lead. And if you are the Johnson campaign, you see all these red dots up here, Jake, you think, okay, we're in pretty good shape, let's keep counting.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: All right, John King, thanks so much. Right now, polls are about to close in the political powerhouse of California as well as three other states out west.
We have some projections for you now, wwo for Democrats, one for Republican. In California, CNN is projecting that Senator Alex Padilla, who was appointed to that seat after Kamala Harris became the vice president, that he will be elected senator from California, defeating Mark Meuser.
In Illinois, CNN is projecting that incumbent Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth will be reelected, defeating Kathy Salvi. And in Idaho, CNN is projecting that incumbent Republican Senator Mike Crapo will be reelected, defeating David Roth.
States that are too early to call at this hour: In Washington State, incumbent Democratic Senator Patty Murray is running against a strong challenge from Tiffany Smiley, the Republican. That race, right now, CNN deems it too early to call. In Oregon, Senator Ron Wyden is running for reelection, that race as well, too early to call.
Let's look at the balance of power. As you know, there are 100 seats in the U.S. Senate. Democrats currently have 42 of them. Republicans currently have 44 of them. The fight over these 14 remaining seats is what we are going to be covering for the next few hours. Republicans need to pick up one net democratic seat in order to wrest control of the U.S. Senate.
We have some governor's races to report for you now. Let's go to Boris Sanchez.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jake, a handful of projections to make. In all them, the incumbent keeping the governor's mansion.
We begin in California with Governor Gavin Newsom. Remember, he survived a recall election last year. There are whispers that he may be considering a presidential run in 2024. He easily defeats election questioner Brian Dahle to win reelection in California.
In the most expensive governor's race in the country but perhaps one of the least competitive, incumbent Democrat billionaire J.B. Pritzker, who largely self-funded his own campaign, he defeats election denier Darren Bailey to win reelection in Illinois.
Let's get a look at Maine now. There, the incumbent Democrats, Janet Mills, had a close race this summer with former two-time Governor Paul Lepage, but Lepage fumbled a question about abortion rights during a debate and Mills never looked back, maintaining an advantage in polling. Tonight, she wins another four years in Maine.
This time, in Idaho, the Republican incumbent, Brad Little, he will win reelection in a state that Donald Trump carried by some 60- percentage points in 2020. He defeats educator Stephen Heidt to win reelection in Idaho.
Some key race alerts now to bring you, beginning in a true toss-up state in Wisconsin. Remember, Joe Biden won here by very slim margin in 2020. Right now, Tony Evers leads by 62,000 votes ahead of election questioner Tim Michels. Sixty-two percent of the vote in in the state of Wisconsin.
We have an update for you now from Michigan. Gretchen Whitmer growing her lead against Tudor Dixon, the conservative commentator. Ninety- eight thousand votes ahead, roughly seven percentage point advantage for Whitmer. Thirty-three percent of the vote in in Michigan.
And what would a key race alert slew be without the state of Georgia? Brian Kemp, the Republican incumbent, 305,000 votes ahead right now of Stacey Abrams. About nine percentage points with 86% of the vote in in the state of Georgia.
As we hand it over to Kasie Hunt with an update on the senators. I would be surprised if you did not update us on Georgia.
KASIE HUNT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Your update would be useless --
(LAUGHTER)
HUNT: -- if we did not have Georgia in there. And of course, we are starting with Georgia yet again because look at these vote totals. Thirty-two thousand votes separate Herschel Walker from Raphael Warnock right now. It is actually a little bit bigger than it has been at some point throughout the night. Look at that, 49.4% to 48.5%. Again, nobody is over 50 heading to a potential runoff. Eighty-six percent of the vote in. We can see this change back and forth still all night long as these votes get counted, folks.
All right, let's move to Wisconsin, where Ron Johnson, the Republican, is setting at 50.4% to Mandela Barnes's 49.4%. There are about 16,000 votes separating them. And we actually can compare this to what Boris just gave us in the governor's race, showed Evers, the Democrat, ahead at 51.2%. About 62,000 votes separating him from the Republican who is sitting at 47.4%. So, you can see this is becoming another one of these examples where we are seeing a difference in terms of people potentially splitting their tickets here.
Now, let's check in on Pennsylvania where John Fetterman -- man, that's close, 49.5% to 48% over Dr. Mehmet Oz here.
[23:05:00]
So, again, the question that I have when I look at this and, you know, Jake, of course, as we know, is from the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, but John King and David Chalian are going to know what kind of vote is still out, what we are looking at in terms of, is it Philadelphia that could give the Fetterman campaign some hope? There's still a long way to go there. Thirty percent of the votes still out.
North Carolina, let's just check in quickly. Ted Budd here, the Republican. sitting at 50.8%. Cheri Beasley, the Democrat, at 46.9%. There are about 143,000 votes separating them at this hour.
So, perhaps a pretty comfortable place to be when you are looking at 91% of the vote in. Reminder, this is currently a republican seat. Republican Richard Burr is retiring, Jake.
TAPPER: Okay, Kasie, thanks so much. And just a reminder, we are looking at 82 competitive House seats. That is really what we are looking at in order to determine whether or not Republicans are going to be able to wrest control of the House of Representatives.
Of the 23 competitive seats that Republicans need to win in order to take control, they are currently leading in 17 of them, 17 out of 23. So, that is pretty good.
Let's take a look at the Democrats now. Democrats have a taller order on their hands. They need to win 50 of the 82 competitive seats. Right now, they are leading in 35 of them.
So, neither party is where they need to be. Republicans have a slight lead -- an easier job to do in terms of what they need to do.
Let's take a look at where we are right now in the battle for control of the House of Representatives. And again, this is where -- these are not called races, necessarily. This is where the vote is.
KING: This is where the vote is, as you fill in across the country. We are now at the west coast poll closings. We will get more and more. So, this is everything, all 435 districts. Narrowed it down just make it easier to understand the stakes in the battleground competitive districts. We bring them up now and you just see, just looking at the map, you don't need the map to see more blues than Republicans had hoped.
You still mentioned the key point, though. This is a very tough climate for Democrats. The margin is so small. Republicans need only a net gain of five, which is eminently doable when you look at the map. But we talked earlier, could Republicans pick up seats in New England? Again, we are not done now. Let me stretch it out for you a little bit, stretch out the map of New England. If you look at the map right now, again, a lot of these races are not called, Republicans thought they could pick up one or two in New Hampshire, they picked up one in Maine, they might get one in Rhode Island and they might get one in Connecticut. They are all blue at the moment. They are all blue at the moment.
So, if you had a lot of red on this map here, just in New England, you would be taking that would be the building block away. You have no such building block here. It does not mean Republicans don't get the majority, but you do not have it.
And so, again, some of these races are yet to be called, including the Maine race. I just want to peek at it and bring it up here. Ranked choice voting, this could go on for a while. But you see, we just called the democratic governor's reelection. The Democratic candidate here in what is a republican plus six District, Jarred Golden, has proven he's a tough Democrat, often at odds with his national party. He is leading there. Again, still a ways to go.
Let's come down to the state of New York in the competitive districts there. If you walk right through it here, I still want to peek in on this one, this is Sean Patrick Maloney, he's ahead of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, 65% of the vote now, and he is losing by 11 points, if look at that.
It does not mean we are done. We still have more votes to count. But this would be a trophy for Republicans in their quest not only for a House majority but to knock off a very prominent Democrat and the deputy of Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
So, Jake, as we go back to you, we are still working on a House map. It looks okay for the Republicans but it does not look like a blowout.
TAPPER: Certainly not. We have another big projection for you right now. CNN is projecting that in the state of New Hampshire, live free or die, Democratic incumbent Senator Maggie Hassan will be reelected, defeating retired General Don Bolduc. Maggie Hassan will be reelected, CNN is projecting.
This is a seat that Republicans thought they could win. They thought they could defeat Hassan. They were very bullish. They were talking all week about momentum being their way. And instead, Maggie Hassan, the Democratic senator, holds on to that seat, CNN is projecting.
Let's look at the balance of power right now in the U.S. Senate. You know, 100 seats, Democrats currently controlled 43 of those seats with Hassan keeping her seat. Republicans- have 44 of them. There are 13 seats remaining.
Republicans need to pick up one net democratic seat in order to wrest control of the U.S. Senate. Those 13 seats are what we are waiting to see to determine if they are able to achieve that. But there are governor's races, too, and we are going to go to Boris Sanchez with some major news there.
SANCHEZ: Jake, there is a major projection we are making right now. Incumbent Republican Brian Kemp is projected to win reelection in the state of Georgia. This is a huge deal for Kemp.
[23:09:58]
Remember, he drew Donald Trump's ire back in 2020 when he refused to fund those 11,000 or so votes that Trump was looking for. Kemp is known for restricting abortion access in Georgia, for remaking the state's voting system, the electoral system there, and, of course, his defeat over Stacey Abrams stamps him, earning another term in the state of Georgia.
Let's turn it over now to Dana Bash for some analysis. Dana?
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Thank you so much, Boris. We did just get word that Stacey Abrams called and conceded. This is a very big win for Governor Kemp, not necessarily a surprise given the way that we have seen it go, but very, very clear and decisive win for a Republican governor who split from Donald Trump and led the state of Georgia in a way that, obviously, his constituents approved of.
CHRIS WALLACE, BROADCAST JOURNALIST: I mean, he not just split from Trump, Trump tried to take him down in the republican primary with former Senator David Perdue, and Republicans in Georgia rejected that. And you are exactly right, they rejected it because, first, Republicans, now the entire state, voters like the way Brian Kemp was running the state.
I think the biggest thing was the way he handled COVID. In fact, remember, when he opened up the state, Trump said -- this is back in the spring of 2020 -- I think he may be going a little too fast. It turns out that there were no severe repercussions in Georgia. They reopened the state. The economy came back.
BASH: Trump tried to take him out in the primary and failed.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, absolutely, and I think that that became a really key part of his message to Georgia voters, that he wasn't beholden to Trump. He did not get weighed down by some of the negatives, the clear negatives associated with Trump in all the shenanigans. Remember, in the state of Georgia, Trump did not do particularly well and kemp is overperforming him.
BASH: I'm going to go right over to Boris for our projection.
SANCHEZ: Yeah, Dana, another major projection just minutes after the last one. In the state of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, the attorney general, will become the new governor of that state. Shapiro had a big lead in fundraising, a big lead in polls throughout. He continued to tie Doug Mastriano to Donald Trump and it appears to have paid off. He takes over the open seat left behind by term-limited Governor Tom Wolf. Dana? BASH: Thanks so much, Boris. So, Josh Shapiro becoming the next governor of Pennsylvania. And sort of a pattern that we have just seen in the last 10 minutes of Republicans who are election deniers losing both in the governor's race, Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania, and then in New Hampshire, the Senate race there, Don Bolduc. He definitely was a rabid election denier in the primary there, then he kind of switched back for a nanosecond in the general and then went back again.
I wonder if, at the end of the night, we are going to be able to say anything about that as a pattern or maybe if these are two isolated incidents.
WALLACE: Well, exactly because we will have to see there are a lot --
BASH: What happens when we go out west --
WALLACE: Affirmatively, Josh Shapiro, the attorney general of Pennsylvania, very popular and somebody who fought Donald Trump when he was contesting the results of the election in 2020 in Pennsylvania. Mastriano is just way too far to the right for Pennsylvania, an election denier, was down in Washington on January 6th, brought buses there, very strongly antiabortion. This was really never a competitive race.
BASH: And then the two questions we still have, we just talked about Kemp. We are projecting him to win in Georgia. And Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania. One of the storylines of the night that is still a big question mark is whether or not they can bring their fellow Democrats across the finish line in the Senate races.
PHILLIP: Right. I mean, I think that you are going to see -- the question is sort of moving in opposite direction in those states. In Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro is doing so much better than Fetterman really throughout this race. And will that pull help Fetterman in what is still a very, very tight race? That remains to be seen.
In Georgia, you know, Brian Kemp has been able to really perform well ahead of Herschel Walker in that race. Again, will he be able to pull Herschel Walker up?
BASH: As you are talking, I just want to point out that on the screen, you see how incredibly close it is.
PHILLIP: How incredibly --
BASH: Yeah, John Fetterman at 49% --
PHILLIP: Look, you're seeing voters basically saying, we are going to make different choices from the top of the ballot to further down. And that is not often something that we see in American politics. But I think it says a lot about these candidates up and down the ballot. There are just factors with the candidates that are changing the way voters interpret what they need to do, and they are splitting for what --
[23:14:58]
BASH: And there is evidence, as we talk about it, as we are looking at those numbers, Walker now at 49.5% and Warnock 48.5%. Nobody yet at 50.
WALLACE: And one point, in addition to what Abby said, it's not just a matter of candidates, it's also that the Senate is up for grabs here. I think a lot of people are not just voting for one of the candidates or the other. They are also thinking, who do I want to be running the U.S. Senate? Do I want the Republicans? Do I want the Democrats? So, that is different from the governor's race. I mean, this has a different stake to it.
PHILLIP: I will say this also about the Pennsylvania governor's race, Josh Shapiro ran very hard on the issue of abortion, and he could make a credible case. I mean, Doug Mastriano was very far to the right on the issue of abortion and would have been a key player if that state were to move to restrict abortion rights, and Josh Shapiro ran on that immediately and he ran on it a very hard --
WALLACE: Election rights. Remember, in Pennsylvania, the governor appoints the secretary of state, so he would have had a lot of control in the 2024 election.
BASH: I just want to mention just quickly one more time New Hampshire. That is a heartbreak for Republicans because even though Maggie Hassan is an incumbent Democrat, she was governor, they of late thought maybe Don Bolduc could actually overtake her and that could be a pick up.
I think you are going to see a lot of questions about what happened there because Mitch McConnell's super PAC pulled their money out of that race and the National Republican Senatorial Committee tried to put more money in but it did not -- it was too late.
PHILLIP: Yeah, I mean, I think they always -- look, Bolduc was not the candidate that they wanted.
BASH: No.
PHILLIP: They knew that he would be a pretty tough sell even in New Hampshire where, you know, it's a little bit more of a freethinking state, I guess you could put it. But toward the end, I think this last couple of weeks in this election has really tightened up a lot of these races, giving Republicans hope.
But what we are starting to see tonight is that some of these states are reverting back to their DNA. I think New Hampshire reverted back to its kind of middle of the road DNA and rejected some of these more extreme candidates. I think you are seeing that even in some of the districts that we have been seeing tonight. Surprises for Democrats holding on to --
WALLACE: One of the other interesting things in that state was, remember, Democrats actually campaigned against a much more moderate Republican in the republican primary, the state Senate president, Chuck Morris, because they thought that Don Bolduc would be an easier candidate. We have seen this in several states.
BASH: And that was a gamble that paid off.
WALLACE: Right. In this particular case, it paid off --
(CROSSTALK)
BASH: I'm going to go over to Jake for projection.
TAPPER: That's right, Dana, we have a major projection right now. CNN is projecting that in Ohio, venture capitalist J.D. Vance will defeat Congressman Tim Ryan and be the next U.S. senator from the state of Ohio. J.D. Vance will be elected the next senator from Ohio, taking the place of retiring Republican Senator Rob Portman.
The balance of power right now is 100 seats in the Senate, 43 of them belong to Democrats, 45 belong to Republicans, 12 seats remain. All Republicans need to do is pick up one net democratic seat, and they will be able to wrest control of the U.S. Senate.
Let's go to Melanie Zanona right now who is at Vance's headquarters. Melanie, a big achievement for a man who has never been elected to anything before.
MELANIE ZANONA, CNN CAPITOL HILL REPORTER: Right, that's exactly right. And I am being told that Democratic Congressman Tim Ryan has called J.D. Vance to concede in this race. You know, Tim Ryan was always viewed as the underdog. He thought that this race was overlooked and that people had a lot of support from the national party.
As you can hear, the crowd is getting very excited right now as this race is being called. There is a lot of energy in the room right now. But J.D. Vance is someone who is going to be very different than his predecessor. His predecessor, Rob Portman, is a longtime centrist.
J.D. Vance, meanwhile, has been a fierce supporter of Donald Trump. He has been an election denier, a 2020 election denier, although he did say he will accept the results tonight.
I have yet to hear whether he is going to come out and make a speech. We are expecting that to happen at some point. We will keep you posted, Jake.
TAPPER: All right, Melanie Zanona at J.D. Vance's headquarters in Ohio. CNN is projecting that J.D. Vance will be the next U.S. Senator from Ohio.
Let's take a look at the big picture for the U.S. Senate. Right now, Democrats leading at 48, Republicans leading at 48, one in a republican seat, one in a democratic seat. It is really quite something.
KING: So, a couple different ways to look at it, let's just start with our live vote counting, you look at the map. That's the democrat leading in the republican seat. That's the republican leading at the democratic seat.
TAPPER: Pennsylvania and Georgia.
KING: Pennsylvania and Georgia. Pennsylvania and Georgia. How many times have we said Pennsylvania and Georgia? Remember, coming in to the night, Democrats thought maybe, maybe, if we have a good night, we could pick up either North Carolina, Ohio or Wisconsin.
[23:20:00]
Two of the three are off the board, right? This one here, North Carolina, this one, you know, we see Ted Budd with a lead there, unlikely. We just called the Ohio race for J.D. Vance. You come up here, Republicans hold that. J.D. Vance will replace Rob Portman in the Senate.
Wisconsin was the third. It is a very, very close competitive race. Senator Johnson now at 32,886 vote lead over the Democratic lieutenant governor. It just changed again. It's up to 43,000 now.
This is what Republicans count on in these states. They think, as we get through the night and we count the late votes, the DNA kicks in an incumbent Republican. But we will see. Sixty-nine percent. Sixty-nine percent. Still a ways to go here. So, we have to count these votes.
But let's just come out here and look at the importance. We look at the Senate's battle for control and use the map this way. Look at the importance for what? First, let's just go back to where we are to remind people. Here is where we started tonight. The narrowest of majorities only because your Democratic president and your vice president breaks the tie.
So, now, let's come this way. We look at it this way. We come into the states. The Democrat is leading right here at the moment. This race is not over. It is not called. Just think about the importance of this race. For now, to begin the conversation, let's say Fetterman holds that narrow lead there. Then Herschel Walker is ahead here. No one is above 50% right now. So, for the purposes of this argument, I'm going to make that a toss-up because neither candidate is above 50%.
Right now, again, we are waiting to call Wisconsin. We are still counting votes out west. But we will see what happens in Washington State. We will see what happens in Arizona. Democrat Mark Kelly has a narrow lead. We will see if it holds.
Republicans are very confident about winning this one. We are still counting votes. Sometimes, Nevada takes a while to. But for the sake of the hypothetical argument, let's say that the Republicans are right and they take this.
So, where does that leave us when we come out? It leads us in a potential situation, if Fetterman can hold on to this and the Republicans take that and nothing else changes, everything else stays where it is, where it was, when we woke up this morning, then we could have 50 republican seats, 49 democratic seats, and we go again to a Georgia runoff in December, assuming none of the candidates gets above 50% there.
That is what makes -- as we watch the outstanding, that is what makes this map so important, assuming, if Republicans are right and they could take Nevada. We are not counting votes there yet. If Oz can come back and win the seat tonight, then you come out in this scenario. If nothing else changed on the map, Republicans would have a majority and this would be for the extra, and the best Democrats could do is 49.
Again, that is assuming Republicans are right, they're very confident about Nevada, and Mark Kelly holds on in Arizona. But it just gets you, if you just come back to where we are, it just gets you into the map that we are in a very narrow chess game for control of the Senate right now, and we have fewer pieces in play in a sense that we are waiting on Pennsylvania, waiting on Georgia, and then Nevada.
Right now, if you are the Democrats, Jake, you are watching the Nevada vote count and you are nervous.
TAPPER: Indeed. And CNN now has two major projections in North Carolina. CNN projects that Congressman Ted Budd will become the next U.S. senator, defeating former North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Cheri Beasley. Ted Budd, endorsed by Donald Trump in this primary, and then Donald Trump rallied for him throughout North Carolina, he will become the next U.S. senator from North Carolina.
In Connecticut, this one is no surprise. Incumbent Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal will be reelected, defeating Republican Leora Levy.
Let's take a look at the balance of power at this hour. As you know, 100 Senate votes, Democrats have 44 of them, Republicans have 46 of them. There are ten seats remaining, ten seats remaining.
And CNN reminds you, of course, that Republicans just need to pick up one net republican seat and won that democratic seat in order to take control of the U.S. Senate. So, that is where we are, 44 to 46.
Kasie Hunt has some announcement for us at the Senate desk.
HUNT: We do, Jake, and this really shows you to John King's point, that we are getting down to the brass tacks here in the Senate as we try to figure out which way it's going to go, perhaps by one seat.
And let's start, as always, in Georgia, where Herschel Walker has very narrow lead over Raphael Warnock, just 15,000 votes, such a small amount considering the millions that have been cast. But that 88% of the vote in there, election officials are saying we might not know tonight.
Pennsylvania, John Fetterman at 49.2%, Mehmet Oz at 48.3%. Thirty- seven thousand votes separating them, again, among millions cast, and this race is one we are going to be counting, potentially, for days here. And as John outlined, this is what will save Democrats if they lose that race out in Nevada, which Republicans are very confident about and giving a shot to actually retain control. Seventy-five percent of the vote in in Pennsylvania at this hour. Now, let's check in on Wisconsin, which remains very close, 51% for the incumbent, Ron Johnson, over the Democrat, Mandela Barnes at 48.8%.
[23:25:00]
This remains very, very close. Mandela Barnes has been underperforming the Democratic governor, Evers. So far, tonight, only about six -- we are 69% of the votes, and we only got about 30% out of the vote outstanding.
Now, let's check in on Arizona where Mark Kelly is sitting pretty comfortably right now, 58% over Blake Masters, the Republican, at 39.7%. That is a 240 or so thousand-vote gap.
I want to check in with John King and David Chalian to figure out what kind of votes are outstanding because there's only about 50% of the vote in in Arizona and we could see that tighten up. But now, we are going to turn to Boris, who has got some critical updates in the governor's race.
SANCHEZ: Yeah, Kasie, truly interesting. As you pointed out, the lead for the republican in the Senate race in Wisconsin as we get to the key race in that state, the Democratic incumbent in the governor's race is currently leading. Right now, tony Evers is 43,000 votes ahead of election questionnaire Tim Michels. It just changed. Now, it is a 45,000 vote-advantage with 69% of the vote in in Wisconsin.
We want to update you on the state of Michigan right now. Gretchen Whitmer nearly 90,000 votes ahead of conservative commentator Tudor Dixon. It just changed again. Now, it is 88,000 votes. The lead is slightly thinning there for Gretchen Whitmer with 39% of the vote in in Michigan.
In Kansas, perhaps the most vulnerable Democratic incumbent running for reelection, Laura Kelly, in a state that Donald Trump won by about 15- percentage points, she currently leads against Derek Schmidt, an election denier. Thirty-two thousand-vote advantage for Laura Kelly with 83% of the vote in in Kansas.
Meantime, the most unusual governor's race you are going to see on the map tonight, a three-way race between Tina Kotek, a Democrat, Christine Drazan, a Republican, and former Democrat turned-independent Betsy Johnson. Right now, the Democrat in this race is within 18,600- vote advantage. Fifty-three percent of the vote in there.
We send it back over to Jake Tapper. Jake?
TAPPER: Thank you so much, Boris. And I just to remind everybody of the competitive seats. There are 82 competitive seats. Republicans have to win 23 of them, and they are leading in 22 of them. So, that is for control of the U.S. House. Republicans are on their way. Of the 23 competitive seats, they have to win, they are currently leading in 22.
What about Democrats? What do Democrats have to do? They have to win 49 of the 82 competitive seats, 49 of them. And right now, they are leading in 42 of them. Not bad, but not as close as where the Republicans are.
And I want you to take a look at some of these margins right now when it comes to these House races. In Oregon, Alek Skarlatos is ahead by 0.08%. In Iowa, Zach Nunn is up by 0.18%. In California, Congresswoman Michelle Steel is up by 0.4%. In New York, Molinaro is up 0.67%. In Arizona, Eli Crane is up 1.38%.
Democrats, too, their leads are pretty narrow as well. We are looking at Kermit Jones up by 0.06% in California. And Tony Vargas up by 0.15% in Nebraska. Ryan -- Congressman Ryan is up by 0.36% in New York. Tom Malinowski is New Jersey up by only 0.88%. In Connecticut, Jahana Hayes is up by 1.72%.
These are competitive seats and their margins of victory right now are so narrow, so narrow. We have not called any of those competitive races and the truth is any one of them could flip at any second as the votes come in, John.
KING: It is remarkable. We are beginning to fill in the map all the way over now. You see this blue, especially around the Southern California coast, the blue up here in Washington and Oregon. We will keep an eye on that as we get later into the deep vote count overnight, probably tomorrow as well because you do have competitive races out there as well. Let's just isolated the competitive races. That's what I was trying to do.
You see out here, you may remember Katie Porter. She's a prominent Democrat progressive. Her district in Southern California has a competitive race.
But let's just come to the middle of the country for a minute and look at these races because, as you said, here's another one of these vulnerable frontline Democrats, Elissa Slotkin. You look at this right now and you say, 43%, the Republican has the lead.
I just want to isolate it by county to go through some of these -- this is what is going on in their campaign headquarters right now. Remember, Spanberger held on, right? Slotkin is another one of those frontline Democrats. This is a Democrat zero plus nine. It's a 50/50 district.
TAPPER: Right.
KING: Joe Biden won it by less than one-percentage point by these lines. So, you are looking at this, you are saying, red county, red county, red county, this is a very republican county by 20 points. But it is a small county, population wise. Most of the people in this district live here. They live in Bingham County, which is Lansing. It is a 32-point. Joe Biden won this county by 32 points and only 11% of the vote is in.
So, Elissa Slotkin, when you pull out to the district, she is losing right now, but you only have 11% of the vote counted in the giant, by far the largest county within the district. [23:30:04]
So, this one here is far from over. You pull it out, let us come back, there is Michigan in the Midwest. Let us pull out to the national map. Jake was just talking about how close many of these races are. These are just the competitive races, right? So, you want to look at win margin. The lighter the color, the more displaced. Let me get that to kick in. Look at all these races that are incredibly competitive as you go through them.
Let's pop up the state of New York. This one through up here in the Rochester area, you have a Democratic incumbent who is losing, Joseph Morelle losing 49.1%, 3,300 votes. You see it is up by county now and you see Rochester.
Let me turn the county up and get to the entire district and come out here. Another race right down here. You have, I think Jake mentioned this, Mark Molinaro, the Republican candidate, against Josh Riley, 50.3% to 49.7%, 1,700 votes.
This is the environment that is playing about across the country tonight. Democrats fighting to hold their House majority or at least to keep any new republican majority as small as possible.
One race that is not close, if you look here, this is the chairman of the Democratic Campaign Committee who, with 68% of the vote in, is losing quite significantly. We will see if that holds up. Again, I said this earlier, this would be a trophy for Republicans because he is such a prominent lieutenant of Nancy Pelosi and runs the campaign fundraising arm. But that one is not done yet either.
I just want to pull out back to the national map again. You see the white or the lighter, those who are closer or competitive races. So, they are coast to coast. The vote count has to be more early out here. Let me talk of the race here and look as well -- Tom O'Halleran, a vulnerable Democrat in the state of Arizona, losing by 2,100 votes to Eli Crane.
These are the building blocks, if you try to think Republicans need a net gain of five, if these frontline Democrats who are in the tough districts who you are going to watch, especially as we get closer to knowing, calling more races in the east and coming out to the west. And so, you see more of the light races out here. We will continue to count them.
Again, Republicans favored to take the House majority, but you are looking at this map right now, Jake, and it is incredibly competitive. The Democrats are fighting tenaciously at least to limit that.
TAPPER: That is right, John. We have some more projections for you from the U.S. Senate. CNN projects in Washington State, incumbent Democratic Senator Patty Murray will hold on to her seat, defeating a challenge from Republican Tiffany Smiley. Patty Murray, Senator Patty Murray, reelected, CNN projects.
And then just south of Washington, in Oregon, CNN projects that incumbent Democratic Senator Ron Wyden will defeat a challenge from Joe Rae Perkins.
So, that is two democratic seats held on. Where does that leave us in the balance of power? Obviously, you know, 100 seats. Right now, we have Democrats with 46 of them, Republicans with 46 of them, eight seats remaining. Remember, Republicans just need to pick up one net democratic seat in order to wrest control of the U.S. Senate. Right now, it is 46 to 46.
And John King, big picture. Let's look at the U.S. Senate here. We have 48 Democrats leading, one in a republican seat. That is Pennsylvania. Forty-nine Republicans are leading, one in democratic seat. That is Georgia.
KING: And so, the question was, were there any takeaways on the map? Could the Democrats pick up republican seats? Could Republicans, more likely, you would think, at least the beginning of this midterm election, pick up? What we are seeing right now is remarkably low turnover in a 50/50 Senate.
You mentioned the current -- they are not called races, but the ones that are tilting in the other direction right now, very close, John Fetterman. This is a republican-held seat. The incumbent Pat Toomey will not run for reelection. So, you have the lieutenant governor, Democrat John Fetterman, against Mehmet Oz, the TV celebrity, Dr. Oz, 49.2% and 48.3%, just shy of 80% of the vote.
But we know this from living through competitive elections in Pennsylvania. We are going to be counting for a while here. I just want to take a peek at where the outstanding vote is. And you see the majority -- the Fetterman campaign, you are saying, okay, the majority of the outstanding vote is down here, Philadelphia and the suburbs around it.
The only caveat I would add to that, though, is there is a test, we don't have enough of the votes there yet to see if Oz can perform better than Trump in the suburbs. We will see if that plays out. But if you are the Fetterman campaign, you are looking -- most of the vote is down here. That is what benefited Joe Biden as the count -- we are not in Pennsylvania in the presidential race. We will see.
Let's come back out here and let's check in again on this one, it has been a seesaw all night, but Herschel Walker maintaining his lead but it is a tiny lead, 14,976 votes, 49.2% to 48.8%. Walker is ahead but is -- I know we sound redundant here but it is important, he needs 50% plus one vote or else there is a December 6th runoff in Georgia. So, keep an eye on that.
Both campaigns will tell you if Chase Oliver starts getting up around 2,5, 2,6 where it will guarantee to go to a runoff. We will see where it is right now, 88%, Jake. Still some more votes to count.
Again, let us take a look. What are we missing in terms of outstanding vote? You see the biggest circles are up in Atlanta and the suburbs. We see some republican areas here. Republicans are here. I want to emphasize this point. These are small circles, meaning as a percentage of the statewide outstanding vote, that is a pretty tiny amount, but that is a lot of republican counties.
[23:35:04]
TAPPER: That is a lot of circles.
KING: That is a lot of republican counties. It is 50 votes here, 80 votes there, 250 votes there. There is a lot still to be counted. So, we have a long way to go in Georgia. Plenty of room for Warnock to get a lot of votes, a lot of room for Walker to get a lot of votes by piecing together little pieces.
TAPPER: I want to bring in Brianna Keilar at the voting desk right now to give us some insight into what she is seeing in Georgia.
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, let's look at some of these key counties here in Georgia because just a short time ago, there was a top official in the secretary of state's office who said that the Georgia Senate race is one race that we may not have full clarity on by the time we all go to bed tonight. I guess it depends on when you are going to bed tonight. But nonetheless, so we are learning --
KING: You sleep on election?
KEILAR: No, it's not allowed, actually. It's part of our job description. But we are learning some new details about Fulton County. Let's look at Fulton County first because there are actually more than halfway done with counting. We are hearing here that they are expected to be finished by midnight, John and Jake. So, that could be revealing some information here just in the next half hour.
TAPPER: Absolutely. Very interesting.
KING: You look at it. We go to west. Again, you look at the margin here. This is Fulton County. Atlanta is by far -- 159 counties. Georgia has a lot. It's 10% of the population. So, it's your largest Atlanta and the suburbs around it, 73.7%. Again, we have called the governor's race here. Stacey Abrams is at 69%. This is why Brian Kemp was reelected in a democratic area. You say 30%. He got shellacked. Well, he narrowed the margin some, right?
TAPPER: Right.
KING: Come back to the Senate race. Herschel Walker getting shy of 25% in Atlanta, the closest and suburbs around it. That matters.
TAPPER: Can I ask? How did Biden do in Fulton County in 2020?
KING: In 2020? President --
TAPPER: At 72.6. And Warnock is a little bit ahead, 73-point something.
KING: There you go. Yes, 74 if you round up. I'm sorry.
TAPPER: Brianna, go ahead. KEILAR: Remember, there were six precincts that opened a little later today in Georgia. And so, they stayed open a little later tonight. Two of those, one in Cobb County, so they stayed open a little later. They are also halfway done on their count. We don't know, though -- we don't have an estimate on when the counting is going to be finished here. So, we are actually not sure when we are going to be getting this better picture of what is happening there.
TAPPER: Cobb County.
KING: So, again, Joe Biden wins this county by 14 points, right? That's what you see right there, 15 points. It's essentially tracking the presidential race in Cobb County. Again, Herschel Walker -- in the governor's race, this is why Brian Kemp gets reelected.
TAPPER: Seven --
KING: He gets 48%. This is one of those counties, again, if you go back, the suburbs used to be republican territory or at least very competitive territory. In the 2018 election, the suburbs made Nancy Pelosi speaker. In 2020, they made Joe Biden president. You come for the Senate race here.
That is the challenge of our time. Without Donald Trump, can Republicans become more competitive in the suburbs? In Brian Kemp's Georgia, the answer is yes for him, not so much for Herschel Walker.
TAPPER: Where did Newt Gingrich represent, former Republican speaker?
KING: Right up here.
TAPPER: That's what I thought.
KING: The lines have been drawn so much --
(CROSSTALK)
TAPPER: Okay.
KEILAR: Finally, we are looking at Gwinnett County. They have counted at this point about 30% of the votes. They are saying they will not wrap up by midnight tonight. So, we are waiting to see exactly when they are going to wrap up. Of course, these are all counties that are leaning democrat. So, obviously, that is going to perhaps shift things as we see these numbers coming in.
TAPPER: Very interesting. Very interesting.
KING: And so, to that point, 56% estimated vote count in Gwinnett, right? It's the second largest county in the state. It's just shy of 9% of the vote. So, that's why, a number one, it matters when it comes to -- it is a democratic county. Warnock will get more votes. The question is, will he keep that margin, the big margin he has now?
You watch these come in and you go up from here. If you keep this margin in the places where there are more votes, you are going to move up. Again, I just want to come back to this just for the context, though, because, yes, most of the votes are here. Right?
You see a couple of large red circles in more republican areas where there is a lot of votes out. The larger the circle means the larger the share of the votes are. And you see these little -- they look almost like polka dots. Well, they don't matter. But they do, they do when you are running up margins like that. Right? When you are running out margins like that. And so, if you keep getting --
TAPPER: That's 8,000 votes, you know.
KING: It's 8,000 votes there. So, if you had a couple hundred or a couple dozen even in a close race, it matters, which is why this is a state. You can look at things and you could have trends. The campaign headquarters are going through precinct by precinct. You look at a race this close without much left to count, you just -- this is why you brew coffee.
TAPPER: Biden only won the state by under 12,000 votes in 2020. David Chalian, you have some more information at the battleground desk about where the outstanding vote is.
[23:40:00]
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Yeah, or the kind of vote that is outstanding, and it gets to the margin issue as well that John was just talking about. So, again, we break it down: mail vote, early in- person vote, election day vote.
I want to note something here. So, let me bring in the uncounted vote. Among the mail vote, about a quarter of the mail vote is still out and that is a 36.5-percentadvantage category for Raphael Warnock. So, that is significant because a quarter of it is still out. He also has an 8.4-percentage advantage among early in-person voting, but there is really little left of that to count.
Here is what I find super interesting. Herschel Walker's margin of success over Warnock with election day voters is now at about 19.1%. That's a little bit lower than we had seen earlier. And there was a huge amount of the election day vote uncounted when we talk about this race earlier, guys. Now, it is down to 28.4%. That remains to be counted.
And I want to remind everyone, I'm going to click off here the election day vote. These two categories of early vote, the mail, early in-person combined, we expect to be the larger share of the overall vote. We expect that to make up about 61% of the overall vote.
The election day vote, which is the Walker category here where he is beating Warnock by about 19% now with the election day vote, that, we expect, at the end of the day, is going to be about 40% of the overall vote. So, we don't think it is going to make up as big of a share as that early vote category in Georgia.
TAPPER: Very interesting. Very interesting.
KING: And so, you look to David's point about the proportion, the bulk of the vote that is out, the larger slice, Warnock is getting the bigger margins and then you see the size of the circles of where, we are geographically in the state it is. That is why, if you are on the Warnock campaign, you never want to be behind. But there is plenty of votes here.
By the proportions David just laid out, the early voting and mail votes, of it continues -- if they continue to come in as disproportionately democratic as they are now and you see the size of the circles, meaning the share -- he has got the margin, the percentage of the different kinds of the votes, and then you say, where are they coming from, and you look at this, this is not over. This is not over. And they're both below 50, by the way, now. We will see when it comes in.
TAPPER: I have something I want to talk to you about with Pennsylvania. But before we do that, I am going to throw it to Anderson Cooper, whose panel -- whose aghast panel wants to chew over all of what we have been doing here.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: We finished chewing on the pizza. We are now --
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: -- on this. God knows what else we're chewing. A lot of food here. Gloria, this is not the night a lot of Democrats worried about, a lot of Republicans hope for. It may be different tomorrow, in the morning, in the late afternoon or the next day. But tonight, it looks different than a lot of people thought.
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: People are voting. And it seems to me, from looking at this so far, that they are voting on their candidates. They are actually saying, you know, I think this person would be a better senator than that other person. And I think, you know, this House member would be better than another one.
It just does not seem to have any sense of a wave or not going to vote straight Republican or -- you know, we don't see a lot of ticket splitting historically in this country. I know the state of Montana is kind of famous for that. But other than that, we don't see that a lot.
I think what we are seeing tonight is people doing that. I mean, look at -- look at the state of New Hampshire, for example. You have very popular Republican incumbent governor, and then people elected -- and he was up for reelection, Sununu. And then you have Maggie Hassan waiting for Senate. So, people were splitting their tickets. And I think that is what we are seeing.
DAVID URBAN, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN SENIOR ADVISER: I would just say, everyone talked about this early on, democracy is on the ballot. I said this earlier. Democracy on the ballot? Democracy won tonight, right? That's the good news for America. As Gloria is talking about, in Pennsylvania, you have Josh Shapiro winning --
BORGER: Exactly. UNKNOWN: -- right now by 11 points over Doug Mastriano, which is a landslide for Josh Shapiro. And we are 33,000 votes apart in the Senate race. So, people are going through, looking at these candidates, and making calls. Van is probably going to cry tonight.
(LAUGHTER)
URBAN: He is going to be probably consoling me here. I'm a lot less optimistic than I was at the beginning of this evening. But it is a night that is changing. We are going to see -- we talked about this, too -- what the number Kevin McCarthy has? Under 20? We are talking -- people thought they would be 30, right? If we get 20, I think Republicans will be happy to walk away with a net gain of 20 and take their ball and go home tomorrow.
VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FORMER OBAMA ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: I think --
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FORMER OBAMA SENIOR ADVISER: I'm sorry, Van.
JONES: That big sound that you hear is Democrats having a big sigh of relief across the country because people woke up scared this morning.
[23:44:57]
People said, my God, we've got these election deniers, we got these people who are winking and nodding at insurrectionists, we got people who we are afraid if they get in there, they will do terrible things, and we are just going to get steamrolling. That was the fear this morning.
COOPER: I've got to say, Van, you are the person --
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: -- for days saying that the people I'm talking to on the ground are fighting and knocking on the doors, are telling me that they are optimistic.
JONES: Exactly. When you listen to the people on the doors and on the ground, what happened was people got scared of those republican polls, saying that this big tidal wave was coming. People said, heck, no.
AXELROD: You know what?
JONES: And let me just -- you can get your turn. And Obama came out, and that helped. And people thought, and I think the grassroots folks, if there had been more money spent on them than on these damn ads, you will have an even bigger firewall against this stuff.
COOPER: Let me ask you, David. The democratic strategy in some races of actually getting ads for some of the more extreme candidates like Mastriano, was that successful?
AXELROD: Apparently so. And certainly, in that case, it was -- yes, you look across -- we have to wait and see how --
COOPER: New Hampshire, didn't they give money to Don Bolduc in New Hampshire?
AXELROD: On the whole, probably so, but --
COOPER: It was controversial. A lot thought it is inappropriate, you know --
AXELROD: What?
COOPER: A lot of people -- you know, it was controversial.
AXELROD: It was controversial. And it was a gamble, and it looks like the gamble may pay off. But, you know, I think it is more than looking at the candidates. And certainly, that is part of what is going on. But this sort of defies history. If it keeps going in this direction, the races out west, we have yet to see, but if it keeps going in this direction, as you are scrolling through the House races, this is not like a normal midterm election.
We have been talking here about whether or not gravity would take hold, whether the normal thing would happen, and the president's approval rating is low, the economy is bad, therefore, the challenging party will make significant gains.
But the question was, will these other things come into play? The Dobbs decision, extremism, Trump, all of these have played into this to make this not the normal midterm election. It is really, really interesting.
COOPER: Scott Jennings, how much of the blame -- I mean, depending on what happens in the coming hours, but if a lot -- if some of these candidates that Trump selected or pushed for don't deliver, what blame does he get?
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FORMER SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO PRESIDNET TO PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: There's a possible --
AXELROD: Another DeSantis commercial.
(LAUGHTER)
JENNINGS: I don't have to make a commercial when the guy wins that big.
(LAUGHTER)
JENNINGS: There's a potential narrative out of this night that if you are a discerning Republican voter trying to figure out the future direction of this party, we once again learned that Trump is not a national winner for the Republicans, but DeSantis may be the next evolution of someone who can marry what you like about Trump but also recover some people that went away from the party during Trump. I don't know what is going to happen for the rest of the night.
On the Senate, by the way, I'm like a broken record. It's really the three. Georgia --
BORGER: Pennsylvania.
JENNINGS: Pennsylvania and Nevada. Georgia is, you know, really close. Pennsylvania is sort of close. Nevada, we have not started getting results in there yet. If Republicans win two out of three of those, they will be home, and so that would salve the wound of not feeling like you had a wave (ph). But that is where it is at in the Senate.
Just looking around this map, I mean, if I were Ron DeSantis or someone who wanted to help Ron DeSantis, that is the message I would be on tomorrow, which is my way is the way to a national majority, his way is the way to a national minority.
ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: The fact is that this is not an Obama-style shellacking by any means. This is not -- you can't really call this a red wave, even though we still have some outstanding votes. So, to Scott's point, this is the time that the Republican Party needs to ask themselves, are they going to continue to nominate poor-quality candidates to appease Donald Trump?
He is right now over on his Truth Social site celebrating the demise of Republicans who lost, criticizing Don Bolduc, a bad candidate. Maggie Hassan was a beatable candidate. That could've been a pick up for Republicans. But solely because of Donald Trump, he ended up being the nominee. He is celebrating O'Dea, a moderate losing in Colorado.
If you want the Republican Party to thrive, we have got to just finally speak out and say, this man is a loser, he lost 2020, he is about to -- he's losing a seat that is winnable this time, in time to look towards what the future might look like.
BORGER: Is there another lesson here also, which is that people are kind of sick of both parties in so many ways?
[23:50:00]
I mean, the fact that it wasn't declarative one way or another -- again, we don't know all the results. But the people are just saying, look, I'm going to look at this candidate because, yeah, the Democrats, I don't like -- I don't like the way they have handled the economy, but the Republicans are threatening democracy and maybe they are figuring, you know what? I don't like any of these guys --
JONES: I think the ticket splitting is encouraging.
COOPER: I got to go to Boris Sanchez far projection.
SANCHEZ: Yeah, there are two important projections to bring you beginning with the race in New York. This race got very close in polling at the end, but in actuality, when the votes were counted, it wasn't very close at all. Incumbent Democrat Kathy Hochul winning her first full term in office. She took over, of course, for disgraced former Governor Andrew Cuomo after he resigned. She defeats Congressman Lee Zeldin to win a first full term in the state of New York.
Next, an update for you from the state of Minnesota. Tim Walz, the incumbent Democrat, projected to win reelection there against Scott Jensen, a physician who made some dubious claims about the COVID-19 vaccine. Two Democratic incumbents holding on to the governor's mansion in those two states as we turned it over to Dana Bash who has some analysis for us. Dana?
BASH: Thank you so, Boris. In New York, this was a place that President Biden went more than once, where people were looking and saying, is this a situation where high crime, concerned about the economy, will actually do in a Democrat in a very blue state? And the answer tonight is no.
PHILLIP: Yeah. I mean, I think that those issues were very real in this race. I think it was maybe closer than the Democrats wanted it to be. But at the end of the day, the fundamentals of the state of New York kicked in here and Kathy Hochul is now an elected governor of that state.
And I will say this, maybe tomorrow and the day after, we will be talking a little bit about, why didn't people want to believe that this was not as close? I think a lot of the races tonight are turning out to be -- their holds for Democrats in places where, I think, a lot of Democrats were just nervous about the numbers.
hey have such PTSD from 2020. We all do, from 2020 and 2018, about not understanding whether the polls were really touching things that were happening.
WALLACE: Let's go back to something that you talked about earlier in terms of New Hampshire. A lot of these states are going back to their DNA. Fact is New York has not had a Republican governor since George Pataki in 2006. And I got to say, the Republicans didn't make a lot closer than we thought they were going to and Lee Zeldin beat Kathy Hochul up on the issue of crime. It seemed to have saliency.
In the last poll I saw, New Yorkers felt crime was a bigger issue than inflation. But in the end, the DNA held, it is a blue state, and Kathy Hochul is the elected governor.
BASH: And then the question is, was it actually in danger? And the fact that there was so much attention put on this and other states, kind of like what Van was saying in New York, that it got Democratic voters energized in a way that they were not before. Jake?
TAPPER: All right, Dana, we are staying laser-focused on those tight Senate races in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Each one is pivotal to determining control of the U.S. Senate. As we wait for more votes to come in and be counted, let's take a quick break and see if the numbers change on the other side. Back after this quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:55:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TAPPER: It's election night in America. We're waiting for polls to close in Hawaii and Alaska. And while we do, let's give you an update on the status of things right now. In the U.S. Senate, 100 seats, Democrats control 46 of the seats, Republicans control 46 of the seats, there are eight seats remaining. All Republicans need to do is win one next democratic seat and they can wrest control of the Senate.
But Republicans are definitely not having the night that they thought they were going to have when it comes to picking up seats. In the U.S. House of Representatives, Democrats control 146 seats, Republicans control 183 seats, including five pickups, 106 seats remaining. Remember, the magic number there is 218. Neither party has achieved that as of yet.
Let's look at some of these states in the competitive races in the state of play. At the beginning of the night, we told you there were 82 competitive House races we're keeping an eye on. Republicans need to win 23 of them as of now. They are leading in 26 of them. So right now, they are on track to be able to win control of the House of Representatives. But we're not making that call yet. That is the status as of right now with the votes as of right now. But right now, leading in 26 competitive seats, they need to win 23.
How about the Democrats? Democrats need to win 49 competitive seats, and they are leading in 40 competitive seats. So, Democrats not where they need to be.
Let's go back to the Senate races. I want to bring in Kasie Hunt. Kasie, tell us what's going on because we got some Senate races. I need to know what's going to happen.
HUNT: Well, we may be waiting a little while for that, Jake, but we can give you an update as to where they stand right now, which is to say that Georgia remains as close as ever, 20,000 votes separating Herschel Walker from Raphael Warnock right now. Neither one of them above 50% with 90% of the vote in. This could stretch out for four weeks.
In Pennsylvania, this continues to tighten. John Fetterman at 49.3%, Mehmet Oz at 48.2%. Remember, this would be a democratic pick up if Fetterman were to win here, which would protect Democrats if they lost elsewhere on the map, say, in Nevada perhaps, where Republicans feel very good about their chances. We got 84% of the vote in and the count is going to keep going in Pennsylvania.
Now, let's check in on Wisconsin where Ron Johnson is maintaining his lead, the Republican incumbent, over Democrat Mandela Barnes who sits at 48.4%.
[00:00:00]
Right now, we've always expected this race to be very, very close. Johnson is really doing what he needs to do. At this hour, 80% of the vote in in Wisconsin.
