CNN10 2024-11-05




CNN 10

Election Day in America. Aired 4-4:10a ET

Aired November 05, 2024 - 04:00 ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

COY WIRE, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to this Election Day edition of CNN 10. I'm Coy Wire. It's Tuesday, November 5th, 2024, Election Day.

Who will become the next president of the United States? Today, America decides. The two main candidates for U.S. president have covered some serious ground over the past few days, crisscrossing the country on the hunt for votes.

The Republican, former President Donald Trump, and Democrat, current Vice President Kamala Harris, held similar schedules in the remaining days of the campaign, visiting key contested states in their final sprint with their final pitches to American voters.

This year, Vice President Harris's team said she planned to vote by mail, while former President Trump is said to be voting in-person today.

Of course, their race is hardly the only one, 34 of the 100 U.S. Senate seats are up for re-election this year. All 435 voting seats in the House of Representatives are up for election as well. 11 states are holding gubernatorial or governor elections, and people are voting on ballot measures, which are laws or issues that citizens decide themselves.

All of this is happening today for those who didn't already participate in early voting. And when it comes to the presidential race, the number we're looking for is 270. That's how many electoral votes the candidate needs to win the presidency.

Each state gets a different number of these based on its population. Most of the attention this year will be on seven key battleground states that could go for either candidate. Those are Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, with a total of 94 electoral votes up for grabs in that group.

As we stated before, though, we may not have the answer tonight. Some states may still be counting ballots. And in a close race, results from some states may not be known for days, so the results of the election may not be either.

And there are other complications with the election process that may also delay results.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Now, as the results come in on election night, everybody's waiting for news of the call.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It now appears President Reagan has won.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He has called Reagan and congratulated him.

JONES: That's when the losing presidential candidate calls the winner to concede the election.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A few minutes ago, I called President Bush.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Barack Obama.

BILL CLINTON, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I congratulated Donald Trump.

JONES: To ensure the smooth transition of power. Now, of course, that's not always how it goes down.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Vice President has recalled the governor and retracted his concession.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's not ready to give this up just yet.

JONES: Election night is just the start of what can actually be a very lengthy process to officially pick the president.

Now, let's back up for a second. When you vote for president, you're not doing it directly. That's why a candidate can win the popular vote, but not the presidency. What you're actually doing, you're voting for electors. Those are people who are appointed in each state to then choose the president and the vice president.

Federal law says all election disputes at the state level need to be wrapped up by December 8th so the electors can cast their ballots on December the 14th.

Now, each state governor has got to certify the electors' votes and then send them on to Congress. So the results aren't official until the new Congress counts those ballots on January the 6th.

Now, it's usually a straightforward process, but let's say one of the candidates questions the legitimacy of the state's count. The governor could choose not to certify the electors' votes or, though this is really unlikely, the state legislature could decide to contest the election and send a different count to Congress, meaning Congress could end up with no results or with competing results from the same state.

Now, that's a violation of federal law, so Congress would no longer have to honor that state's electors at all. Now, the House and the Senate can then decide which result is valid or throw out the votes from that state altogether.

Now, I know you think I'm crazy, but this actually happened. It was 1876, shortly after the Civil War. Samuel Tilden won the popular vote, but there were 19 electoral votes in dispute. Congress had to step in and broker a compromise. Rutherford Hayes was eventually named president in exchange for the end of Reconstruction and the withdrawal of federal troops from the South.

Here's where things get even more interesting. If a candidate still doesn't have a majority of electoral votes by the end of this process, the 12th Amendment says the House of Representatives decides who will be president, and each state delegation gets one vote. The Senate picks a vice president.

No matter what happens, somebody has got to take the oath of office on January 20th. If both the president and the vice president are still undecided, the Speaker of the House temporarily gets that job.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WIRE: As we have said, polls this year say the race for the White House looks to be very tight. In the final nationwide CNN poll before votes are counted, get this, the poll finds that 47% of likely voters support Vice President Kamala Harris and an equal 47% support former President Donald Trump. How that election map plays out will make all the difference.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The data tell us it is the closest race in the 10. This is my 10th presidential election. There's never been one this close according to the numbers, but they do sometimes break late.

So you should prepare yourself for any possibility of outcomes, a split back and forth between the states, or you can prepare yourself that one candidate does have late momentum and runs up most of the battleground states. Either one of those scenarios, a sort of a split decision, a boxing match, or somebody sweeping most of them is possible. So let's go through some of the numbers. And why do I say that?

Let's start in the blue wall states, right? Look at these. Forgive me for turning my back. Just want to stretch this out a little bit so people can see it more clearly at home. This is the CNN poll of polls.

You're right. There were some "New York Times" data out today. There are some hints of maybe a little bit of Harris momentum in there. The Sunday before the election, I always lapse back into caution mode, right? Let's be careful. Let's let people vote. Let's be respectful of the process. And let's look at the average of the polls. That's the safest way to do it.

49-46 in Wisconsin. So you could say Harris is a lead. That's so close. It's -- you know, that's a statistical tie. But 48-46 in Michigan. 48-48, an actual tie in, of course, battleground Pennsylvania.

So let me just shrink this down and take it off to the side a little bit and put it down here. And then we'll do this one. So that's the blue wall states. What about the Sun Belt states, right? So forgive me again. I just want to stretch it out.

North Carolina, Trump with a one-point edge. That's the statistical tie. No clear leader. Georgia, same thing. Trump 49, Harris 47. So the Trump campaign say we're ahead a little bit. I would say then that means who turns out it's going to affect that.

And Arizona, again, Trump consistently has had a tiny lead in Arizona, small lead in Arizona. 49-47, again, certainly advantage Trump by the numbers, but within reach for the Vice President. It's that close.

So let's take this literally, as in let's assume it played out exactly like our averages say on the Sunday before, right? So you have Harris gets Wisconsin, Harris gets Michigan, Pennsylvania's an actual tie, right?

Donald Trump would get North Carolina in that scenario. There we go. Make it red. Donald Trump will get Georgia in that scenario. Make it red. Donald Trump gets Arizona in that scenario. Make it red. Where does that leave you?

Look at this. We don't have any recent polling. We don't have enough to have a poll of polls in Nevada. So we're leaving that one as a toss-up. But under that scenario, just giving them as we have them in our battleground poll of polls right now, 262 for Trump, 251 for Harris. Doesn't matter really who would win Nevada in that case. It would get Harris to 257. It would get Trump to 268.

So let's, for the sake of this argument, leave it yellow as a toss-up because the point is it all comes down to battleground Pennsylvania in this scenario. If everything plays out exactly the way it averages out right now, whoever wins Pennsylvania wins 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and gets to be president of the United States.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WIRE: All right, superstars. Thank you for watching this special election edition of CNN 10. For the latest up-to-date info as the polls close tonight, you can head to cnn.com and we'll see you right back here tomorrow.

But before I go, my favorite part of the show, our shout out goes to College Preparatory School of America, Lombard, Illinois. We see you and we appreciate all your efforts to be part of the show. And you should be very proud of every effort you put in each day to be the best you can be.

I'm Coy Wire. Thanks for watching CNN 10.

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