News 24/7

Democrats retained control of the Senate after winning the Nevada seat.

admin
CNN - Top stories: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-eve-campaigning/index.html

CNN - Top stories: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-eve-campaigning/index.html

Are Republicans favorites the winners of the 2016 U.S. House race? The bottom two sides may be hiding behind gerrymandering

That finding doesn’t mean Democrats are favored to hold the House, because Biden won the popular vote by 4.5 percentage points — a better showing than seems likely for Democrats this year. Recent polls have suggested roughly a dead heat between the two parties in the national popular vote. Democrats appear to have a legitimate chance of retaining the House. (Nate will be laying out that case in his newsletter next week; Times subscribers can sign up to receive it.)

Gerrymandering is a real problem for American democracy, especially in the drawing of state legislature districts, as The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer recently documented. If the Supreme Court limits the power of state courts, some states, like North Carolina, will likely have to rewrite their congressional maps. Still, if you were going to rank the biggest current threats to American democracy, gerrymandering would not be at the top of the list.

The movement inside the Republican Party to refuse to accept defeat would top the list. After that, in some order, would be the outsize and growing influence that the Senate gives to residents of small states; the winner-take-all nature of the Electoral College; the lack of congressional representation for residents of Washington, D.C., and of Puerto Rico, many of whom are Black or Latino; and the existence of an ambitious Republican-appointed majority on the Supreme Court even though Democrats have won the popular vote in seven of the past eight presidential elections.

The truth is more applicable to Democrats than it is to the nation. The Democratic incumbent, Steve Sisolak, is competing with the sheriff of the most populous county in a closely fought race for governor. And its congressional races could help determine partisan control of both chambers: In three of its four House races and in the contest for U.S. Senate, Democratic incumbents are in tight battles.

The battle for Senate control was decided by Arizona and Nevada, states with large shares of mail-in ballots and rules that can slow the processing of those ballots.

Republicans predict they will win the House of Representatives on Tuesday – a victory that, if it materializes, would give them the power to throttle President Joe Biden’s domestic agenda and clamp an investigative vise on his White House. The Senate is in a very close election with races in several states likely to determine who wins the majority.

The question of who will control Congress has not been answered, as the results of the election in November have not yet been counted. On this day, we can draw some conclusions.

Three states in particular — Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania — that are seen as the likeliest to change party hands have emerged as the epicenter of the Senate fight with an increasing volume of acrimony and advertising. In many ways, the two parties have been talking almost entirely past each other both on the campaign trail and on the airwaves — disagreeing less over particular policies than debating entirely different lists of challenges and threats facing the nation.

After two years out of power, the Republican Party’s keenness to return to the pinnacle in Congress is palpable, and has been the most important motivating factor in its midterm campaign strategy ahead of the election on November 8.

In winning the Virginia governor’s mansion last year, Youngkin adopted a subtle campaign strategy. By talking about the handling of gender issues in schools and referencing “election integrity,” the former businessman sent sufficient “Make America Great Again” messages to ensure turnout in pro-Trump rural counties. He was careful to not upset the voters in the more liberal Washington, DC suburbs, where parents were frustrated by Covid-19 lock downs.

“The winning team is the winning team – elections have consequences,” Youngkin said, urging all Republicans voters to get behind Lake, but also encapsulating the ideological choice he must make for a future in the party.

There is no reason for a political party to focus on winning power. Politics is the art of possibilities. And successful parties and leaders understand election victories are paramount. Democratic presidents from Lyndon Johnson to Bill Clinton were known for doing what needed to be done to win, reshaping their own principles if necessary. Johnson, a former Senate majority leader, especially was ruthless in wielding his authority won at the ballot box. Nancy Pelosi has dominated the House without being determined to use her power many times.

For a party that once prided itself on its heritage of promoting global democracy against tyranny, this is a huge departure. Liz Cheney and other Republicans who supported these values in the past were ostracized because of their opposition to Trump. Flake did not run for reelection and Cheney, the vice chair of the House select committee investigating January 6, 2021, lost her primary this summer to a Trump-backed challenger. Meanwhile, extremists who promote conspiracy theories and question the election, like Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for example, are superstars in the party because the Trump base loves them.

The most striking example of naked pursuit of power was when McCarthy went to Mar-a-Lago to reconcile himself with Trump, just days after he criticized him over the Capitol insurrection. The California lawmaker knew that his party’s hope of a House majority and his own dreams of being speaker hinged on a rapprochement with Trump and his base voters.

McConnell rode out Trump’s turmoil and his choices of candidates in order to get the Senate back in GOP control, which may have made it harder for the party to win control of the Senate because of the state of the national environment.

McConnell doesn’t seem to mind that Trump has made racist posts against his wife. He has done more than just keep quiet. The Senate Leadership Fund, the super PAC affiliated with the minority leader, has poured tens of millions of dollars into key races – including in states like Ohio and Georgia in a bid to bail out misfiring candidates effectively crowned as party nominees by none other than Trump.

McConnell’s committee is spending money in New Hampshire, where the GOP nominee has said he wouldn’t vote for McConnell. It could bolster a possible GOP majority.

The impulse to win control of Congress at all costs – even if it appears to compromise values the GOP professes to stand for – was on display when several US senators flew into Georgia earlier this month to rescue controversy-swamped Senate nominee Hershel Walker.

Walker and the pitfalls of the midterm elections: The case of a possible failed campaign by a pro-Trump nominee to become a senator

The pro-Trump nominee has faced allegations that he paid for a woman to terminate her pregnancy despite having said during the campaign that he would support a national ban on the procedure with no exceptions. Walker has denied the allegations, which CNN has not independently confirmed, but the furor highlighted the risky nature of a candidacy that probably wouldn’t have happened but for his friendship with Trump.

Cotton, Scott and McConnell don’t pay much attention to Walker’s credentials. If he is elected, he will return to power for the GOP if he can achieve at least 51 Republican votes in the Senate. He was never supposed to be abandoned.

Trump persuaded Perdue to run against Kemp in the primary. The primary vote humiliated both Perdue and Trump.

So while his endorsement may be valuable to Lake in a close gubernatorial race, her rising star power in Trump world also offered a strong incentive for his trip. And it explains the hug after his speech in which he embraced the kind of political personality who wouldn’t have been let anywhere near his events last year.

A month ago, Democrats had a 7-in-10 chance of keeping the majority in the US Senate in the midterm elections, according to a forecasting model built by the wizards over at FiveThirtyEight.

The Fate of the Senate Race: A Case Study of Fetterman, Masters, Moore, Barnes, Warnock, Nelson, and Nelson

There has been a narrowing of Democrat John Fetterman’s lead over Republican Mehmet Oz due to concerns about the lieutenant governor’s health. Fetterman appeared with the President during his visit to Pennsylvania.

Where the democrats are spending their money? Joe Biden had a golden summer, but what has not been good for Team Blue

Democrats had a golden summer. A surge in voter registration was caused by the Dobbs decision. Voters handed Democrats a string of sweet victories in unlikely places — Alaska and Kansas, and good news in upstate New York.

Things are not good for Team Blue, and there have been rumblings in the past month or so. In the latest New York Times/Siena College poll 49 percent of likely voters said they planned to vote for a Republican for Congress, and 45 percent said they planned to vote for a Democrat. Democrats held a one-point lead last month.

The poll contained some eye-popping numbers. Democrats were counting on abortion rights to be a big issue, as they gained broad support among female voters. It doesn’t seem to be working. The gender gap used to favor Democrats over the past month. In September, women who identified as independent voters favored Democrats by 14 points. They now favor Republicans by 18 percentage points.

Looking at where the parties are spending their money helps you understand how they think the campaign is going. As Henry Olsen noted in The Washington Post last week, Democrats are pouring money into House districts that should be safe — places that Joe Biden won by double digits in 2020. Politico’s election forecast, for example, now rates the races in California’s 13th District and Oregon’s Sixth District as tossups. Two years ago, according to Politico, he won those areas by 11 and 14 points.

Biden’s sharpened message, after all, has been delivered in Washington – not standing on stage next to Democratic candidates in the midst of the most heated races across the country.

But in the meantime, the fact Democrats remain ahead or within the margin of error in critical races across the country has given Biden and his team a sense that things could, to some degree, break their way if some external factors line up to their advantage.

Some in Biden’s own party have begun openly questioning the party’s message – and warning that any momentum that may have existed has given way to clear signs of Republicans regaining the upper hand.

Biden said last week that it had been back and forth with them. “I think that we’re going to see one more shift back to our side in the closing days.”

It was a candid acknowledgement of the moment that has Democrats once again scrambling to take on a message to blunt GOP momentum, a reality compounded by differing views inside the party of where that message should actually land.

But Biden’s public comments also reflect the view, two weeks from the day votes will be counted, that has Democrats “very much still in the game,” one Democratic official said.

The definitive outstanding question is whether that will hold in the home stretch of the campaign, when a small universe of undecided voters traditionally break with the party in power.

One official from the Democratic campaign said they had been sucked back into their own firing squad. “It was never as good as people seemed to think it was (at the end of the summer), and it’s not as bad as some are acting now. But it could be if we don’t pull it together.”

The weight of that history, not to mention the acute headwinds created by economic unease that continues to rank first among voter concerns in poll after poll, aren’t lost on Biden or his advisers.

It might be understandable if that was the case given Biden’s track record. The mid-terms make it clear that Biden is a better president than he is thought to be. “He has been underestimated and criticized despite having a formidable first two years. The midterms should make Republicans nervous as they think about 2024.”

Will Biden Hit the Road? The Issues of the Presidency on Economic Policy and the Electoral Insights of Congress

He will hit the road for bigger campaign events after weeks of intentionally smaller scale official events designed to highlight legislative accomplishments, advisers say.

Gas prices, which have fallen for the last two weeks, as well as a GDP report which analysts expect to show good growth after two quarters of contraction are two factors they point to.

Officials acknowledge their deficit on the economy, despite cornerstone legislative achievements and a historically fast recovery from the pandemic-era downturn, isn’t going to flip over the course of 14 days.

But given the close correlation between gas prices and Democratic electoral prospects over the course of the last several months, they see an opportunity to at least make some gains – or fight to a draw – with undecided voters or those weighing whether to vote at all in the closing days.

In recent weeks, officials say, it has been laid bare in a very acute way by Republicans, whether it is on abortion, popular programs such as Social Security and Medicare, or proposals to undermine many of the individual provisions enacted by Biden that consistently poll in favor of Democrats when taken in isolation

In order to counter Republican enthusiasm, Biden has spent the last weeks trying to highlight individual issues officials see as key motivators to base voters, including abortion rights and Biden’s actions to cancel student loans for some borrowers.

The Supreme Court decision to strike down the contraceptives law was seen by the West Wing as being overly optimistic by Democrats.

But Democratic Senate candidates in battleground races are all polling with narrow leads or within striking distance. Even if the Democrats were to break away, there is still a path to hold onto the Senate.

With Americans struggling under the high cost of living, Democrats have failed to head off a referendum on Biden’s economic management and presidency with most polls predicting building Republican momentum that could deal the first-term president a classic midterm election rebuke.

Of course, the voters — not the polls — will have the final say on all of these questions. As such, we spend a lot of time going through the risks of polling error in this newsletter. But for this post let’s imagine that the polls are exactly right about the national political environment. The race is very delicate if that is the case. There are possibilities ranging from a Democratic hold on the Senate to a total Republican victory in the House.

The Senate win comes with control of the House – where Republicans were widely expected to win a majority – still up for grabs. Ballots are still being counted in key districts in some states, including California, Arizona and Oregon, with large shares of mail-in ballots. Even if Democrats don’t retain control of the House, they could leave the GOP with a small and unruly majority.

Republicans are increasingly bullish on winning big in Tuesday’s midterm elections, as they slam Democrats over raging inflation and crime while President Joe Biden seeks a late reprieve by warning that GOP election deniers could destroy democracy.

In an exclusive interview with CNN, the potential next Republican House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, laid out his plans for power and vowed to tackle inflation, border security and rising crime. He promised broad investigations against the Biden administration on the Afghanistan withdrawal, the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic and how the administration has dealt with parents and school board meetings. And he didn’t rule out an eventual push to impeach Biden.

In a sign of the critical stakes and the growing angst among Democrats, Bill Clinton, Donald Trump, Barack Obama and Joe Biden all took to the trail over the weekend.

The campaign that former President Trump used to demonstrate his enduring magnetism with grassroots Republicans in Ohio will end on Monday with a rally for the Senate nominee. The speech Trump gave on Sunday ended in the rain and predicted an incredible slate of “trueMAGA warriors” to Congress.

Biden warned that the nation’s core values are in danger from Republicans who have denied the truth about the Capitol insurrection and the brutal attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband.

Biden was correct when he said that the democracy was at stake in the elections. The argument got people talking. Biden and the Democrats made that case because of Trump and election-denying extremists.

The president will end his campaign at the Democratic event in Maryland. The fact that he will be in a liberal bastion and not trying to boost an endangered lawmaker in a key race on the final night reflects his compromised standing in an election that has reverted to a referendum on his tattered credibility and low approval ratings.

The GOP Defends the Right Way: Donald Trump Wins the White House and Republicans Can Defy the Will of the People, Even if They Lose

On CNN, the RNC chair predicted that the GOP would win the House and the Senate and accused Biden of being oblivious to the economic anxiety among Americans with his warnings about democracy.

But the president warned in a speech in Pittsburgh on Saturday night alongside Obama that Republican concern over the economy was a ruse and claimed that the GOP would cut Social Security and Medicare if they won majorities.

They are all about the wealthier becoming wealthy. The richer ones stay wealthy. The middle class is stiffed. Under their policy, the poor get poorer, Biden said.

The first national vote after the election of Donald Trump caused chaos and violence and there are fears that some Republicans might attempt to defy the will of voters if they lose. Ron Johnson, a senator from Wisconsin, has raised concerns about the vote.

A staffer at the headquarters of the candidate for governor of Arizona opened a letter with white powder on Sunday. Lake’s opponent, the current secretary of state of Arizona, called the incident “incredibly concerning”.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-eve-campaigning/index.html

The Left Behind: Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis at a White House Inflaton Debate in Fla., on Oct. 21, 2016

There were dueling rallies in Florida by President Trump and the state’s Gov. Ron DeSantis on Sunday night. The ex-president, who is expected to launch a third White House bid within days, coined a new nickname Saturday for the man who could prove to be his toughest primary opponent: “Ron DeSanctimonious.”

The Governor of Florida turned his ire on Biden and called his opponent Charlie Crist a donkey, instead of engaging with him, since he did not want to hurt the feelings of the Biden camp.

As he rallied for Rubio, who is seeking reelection, Trump didn’t repeat his mockery of DeSantis on Sunday but again teased the likelihood of a presidential run. There was a sign that the next presidential race was stirring when Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton decided against running in the Republican primary.

Bill Clinton was in New York on Saturday stumping for Kathy Hochul. The Empire state is safe territory for the party but Hochul is in a close race with Zeldin which demonstrates the strength of the national environment.

Most election rallies are just for the sake of it, but your life is on the line. Clinton said the life of young people in the audience was on the line.

Biden, however, has not managed to speak effectively and personally to Americans craving a return to normality after the pandemic or to get across that he fully understands the pain of rising prices in a 40-year-high inflation explosion that his White House once repeatedly branded “transitory.”

If Republicans win back the House, they can make a mockery of Biden’s program and cause a series of political fights over spending and debt-ceiling. They will hold hearings into the surge of migrants across the southern border and the withdrawal of the US from Afghanistan.

A GOP majority would contain scores of candidates in Trump’s extreme image and would be weaponized to damage the president as much as possible ahead of a potential rematch with Trump in 2024. And a Republican Senate would frustrate Biden’s hopes of balancing out the judiciary after four years of Trump nominating conservative judges.

The Economic Impact of the 2016 Presidential Rebuke on the Nation’s First-Term Electoral Candidate J.D. Vance

The dispirited nation votes Tuesday in an election that is more likely to cement its divisions than promote unity.

The country can often be set on a new path when people freely choose their leaders, and those leaders accept the results.

The cost of living crisis is the most important issue for voters who are still waiting for the restoration of normality after aonce-in-a-century PAIN that Biden promised in 2020, with polls showing the economy is the most important issue.

A gusher of news on job losses just before polls opened, including in the tech industry, worsened jitters about a slowdown that could destroy one of the bright spots of the Biden economy – historically low unemployment. Americans are already struggling with higher prices for food and gasoline and now must cope with the Federal Reserve hikes in interest rates that not only make credit card debt, buying a home and rent more expensive, but could tip the economy into a recession.

The economic situation threatens to set up a classic midterm election rebuke for a first-term president – and in some ways, this would be a sign that democracy is working. Elections have for generations been a safety valve for the public to express dissent with the country’s direction.

While that continuum is the essence of democracy, the run-up to these midterms has also highlighted the depth of the nation’s self-estrangement in a political era in which both sides seem to think victory for the other is tantamount to losing their country.

On the eve of an election in which he is not on the ballot, Trump made it all about himself – even as he claimed he didn’t want to overshadow Republican candidates. While campaigning for Republican Senate nominee, J.D. Vance in Ohio, Trump made false claims about America’s decline, and presented himself as a leader who would rebuild the country. And he laid the groundwork to proclaim he is the victim of totalitarian state-style persecution if he is indicted in several criminal probes into his conduct.

Tuesday looks set to be a tough day for Biden. During the final hours of the campaign, the president did not focus on trying to get vulnerable Democrats over the line. Instead, he was in the liberal bastion of Maryland – a safe haven where his low approval ratings likely won’t hurt Democrats running for office. While he did stump for Pennsylvania Senate nominee John Fetterman over the weekend, the venue of his final event encapsulated his drained political juice as he contemplates a 2024 reelection campaign.

“I think it’s going to be tough,” Biden told reporters. “I think we’ll win the Senate and I think the House is tougher,” he said, admitting life would become “more difficult” for him if the GOP takes control of Congress.

Trump will seek a second term in the White House when he makes an announcement at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on November 15. The fact that a twice-impeached president, who left office in disgrace after legitimizing violence as a form of political expression, has a good chance of winning underscores the turbulence of our time.

The shadow of violence that has hung over American policies since Trump inciting the Capitol insurrection was worsened when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recalled a moment of trauma when her husband had been attacked with a hammer. In a rare interview, she chastised certain Republicans for joking about it.

There is a party that is critical of the election outcome, and mocking any violence that happens. “That has to stop,” Pelosi said.

McCarthy told Melanie that impeachment will not be used for political purposes. If something rises to the occasion, then it would not be used at any other time.

And Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who says he’s in line to be chairman of the permanent subcommittee on investigations if he wins reelection and Republicans take the Senate, said he’d use the power granted him, in what is likely to be a very narrowly decided election, to further crank up the partisan heat in Washington.

The Disappointing First Election of 2024 for the Republican Party – Reflection of a Faint CNN World Affairs Columnist

There’s something magical about democratic elections, when differences are exposed in debates and fierce campaigns. It had been expected that both sides would abide by the verdict of the people.

Frida Ghitis is a world affairs columnist, a former CNN producer and correspondent. She writes for The Washington Post and World Politics Review as well as contributing weekly to CNN. Her views are her own in this commentary. View more opinion on CNN.

There wasn’t a red wave and it was less than a tsunami. Predictions of a huge Republican victory at the polls did not materialize. It was a deeply disappointing election for the GOP. It was a bad day for former President Donald Trump who was hoping to become the party’s presidential candidate in 2024, but his hopes were dashed by a Republican landslide.

The campaign spearheaded by Trump and his election rivals failed to live up to expectations. Some of the Republican victories looked like a rebuke to Trump and his group of anti-democratic activists.

In exit polls, a high percentage of voters said they chose their House vote to oppose Donald Trump. And just 37% said they had a favorable view of the former president, the presumed GOP front-runner, at least before this election. That should alarm the party…”

On election night, Trump told an interviewer, “I think if [Republicans] win, I should get all the credit. If they lose, I shouldn’t be blamed at all. The evidence supports the fact that he deserves a lot of the blame.

According to CNN Projections, the Republicans have won over 200 of the 218 seats they need to take the majority while the Democrats have won 204.

They could well do it. Nancy Pelosi could be replaced as House speaker if Republicans get into the House, but even if they do they will be in for a rude awakening. The first election after 9/11 saw the best performance by the party since George W. Bush in 2002.

Shapiro, Oz, & Me: When Donald Trump and Joyce M. Davis met Michael Mastriano: The road to a national majority in Pennsylvania

Democrat Josh Shapiro won the race for governor of Pennsylvania. Joyce M. Davis wrote that Mastriano scared many PAns with his “take-no-prisoners Trump swagger”. He advocated for a ban on abortion and said that women who didn’t follow it should be charged with murder. On top of all that, he’s an unapologetic election denier,” Davis observed.

Walker could win the election in December. He should never have been on the ballot because he was heard campaigning or learning about his past. Trump apparently thought fame would do the trick, just as it did for him. So, he also backed TV star Mehmet Oz for the Pennsylvania seat. John Fetterman, Oz’s opponent, was a key skill for a political candidate after suffering a stroke.

Scott wrote, “My way is the path to a national majority, and former President Donald Trumps way is the path to future disappointments and continued suffering.”

That all happened within hours of Trump deploying one of his mob-style tactics, threatening to reveal “things” about DeSantis if he runs. The former president said, “I know more about him than anybody except his wife.”

Trump will announce his candidacy soon despite his poor showing. Most Democrats find the prospect hard to stomach, but most Republicans would also like him to just focus on his golf game,” Ghitis noted.

The Democratic Party in 2020: What Happened? The Case of the Abortion-Rights War in New York, California, and Vermont

Democrats won over Biden skeptics. The Democratic candidates won over voters who were unhappy with the president because of the strength of individual candidates. In New Hampshire, a Democratic incumbent won nearly all voters who approved of Biden, and one-fifth of those who disapproved.

In New York, the issues were not critical. There was no danger that the Democratic Legislature would overturn abortion rights. No movement emerged in 2020 to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory in New York, and there is little indication that anyone feared Mr. Zeldin might do so. The Republicans focused on crime because of this. And it paid off.

The most obvious differences appeared to be the abortion and democracy issues that were at stake, state by state. In Pennsylvania, Republicans nominated a candidate for governor, Doug Mastriano, who was central to efforts to overturn the states’s 2020 presidential election results. There were Democrats who feared that a Mastriano victory could lead to a constitutional crisis. It could have threatened a long-held right as well because Mr Mastriano is an ardent opponent of abortion.

There are exceptions, of course — like Democratic strength in Colorado or Republican durability in Texas. Most of the parties most impressive showings fit well.

“The abortion-rights side seemingly went a perfect five-for-five when it came to ballot initiatives, recognizing a state right to abortion in Michigan, California and Vermont,” wrote law professor Mary Ziegler. “Kentucky, a deep red state, turned away an attempt to say that the state constitution did not protect a right to abortion. Montana’s abortion measure, which threatened to impose criminal penalties on health care providers, was rejected by voters in Tuesday’s referendum.”

The Red Wave: Why It Didn’t Happen in Florida, and How We Need to Address It: Rick Scott, Ron Johnson, Liz Cheney, and Mitt Romney

A group of senators, including Rick Scott of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, sent a letter to McConnell asking him to delay the leadership elections so they wouldn’t be a factor in control of the Senate.

There are multiple reasons why the red wave didn’t happen, they wrote. “We need to have serious discussions within our conference as to why and what we can do to improve our chances in 2024.”

Marco has been re-elected to his seat in Florida. “We need to make sure that those who want to lead us are genuinely committed to fighting for the priorities & values of the working Americans (of every background) who gave us big wins in states like #Florida,” he wrote on Twitter, quickly receiving the backing of Senators Ted Cruz of Texas and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming.

Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s presidential nominee in 2012, released his own prescriptions for the future, which strongly hinted that Republican losses reflected the party’s embrace of rage and recrimination over policy proposals. He told Republicans to work with Democrats in Congress to slow inflation, open broader pathways for legal immigration, and address climate change, while increasing domestic energy production.

He wrote that it would be tempting to try to pursue pointless investigations, messaging bills, threats and government shutdowns.

Representative Liz Cheney, the Wyoming Republican exiled by her party for her resolute opposition to Mr. Trump, called the midterm results “a clear victory for Team Normal,” but speaking on Friday afternoon at the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics, she signaled that Tuesday’s vote was “a step in the right direction.”

What we need to know about the Republicans: The razor-thin race for Nevada’s Senate seat and Arizonan’s governorship is still going strong

The votes are still being counted in the key races across the country. Election Day turns into Election Weekend, so here is what you should know.

The razor-thin races for Nevada’s Senate seat and Arizona’s governorship have not been called as many ballots are still to be counted.

As of Saturday, the governor’s race was still too close to call with Lake, one of the most important election deniers on the ballot this year, trailing by 34,000 votes.

CNN projected Friday that Arizona Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly will defeat Republican Blake Masters in Arizona, and Republican Joe Lombardo will defeat Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak in Nevada.

Senate Republicans were confident going into Election Day about breaking the tie in the Senate that has given Democrats control of the Senate on the strength of a tiebreaking vote by Vice President Kamala Harris. Now Harris’ vote may not even be needed if Democrats and Sen. Raphael Warnock tackle Herschel Walker in the Georgia runoff on December 6 and claim a 51st seat.

Which party reaches the 218 seats necessary for a House majority will hinge on races in states with a large share of mail-in ballots – including California, where identifying winners in some races could take weeks, Oregon and Arizona.

The Republican Party of Arizona, the Republican National Committee, and the Senate candidate in Arizona criticized the tabulation process.

The groups demanded constant shifts in ballot processing and threatened a potential legal action if they didn’t get their way.

Addressing the specific accusations from the RNC statement, Gates said: “I would prefer that if there are concerns that they have, that they communicate those to us here. I’m a Republican. Republicans are three of my friends on the board. We should talk about these issues with us, as opposed to making baseless claims.

The party defied the historical trend of midterm elections breaking against parties in power and overcame anxiety over high inflation, cementing its majority as voters rejected Republican candidates who had aligned themselves with former President Donald Trump and in many cases parroted his lies about widespread election fraud.

The economy: A slim plurality of voters, about 31%, called inflation their top issue, and roughly 8 in 10 said inflation had been a hardship for them personally. Voters said they trusted the GOP to handle inflation, by a 12-point margin.

Abortion rights: The Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade brought abortion to center stage, with about 27% of voters calling it their top issue. 6 in 10 voters felt bad about the decision and 4 in 10 expressed anger. Democrats had a 11-point advantage over the Republicans when it came to which party voters would handle issues related to abortion.

Former President Donald Trump: Trump was on voters’ minds nearly as much as the incumbent. One-third of voters said they were expressing opposition to Biden and a quarter said they intended to vote against him.

CNN Exitpolls are a blend of in-person interviews with Election Day voters and in-person interviews, telephone and online polls measuring views of early and by-mail voters. They were conducted by Edison Research on behalf of the National Election Pool. Read it here.

The Senate is Better than the House: Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock and Democratic Sen. Herschel Walker are facing off

It is simply better. The bigger the number the better,” Biden, who is in the midst of an international trip, told reporters in Cambodia shortly after CNN and other news outlets projected Democrats would keep their Senate majority.

What’s more, the Senate has sole authority to confirm judicial nominations and key executive appointments, which is critical, even if a Republican House blocks other major Biden initiatives.

Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and his Republican opponent, Herschel Walker, are facing off on December 6 after neither passed the 50% threshold on Tuesday.

He said he was looking forward to the next couple of years with Democrats and that it would be better to have 51 seats in the Senate.

Democrats have no votes to spare because the Senate is currently tied, with Vice President Harris holding the tie-breaking vote.

Chuck Schumer called the Democrats’ hold on the Senate a victory and said it was a rejection of the “isolated, anti- Democratic, misogynist, and racist” republicans.

Schumer said they defended a woman’s right to choose after the Supreme Court overturned the Wade decision.

The Supreme Court reversed its opinion on abortion rights in June, but Democrats have the ability to block any GOP measures that would ban abortion rights.

Only one Senate seat has changed hands so far in the 2022 midterm elections: Pennsylvania, where Democratic Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, who campaigned as he recovered from a May stroke, defeated Republican Mehmet Oz, the celebrity doctor who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump.

Cortez Masto and the Politics of the House: An Analysis of Laxalt, Trump and the Case for a Democratic Supermajority

He was involved in the legal efforts to overturn the results of the presidential election, which he said wasrigged, and co-chairman of Trump’s campaign in Nevada. According to the argument made by Cortez Masto the lies and election conspiracy theories embraced by Trump and his allies led to the attack on the US Capitol.

After the Senate primary, Masters scrubbed his website of language that included the false claim that the election was stolen, which had previously been posted on his website. He conceded during the debate that there was not evidence of fraud that would have changed the outcome of the election. But the Republican nominee seemed to reverse course after receiving a phone call from Trump urging him to “go stronger” on election denialism, a conversation that was captured in a Fox documentary.

The tone Laxalt struck Saturday was different than Trump’s. Laxalt was leading Cortez Masto by a very small margin as the Clark County ballot dropped on Saturday.

Democrats could add to their margin in the Senate, if incumbent Raphael Warnock defeats Republican challenger Herschel Walker in a runoff in Georgia on Dec. 6.

There are questions about whether to alter the cloture process in the Senate as Democrats still don’t have a majority, and would need to overcome the filibuster to get major legislative priorities.

McConnell said there was a greater likelihood the House would flip than the Senate.

Democrats retained their Senate majority and the fight for control of the House is the biggest question going into next year.

CNN projected Saturday that Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat, would defeat Republican Joe Kent in the 3rd District of Washington.

Her victory came largely as a result of Trump’s efforts to punish Republicans who voted to impeach him. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, a moderate who was widely viewed as a lock for reelection, did not finish in one of the top two slots in the primary and therefore didn’t advance to the general election.

What to Know About House-Senate Control in the Midterm Elections: A Tale of Two False Candidates and Three Winners

California has many undecided races, where counting mail-in ballots can take weeks and significant shifts can occur late in the process. There are undecided races in other states with large quantities of mail-in ballots.

A backlash against House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy is a result of the GOP’s lackluster performance in the mid-terms.

He said the Democratic Senate candidates “beat some very flawed challengers who had no faith in democracy, no fidelity to truth or honor. And even when the polls looked bleak, our candidates never gave up and never lost faith.”

Senate control already being settled will take a lot of the national spotlight and TV advertising funding away from the Georgia Senate race.

“It’s about who has the competence and character to represent us; who’s willing to tell the truth; who has the knowledge needed for the job,” a narrator says in the spot.

It’s the second straight election in which overtime in Georgia, which is triggered when no candidate tops 50% of the vote in the general election, will be necessary.

Jon Ossoff defeated David Perdue in the first Georgia Senate race of the 20th century. Loeffler had been appointed to the Senate in 2019 when former Sen. Johnny Isakson resigned for health reasons. It was a special election that she was defeated in.

If she wins, Lake would be a rare Trump-supported election denier to win a competitive statewide race this year. Other Republicans who had parroted Trump’s falsehoods about widespread election frauds lost governor’s races in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and secretary of state races in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, and more.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/politics/midterm-elections-what-to-know-house-senate-control/index.html

Clark County Senator Adam Laxalt and the Closeness of Maricopa County’s Supermajority-Demagnetic Electoral Race

In an interview with CNN Saturday afternoon, Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates said that about 190,000 votes remain to be counted in Maricopa County.

He said he was confident that about 95% to 99% of those votes will be recorded by Tuesday. He said that the county will keep reporting votes until they’re done.

In Alaska, the ranking of voters will decide the fate of the state’s House and Senate seats. Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola, who won a special election this summer, is in a strong position to eclipse the 50% mark. Kelly Tshibaka is a Republican who supports Trump and is trying to get Murkowski and others impeached for the attack on the US Capitol.

The election was not free of misinformation, and officials in Arizona and Nevada were working hard to keep it from happening again. It was posted Friday night that Clark County, the most populous in Nevada, was finding all sorts of ballots to steal the election from Adam Laxalt.

“We’re taking ballots in that we’re required to take in according to the law, there’s no way that we can find ballots,” Gloria said. “They’re brought here by the United States Postal Service. As long as it’s postmarked [by Election Day], we process those ballots and put them in the count.”

Still, Laxalt acknowledged in a tweet Saturday morning that the mail-in ballots that had arrived over the past couple of days continued to break in higher Democratic margins than his team had calculated. “This has narrowed our victory window,” he tweeted. He said that the race was going to be decided by the thousands of Clark County drop-off ballots. We can still win if they are Republican or Democrat. If they continue to trend heavy DEM then she will overtake us.”

Underscoring the closeness of the race, Laxalt put out a series of tweets Saturday evening encouraging voters to “cure” their ballots to ensure that any ballots with technical errors with signature or other issues could be fixed to ensure they are counted. The deadline to cure ballots is 5 p.m. on Monday.

“For my people who knocked doors in 115 degree heat, and for the million+ Arizonans who put their faith in me, we are going to make sure that every legal vote is counted,” Masters tweeted. I will congratulate Senator Kelly if he has more of them than I do. Voters decide, not the media.

Maricopa County Election officials pushed back on Masters’ earlier contention – one that Lake had also made – that the vote counting in Arizona was moving too slowly in Arizona’s most populous county.

Gates added that candidates and activists who were stating that the count was taking too long have not been “paying attention to the history of how we have counted votes here in Arizona for decades now. Over the last couple of decades, the count has taken an average of 10 to 12 days.

The best opinion takes of the week: A brief look at Benchley’s legacy and the disappearance of a famous racehorse

Editor’s Note: Sign up to get this weekly column as a newsletter. We looked back at the best opinion takes of the week from CNN and other outlets.

The disappearance of a famous racehorse and the tragic death of its trainer are some of the things that are investigated by the master of detective stories, Robert Benchley, in one of his works. The police inspector wants to know if there is any point to which the detective would like to draw his attention.

It was only a little more than a week ago that Republicans thought they’d be savoring a crushing victory – and some Democrats were starting to blame each other for what they feared would be a disaster.

The New Yorker reported November 4 that the GOP candidates in races like Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania were on the way to a clean sweep. Wallace-Wells wrote, “The word that kept coming up in these conversations was bloodbath.”

“People sometimes wonder what it will take to get young people to the polls,” wrote Dolores Hernandez, a junior at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. “Well, after the 2022 midterms, they no longer have to guess.”

“Place in front of us an existential issue that could determine our future. Give us the knowledge that we are able to vote on certain issues, and we will turn out in droves. The Gen Z friends viewed abortion as an important issue.

The University of Michigan student activist said the line of students waiting for same-day registration to vote stretched for four hours on Election Day. There was a feeling of excitement around the election on the campus. The motivating issue for many young women was abortion rights.

Nationally, exit polls showed that voters between the ages of 18 and 29 supported Democrats over Republicans by a 63% to 35% margin; no other age group was nearly as pro-Democratic, with voters over 45 strongly favoring Republicans.

John Avlon thinks that the polls were a repudiation of former President Donald Trumps election lies and many of the top ticket candidates who parroted them.

Roxanne Jones said that she was a relief. It feels as though a majority of voters want politics to be more focused on what is best for America, rather than what is best for conspiracy theorists.

“Plenty of voters are worried about unchecked progressivism on the left, but they’re even more worried about unchecked extremism on the right,” observed Tim Alberta, in the Atlantic.

“That extremism takes many forms: delegitimizing our elections system, endorsing the January 6 assault on the Capitol, cracking jokes and spreading lies about the assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband. Donald Trump is the only person who symbolizes all of this extremism, which many swing voters rejected on Tuesday.

A few careers and a few others were broken during the election. Wes Moore, who became the first Black governor of Maryland, is a rising star, wrote Peniel Joseph. Joseph said that if there is a campaign that advocates equal opportunity, compassion for the incarcerated and education for all children it can win and spread across the country. “Wes Moore’s victory has recaptured some of the magic that has been lost in our politics in the tumult of the past few years. It is hoped that this is just the beginning.

For Sophia A. Nelson, “the big heartbreak of the night” was the defeat of Stacey Abrams by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp – “a repeat of her defeat to him four years ago, when the two tangled for what at the time was an open seat…”

In Texas, Democrat Beto O’Rourke lost to incumbent Republican Greg Abbott for governor. In the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Nicole Russell wrote that after “his third huge loss, it’s time for him to stop running for offices in Texas. We’ve had enough Beto for one lifetime. His liberal policies in Texas are not welcome.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/opinions/five-lessons-midterms-opinion-columns-galant/index.html

Does Sexiness Matter? Seven Lessons Midterms on Putin’s Sexiest Man Alive, Mark Galeotti, and Sara Stewart

In a new sign its invasion is faltering, Russia pulled troops out of the city of Kherson, the only regional capital it captured in Ukraine since the February invasion. The architect of the war, President Vladimir Putin, may be able to retain control of his nation for a time despite the debacle, wrote Mark Galeotti. The impact of continued defeat is going to be significant. Putin’s dreams of establishing Russia as a great power on the back of its military strength are over, and so too are his ambitions of securing a legacy as one of the nation’s great state-builders.”

Sara Stewart said the actor Chris Evans was a candidate whose appeal had not aged well, after he received an accolade that was first bestowed on MelGibson in 1985.

“People magazine recently announced this year’s Sexiest Man Alive, which makes it a great time to ask: Can we get rid of the whole tradition of People’s Sexiest Man Alive?”

“Think about the inherent ridiculousness of declaring anyone the sexiest person alive. Sexiness, by its very nature, is subjective. So it’s a winky joke that People offers up its own tastes as if they are everyone’s. And by making their subject male, they’re tacitly saying: See, we’re not objectifying women, we’re so evolved. Men can also be objects of lust. It may have been a comment that was made in the 1980s, when Playboy and other magazines imposed a misogynist ideal of sexiness. But now? Not so much.”

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/opinions/five-lessons-midterms-opinion-columns-galant/index.html

Five-lessons-midterms-opinion-columns-galant: Twitter and Queen Elizabeth II’s death

The new season of “The Crown” shows how the royal family went through turbulent times, including Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s divorce and a fire at Windsor Castle.

The details of the show’s storylines did not sit well with former UK Prime Minister John Major, who described the series as a ‘barrel-load of nonsense’. Dame Judi Dench warned that the series could blur the lines between historical accuracy and crude sensationalism as the nation mourns the death of Queen Elizabeth II.

Musk is going to have to do it alone, without the help of a journalist. She feels like she has had enough. “I deleted Twitter on the day Elon Musk became the platform’s new owner,” Jones wrote. After a dozen years of a relationship withTwitter that I admit brought some moments of joy, it was time to say goodbye and good riddance.

“That small act may not change much in the Twitter-verse of 237.8 million users. But for me, quitting Twitter was an act of power and self-care. I was setting boundaries in my life, so that I wouldn’t allow anything.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/opinions/five-lessons-midterms-opinion-columns-galant/index.html

Five Lessons in Midterms: What Happens if You Buy a Lottery? The Case Of Bill Carter and his Wife

Bill Carter and his wife don’t normally buy lottery tickets, “having long concluded that it felt like burning a $10 bill (sometimes a $20 bill) on a barbecue grill.”

But last week’s Powerball caught their attention as it soared toward a $2 billion jackpot – and they bought a few tickets. “How could we not? Think of what we could do with the money.

“Really: What would we do with all that money? After helping the kids, donating to charities, buying several homes, etc., what else? Build a ‘money bin’ and swim around in it like Scrooge McDuck? Unwise. Money can make you liquid, but it isn’t.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/opinions/five-lessons-midterms-opinion-columns-galant/index.html

The Origin Story of the Superman: Joe Biden, Helen Louise Cohen, and the Rise of the Senate: A Deep Look at the Legacy of Candidate Obama

The origin story of the Man of Steel is well known. In 1934, at the age of eighteen, Superman was created byJoseph and Jerome Shuster and classmates, Roy Schwartz noted. Siegel described in his unpublished memoir that newspapers rejected the first superhero because it was too positive for children to relate to.

As Schwartz wrote, it was possible that Helen Louise Cohen was a progenitor of Lois Lane, as she might have had a resemblance to Superman. She also sent letters with drawings of Cohen and sketches of Superman.

Ultimately, she broke it off, choosing instead to marry “a dashing officer, later awarded the Legion of Merit and eventually becoming a colonel in the Army’s 88th Infantry Division.” Shuster was too nearsighted to enlist in the military during World War II.

Cohen told her two sons that Shuster was too mild for her. But she kept his letters and sketches and now the family is sharing them with the world, Schwartz wrote.

Editor’s Note: David Axelrod, a senior CNN political commentator and host of “The Axe Files,” was a senior adviser to President Barack Obama and chief strategist for the 2008 and 2012 Obama presidential campaigns. The opinions he gives in this commentary are of his own. CNN has more opinion on it.

That politician was Joe Biden, who whispered that salty line (in fuller form) to then-President Barack Obama a dozen years ago at the signing of the Affordable Care Act, only to have it captured on a hot mic.

Biden would not be hurt if he shouted it from the rooftops of Cambodia, where he is attending an Asian summit, once he learned that the senator from Nevada was projected to win reelection.

It was the final turn in a week of amazing results for Democrats, who had scored unexpected victories in several races across the country.

Democrats will continue to control the agenda on the Senate floor and in committees, which is no small thing — particularly if Republicans take the House.

By allowing Trump, and not Obama, to fill the Supreme Court vacancy and speeding Barrett through in record time, McConnell and his Senate majority changed history.

What the Post-Principal Referendum from Winston Churchill, Rupert Murdoch, and the U.S. Senate During Biden’s World Series Had to Say

After losing his majority in the parliamentary elections in Britain in 1945, Prime Minister Winston Churchill was supposedly given assurances by his wife that they were a “blessing in disguise.”

But this year, the typical referendum on the ruling party and President became equally a judgment of the opposition and its putative leader, Trump. It was a condemnation of election denialism and coarseness.

That verdict was not lost on some Republican politicians who, out of fear and opportunism, have stuck with Trump despite knowing better. Watching their quick post-primary exodus from his camp, led by Rupert Murdoch and his right-wing media empire, has been something to behold. Losing can’t be condoned, but transgressions against democracy and decency can.

The verdict from Nevada came while Biden was overseas, meeting with his peers from around the world and poised for a sidebar meeting with China’s Xi Jinping.

The President might have been hobbled going into these discussions by a thumping in the midterms. It would have intensified growing doubts among our allies and adversaries about the durability of American democracy and about Biden’s political viability.

The people had their say and used it to deal a blow to Trump and Republicans who did not agree with them.

Exit mobile version