john berman here. i want to welcome our viewers in the united states and all around the world. it is 10:00 a.m. on the east coast, 7:00 in the west, and this is cnn's special live coverage of a nail-biter of a

presidential contest. no clear winner at this hour. so much up in the air. it's all coming down to a few key battleground states. right now joe biden has 224 electoral votes to the president's 213. and as the former vice president calls for patience and for every last vote to be counted, president trump is falsely claiming victory. he hasn't won, not at all, sowing doubt in legitimate vote-counting practices and he's lodged baseless claims of fraud. let's get straight to the numbers that tell the story of where we are. we will begin with a cnn key race alert. these are the states that tell the story this morning, starting with wisconsin. overnight joe biden took the lead there. he's now ahead by 20,000 votes with 97% in. 10 electoral votes up for grabs. not left to be counted. 20,000 might not seem like a lot

but it's what donald trump won by four years ago and more than what democrats won by in 2000 and 2004. in michigan with 16 electoral votes up for grabs, about an hour ago joe biden took the lead by about 9,000 votes. 90% of the vote in. 16 electoral votes up for grabs. the vote remaining, vote by mail, largely from urban population centers. both of those factors have skewed democratic. that's the story of the morning. pennsylvania, we're waiting there. 587,000 separates donald trump and joe biden, seemingly a comfortable lead, but with 76% of the vote in, the vote remaining from the key urban population centers, vote by mail, that can skew heavily democratic. there's enough to make up the difference for joe biden. can he pocket it all? we don't know yet. georgia, this hasn't moved in a while. we're waiting on votes to come in from georgia. president ahead by about 92,000

votes. the vote we're waiting on, urban population centers, vote by mail that skew democratic. that's why joe biden has a chances -- maybe a good chance -- still in georgia. other states we're watching closely, nevada, this is razor thin. joe biden 7,000-vote lead. too close for comfort. all of the election-day vote is in there. vote remaining, vote by mail, clark county, both of which skew democratic. again, much closer than the biden wants. north carolin north carolina, 15,000 still up for grabs. we're watching that vote still. and arizona, he's afraid by 93,000 votes. that actually shrunk. it was more a few minutes ago. he's ahead with 87% in, 11 electoral votes. if joe biden hangs on there, it changes the electoral college map in the entire country.

this is the overall picture, former vice president joe biden with 224 electoral votes, donald trump with 213, but it's the states remaining that will tell the rest of the story. let's dig deeper now. let's walk over to the magic wall, our phil mattingly is there. phil, what are you watching? >> look, there's no question the story of the morning has been the inverse of what we saw last night, states that reported vote-by-mail early looked good democratically and then later reverted strong republican. now the inverse, with states particularly pennsylvania into the midwest, where vote by mail was counted after the election day vote have started out-read and moved and shifted progressively to the democratic side. let's start with the state of pennsylvania. as things currentlip stadd, 76% reporting, and as john laid out, stand lead for donald trump, 587,000 votes. but it's where that vote outstanding is and what it's comprised of that gives the biden campaign some sense of

optimism. i want to be very clear. this is a lot of ground to make up. it's a lot of ground to make up. why there's a possibility here, why there's a pathway here, there's somewhere over 1 million absentee ballots outstanding vote by mail. why that matters, where they come from and how they're brought about. vote by mail has skewed heavily democratic. we've seen it repeatedly over the course of the last several hours, as wisconsin went is from red to blue as vote by mail came in, in big democratic counties. same thing in michigan. will pennsylvania be the same? well will have to see. where is there outstanding vote right now? let's start with philadelphia. largest county in the entire state, 12% of the population here. look at this right now only 56% reporting. that means there's a lot of vote to come in here, jong. you look at the margin as well. what was the margin back in 2016, hillary clinton did better. democrats expect that margin to expand, they expect that turnout to go up. there's vote here and it will be significant. will it be 500,000 significant?

probably not one county but you push out in southeastern pennsylvania, montgomery starting to come in more, we saw the margin grow here. move over to bucks, swing county, only 55% reported. democrats may lose bucks. but they aren't going to lose it like thatill lose it like that as it currently stands. point being they look in southwestern pennsylvania, allegheny county, a lot of outstanding vote in strongholds. the biggest question, there are a lot of counties donald trump is winning handily that also have standing votes out. and he blew this once again putting a huge margin on the board. but what we saw in wisconsin and what we saw in michigan, even in republican counties and republican strongholds, the outstanding vote was vote by mail, and even though it was in republican strongholds, still skewed democratic. it didn't flip the county by any

means but it did close margins and it did give votes to the bottom line of the biden campaign. i don't know if that happens in pennsylvania. we do not know the answer to that or if joe biden can close this gap. we know biden has a lot of vote outstanding in southeast pennsylvania and allegheny county and based on what's happened in other states, perhaps they have vote in republican counties as well. >> let's talk about that. that's why democrats have not given up on pennsylvania because of what happened in wisconsin and what is happening before our eyes in michigan. let's take a look at michigan if we can to get the latest update. hasn't changed very much. former vice president joe biden ahead by about 10,000. >> by about 10,000 votes. and they're up, they're up. sound familiar? 2016, donald trump won this state by just shy of 11,000 votes. let me tell you why democrats over the course of the night and morning, keep forget that, have become more confident in where this stands. about three hours ago joe biden was losing michigan by about 220,000 votes. we've seen that progressively be

eaten away at and flipped over the course of the last hour or so. why? same thing we're reporting in pennsylvania, major outstanding vote. that vote came from vote by mail. major place it's came from, huge democratic counties where turnout is large and still outstanding at this moment, even with 90-plus percent in, wayne county still has 30% outstanding. look at this margin, 67/31 but more importantly, look at the top line, 447,000 votes with 37% outstanding, there's significant democratic vote via absentee and vote by mail, which has continuously skewed democratic, that will come in here. that margin, that margin of 9,000 is almost certain to grow bigger. the question for the trump campaign is, what are the outstanding counties? how can we match up with wayne kounk, the kind of behemoth in the state. we have red counties. donald trump won this narrowly, western part of the state, more

conservative bet. 2020, bigger margin. bigger margin, which is kind of a surprise. 2018 governors race and some of the midterms, this is one of the counties that started to push towards democrats. however, what's the outstanding vote? 83%. where is that outstanding vote coming from? according to secretary of state mostly via absentee ballots and grand rapids. even though it is in a republican county, it looks like based on pass precedent and based on what we have seen over the portion of the night, a lars percent would be democratic as well. we watched it play out in wisconsin, watched it play out in the state of michigan and watching it start to play out in pennsylvania. where it ends up, we certainly don't know yet but it's led joe biden to lead michigan and wisconsin. >> let's go to arizona now. that totally changed over the last few minutes and i don't know why. it would have been 130,000 vote margin and now 93,000 vote

margin. why? >> if it's getting chopped into it's from maricopa or yuma as well. looks like yuma. the biggest question for arizona, the trump campaign made very clear they were furious when other outlets -- we have not called arizona yet -- because of the outstanding vote. right now 86% and joe biden just shy of 100,000 votes. biden campaign and democrats point here, maricopa county, the largest county in the state, 60% of the population, a county shifting towards democrats, finally took the turn 2018 senatorial race. biden with a comfortable margin. if you're winning fmaricopa by five points, pretty good chance you will win on past precedent. the big question can president trump win with what is outstanding, 14% or so? here's the problem with that, my understanding is that area is mail and skews democratic.

but maricopa is a little different how they do things. but the question, can he roll up any vote to cut into 100,000? it's a republican county here. can you start picking up vote with what's remaining? move over, 95%, not a lot to pick up there. maybe, maybe. >> right. >> i think the point is this hasn't been called and that means donald trump has pathways, the pathways largely involve closing the gap in maricopa and pick up in other red counties. can that happen? it's up in the air. we have not called the race yet. we will have to see. >> and back to georgia, a lot of pepper looking at, president ahead by 103,000 votes. this has been fraustratingly static the past several hours. we've seen changes in wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania. they have not loaded more vote yet. what's missing? >> let's go to what's outstanding and it will look familiar.

largely blue and largely strongholds. the key for democrats in this state, if it's democrats stacey abrams, who fell just short blownout turnout in the atlanta metro areas. what's outstanding now? let's start with fulton and bring it out. 95% reporting, fulton coming in handily as they started to count. interesting a little bit. but you look at the margins, doing better than hillary clinton. here's the big one democrats want to pay attention to, dekalb county, fourth largest county in the state, you look at the numbers trailing by 100,000 and there's 20% outstanding and your expectations are this margin will hold or grow, that is a place of growth for you. also though, you look at these outstanding votes right now, richmond county, home of augusta, look at the margins. not huge. you're not going to count 100,000 votes here. pick up 10 or 15 maybe. go down to savannah. same story, not huge, 4,000,

5,000 votes. bottom line, is there a pathway? we don't know. we know there's enough vote outstanding and a lot of that vote comes from democratic strongholds, will that be enough to overcome 300,000? democrats feel like they have a chance here. republicans feel like georgia went better than maybe they thought it was going to at least originally. >> they were actually worried. >> genuinely worried. bewill see how it turns out when those democratic stronghold counties start to come in. >> i want to look at this now on the terms if it were to end like things stand now, who would win? that's not the case. let's stipulate there are still many votes to be counted. given where things stand now, who would be winning? >> as someone standing here the last eight hours, i can tell you things will shift. things will shift but the shifting started to narrow, opportunities for shifts, i guess, started to narrow. everything you see filled in has been called. blue it's biden, red it's called for president trump. right now biden is 224 electoral

votes. president trump 213. we can go ahead and stipulate that, say, president trump wins alaska. we will give him that. we give him north carolina as well. he's got a pretty solid lead there. republicans feel good about things. we will give vice president biden maine and we will give him maine too. there we go. where does that lead us? vice president biden is leading in arizona. again, we're not calling these races, we are playing out scenarios and pathways. we talked about nevada, very close. way too close for democratic comfort. but you laid out the dynamics of how that race is working. for the sake of doing this, we will give vice president biden nevada. look what's left, state of georgia, state of pennsylvania, state of michigan, state of wisconsin. where does joe biden lead now? joe biden leads wisconsin. joe biden leads in michigan. where does that put joe biden? >> 271 electoral votes. >> joe biden 271 electoral votes. >> and in the white house. >> and in the white house.

again, this is not done. this is a pathway. if you're the trump campaign, you're keeping a very close eye on nevada. you flip nevada, that changes the dynamics of everything. you hope there's something in maricopa. you're saying michigan, we will see what happens with wayne. 9,000 votes isn't a whole lot. wisconsin, 22,000 votes, not a whole lot. and the legendary wisconsin reporter was saying this would be the third closest race. >> yes, not even the closest. >> and we have not even factored in pennsylvania yet. >> the important thing for biden if you're looking for paths, they can get to 271 without pennsylvania and without georgia, which is why they're watching this so close as the margins are so narrow. nevada and arizona will be counting up to the day. it will be shocking to get a call today. we just don't know. votes are still coming in. nevada, i should note, and you can click on nevada if you want, this margin is like 7,000 votes at this point. nevada, all of the election-day

votes have been counted, all of it. all that's outstanding is vote by mail, largely in clark county, which has tended to skew democratic, vote-by-mail itself tends to skew democratic. harry reid once won a race by less than 500 votes. it can be close. joe biden is hoping this will grow but it's much closer than they want. >> and the trump team was telling everybody who would listen, nevada is in play. and everybody in the analysis map kept giving it to joe biden in large part because of harry reid's organization. they changed it into a place democrats thought they had unlocked based on early voting turnout. clark county, 10, 11-point margin, ball game. biden had an 11-point margin by the night. by this morning, he no longer had the margin. you lay the key economic of largely vote by mail, and how

that outcome turns out. it's skewed democratic throughout the course of the morning. we will see if it does if it comes in. if you're the trump campaign, you're hoping and praying it does not because if it does not and you have a shot at nevada, you change everything in the math we just laid out. as it currently stands, the biden campaign probably in a better position based on everything we've been looking at over the course of the last 12 hours when it comes to nevada. but we have to wait and see. >> every state right now changes everything for both candidates at this point. >> good point. >> we have six floridas and ohios at this moment we're watching closely that could be decisive. we just don't know at this point. i will let you go back to counting, phil, because we want the latest as it comes in in the meantime, let's go to jessica dean, who's following the biden campaign in wilmington, delaware. i understand they're giving an update now? >> yes, they are actually doing a briefing right now that they're streaming, with the

campaign manager and one of the senior advisers, john. we're hearing a lot of optimism, a lot of confidence from the biden campaign this morning as these votes continue to be counted. one top adviser telling cnn they expect to win today. we're also told by a biden official that this race is moving to a conclusion and they believe it is moving to a conclusion in biden's favor. so let's break down why they are saying that, why they think that's where this race is going. they believe they will win wisconsin. they really like the vote-by-mail situation in michigan. they feel confident there. they believe they will win pennsylvania, nevada. so they're putting these things together and on this briefing right now, they are going through much like what phil and john just did there, going through county by county, what's outstanding. i spoke to an aide this morning based on what is still out there and what has been reported if they feel like they're on the right track, that this is going

in the right direction for them. they also have an eye on georgia. they're looking and keeping a close eye on fulton county in georgia as those returns continue to come in. the biden campaign still urging patience as joe biden has all along and said last night, urging patience but they deeply believe that this is all going to come to an end and when it does, joe biden will have the 270 electoral votes needed to go to the white house, john. >> jessica, please keep us posted in wilmington, delaware. let's go right to the white house and get the trump campaign side of things. jeremy diamond is there. what is the campaign or spoiz the white house, and frankly there's no difference, because they're running the campaign maybe in violation of the hatch act, out of the white house, but what are they saying jeremy? >> the campaign just had a hastily called report and did

not take questions. but they're projecting confident? their map to victory. specifically bill stepien said we look at the numbers and we're confident in our pathway, we're confident in our math. what they're confident in, john, in some of the remaining states, they said cnn has yet to call, they believe there are more votes that remain than have been estimated in the state of arizona, and that will ultimately help them narrowly edge out joe biden there. they also are expressing confidence in a victory in nevada, which is much closer, of course, than what we were expecting and they're also projecting confidence in pennsylvania but as it relates to pennsylvania, they were using some very specific wording. and that is if all legally cast ballots are counted, they will win. if illegally cast ballots are counted, they're not so sure they will win. what that comes down to, john, the president's complaints and campaign's complaints about the supreme court decision as it relates to pennsylvania and a team as it relates to counting

ballot that's were postmarked before election day and arrive after election day. those are still, unless the supreme court reverses itself, those are legally cast ballots and we do expect those to be counted in pennsylvania, which suggests perhaps the president will lose pennsylvania if indeed those votes are allowed to be counted. but, again, it is notable to see this campaign expressing this kind of confidence. obviously they're trying to counter what we are hearing from the biden campaign and the fact the momentum appears to be shifting in joe biden's direction but that is what they are saying as of now, john, projecting confidence in the math and confidence in the pathway to victory. >> we have no ideas how many votes will come in pennsylvania legally today and tomorrow and the next day because they're not in yet. so we just don't know how much of a factor they will play, if at all, but the trump campaign clearly already trying to game it out and besmirch the whole notion of it, even though they

are legal, so says the pennsylvania supreme court. jeremy diamond, thank you very much. while these votes continue to come in, i want to bring in cnn senior political kmep tater david aaxelrod and abby phillip. i watched both of you on tv last night. you were phenomenal. little different story as we wake up this morning then maybe you went to bed, if you went to bed. david axelrod, 30,000-foot view, what are you seeing? >> first of all, it's a different story but not a surprising story, it's the story we anticipated. because of the way people voted in this election, it was always going to be the case that these mail-in ballots because of the refusal of legislatures in these states to let them be processed earlier would be processed after the election and that they were going to skew heavily in favor of biden because more democrats voted by mail than republicans. the president of the use knew that when he spoke last night. he knew that about pennsylvania.

he knew that before michigan. he knew that about wisconsin. and he knew that when these votes came in overnight, that it would likely change the picture there, and it did. what we learned is that these battleground states are battleground states for a reason, they're close. ultimately, they may tip in joe biden's favor. looks favorable for him in wisconsin and michigan. now in pennsylvania it looks very much up in the air. but they are going to be close races and they will tell the story. >> abby philip, it's interesting hearing from both the trump and biden campaigns this morning. i covered george w. bush in 2000. i lived through the recount and have the scars to show it. one of the things that was learned there, you've got to be aggressive out of the gate. you've got to come out. not do what the president is and stop the count and declare victory but you have to declare optimism and be aggressive. which is why i think we heard formally from both campaigns

before 10:30 a.m. the next day. >> yes, there's a reason the trump campaign called their briefing literally for five minutes before the democrats were holding their briefing. everyone wants to control the narrative this morning. but that being said, the reality is the votes need to be counted, and we need to see what the votes say. it does not matter what narrative either campaign wants to draw this morning. we need to see what the votes actually say. i cannot emphasize that enough. but what i will say this morning based on what the trump campaign is already signaling they are going to two, they're talking about recounts in wisconsin. they're saying these races are so tight that they might challenge it. look, joe biden right now as we're speaking here last i checked, he had a lead in wisconsin of about 20,000 votes. four years ago donald trump won the state of wisconsin by about 22,000 votes.

i say ulf thall of that to say, similar story in michigan, i say all of that to say president trump won the presidency on very, very narrow margins. we could also see very, very narrow margins in this race as well. we could not see very narrow margins. but my point is you can't be talking about recounts as we sit here and as we stand here because it is just too early. votes have not been counted. and that's all about it and we need to see what the votes actually see. >> and can i just say, abby was all over this last night. this is also not a surprise because the president has been signaling this for months. he understood what his political situation was, and it was very clear that he was going to -- that he was going to challenge these results on this basis. he was setting up the predicate for it. i think there are two reasons. one is, yeah, he thinks this is the only way he can win. but the second reason is, i

think if he loses this election ultimately, there are only two options for donald trump, either he wins or it was stolen. there's never a third option, which is that he lost. being a loser is just an unacceptable outcome for this president. so they're going to kick up as much dust as they possibly can regardless of where these numbers land. >> and we don't know where they're going to land. it's truly an extraordinary thing we're witnessing this morning, the swings over the last 12 hours have been remarkable. there may be more to come. abby philip, david axelrod, stand by. we are waiting to hear from pennsylvania officials, including the governor there. we'll get an update from a state where they're still counting, still hasn't been decided. our special live coverage continues after this. my psoriatic arthritis pain?

i had enough! it's not getting in my way. joint pain, swelling, tenderness...much better. my psoriasis, clearer... cosentyx works on all of this. four years and counting. so watch out. i got this! watch me. real people with active psoriatic arthritis look and feel better with cosentyx. cosentyx works fast for results that can last. it treats the multiple symptoms of psoriatic arthritis, like joint pain and tenderness, back pain, and helps stop further joint damage. don't use if you're allergic to cosentyx. before starting, get checked for tuberculosis. an increased risk of infections and lowered ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor about an infection or symptoms, if your inflammatory bowel disease symptoms develop or worsen, or if you've had a vaccine, or plan to. serious allergic reactions may occur. i just look and feel better. i got real relief with cosentyx.

watch me! feel real relief. ask your rheumatologist about cosentyx. to give you the protein you need with less of the sugar you don't. [grunting noise] i'll take that. woohoo! 30 grams of protein and 1 gram of sugar. ensure max protein. with nutrients to support immune health. it's velveeta versus the other guys. clearly, nothing melts like velveeta. ♪

i had this hundred thousand dollar student debt. two hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars in debt. ah, sofi literally changed my life. it was the easiest application process. sofi made it so there's no tradeoff between my dreams and paying student loans. student loans don't have to take over for the rest of your life. thank you for allowing me to get my money right. ♪ with priceline, you can get up to 60% off amazing hotels. and when you get a big deal... ...you feel like a big deal.

♪ priceline. every trip is a big deal. ♪ you can go your own way ♪ ♪ go your own way your wireless. your rules. only xfinity mobile lets you choose shared data, unlimited or a mix of each. and switch anytime so you only pay for the data you need. switch and save hundreds on your wireless bill. plus, get $300 off when you buy the samsung galaxy note20 ultra 5g. learn more at your local xfinity store today.

welcome back. this is cnn's special live coverage. 10:31 a.m. on the east coast. why am i giving you the time? if you managed to sleep last night, things changed. you may have gone to bed thinking this election was headed one way and then you woke up and saw things were different and maybe trending, trending increasingly in another direction. joe mattingly at the magic wall.

you have a neat tool to show there. >> look, this is the map right now. we have been talking about this the last several hours, shifted in the last several hours. but what happened beforehand? if you spoke to big trump supporters, went to bed happy. big biden supporters, not super happy. let's track through this and walk through how things changed. this is 1:00 a.m. in the morning, look at nevada, wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania. just keep pennsylvania right here. all of a sudden nevada flips and wisconsin starts to flip. sorry, this is 5:00 a.m. one more. michigan as well. i will take all of these off and i want to watch it again. the progression throughout the night as we're live on television talking about this as it happened, as things looked very, very good for the trump campaign, particularly in the midwest, pennsylvania into the midwest, nevada as well. we're waiting for votes to come in. 1:00 a.m., 2:00 a.m., 9:05 a.m.

you just watched it. we talked about the progression over the last several hours, progress in wisconsin and michigan and may be happening in pennsylvania. >> there's a reason for it. explain. >> the best way to do this, and let me turn this off for a second, open the state of ohio. i think this is the best demonstration. a lot of people who were paying attention early in the night were looking at ohio and turnout in ohio and suburbs of ohio. donald trump looked like he took it off the swing state map. i'm in ohio. i'm stunned by the margin in the state of ohio. early in the night as the early vote was counted and released by ohio, it looked like this had a chance to turn blue, or at least narrow, tremendously. >> same thing as last time. >> happened in north carolina as well to some degree. little bit in georgia and florida. basically it was kind of vote you were counting when dictated

what this was going to look like. that's ohio. we've seen the inverse over the course of the last several hours with these states, with wisconsin, with michigan. right now pennsylvania's still red but starting to shift as well. why is that? they counted election day vote first, in-person vote first. that throughout the course of the night, throughout the course of the country east to west skewed heavily republican. and that is by design. president trump worked on that in person, blew out their in-person goals almost throughout the country. what was left? opposite of what was happening in ohio, early vote. how did early vote skew? very heavily democratic. where did it come from? largely urban population centers and suburbs, democratic strongholds. these two states and we're still watching pennsylvania, a couple hours ago pennsylvania with 630,000 votes. 550,000 is still a huge mountain to climb for joe biden. >> but it's 80,000 less.

>> and it happened in the course of an hour. why? mail-in ballots are coming in, more than a million mail-in ballots from southeastern pennsylvania, democratic stronghold, allegheny county, democratic stronghold. that's the progression. sometimes it looked red and flipped blue, sometimes vice versa. nothing is wrong or different. it is when things are being counted. >> the governor of pennsylvania briefing now. let's listen. >> we still have work to do. i want to start by saying thank you to all of the staff, volunteers who worked so hard to count those votes and are still working hard to count them. you know, the promise of democracy is that every vote counts and that has been the promise of democracy since 1787 and it's still the promise of democracy. and i intend here in pennsylvania to make sure we keep that promise. as i said, counties continue to report results and, again, these

results are coming in more slowly than they have in the past. so we have to be patient. but confident these votes are going to be counted. they're going to be counted accurately. and they will be counted fully. the delay we are seeing is the sign the system is working. this is a new system. we went intoee infect wi effect last year. and there are 3 million, millions of mail-in ballots being counted. that takes longer than the way we used to do it with the stand-in, in-person voting. we may not know the results even today but the most important thing is we have accurate results. ment again, even if that takes a little longer than we're used to. make no mistake, our democracy is being tested in this election. this was a stress test of the ideals upon which this country was founded and the basic rule of one person, one vote, that

still carries and has to carry here. our democracy with stood challenges before and for over 200 years we've upheld and strengthened our commitment to basic fairness and due process. i have full faith that we will similarly meet this moment, and i will do everything within my power to ensure the results are fair and that every vote is counted. pennsylvania will have a fair election, and that election will be free of outside influences. i will vigorously, and we all will vigorously defend against any attempt to attack that vote in pennsylvania. and every pennsylvanian, every pennsylvanian can have confidence in the outcome of this election due to the diligence, the county election officials and hard work of secretary boockvar and her folks at the department of state. thank you, again, to all pennsylvanians who voted.

rest assure your vote will count and hasn't already been counted. your vote will make a difference in this election. this is the way we elect our officials. this is the way we hire the people who are public servants. it's the promise we give to all pennsylvanians, all americans their vote counts and i intend to keep that promise in pennsylvania. now i'm broproud to turn this o to secretary of state kathy boockvar. >> good morning. i want to echo some of what governor wolf said about once again thanking all of the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of election workers that were and are still involved in the process of enabling this great democracy in pennsylvania and across the nation.

the work that they have done and continue to do is just tremendous. still, we've been talking, department of state folks were at the operations center, i don't know, 4:30 in the morning, went to take a shower and we're back within a couple of hours of that. so had been working around the clock, as are many of the counties. and we've been talking about yesterday again and how incredibly smooth, it's one of the smoothest, least issues elections, presidential elections than i have seen in any time that i could possibly remember. and i have been in and around elections for a long time as a voting rights lawyer and poll worker. this was incredibly smooth, and that's a huge credit to all of the election workers both at the state level and local level as well as our state partners like

pima and department of homeland security, who made sure all of those things people were worried about, whether it was voter intimidation or issues at the polls really could not have gone more smoothly in the middle of a global pandemic with all of the voting, reform changes we saw from act 77 and act 12. so that's huge kudos to everybody involved. also, we're exactly where we said we would be. we said it would take some time to count the mail-in ballots and we're approaching 50% of the mail-in ballots counted, which is great. as you know, you can go to our election night returns website and the supplemental dashboard to get the greater details on that. but there are still millions of ballots left to be counted. so the counties are working incredibly hard. you're going to see a lot of updates in the next couple of hours and throughout the day. we've been -- there were a

number of counties that made major additions in the wee hours of morning. if you checked kind of early on this morning, you may want to check again because there's already been more ballots accounted for on our dashboard. again, this is a process. we've got somewhere -- i don't know what the totals will end up at but somewhere between 2.5 million and 3 million ballots. as i said many times, we've had 260,000 ballots cast by mail in 2016. so we will be at ten times the number of mail ballots and the counties are already approaching 50% done. so i urge everybody to remain patient as governor wolf said, we're going to accurately count every single ballot. the vote count, as i said many times, is never done on the day of election night. and the counties are doing this

accurately and then accurately as quickly as they possibly can. again, i'll also remind everyone, military and overseas ballots are not due until a week after election day. so next tuesday is the deadline for military and overseas voters to cast their ballots and we want to make sure not even every civilian absentee mail-in ballot is counted but every man and women serving our country, that their votes are counted. so thank you and we're happy to take questions. should i stay? >> i'm sure you want to talk to kathy. any questions. dennis? >> can you tell us where we stand right now and what you know of challenges, legal challenges from the trump administration and how you're preparing to deal with those? >> so i think, you know, basically what you know that's been publicly reported, that's really all we have at this

point. and i can't talk about active litigation unfortunately. so as things are filed, of course, they will be publicly physical. >> do you have attorneys to handle that? or are you bringing in somebody from the outside? what would that be? >> we have a mix. what we have been doing all along with the litigation that's been flying this year, we have a mix of inside and outside counsel. >> plus the attorney general. >> plus the attorney general is also representing us in a number of these things. it's been a great team. the attorneys, i will give a shout out to the legal team in the department of state, who have been really put to work this year and they are amazing. tim and cat and team, thank you. we also have tremendous teams of outside counsel who have been involved in all of this. as the governor said, we will make sure every vote is counted, every eligible voter has the right to cast their vote. >> how many counties are

handling ballots that are coming in tuesday, thursday, friday? how are they handling that? does each county set them aside? >> you can go online to see our guidance and last night we gave more technical guidance to the counties, which we can forward to you. it basically lays out the process. you're talking about late-arriving ballots? everything will be segregated. i'm not sure if you were here yesterday. all of those ballots will be segregated but they will be counted and counties have been given detailed instructions, which, again, you can find in those guidances to walk them through how to segregate those races, those ballots. >> can you talk about the order in which those things will be counted? is that a county-by-county decision? can we expect to see those numbers already reflected or something they would get to later in the process? >> basically, it's going to depend. there are some counties already done counting mail-in ballots

received before 8:00 p.m. but they won't be inter mingled on the website as you see it now. they will be segregated. but it will vary county to county when they start because they're working on the other ones first. >> will the county be reflected on the website too? i'm unclear on that. >> stay tuned on that. >> those on segregated ballots, there were 5000,000 ballots issued that have not been cast -- >> i'm sorry, can you repeat the question. >> there were 500,000 mail ballots issued that had not been cast as of yesterday. is there a way for the state to determine how many of those 500,000 people chose to vote in person instead, or do we need to operate under the assumption all 500,000 could come in before friday? >> all of that will be trackable but i don't -- we won't have it today. basically between provisional blots and the poll books and, of course, mail-in ballots, you know, as you all know, like only

one vote can be counted for any voter. so you'll be able to see all of that. but it will take some time for that data to be quantified. yes, sir? >> last night i believe your comment was we didn't know how many mail-in ballots arrived yesterday. do we know yet how many ballots arrived yesterday? what is the number of mail-in ballots? >> i don't have that with me this morning but check on the dashboard, and that will be updated throughout the day. yes, sorry. jan? >> the ballots that arrived yesterday that can still be counted may not have a legible postmark on them and raising questions about whether or not they should be counted or not, and they said it was the prepaid envelopes the state provided. i'm wondering if you could speak to that. >> i'm not sure, anything

arrived yesterday, doesn't matter if it's post marked or not. anything that arrived yesterday is valid. that's what pennsylvania's law always been. you're talking about late-arriving ballots. the way we did prepaid postage in peps, we went to the counties where they are. if they wanted it to be through their pennsylvania reply mail, usps permit, we did it that way. if they wanted us to reimburse them for stamps or metered postage, we did it the way they want. some of them -- i don't remember how many -- how many counties are using business reply mail but those are still postmarked. they have timing marks, they're date stamped and still trackable by date. it's a finy traction of any of those things, whether it's business reply mail or regular mail. we've all had that situation where you get a letter that's not postmarked, it's rare. same for business reply mail. they do a timing mark.

so it's not accurate. they're all stamped. >> if there is one of those rare occasions, would it be counted? >> under the current supreme court decision, which is currently the law, yes. as long as there's no affirmative evidence it was postmarked after november 3rd, as long as it's received by december 6th at 5:00 p.m., it will be counted, yes. >> it's my understanding the state's website is showing 18 counties with 0% maril-in ballos counted. is that accurate? >> what i suggest, sometimes counties are uploading on their own websites and haven't transmitted the file to the department of state. they have their own local races. pt i urge you, if you see any -- and this is what we will be doing throughout the day, go to the county website. you should always do that. it's a great way to double-check but we're going to be following up with those counties to say hey, make sure you get us the

files. some of them this year because we had for the first time a website that would itemize the mail-in ballots from the in-person ballots from the provisional, some of the counties when they uploaded the results, it merged the two types into one. and that was just they formatted it wrong. so we're working through that to make sure the actual attribution of those ballots are right. >> did you notice a larger-than-expected number of counties reported -- >> it doesn't mean they haven't counted. it just means they have not uploaded to the department of state website yet. so just double-check their websites. >> if i heard you correctly during your introductory remarks, it was between 2.5 million and 3 million mail-in ballots. if you can speak with as much specificity as possible regarding that, that would be helpful. >> i think the numbers i gave yesterday, it was just under 2.6

million as i recall. again, i'm not sure what has actually come in. as of yesterday at some point, it was just under 2.6 million that had been cast. and that's when i think i said there was 83 -- >> okay, you have been listening to, first, the governor there of pennsylvania, tom wolf, and now secretary of state kathy boockvar decide where they are in terms of their counting. it is ongoing. there are many votes left to be counted. more than a million she was just saying. we want to bring in now david axelrod, abby phillip, election law analyst rick pill gus. i was just doing a little back of the envelope math. maybe you can help check mine. that's right, back of the envelope. 1 million-plus votes still to be counted. trump is ahead of biden by 543,000. biden has been getting about 70%

of the mail-in ballots. so biden still has a good chance in pennsylvania? >> well, yeah, i think everybody recognizes that and that's why, you know, the trump campaign has been so active in trying to question some of the ballots and how some of the ballots are being handled because they know that these numbers may not pencil out for them. yeah, pennsylvania is very much in play this morning. >> so, rick, just to add to that, just because what we should really parse carefully what we are hearing from both of the campaigns. what the trump campaign is saying about pennsylvania is they think that out of those outstanding votes, the margins are going to be tighter for donald trump. they're not saying necessarily that they think if things remain the way that they are, that they

can maintain their lead. so they're hoping the margins narrow. but if they don't, i think you're right and david is right, this is why the biden campaign is more confident that they will pull out in pennsylvania. it's also why for the trump campaign arizona becomes so critically important. they need it if they're going to lose pennsylvania to keep their hope alive. >> alisyn, let me just respond to something abby said. they had a press briefing this morning and they insisted that they will win arizona and nevada, and they had to do that because if you concede arizona and nevada, which i think will clarify themselves in the next many hours, then pennsylvania becomes irrelevant. as important as it is with its 20 electoral votes, it becomes irrelevant because it's clear michigan and wisconsin are drifting in the other direction. i think they are trying to hold their place and tell everyone

this is still doable and they're insisting on that. we'll see when the cards are turned over in vegas and elsewhere later today. >> in the meantime, rick, you're already seeing legal challenges cropping up in pennsylvania? >> yes, there are already at least three lawsuits in pennsylvania. one has gotten a lot of attention because it's been pending for quite a while now. and that's the one that went to the supreme court once already, which is this three-day extension for the receipt deadline for the absentees which the pennsylvania supreme court order we will have to see how many ballots come in that three-day window. could they affect the outcome if the margin is so tight in pennsylvania? that case is absolutely going back to the supreme court if that margin is close enough to possibly make a difference. the court had a chance to stop that and declined to do it both

times. it didn't issue a state. voters in pennsylvania have reason to believe it's valid for them to task those ballots and return them in the three-day window after election day but that obviously is a big issue. the second thing is there are big inefficiencies about how some of the states are handling some of these absentee ballots. the secretary of state issued unclear guidance in my view. that opens up further challenges. there are challenges like that in the court. i don't know if they will affect as many ballots potentially as the ballots that come in that three-day window. i have to say, pennsylvania has done an incredibly sloppy job in this election. it's been clear for a long time the massive failure of political leadership in that state on both democratic governor's side and republican legislature's side and the country is now put in this position where we have 50% of the absentee ballots still to count in pennsylvania. we do have to wait. we have to be patient. but we shouldn't be here in the

first place. >> we're just getting a report that the biden campaign says joe biden will address americans today. ax, what do you think he should say? >> i think you're going to hear people talk about where the state of play is, and i'm sure a very strong rebuke of the president for what he did last night. essentially claiming victory knowing that these numbers were going to turn, claiming victory and alleging that anything that changes the result would be fraud. and declaring that he wanted to stop the voting, as he said, as if we are in some authoritarian state. i think biden, he's probably going to reassure the country the process is going forward, we're going to have an answer and that he expects that answer is going to be him. >> guys, stick around. we're going to need your

analysis throughout the day. really appreciate talking to you. more votes are coming in as we speak. stand by for cnn's special live coverage. (coughing) hi susan! honey? yeah? i respect that. but that cough looks pretty bad... try this new robitussin honey severe. the real honey you love... plus, the powerful cough relief you need. mind if i root through your trash? new robitussin honey severe. strong relief for your severe symptoms.

all eyes on michigan as joe biden moved into the lead and we wait to hear shortly from officials in that state. i'm anderson cooper. this as election day in america continues. michigan and wisconsin. you see vice president biden on the top states have been turning bluer all morning. more votes still to be counted. arizona, nevada still in flux but biden holds the lead in those states too right now as well. georgia, surprisingly close. erin burnett is with us as well. erin? >> amazing how close it is, and here we are. we will dig into the numbers.

the shift, change in count and talk to the officials in these closest states to try to see when we're going to know. >> yes, we all need to take a deep breath and wait for the votes to be counted but there's a lot to discuss in the hours ahead. we have reporters standing by with the two campaigns weighing in on their path to victory. a lot to bring you. thank you very much for joining us. it will be a long and exciting day. let's start with john king and big picture, drill down maybe on wisconsin and michigan as well. everything has been shifting just throughout this morning. if you went to sleep last night thinking you knew the way this thing was going, you had a surprise this morning. so, john, for those who stayed up late and are just now tuning back in, big picture, where are we? what happened since last night? >> the most important point, anderson, is the point you just made so before i get to the map, i want to reinforce it, patience, patience, patience. both campaigns want to be patient today. joe biden is leading in those states and the biden campaign said keep counting wisconsin,

michigan and pennsylvania. they have every right to ask that. let's start there. if you went to bed around 3:00 a.m., wisconsin was red then. donald trump was leading. michigan was red then. donald trump was leading. you see the map now, it does look very different. here's what i'm going to do, i will tap away. you see the states going gray. the ones that are gray, we have not called them yet. we have the leads. we have not called nevada, arizona, wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, maine, north carolina or georgia. now i will take that off and you see who is leading. leading is not winning. leading means we're still counting votes. i left here about 4:00 in the morning. this was still red. now it is blue. very narrowly blue, which is why we will continue to count. joe biden on top of wisconsin. 49.4% to 48.8%. at the moment they're continuing to count. they will continue to count. very close. as they continue to count, we know what's happening, lawyers are getting involved. and most of that is fine.

you want eyes on everything that's happening. where does it go from there? michigan, 94,000 votes. remember, president trump won this state by 10,000 votes. nail-biter in michigan seems to be a trade mamark of the trump presidency. about 90% of the vote in but, again, they still have to count votes. one of the places they're still waiting, wayne county. this is detroit, area around detroit is heavily democratic. you see 70%. so if you're in the biden campaign you think largest county in the state, predominantly democratic, we think we will add votes but let the process play out today. and now over to the commonwealth of pennsylvania, still red 3:00, 4:00, still red this morning. when i left last night it was around 660,000 i think so it's a little smaller for donald trump. 78% in. but secretary of state of pennsylvania just moments ago saying they still have a lot of votes to count, asking for patience, but she did say she expects progress throughout the day. let's pull it out. i will walk over here, this is

the context that matters. 270 electoral votes to be the next president of the united states. where are we now? joe biden 224, president 213. changes overnight, this is one of the reasons they matter and this is why the trump campaign says we believe nevada and arizona can turn. there's a reason they're saying that. they cannot concede those states because they need them. if joe biden keeps his lead here and keeps his lead here, keeps his lead here, keeps his lead here, them you get 267. 267, we have not called maine yet. if joe biden can win maine, even if he les the second congressional district to the president, even if he lost the second congressional district, which is quite possible, joe biden could win the presidency with michigan, wisconsin, arizona, nevada, 2-3 in maine. he wouldn't even need pennsylvania, north carolina or georgia. that's the reason the trump campaign says we're not done out here, anderson. we're going to count throughout

the day. both men have the chance to be the next president of the out. patience will be required. we have people watching. the campaigns have people watching. when you hear stop, it's a fraud, stop counting. it's simply wrong. let's count votes. >> what is the situation in nevada right now for both candidates? >> let me come back over here so we can do that. sorry for the choreography issues here. let's bring this up over here. nevada 7,647 votes. you see state after state, we have close elections. many vegas, 72%, 73%, sometimes higher depending on turnout, but 7-10 votes coming out of here. again, 84%. we will have more votes. many 53% to 45% if you round it up. odds are everything we've seen in clark county so far, joe biden will get more votes but that's what odds are. but let's the people count the votes and see what you get. you come through the rural

counties, not a lot of people live here but the president will make up votes in people like this, make up votes as we move around the counties like this. 88% there, again, president winning big. you see, 1,300 to 750. he will make up some vote. this is why you have to be patient and why states are complicated. carson county, this is a big one, 61% to 34%. biden can pick up a few. trump pick up some. this is the issue all day long. tate officials a state officials are working. some didn't sleep or very little sleep. east coast, west coast, carolina, georgia, pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, keep counting. the question is at the end of the day some of the states may be close enough for mandatory recounts or candidates can request recounts so that's part of the issue as well. patience is the operative word this morning. >> is it fair to say in

michigan, wisconsin, nevada and arizona the outstanding votes that have not been counted, outstanding tallies, can you say one way or another whether they're in counties that lean more democratic or republican? >> we know some of them are. pennsylvania is more of an exception because there are several counties, half dozen or more, that president trump carried four years ago where they deliberately said we will be overwhelmed on election day and will wait until today. those are counties trump carried and leading today. we also know from the data the overwhelming mail-in vote in pennsylvania was democratic. we need to balance that out. you can say based on the data we have and based on the vote return so far, we expect a lot of those votes still outstanding to be for joe biden but we need to let them count them and not jump ahead. 45,000 votes in the commonwealth of pennsylvania looks like a big lead but not so much if you start thinking we're only up to 60% in philadelphia and philadelphia county. philadelphia city and county around it, if you're only up to

60%, you know, common sense right here, joe biden's getting 78% to 21%. if you want to round that up, 22% for president trump. you know as they count the votes, joe biden will win the bulk. is it enough? we've done the imagine. and based on missing -- missing is the wrong word. this will be the confusing day. they're not missing. no one is knocking on doors asking people to hand in ballots. these ballots are in secure locations, both campaigns are watching them. when you hear talk about shenanigans, everybody needs to walk through the process. in philadelphia, move over to montgomery county, again, 85%, more votes to be counted. 69, round up to 39. democrats outside of philadelphia. so we've done the math and there's a possibility with joe biden when you look at how many are out, where are they, what do we know about the mail-in voting percentages, yes, joe biden has a chance to overcome what looks like a pretty big lead. >> john, secretary of state, we

heard from the secretary of state in pennsylvania a short time ago, she was talking about millions of ballots have yet to be counted, she said millions with an s. in particular she was also talking about ballots coming from members of the armed forces, which there's i think a ten-day window for those ballots to still come in. >> you're raising a critical point, and, remember, we'll walk through this all day long. there are different rules in different states. 134 state says the ballot has to be received by election day. other states says postmarked by election day. even if we make progress today, we may not get to the finish line in some of states and commonwealth of pennsylvania is one. ballots in hand they will count today. most ballots could come in that are considered legal ballots. watch again, we saw the president last night, the president wants to stop the count. that's not what we do in the united states but we know that tells us the posture of the president's legal team. they're going into these places saying stop the count. that will be the fight.

but you raised a very important point, military members, this happens every election. they mail in their ballots as long as they were legally cast and postmarked by the right time and on the way, they should be counted. so if it's very, very close, we think we will make a lot of progress today. secretary of state, you mentioned her, secretary of state boockvar in pennsylvania, said they will make a lot of progress today. but if it stays close our patience could be required for another day, three, perhaps more. >> the notion of stopping counting ballots, as the president suggested last night, people in the armed forces their ballots wouldn't count. that seems impossible to imagine. >> and just, look, number one, i know there are trump supporters watching as well, biden supporters watching, we need to -- it's impossible. impossible. many ask people to take their hats off today. this is the united states of america and we count votes. that's what we do. there's an inconsistency in the trump argument, anderson, if you

pull it out, trump is saying stop here. i'm winning in pennsylvania. i'm leading in pennsylvania, just stop. they're mad because at 3:00 a.m., 4:00 a.m., these were both red. trump campaign said stop, we think it's over. yet at the same time they're arguing we need to keep counting votes and looking in nevada and arizona. why? they're trailing in those states and they were trailing consistently. this was not a case of these states flipping overnight as they counted more ballots. the president was behind pretty much from the beginning of the count. once we had a credible representation of the ballot. there's an inconsistent representation. please stop because they're key to my 2016 maps. out here, keep counting. there's a reason, if you go through the math, i will bring this back to where we are, if you bring this back to where we are, if joe biden wins this, this and this, right, i haven't done maine yet. we're still waiting on north carolina, then it's absolutely

imperative. it's absolutely imperative for the president to go here and here. it still may not be enough. even if the president were to get this, the president needs this map and we still have alaska to add to it. do that when alaska comes in, do this and then the president of the united states can win. but there's a possibility he needs either nevada or arizona for his math if the trendlines here continue the way they're going, which is why, again, it's inconsistent. they want you to stop here, keep going there. that tells you everything you need to know. that's politics. we need to do the math. >> john, please stand by. i want to go to philadelphia more of the count there and speed of it, kate build win, what are you learning? >> hey, there, 50% is the mark philadelphia just hit. that is how many of the mail-in ballots they have been processing nonstop since yesterday.

that is how many of the mail-in ballots they have finally been able to count. commissioners just updated us a short time ago, and they added 45,000 mail-in ballots to the count. as of 4:00 this morning, it was around 141,000 mail-in ballots had been counted. they just updated it. now it's near around 186,000 mail-in ballots. they say there's no issues to report, that the process just takes time, from the beginning of opening the envelope twice, flattening it out, getting it into the processing machine and then scanning it. the the wway the system works, it might be confusing and frustrating at times, is the count and report comes out in waves. the latest wave was just updated. it is very clear from my conversations, anderson, with the people overseeing this and in charge here in philadelphia, that they are acutely aware that

the country's eyes are on them and they want to get it right. how long will it take? when will they be done? they're definitely not committing to a timeline publicly but behind the scenes i'm told it is not unreasonable to think they will be done with the count here in philadelphia by tomorrow morning, be done with a vast majority of the 350,000 mail-in ballots, definitely the most of any county in the commonwealth. i'm told it's not unreasonable to think they will be done by tomorrow. >> kate, two quick with points, you said they counted 150,000 and 50%. does that mean there's another 150,000 still could be counted? >> yes, so there's 350,000 mail-in ballots here. they still have more coming in because, remember, how it works in pennsylvania is if it's

postmarked by election day, they have three days to come in. mail-in ballots will still be coming in. those be segregated and put to a side in the processing, in this massive processing facility they're doing kind of right behind me. they have, yes, they have it, they're at 186, 186,000 and they've got just that to go. and the process is moving. they think they will get it done. >> let's go, kate, appreciate it. we will check back in as soon as we get more votes coming in. john king, we see kate saying 45,000 more votes being counted. can you look at that area in philadelphia? >> you pop it out again. you're in central city philadelphia, always blue, and always blue by a lopsided margin. this is why in the biden campaign they say be patient. they think they have the map to overcome this. we went through this in 2016. late in the night the clinton campaign thought wisconsin and michigan would flip back. they didn't in the end. but we counted them and we got to the end.

that's what we need to do here. is the biden math right? we know they're overwhelmingly disproportionate democratic votes. the mail-in votes in pennsylvania, entire commonwealth. if you think about the city of philadelphia and democratic areas around it, it is reasonable to assume the ballots left in this area are going to be -- look how the vote is coming in so far. 78% if you round up, 22% if you round that up. lopsided for joe biden. there's no reason to assume that will change. especially because we know from all of our data and even the ones we counted so far, mail-in ballots in pennsylvania are disproportionately democratic. the math is a possibility. kate mentioned philadelphia. it's not just philadelphia though. the suburbs around philadelphia are populous and absolutely essential to the democrats and they're missing votes as well, up to 85% in montgomery county here. delaware county, 74%. you see the biden margins in the votes we have counted. there's no guarantee those margins continue.

if it gets bigger, it could shrink. that's why you count votes. but common sense tells you, okay, biden is winning 59/40. so as they count votes, will he add enough? that's why you count. here's montgomery, come to philadelphia here and look through. in all of these places you see the blue in southeastern pennsylvania. that's the foundation of any democratic win in pennsylvania has to start here. also last night, next place to look is out in allegheny county, they have more votes to count as well. where they need to do the most counting are democratic areas which, yes, biden has a chance. let them coupe the the votes. >> john, stand by, we have a key race alert. a key race alert in michigan. let's take a look. more votes have been counted, more votes coming in. joe biden has widened his lead somewhat, 32,565 votes ahead of donald trump. it is still very close in

michigan but this is very significant. it had been about 10,000 or so votes difference between them. let's go back to john king. hillary clinton lost in michigan, correct me if i'm wrong, by about 10,000 votes. that's what biden's lead had been up until this moment. he's now extended it to 32,565. >> he has. you look at the map and see a lot of red in the middle but blue where the democrats need it to be blue. main point is wayne county, detroit and the area around it, by far the largest county in michigan, 18% to 20% will be right in this county. they're still counting there. biden total has grown. he passed president trump overnight, took the lead. not a win, he's leading. but 76% of wayne county, a quarter of the vote we know that's coming in lopsided for the democrat, 67% to 32% if you round up there. you see joe biden's vote total, 489,000 plus. i want to go back and look, four

years ago clinton campaign was disappointed in wayne county. they wanted more raw votes, if you will. the president was just at 30% of the vote. but we know just about everywhere, turnout is up this year so if you see that at 519,000, then you come here, joe biden is at 489,000. just logic tells you, the math has to prove it. again, this is why patience is required but logic tells you, common sense tells you, they have ballots to count, they're only at 76%, that joe biden will stretch that. and if he sticks anywhere close to that percentage, that means he's adding pretty serious math as they count the votes. the fact his lead is widening and they still have votes to count in wayne county is an encouraging sign for the biden campaign. doesn't get you the finish line but encouraging. you look at other places and now you're going through. the larger counties, democratic counties, 82% in kalamazoo. closer here, 10-point gap if you look at it, so you count the votes. maybe joe biden will add more. maybe the president comes back.

that's what we have to be patient and walk through. you see the red in michigan. one of the challenges is check in on the smaller places. where we know the president runs it up. not a lot of math but every county counts. you see claire county, 95%. one of the challenges when you get close to the end, where else might there be votes? if you know wayne county has a ton of votes to count, are there places the president can counter that? a little bit here but 95% is in. move here, 96% in. move here, 99% is in. that's why if you're in the biden campaign, these smaller rural counties that go republican, most of the votes are in. we'll watch and count. morning after sometimes you will see a county official raise their hand and say we have absentee ballots. nothing wrong with that. they were overwhelmed yesterday. watch as the process plays out. looking at other places, oakland county. suburbs, used to be a swing area. trending more and more democratic. they're at 95%.

just about done that. as they continue to count the votes, it's possible joe biden has more. there are republicans that can pull in both. let's look at macomb county here. this is a key battleground in the state, blue collar workers, north of detroit into macomb county and 53/45. 254,000 votes. here's one of the things i'm looking at, turnip was up in this election. go back four years ago, he was at 224, 00. you see fds of higher turnout. hillary clinton 126,000 and change. come in here, joe biden passed that. one of the things you're looking at, do we have vote counts already that are higher than 2016? in places where you don't, you know there are a lot more likely to be counted here. if you're the president, this is the place you're winning by eight points. you do that there, you might add some votes but they're at 95%. if you're going to add votes, it won't be a ton. if it's early votes, it might actually break for joe biden so this is where you're looking. by the end of the day, wayne

county is at 76% now. where is wayne county, detroit, as we get later into today? if they can move their map, their count, if you will, closer to the finish line, we'll have a much better sense whether that leaves 32,000 and change, whether it stands. but you maic a goke a good poin for the president three years ago, if you're joe biden, you like these numbers but you have to wait. >> kent county, michigan, where grand rapids is, a democratic area, i know earlier 70% of folks still needed to come in. what is it like now? >> we're up to 83%. this is a tight one. this is one the president carried four years ago. this is one of the suburban battles, grand rapids and suburbs around it, you see 51/47, if you round joe biden up, 153,000 votes for the president now. if you go back in time, again, he won this but he was below 50 because of the third party

candidate 48/45. because it's larger, right? this is the fourth largest county in michigan. everywhere is counting what's left, all across america, not just the battleground states, are counting what they didn't get to yesterday and counting what's coming in as long as it's legal. if you're in a state where it can be postmarked and arrive today, you count them. the places we spend most of our time on will be places with more votes, populated counties. that means there's more to be counted and the president is leading. it doesn't mean they are votes for president trump but still votes to be counted there. the disproportionate amount we're waiting for now come from here, always the biggest basket of votes for democrats. the question is, how many are left and how fast will they count them? >> wow. what a day we have ahead of us. >> yes, we do. >> waiting to hear from michigan's secretary of state expected any minute as our live election coverage continues. (harold) twelve hundred strings of lights. (betsy) quarter mile of tinsel.

(harold) and real snow all the way from switzerland. (betsy) hmmhm... gonna be tough to top. ♪ (betsy) well played. (vo) add some thrill to your wish list. at the season of audi sales event. get exceptional offers now.

when panhe doesn't justs mmake a pizza. he uses fresh, clean ingredients to make a masterpiece. taste our delicious new flatbread pizzas today. panera. brushing only reaches 25% of your mouth. listerine® cleans virtually 100%. helping to prevent gum disease and bad breath. never settle for 25%. always go for 100. bring out the bold™

♪ ♪

heart monitors that let your doctor watch over you, just like you watch over your best friend. another life-changing technology from abbott, so you don't wait for life. you live it. with the electoral map trending somewhat bluer at this hour than it was just a few

hours ago, we're waiting to hear from michigan's secretary of state any moment as joe biden stretches his lead in michigan. we'll go there live when that happens. he had only about a 10,000-vote lead. his lead is now about 35,000 votes or so. the president and his campaign advisers have just been weighing in on the race and their strategy going forward. the biden team is also making news. let's check in with cnn's jessica dean at biden headquarters in wilmington, delaware and cnn's john harwood reporting on the president. john harwood, let's start with you, what are we hearing from the white house today? >> what we're hearing, anderson, is a reiteration of the strategy the president has been signaling all year long and the strategy is to try to subvert the process, the democratic process of vote counting because he knows more americans are against him than for him. he's been saying so all year, he could only lose in a fraudulent election. last night he tried it in the middle of the night. he said i'm leading in all of

these states. i won the election. stop the vote counting. and then this morning he has noted that vote counts overnight in places like michigan and wisconsin, he said, have magically disappeared his lead and he's blaming or suggesting there's fraud in that vote counting. >> john, we've got to step in, i'm sorry. we will come back. michigan secretary of state is speaking. let's listen. >> effectively, methodically and securely. this meticulous process is all about and focused on ensuring every absentee ballot is counted accurately and fairly. we have many secure protocols in place to confirm the validity of every ballot, and in fact that's why the process takes so much time. our goal is to ensure we're being transparent and fully accurate and the public, you all, can trust the results of the result as an accurate reflection of the will of the

people. now importantly, as we go through this counting as the counting is completed, four of the county and state levels that are also comprised of both parties will review the procedures and counts of the entire election before the results are certified as official. that's the process we're in right now, the beginning of the 23i first tabulation. when we have the first unofficial tabulation, which we hope will come some ditime in t next 24 hours, we will finalize official protocols moving towards an official tabulation, which could take even more time. notably you may be thinking why are we still waiting to hear from michigan? why are they still counting our ballots? for about 18 months the state of clerks called on the state legislature to update the law to provide time for preprocessing on ballots that were on par with many other states like ohio, able to count the vast majority of our ballots yesterday. our state legislature chose not to make that change to our laws and here we are in michigan,

where our counting process is continuing long after the polls have closed. but rest assured, we're focused on counting every single ballot. that's our focus, every single ballot, every ballot in michigan will be counted. importantly also right now there are tens of thousands of ballots that still need to be counted and jurisdictions have been reporting throughout the morning, as many of you know and have been following, but the information i have is ballots are still being counted in our larsest jurisdictions including detroit, grand rapids, clint, kalamazoo and various other municipalities and townships. these ballots were cast by tens of thousands of michigan citizens who the vite to have their vote counted. they with ensure the result of our election accurately every single ballot cast and this is particularly important in close races, as the numbers of outstanding ballots is still greater than the margin of difference between many races

with leading candidates. so at this point i ask for patience out of respect for the will of our voters and work of our election workers who are volunteering in communities all across the state to serve the public and are committed to ensuring an accurate count. now, i continue to expect, as i have for weeks said we expect results to be in by friday. we're still certainly on track for that. as i mentioned recently e. we're on track to have our results in much sooner. i continue to expect we will have more information throughout the day. as i mentioned last night, i'm optimistic that by the end of the day, the majority of our ballots will be tabulated and much closer to if not having a full and unofficial complete result to announce at that point. i also want to mention -- >> you're listening to joycelyn benson, secretary of state in michigan. obviously, just too close to call at this point in michigan. right now joe biden has about a 32,000-vote lead in michigan. more numbers have come in just a

short time ago and his lead increased from the 10,000 or so that it was to 32,000. the secretary of state really the headlines, 31,000 i should say. the headline regularly from the secretary of state is they said -- she says there are still tens of thousands of votes to be counted. they hope by the end of today to have kind of an unofficial vote tally. it will be tomorrow or even friday before they can firmly say, and officially say, what the results in michigan. she said she hopes it would be before friday. we're getting new michigan results now. let's put them up. take a look at these. michigan results, joe biden's lead dropping somewhat. he's now at 29,525 votes ahead. it had been 32,000 and 31,000. slight downward move for joe biden. his lead still 29, 525.

we were looking at michigan moments ago with john king at the magic waull, looking at waye county, the detroit area. a lot of votes, it seemed -- let's go to john king right now. john, you see the few votes lost and gained for president trump. where are the votes remaining? >> what you see there, joe biden's lead narrowing a little bit. which is why we ask people throughout the day to have patience, whether you're biden supporter or trump support or three people left in america who are neutral about this. i think it's important we have patience, have patience. we're seeing the numbers move. as you mentioned, joe biden now 29,525, little above that. just a short time ago, it was above 30,000. what are they doing? why is that changing? it's changing because they're counting votes. you heard the secretary of state stay she hopes to get it done by friday. that's unnerving and i understand that. it's a close race.

her point is the lectugislature michigan would not change the law to allow them to start processing the ballots sooner. what did she say, many of the larger jurisdictions, still have more ballots to count. largest is wayne county, predominantly democratic, detroit and areas around detroit. this is where democrats need to run it up to win statewide. and joe biden is doing just that. 67% to 32% if you round it up. but you see 76% of the estimated vote, which means they have about a quarter left to count. common sense, history, our own polling and data tells us joe biden will add to his total here in wayne county. that doesn't mean there are not places for the president to pick up votes. it means if you look at the biden lead now, 34,000, it is likely to grow from wayne county. where can the president offset that? we talked earlier about kent county, maybe, the president is leading kent county, grand rapids, suburbs more

conservative. right now joe biden is in the hunt here 51/47, if you round that up, but we will just count the votes and see what happens. there are more votes in grand rapids as the secretary said. then you go through kalamazoo, more votes and more people live here. this is the ninth largest in the state of michigan. joe biden ahead 54 -- >> on, we just got more votes in michigan. biden's lead has actually grown 34,769 ahead. so this is going to be happening all day long. >> right. you have all of these counties counting votes and posting on their website and reporting to the state. we saw this in pennsylvania. this will be where people are frustrated, a county may post votes before the secretary of state has. in some cases the state may post votes before county officials put them on their local site. there will be mixed message during the day. the key point is at the end of the day.

you heard secretary boockvar in pennsylvania and secretary benson in michigan will do the same thing. whether it's a small county like this, 99% here, she will be checking in getting reports from people to see are there votes to be counted here? move up to genessee county here where flint is in michigan. 95% now. so they're almost done. almost done. this is closer than i think the democrats would like it to be, 50.4% to 48%. if you round up. four years ago, nine-point race there. if you think the democrats need flint, it's closer than they want it to be but they will continue to count votes. all of the data tells us before the election the mail-in votes, most of what we think is yet to be counted, those mail-in votes were disproportionately democrat. that's what the data said before the election. we're in the election. we can set that aside. we know common sense and logic but the most important thing in the next few days, oakland 95%. come back up here, genessee 95%.

you see the red counties, 95% here. come over here, 95%. these are much smaller counties but very vote counts. it will seesaw up and keep counting. >> is it really wayne county in michigan that has the most votes outstanding? >> yes, yes. again, exact numbers we need to get from wayne county officials but you see 76% now. if you have a pen and paper at home, you can do the math yourself. 76%, joe biden's leading 67/32. you have 25% of the vote to be counted. if it keeps coming in at these percentages and there's no guarantee, some democrats think it will be higher, the mail-in ballots are so disproportionate, this will go up. we don't know. that's why they're optimistic there but we just need to wait and count the votes. there will be a lot of political

spin with tarzan moments with people saying stop the vote, just let people do the jobs and count the votes. >> you're talking about well over 100,000 votes there. my math is not very good but given the vote, i mean, there's 700,000 or so votes already cast. if 25% have yet to be tallied, yeah, it's more than 150,000. >> that's exactly why because wayne county is blue. it's always been blue. exactly why the biden campaigns thinks will it add to the total, 25% of the vote, 24%, somewhere in that ballpark where joe biden is getting 60%, 70% of the vote. he will get the majority of votes in wayne county. history tells us that. we're not making that up. four years ago, again, this was a source of disappointment late on a tuesday night, we got into this earl yins morning. i remember the clinton campaign saying don't call michigan. we're going to poll more votes

out of wayne county. we should be skeptical of what any campaign tells us. skeptical about the biden and trump campaign today. just use the facts. we know four years ago hillary clinton did not pull it out. she got 500,444 votes in wayne county. we know this is a higher turnout election. we will see in the end. joe biden chi of 490,000 votes, right? hillary clinton four years ago, 520,000 votes. i'm rounding up. 520,000 and change then. it tells you because we know the turnout was up in this election, there are votes out there to be counted. you know this is a disproportionately democratic place. biden campaign has every reason to believe they will get more. guess what, the way we know if that's true, give them the time to count it. you can be frustrated. we wish it would happen quick more quickly but it isn't. the question is when you hear where are these votes coming

from, wayne county, democratic or tiny republican county here, lake county, these votes are in-house, democratic eyes watching them, republican eyes watching them, local officials watching them. in some places they have cameras, i know they have that in philadelphia. when you hear about sneaking in new ballots, that doesn't happen. if somebody tries to do it, somebody will see them. >> if anybody is playing a drinking game, nobody should play -- nobody should play a drinking game on counting the vote. that and patience are the words we're going to hear a lot of today. georgia, john, secretary of state has been briefing reporters, he said 200,000 absentee ballots have yet to be counted and 40,000 to 50,000 early votes remain outstanding. they say they hope to have them kmounted counted by this afternoon. how significant would that be? >> you just mentioned 240,000, if i got the mail quickly,

that's 50.5 to 48.3, so 51 to 48 if you want to round the president up, for joe biden to make that up with less than 240,000 votes if that's the right universal vote, that's a pretty enormous hill to climb. the question is, where are those votes? you're looking at the map, if the democrats will mount a comeback in georgia, it will be here and little help from here but atlanta and suburbs around it are key. let's just go in and take a look. again, you have to find out where exactly are these votes. but if you go in fulton county, i left at 4:00 in the morning. they were not near 95%. they are now. you see atlanta and suburbs around atlanta, overwhelmingly democrat. joe biden's getting 72% of the vote there but this says they're 95% in. it's a larger population center. that 5% can be a lot of votes. let them count them and see if it happens here. this is one i'm looking at dekalb county, you come to the east of atlanta, very important suburban area for democrats, suburbs trending their way. if you don't believe me 83% to

16% there. there are a lot of votes to be counted. logic tells you looking at the results so far, joe biden will add to his math here. is there enough to overcome 100,000? we will wait the day out. do the math at home. probability hill is pretty steep but because if they're missing from these areas here, fulton county missing 5%, dekalb county missing 11%. this is a little closer but joe biden has the lead there. if you walk through these counties, 95% here, went through that, gwinnett county 95%, 80% dekalb tells me watch that. watch the next wave of joets. joe biden narrows the lead if more of this comes in you're putting in play, if not, what is the harm, even if the president keeps his lead? what is the harm of counting the votes and knowing with more certainty as we walk through the delicate hours ahead of us. >> john, for viewers not following this as closely, the president has said in a tweet that late at night, there were

all of a sudden magically all of these votes appeared that changed to a biden lead in a number of states. there's nothing magical or nefarious about it, it's simply votes being counted. >> simply votes being counted. imagine you come home from work, you have a stack of bills on your desk, you're tired. you want to do them all. you can't do them all of them. you go to bed and get up early and get up and do the rest. so you're tired and had to go to bed. you didn't have enough help and went to bed. that's all that happened here. go back to 2018. democrats had a big night on the midterm election night. we didn't realize how big for days, days, anderson. california, other closely contested house races, they kept counting legally cast ballots. that's the point, legally cast ballots. each state has its rules. both campaigns have every right to send in lawyers to watch. that's fine. that is perfectly within the rules and systems to say how are

you handling that ballot? can i look at that ballot? can i check, was that processed right? can i look at the postmark? all of that is perfectly legal, happens every election and both campaigns have every right to do it. that's why we have rules and you have appeals in the process. let it play out. there are eyeballs on these ballots. they have been collected. some will come in today. some will come in today, in states that allow ballots to come in today as long as they're postmarked and that's perfectly legal too. this happens every year we have an election, every four years presidential election, every two years midterm election. some states have elections in the middle of those for state and local offices as well. they know what they're doing and how to do this. if there are issues, is there will be eyeballs on them and people can complain. to blanketly say people are sneaking in ballots and cheating and stealing is simply false. still ahead, how the biden campaign is feeling with the count in michigan changing by the minute. iend. and now your co-pilot.

still a father. but now a friend. still an electric car. just more electrifying. still a night out. but everything fits in. still hard work. just a little easier. still a legend. just more legendary. chevrolet. making life's journey, just better.

we started by making the cloud easier to manage. but we didn't stop there. we made a cloud flexible enough to adapt to any size business. no matter what it does, or how it changes. and we kept going. so you only pay for what you use. because at dell technologies, we stop...at nothing. ♪

and let me tell you something, because at dell technologies, we stop...at nothing. i wouldn't be here if i thought reverse mortgages took advantage of any american senior, or worse, that it was some way to take your home. it's just a loan designed for older homeowners, and, it's helped over a million americans. a reverse mortgage loan isn't some kind of trick to take your home. it's a loan, like any other. big difference is how you pay it back. find out how reverse mortgages really work with aag's free, no-obligation reverse mortgage guide. eliminate monthly mortgage payments, pay bills, medical costs, and more. call now and get your free info kit. other mortgages are paid each month, but with a reverse mortgage, you can pay whatever you can, when it works for you, or, you can wait, and pay it off in one lump sum when you leave your home. discover the option that's best for you. call today and find out more in aag's

free, no-obligation reverse mortgage loan guide. access tax-free cash and stay in the home you love. you've probably been investing in your home for years... making monthly mortgage payments... doing the right thing... and it's become your family's heart and soul... well, that investment can give you tax-free cash just when you need it. learn how homeowners are strategically using a reverse mortgage loan to cover expenses, pay for healthcare, preserve your portfolio, and so much more. look, reverse mortgages aren't for everyone but i think i've been 'round long enough to know what's what. i'm proud to be part of aag, i trust 'em, i think you can too. trust aag for the best reverse mortgage solutions. call now so you can... retire better and remember the moment that things,

for one strange time in our lives, got very quiet. we worried over loved ones, over money, over our planet, and over takeout. let's remember this time when so many struggled to feel secure, and build a future where everyone can. because when the world seems like it's standing still... that's the perfect time for us to change it. right now with numbers moving in joe biden's direction in michigan and wisconsin, perhaps even georgia, the question is what must be the thinking at biden headquarters.

jessica dean in wilmington, delaware for us. john harwood covering the white house. jessi jessica, let's start with you. what are you hearing from the biden campaign? >> just a little over an hour ago they held a briefing, biden's campaign manager saying they believe they have a clear path to victory. they are very optimistic. a senior adviser telling cnn they believe they will win today. let me walk you through a little bit why they are saying this. they believe they are going to win wisconsin. in michigan, they also believe they are going to win there. they are very optimistic about the vote by mail numbers there. in pennsylvania, they believe they are going to win pennsylvania as john has been showing us the vote by mail in philadelph philadelphia heaven their eye on there. georgia, they are watching fulton county. they are realistic about north carolina acknowledging president trump is up there right now. overall, like we've all been saying all morning, they are asking for patience but they are incredibly optimistic.

they believe that when all these votes are counted that joe biden will be the next president of the united states. anderson, we're also learning that joe biden is expected to address the nation at some point today. we're waiting to hear when that might be and what his message might be. they also the campaign watching the numbers, watching which states might be called in the coming hours as well and we'll adjust as need be. >> have they talked at all about legal challenges? clearly the president is set on doing all he can. >> right. and at one point on the briefing, one of their senior advisers and lawyer bob bower was saying president trump had threatened to send lawyers to the supreme court but that has not happened. if it did, indeed, happen, he would be in for a very large defeat in the courts. the biden campaign really believing the law is certainly

on their side here and they are going to win this just outright. >> all right. jessica dean in the biden campaign. let's go to john harwood standing by in washington. john, what are we hearing from the president? >> anderson, we heard from the president, the tweet you mentioned from john king where he claimed his lead had magically disappeared in democratic run states with secret vet dumps. twitter flagged that as untrue. not magic, not secret vote dumps, they are simply counting the votes. the problem for the president is last night he signaled the strategy of trying to stop voting counting. now that joe biden has taken the lead in both wisconsin and michigan, joe biden is leading in states with 270 electoral votes. it's not a tenable strategy to try to stop vote counting across the board if your opponent has enough electoral votes to win. what the trump campaign is doing, they outlined on a conference call cherry picking

saying the math works for us if we only count legally cast votes. they are going to keep counting in places where they are behind to make up the deficit. but in places like philadelphia where joe biden is making ground try to disqualify votes that will disadvantage him. what we've seen from 2000 battle from bush and gore, if you have the lead, that's an advantageous position. if you're trying to have additional vote counts, it's disadvantageous to say i want vote counting stopped here and not there. remember, supreme court threw out florida vote count on the grounds it was counted different ways and that violated equal protection for voters. that's the same challenge that the trump campaign is going to face if they say let's keep counting in nevada and arizona but stop the count in pennsylvania as these mail-in ballots, which we all anticipated would favor joe biden coming in.

it's also worth noting, finally, anderson, that the reason these votes are getting counted slowly, republican state legislatures with the acquiesceaacquiesc acquiescen acquiescence, they were hoping to stop a late vote count and late surge of votes for joe biden, which is exactly what we're seeing right now. >> john harwood, appreciate it. let's go to more with erin burnett. >> let's ask david how to interpret this. you hear john harwood, a lot of confidence. you count these mail-in ballots it's going to brain our favor. that's what the trump campaign is saying. when you take a place like michigan and we now have a margin as the votes come in of more than triple the margin of trump's victory in 2016 but this time for joe biden, the ballots outstanding around detroit is the confidence the trump cam paper right now really rooted in reality?

>> well, listen, we're going to count the votes and see. to your point about michigan, not just are we waiting for more absentees from detroit, we are also waiting from grand rapids, the city of grand rapids is the population center inside of kent county. john was showing that on the wall a little bit ago. there are some 60,000 absentee ballots to be counted in grand rapids. we expect them to overwhelmingly favor joe biden there. it may add to the total. we don't know how many of those 60,000 have been counted and are included. a 30,000 vote lead. this is why jessica dean was just saying has the biden campaign feeling very good that that lead in michigan is insurmountable for donald trump. now, erin, i think what bill and the campaign manager on the trump said about wisconsin was really interesting because he

pointed to, said it was a razor thin margin and recount territory, perhaps. it is true, if you are less than -- if there's a margin of less than 1%, the losing candidate can, indeed, request a recount, but not until the official canvas is done. the counties have until november 17th to get that in on the 17th of november the state puts out that official canvas and then the candidates if it's within 1% margin has a right to recount. not sure they are indicating that's their strategy. doesn't necessarily mean that 20,000 vote lead will change that much. that is about how much donald trump won the state last time, erin. >> i want to update the numbers for michigan. they are keeping -- they are going to be dripping in throughout the day. we're now up to 35,551 in terms of as of the very latest with the votes to come in, but that's the latest margin in favor, currently, of joe biden in the state of michigan.

so as these counts come in, david, how do you interpret, because you're talking about you can request a recount, be within the legal margin in michigan. >> that was wisconsin. >> where the margin last time was .8 of 1%. that doesn't mean it will change the count. the campaign manager for trump says if we count all legal ballots we will win, trying to sow doubt in the legality of ballots which all of these are legally cast ballots cast in the state. >> what they are indicating is they are going to try to define in court arguments what a legal ballot is and fight for their definition of what a legal ballot is. that's where the court action will come as -- we're not in overtime yet. we're in the fourth quarter of the game in terms of vote count.

that will come once these canvasses are done. i will note stepien mentioned data, a state clinton won, that's giving biden confidence now. each side will express confidence. sometimes it will be hard to separate out the confidence and spin from the data but we do have votes to look at and we do have information. in nevada what is giving the trump campaign some hope is that i think we're up to like 86% of the estimated vote in nevada that there's a greater percentage of outstanding vote. but here is the problem. so much of that outstanding vote is in clark county las vegas, or warshaw. not only the absentee trending towards biden but democratic y