looking for a job and i've always wanted to work at mcdonald's. how do you like my garbage truck? this is in honor of kamala and joe biden. >> are we ready to vote? are we ready to win? >> with your vote tomorrow we can fix every single problem our country faces. >> all right. on this election day, a final reminder that it is now up to you. it's in your hands. it's the beauty of the system that we have that no matter what we may or may not say here as we cover the candidates, it's your decision. it's up to you. voters are voting. get out there. don't miss your chance. thanks to all of you for being with us. as the famed political

scientists barry manilow once said, looks like we made it. it is election day in america. holes opening across the east coast, midwest and south. we have a live look at the critical battleground states of pennsylvania and michigan, georgia, and north carolina. one way or another there will be history. will donald trump be the first president since grover cleveland voted out of the white house and then voted back in? will kamala harris be the first woman ever elected president? hours ago both candidates held their final rallies. >> all we have to do is get out the vote. if you get out the vote they can't do anything about it. in other words, to make you feel guilty, we will only have you to blame. >> this could be one of the closest races in history. every single vote matters. your vote is your voice , and your voice

is your power. are you ready to make their voices heard? i am john berman in new york, sarah sider is in wisconsin and kate baldwin is in pennsylvania. this is cnn's flagship morning newscast deluxe edition. cnn new central starts now. >> this is it, everyone . we are in pennsylvania. this is the battleground that put joe biden over the top four years ago and the commonwealth could be just as consequential this time around with 19 electoral votes, pennsylvania is the biggest prize of all the battleground states. the statements visited by the campaigns this year. this morning we are in bucks county, pennsylvania. this is bensalem

high school. doors are opening right now and the polling site is just now opening up for business today. teeple started lining up before 6:00 a.m. , more than an hour before the doors opened. three precincts to vote here. i was here four years ago on election night and this is one polling site that sees a lot of foot traffic and can handle a lot of voters. bucks county is one of those counties that we talk about north of philadelphia and it is considered the swinging is county of the swing state and is known as something as a bellwether for the commonwealth. today, we will find out if it is true this time around. let's go over to sarah and another critical battleground state. >> reporter: we are in cedarburg, wisconsin. we are less than an hour away from the first vote being passed in person here and the first

absentee ballot being counted in the state. in the state election officials have to wait to begin counting until holes open. already, more than 1.5 million absentee votes have been cast in wisconsin. election officials tell us it could set a brand new record early in person absentee voting . more than 41% of all active registered voters in wisconsin have cast ballots for the polls have even opened before the wisconsin election commission . cedarburg is an interesting place, it has 12,000 people in it , we are inside the community jim , this is the only place in town where people can vote. we are expecting to see big crowds here. joe biden won by 19 votes, he won the state by 20,000 votes in 2020 there is a lot of excitement as to what is going to happen as they prepare for what could be a record-breaking number of voters. as you know, wisconsin has 10 electoral votes up for grabs. a big one there sarah. i

am in the non-swing state of new york. let's check in with both campaigns. we are in palm beach florida covering the campaign. what is the mood there? >> happy election day, john. we made it. when i talked to the trump campaign about what they are thinking about they said it comes down to one issue and that is turn out. to give you a sense of what donald trump will be doing, he will be at his club at mar-a-lago, back there behind me somewhere, he will be doing some tello rallies and we expect him to vote in person today with the former first lady melania trump and tonight he is planning to arrive at some point at the palm beach invention center where they are doing their election night party. we saw yesterday donald trump finish off his final day on the campaign trail with a series of rallies across three

different states. the one thing that his campaign kept pushing is this idea of please hit your closing message. they really wanted that closing message to be where you better off four years ago than you were today? take a look at what donald trump said to his supporters. >> we do not have to live this way we do not have to live this way. can you name one thing? with your vote tomorrow we can fix every single problem our country faces and lead america to new heights of glory. think of how beautiful that is, new heights of glory, that's what's gonna happen. >> reporter: john, that was a type of rhetoric donald trump campaign hoped he would be using, far longer than just yesterday . he did end up giving the closing message in both pennsylvania and michigan. he also brought up members of

his family, the only daughter who was not there was ivanka trump and also melania trump was not by his side. they were trying to make a full show of that final rally before that . a big focus for the trump campaign today is turnout. when i talked to his advisors, at this point, the one big question is whether or not there people feel they are expected to about for them will actually turn out . they argue they are cautiously optimistic. of course, they do not know anything and we do not know anything about how this is going to go, but they will be closely huddled up at mar-a-lago analyzing the data and seeing what happens. >> they are saying it all comes down to turnout , a novel idea in political coverage. thank you for that. >> let's go over to eva who is in washington or vice president harris will be. what is the mood inside the harris campaign?

>> reporter: john, the harris campaign wakes up confident that they have multiple pathways to 270. the cleanest path continues to be the blue wall states of michigan, pennsylvania and wisconsin , they have long maintained they are competing , or have completed rather, in all seven battleground states. they are expecting near-complete results from north carolina and georgia, probably this evening. the other states are soon to follow. they also anticipate that this process could take several days and that would not be unusual. throughout, it is important that the team remains calm and confident. as for the vice president , she closed out her campaign in pennsylvania visiting every corner of the state with the same positive and optimistic hopeful forward-looking message as she tried to consolidate a diverse coalition of voters. take a

listen. >> we are the promise of america . i see it in the women who refuse to accept a future without reproductive freedom and in the men who support them. i see it in republicans who have never voted for a democrat before, but who put the constitution of the united states above the party. hour as of the vice president we will hear her today do several radio interviews and her running mate governor walz will be in harrisburg, pennsylvania. the big event is at howard university . the watch party tonight, a tremendous homecoming for her after graduating from howard nearly 40 years ago . a remarkable moment for this historically black college. >> the harris campaign feeling it could be decided quickly, or it could take a while, that narrows it down. eva mckend,

thank you very much. we will talk to you shortly. let's go back to kate in the commonwealth of pennsylvania. >> it could happen quickly or take a really long time . welcome to pennsylvania and the voting rules of pennsylvania for sure. we will continue our coverage here in pennsylvania, and we will also take you live to battleground georgia as doors or opening right now at polling site across the state. also, there were early reports of at least one poll worker rested after making threats to other poll workers. a huge podcast star joe rogan making an 11th hour endorsement throwing his support behind donald trump. yes, you are hearing some dj going on behind me because we have a dj at the polls here. we will keep that going for you. also, this, the first vote being counted in the country in tiny dixville notch , new hampshire.

>> 342 kamala harris, three for donald trump. following the national trends.

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we are taking a look there is warren, michigan , bright and early and already voters are standing in line and making their choice. it is election day in america happening now. polls are also open in georgia , one of the seven swing states that could determine the outcome of the election we had more than 4 million georgia voters have already cast their ballots. cnn's isabella rosales is in atlanta. >> reporter: good morning. the polls just opened up about 15 minutes ago . you can still see a line of voters trickling in one at a time going in there to cast their vote for the person who earned their vote. i want to introduce you to elizabeth gonzales. she was the first person in line. elizabeth, thank you for talking with us

what time did you get in? >> i went to get breakfast at 5:00 and i got here shortly after 5:00 and i made sure i was first in line. >> reporter: two hours before the polls open. wow. is there a particular candidate ? which candidate earned your vote. >> i would rather not say it was one of the important ones >> reporter: between the two major candidates. what issues spoke to you? >> women's reproductive rights and the way women or husbands are sacrificing their wives, children are sacrificing their mothers and doctors are being threatened with jail time all because women need their reproductive rights. regardless of what side you believe and what issues you believe , women have the right to have their health and it shouldn't be

other people outside, it should be between the healthcare provider and the woman. >> you told me early on you were not sure you're going to vote this time around because of the politics. >> yes, because in the 2020 election everything was crammed down everyone's throat and i had it up to here. at the last moment i decided, i know my vote and i know my vote counts. my voice needs to be heard . >> thank you, elizabeth. i appreciate your time and your voice was heard and you were the first person in line. sarah, back to you . >> it is wonderful to see americans who understand that it is so important to take part in this part of our country. she knows her boat counts and she was there bright and early him at the first one in line. isabel rosales , thank you for bringing that to us. >> and they are there to vote for one of the major candidates. it is nice to hear

from someone who thought through the issues clearly and she went out to vote because she wanted her voice heard. >> the new warning from the district attorney for anyone trying to intimidate voters. >> anybody who thinks it is time to play militia f around and find out. if you're going to turn an election into some sort of coercion, if you're going to try to bully people, your going to try to erase votes or try that nonsense, we are not playing, f around and find out. that's what we will do.

welcome back . we are live in pennsylvania . what you're looking at our live pictures across the country. we have maryland, polls are open in maryland. georgia, polls are open in georgia. wisconsin, polls will be opening there in the next hour. back here in buck's county, pennsylvania , this morning we know the candidates are basically back at home . some of their final

stops are right here in pennsylvania where holes are now open across the commonwealth. vice president kamala harris closed out her campaign by crisscrossing pennsylvania ending at the philadelphia museum of art on the iconic rocky steps. donald trump spent part of the election rallying supporters in pittsburgh and then wrapped it all up where he did in 16 and 20 in grand rapids michigan. the mood and the messages from the two candidates as we kickoff this election day could not be more different. what does all of this mean for battleground pennsylvania? joining me now is cnn host, political commentator and pennsylvania native the one and only michael. i don't know what you have where you are, michael, i have a dj here which we will have throughout the morning. you are also in bucks county , talk to me about where you are and what bucks county represents in terms of pennsylvania and where could be headed >> kate bolduan , welcome to my

hometown, doylestown come up bucks county pennsylvania. this is the county seat , behind me the iconic county theater where i will have you know , in high school i saw the movie slapshot 12 nights in a row, my buddy was the ticket taker. bucks county, as you know , is the most purple of the philly burbs . if it comes down to pennsylvania it will come down to the philly burbs. donald trump has lost his county twice but by different margins. if he could keep a close or when it as in 2016 it would be a good sign for him. if the margin out of the county as it was in 2020 it is problematic for donald trump a good news for kamala harris. the county is shaped like a rectangle. you are in lower book which tends to be dense and democratic, the farther north you move the more rural and conservative it becomes. where i am in doylestown, my hometown where i was born and raised , is really a purple area . this is the

purple list of those counties. if you know what's going to happen here, you have a good insight into how this all turns out. >> i had some good insight this morning , we spoke to the first motor heading in and she lied up more than an hour before and she said she wanted to be here to vote in person and she was voting for donald trump because she said what her focus was the economy, the border and form policy. i spoke to two other women who were also early in line and they said they voted for kamala harris because their main issue this time around is women's rights. one of the women telling us , you don't get the tell me what i do with my body . those two interactions encapsulates what this election is all about. the two very different realities . it seems that the candidates are offering at the end of this campaign. what are you hearing from your listeners and from

everyone you're interacting with in pennsylvania? it's not where this campaign began but where it is ending for people. >> reporter: if you're half an hour north closer to me maybe the number one voter in the morning would have been my mom, i think she has already into the polls. i think this is a dice encapsulation where the race is nationally. for women it is largely about abortion rights , the way it has been. for republicans it is about immigration, the perception of the economy . in the big picture sense, the reason why i think where you are and where i am right now is important, this is an election that is a battle for suburbia it used to be, kate bolduan , it would be philadelphia versus the rest of the state beginning with the caller burbs. not just pennsylvania but across america suburbia has become increasingly democratic and increasingly purple. i went

back and looked at pennsylvania maps since i came of age in 1980. it is amazing to see the change that has taken place him of the rural areas as republican, urban areas are democratic, suburbia increasingly purple and democratic. >> one thing that we know is votes come in slowly in pennsylvania , because of the rules, we will have to talk more about that, but that means it is very likely we will not have a result here in pennsylvania at the end of the night, and maybe not even tomorrow. in that lag is where fear can be soaked and conspiracies can be launched and we saw that in 2020 three we heard, even yesterday, donald trump suggesting that it's a already happening , unfounded is the accusation, but it could be happening in pennsylvania. how is a conversation landing this time around considering the mess that we live for 2020?

>> i voted by mail like many pennsylvanians, i did it about 10 days ago. of 25 minutes ago when the polls opened is the first time they could count my ballot and all of the other mail-in ballots because we do not allow pre-canvassing . i wish the legislature could get its act together because then we would know the victor tonight. as you point out the likelihood is it is going to go into the wee hours of tomorrow morning. if it is a close election , what i am most concerned about and i'm glad you're bringing this up, keep your powder dry. it does not mean any tomfoolery, only election trickery is taking place come it is just the way we count our ballots in pennsylvania. remember, last time they called the election the saturday after and that's when cnn was finally able to make the call. why was cnn able to make the call saturday after? because of pennsylvania.

it could happen again tonight. then again, if they are all off in a similar fashion, maybe it's not as close as people suspect. >> that is the fun of today , it could be a long time or super quick. we will find out together. that is the beauty of today is we do not know. what i love right now is i'm sitting in a cloud, the fog has set in here. this is really fun. it is great to see you michael, thank you so much, happy election day. >> you to. as we talk about pennsylvania, the center of the universe. donald trump made two stops here in pennsylvania before closing out his campaign in michigan , taking time to rehash old grievances even his disdain for nancy pelosi. >> she is a crooked person. she is a bad person. evil evil, sick, crazy -- ohno . it starts with a b but i will not say it.

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you are looking at live pictures from a voting site in manchester new hampshire. i believe i was at the various voting site for the new hampshire primaries. i cannot remember back that far , back in the winter. here we are, on election day, new hampshire casting their ballots this morning. last republican to win new hampshire was george w. bush in 2000. it has been a fairly safe democratic state, but the margins can be tight. as we approach the polls closing, i want to give you a guide on what to watch based on the times the polls close. this is the map right now, basically nothing. i want to go back to

2020, arisa joe biden won. georgia the polls close at 7:00 , it was razor thin here four years ago, door biden won. one county i want to watch tonight is fayette county, this is just outside atlanta. you can see donald trump won but by seven points four years ago. in 2016 he will won by 20 points. it has been moving towards a democrat: . will it continue to move that way? if it moves towards harris that might be a good sign, if trump can spread his lead again it might be a sign that things are trending his way. north carolina the polls close at 7:30, this is a state that donald trump won in 2020 , he has been there four times the last few days. one county in north carolina is nash county. this is a county that joe biden won four years ago even though he lost the state he won by 120 votes. it

is pretty close there. four years before that you can see donald trump won nash county when he won the state and he won by less than 100 votes. as goes nash county , maybe we can get a sense of where things are going over the course of the night. pennsylvania, kind of the rose bowl of the primary states, we are all watching pennsylvania closely. joe biden won by 80,000 points in 2020, donald trump by 40,020 16. erie county, joe biden won by 2000 votes in 2020, you guessed it, donald trump won by 2000 votes in 2016. it is a swing county. but, if you're looking for erie county to get a sense on how the night is going , you may have to wait. i want to remind you how pennsylvania went four years ago. the polls close at 8:00 . at 10:00 in erie donald trump was taking the lead in the poll count. it was not until all the way friday morning , it was friday morning of election week when

joe biden went ahead in erie and stayed ahead. ultimately we called sylvania for joe biden. erie counter county is a bellwether but it might be latebreaking. finally, wisconsin, the polls close there by 9:00, one county to look at is your county. joe biden won in door county , he won wisconsin by less than 300 votes four years before when donald trump won door county he won by less than 500 votes. it could give you a sense of what's happening in wisconsin if you're willing to stay up all night. let's go now to wisconsin. our very own sarah sidner is there. >> i am certainly willing to stay up all night. it is election night come it is election day. i am in the ideal picturesque town of cedarburg, wisconsin . it is one of the blue wall states, of course, that we are all watching , along with pennsylvania and

michigan. trump won those in 2016 and biden flipped them in 2020. joining me now is tracy seti who is the clerk of cedarburg. i know you said you are used to being behind the scenes, but you have good information so we are coming to you. can you give me a sense of what will happen here in this jim? this is the only place of cedarburg where people are voting in person, correct ? >> that is correct this is the one polling location for the entire city. >> what happens? they come in and -- >> the flow is they come in through the front doors, they will check in at one of the electronic whole books . they will get a number, a voter number, it will include their ward number and they will take it to one of these tables and that is where they get their ballot. then they go to one of the booths , they vote their ballot and they put it in the machine which is right behind you and the exit here. that is the flow.

>> it is a flow to get people in and out as fast as possible. can you give me a sense on how the votes need to go to get counted. there is a lot of conspiracy theories, how does it work? it is a very secure thing that you do. >> it is. i think in wisconsin we are somewhat unique because it all happens right here. we have all the people voting in person that put their ballots in the machine. we have an entire team of absentee people who just process the absentees, they will do that all day , my goal is to have it all finished by the time it:00 comes around. those ballots are getting put in the same machine. it all happens here. >> account dean the counting happens here and then it sent to the county and up and up let me ask you the difference between 2020 and 2024 . what are using and far as the

numbers voting ? >> it is interesting. cedarburg in general has always had a high turnout for november elections, like 90-ish percent. that is not surprising , but the absentee rate is somewhat surprising because 2020 we saw about 65% turnout in absentees. we are seeing close to those numbers again in this election. in 2020 there were more mail-in ballots and in 2020 there were more voting a person. >> it makes me happy to see all this. you came here this morning wearing your sparkly american earrings. i really appreciate that and i appreciate your time. >> back to you, john . that is how things will work here in cedarburg, wisconsin and across the state. >> you make sure of that. sarah sidner in cedarburg, wisconsin.

with us now former strategist terry sullivan , political anchor for spectrum news errol lewis and former director for vice president harris thomas simmons and . you can see how excited i am, i am slurring already and i have not had a drink, as far as any of you know. >> it is not even 8:00 a.m.. >> there is no feeling. any tweet you make any analysis that you make can decide the whole election. actually i want to hit that point correctly . terry, how helpless of a feeling is it on the morning of an election? >> it is awful. my tradition used to be when i ran campaigns was to go get a haircut. it has been a few years. no , there is an important get out to vote for the field teams , if you are in communications or

managing a campaign , it is an awful day and superlong. >> is absolutely right, nothing worth being a press guy in the middle of election day. the stories matter, maybe they used to be midday lunch stories you got one of those places like where sarah is and you facilitate a watch and see what's happening. after that you just sit around going to the movies waiting for something to happen, something might happen but usually nothing does. >> how natalie cleared that up how awkward do you feel right now? what is the major thing you're looking for? >> it is one thing, it is voters, we know where all the voters are for the candidates but there are pockets for both. mainland puerto rican residents who almost never vote typically , will they come out for kamala harris in the wake of the rally? we do not know. kamala harris has a number of young college aged women who have expressed enthusiasm for her

and never voted before. you can never trust of college kids will come out, we don't know. there are pockets in pennsylvania and towns like reading and allentown where hispanic man men are planning to vote for trump. will they? these are the x factor unknown voters that we cannot really pull and we will not know until they do the thing. >> the question is who shows up. i thought the most interesting thing with that final poll out of iowa it showed women , especially older women over 50 seem to be breaking towards kamala harris. if that is true as a trend either in the midwest or nationwide, i think a large national narrative starts to take shape about this being the first national election since roe versus wade was overturned. anyone who is over 60 for sure and maybe 50 would remember that roe versus wade was important that there was an era before it and your relatives lived through it and this is the first chance to weigh in on

that at a voting booth for millions and millions of women, is this going to be their verdict? polls suggest it might be. >> a couple of things. first of all i want to see how women are voting and what is the spread between women and men. kamala harris has over performed with women you can see a 10 point spread of women over men she should be okay. second, i look at the city of detroit, the place i am from. they are looking at 50, 52% voter turnout in order for her to be competitive in the state, they are looking at 55 minimum and if they get closer to 60 that is been much a wrap for the state. same thing for philadelphia, if they get over 500 550 she is probably a wrap. >> i think as the night starts the first thing you will get are the east coast numbers and states like carolina and georgia, those will come in first. will we will see happen will be a predictor, trump

should win them, he is favored to, the question is the margins if he ekes out a win or does not win one , it will be a bad night for trump. if he wins comfortably, three or four points, it could be a very bad night for kamala harris. that will be the first indicator of the night. >> the problem has been georgia and north carolina we did not call until after we called the presidential race. at least in georgia we have a since they will count more quickly, we will see. errol , event in the last week as we have had this run-up to the election, anything you can post to point to that matters? >> maybe that horrible rally at madison square gone garden where those disparaging remarks of latinos were made and the crude and obscene comments made from the podium might have made an impact , only because we know across multiple platforms including digital platforms, a lot of latino community activists were really red-hot,

even before that night was over and it was in key swing states like pennsylvania and florida and georgia that those kind of votes can make a big difference. >> what was the question? >> the question is something that mattered at the end? and/or who had a better closing ? >> i think errol is right, that rally could be determined , it is so tight and it could make a difference. i have been telling people, in the past week sunday 5 million americans have already voted, that is one third of the voting population. the rest plan to come out today. i know everyone is anxious, it is over, relax, nothing you can do about it now, go vote nothing you can do about it. that goes for the campaigns too. i think in the closing days, unless something happens it is baked, they have done all that they can do. i think in the last few weeks, trump kind of decided moderates

independence i'm not getting it anymore i'm just running to the base. i think it has been decided for some time. >> i think that last point for me is right, maybe not one individual thing although the madison square garden rally was a thing. it is the collective spirit that has been happening. collectively i think donald trump is making kamala harris's argument. he is going dark and fearful and she's going big, fun and helpful. frankly, this is the most stark choice between two presidential candidates that i have seen in my entire lifetime, demographically, geographically and how they are running their campaigns. again, his is full of fear trying to anger everyone and versus trying to bring everyone together. >> i look at the campaigns, you have to remember all the data they have, they have more. they have better data. i watch what they are doing. it is interesting trump has become,

from what was a very disciplined campaign for morris most of the cycle by trump standards , the last week or two he has been undisciplined, that could be a sign of confidence. we don't know. >> or he is scared >> or he has given up. >> the other point is travel. he traveled to virginia and méxico this week. that is either insane or they are looking to really run the score up. >> he passed up an invitation to be at the penn state , ohio state game, in a city that sees 100,000 people in pennsylvania. >> people don't go to those games to see political candidates. >> but he does. >> randomly out of the crowd of hundred thousand you could pick up a few hundred thousand votes. >> he went to north carolina four times that indicates that they do believe they need defense there. north carolina is the defense for the trump campaign. what i get from all

of you is that there are two competing theories and we will find out which one is right is donald trump right that the election is going to come down to young men? or the male vote? this is the best they made in the hundred days that she has been running that it is suburban women and disaffected republicans. >> she went all in fairly early on and closed out with liz cheney for that reason. that is risky for a democrat. they have been disappointed by trying to get suburban women . >> it is not as risky as it has been in the past what we saw after, there was a big rush of women to the anti-maggot position. pro-abortion rights reformation. it happened as far as kansas and in elections like the midterms. >> trump seem to write off the suburban woman disaffected republican woman a.k.a. betsy cut. he told nikki haley and nikki haley voters we do not want you we do not want your vote. he could have chosen nikki haley, he could have made

specific overtures to the very voting demographic that is left that he needs an is that he held rallies, the likes of which repel those voters. >> thank you very much. in closing i think we all agree it will all come down to turn out. >> thank you , captain obvious. we will get back to you soon. >> protecting democracy on election day. we have information on how the fbi is keeping a close eye on election related threats and also whether we know , weather can be a real factor when it comes to election day. how it cold front and storms could affect the trip to the polls for some. we have your election day forecast. we will be right back.

you're looking at live pictures on fulton county georgia , that is atlanta georgia . very close four years ago . considered a swing state

this time around. holes closing at 7:00. if you live in the greater atlanta metroplex you still have time to vote, does not appear to be lines right now. in the meantime, happening now, a georgia poll worker has been charged with sending a bomb threat to the county election office. the department of justice said the 26 pretended to be a voter in a letter that warned his fellow election workers the said quote, boomwatch every move they make and look over their shoulder and it ended with ps the fi is investigating the case. they have set up a national command post to respond to election related threats. senior chief law-enforcement intelligence analyst john miller is with us right now. tell us about the command post. what does it do x >> the command post has been in operation before and other elections. it is located inside a come that is the fbi strategic information operations center. that is

where they keep their thumb on the pulse of ongoing events. in this case they sectioned off a large piece and that is for election only it what you got is the u.s. secret service, you have the fbi criminal division, counterintelligence division for actions by other countries, counterterrorism division by something that could be spending up here, dozens , a dozen agencies with dozens of people , 80%, 24/7, going at least to the end of the week and longer . >> it has been in place before and maybe their efforts are at a higher level. >> definitely. why? a couple of things. one, i think they learned lessons from january 6th about underestimating some of the dynamics around compassions and political divide in the country . also, if you look at the lead up to this, what do we have? in

october we have an individual who said he was inspired by isis and with another he was going to shoot up election day locations out in the midwest . this was straight up terrorism without picking aside. you have the individual in australia who was a registered russian agent who was doing deep fakes of haitian immigrants illegally voting on video through right wing posters . you have the plot, what was it, yesterday , by an individual in tennessee to attempt to blow up the power grid with explosive laden drones. you see around the election, adjacent to the election, foreign espionage interference, chat rooms full of threats to send arm people to polling locations , terrorist plots, it is a lot going on. >> you mentioned january 6, how do you make sure that does not

happen again factor in ? >> the knock on fbi, secret service, dhs, fair or not, around january 6 is that they had intelligence that there would be disorder and it would be large before the storming of the capital. they did not share it widely enough and they were not prepared enough because they did not consider it as credible as it was. in this case, they are leaning way forward. way more people in the command center this time around, a larger number of agencies, more fbi components on the idea that we have to be able to respond , but more important, this is a national effort. when the intel comes in , if it is actionable, get it to the field office and to the state and local police law-enforcement and get on top of it right away. >> hopefully they will not be necessary but good to have them there. john miller, thank you very much. kate. >> the weather on election day can have a impact on voter

turnout, especially when you talk about critical battleground states. let's get over to derek who is checking tracking this. i know the forecast and bucks county is is foggy now that i'm told it will be beautiful day. what are you watching? >> there are a couple of curveballs that we are watching, mainly a low deck of cloud providing you fog northeast of philadelphia, that is not the major story. in your swing state things are looking pretty decent especially later this afternoon, it is across the nation's midsection , the upper midwest and into the mid-mississippi river valley, this is getting pummeled by heavy rainfall. swing states of michigan and wisconsin it will be a wet drive to the polls and what election day line if you have to stand outside here and grand rapids michigan it looks pretty showery. i want to show you this band of rain falling over st. louis at this has prompted the national weather service to issue a flash flood warning, that has extended .

some of the most rainiest two days in november history, actually today and yesterday are falling in st. louis. there are reports of localized flash flooding on the roads and in and around the metropolitan. take care if you're traveling to the polls. that advances eastward, but it does not make it to the east coast. we are sandwiched in between nice the weather on the west coast and the east coast, including philadelphia am aware that low bank of clouds and fog will dissipate and we will see sunshine. also in the battleground state of georgia and near atlanta , the sun should peek out during the course of the day. temperatures in the 70s, there is a cold front swinging in across the intermountain west that will provide snowflakes for the higher elevations. kate. >> thank you so much for that. a new hour

the polls opening in a huge batch of new states this morning. we have pictures, we hope , from grand rapids, michigan, and springville, ohio. turn the lights up a bit . we are standing by to see if donald trump votes soon in florida. kamala harris already voted by mail and we soon will speak with radio hosts. both candidates held rallies overnight. >> we have an opportunity in this election to finally turn the page on the deck aid of politics that have been driven by fear and division. we are done with that. we are done. >> we will defeat the corrupt system in washington because i'm not running against kamala, i'm running against an evil democratic system. these are evil people. >> i'm john berman in new york. sarah is in new york. kate bolduan is in pennsylvania. it's on. this is

election day in america. and this is why it's so exciting. stop guessing and now they can start counting the real votes. voters get to get there say today. we are in bucks county, pennsylvania. this is the biggest swing county in the biggest swing state with its 19 electoral votes. biden won this county and pennsylvania two years ago. this time around nearly 2 million mail-in ballots have been received across the commonwealth. they still have time to hand those ballots and by 8:00 p.m. tonight. in bucks county more than 120,000 mail-in ballots have been handed in and the mail-in ballot in pennsylvania, the counting of them, is a huge thing, especially in philadelphia with the rules and pennsylvania . it can slow

things down. the district attorney of philadelphia offered a very clear warning to anyone looking to intervene interfere or get in the way this election day. >> anybody who thinks it's time to play militia , f around and find out. anybody who thinks it's time to insult , to divide, to mistreat, to threaten people , f around and find out. we do have the costs. we do have the jail cells. we do have the philly juries and we have state prisons. if you're going to try to bully people, believe votes are voters, try to erase votes or try any of that nonsense, we are not playing. f around and find out. >> reporter: polls are open across the commonwealth right now. they open at 7:00 a.m. and close at 8:00 p.m. this evening. in bucks county at bensalem high school we saw people lining up more than an hour before the doors open to make sure they were first in line. over to sarah sidner and

battleground wisconsin. >> reporter: hey . seconds ago a big announcement was made in cedarburg, wisconsin. the 2024 polls for the election are now open. and the very first absentee ballot cannot be counted. we are off to the races in what polls have predicted may be a razor thin victory for either candidate in the state. wisconsin is one of those blue wall states that the big question is will the blue wall stand for harris or crumble for trump this election? the way wisconsin and the shift from trump to biden in 2020 after nearby milwaukee was counted led trump and his allies to begin unfounded questioning of the fairness of the election. cedarburg, a picture-perfect town with an extremely high voter turnout to the tune of 90% , this city has voted republican for every single presidential election since 1936 until 2020 when it broke blue for joe biden with its 12,000 plus voters. biden

won by just 19 votes and it foreshadowed what happened to the entire state of wisconsin, which went to biden by 20,000 plus votes. the weather, by the way, not picture-perfect. it's raining here. but there are already 50 people outside in line long before the doors even opened and now they are all coming in. you can hear the excitement and see the folks behind me and the poll workers doing their job. the first vote was cast two minutes ago. >> i will take it. thank you very much. you can see the polls open behind sarah in wisconsin. also open in georgia and north carolina and they will be two of the key swing states where the polls close the earliest at 7:00 and at 7:30. nick valencia is in lawrenceville, georgia. miguel, what do you see this morning?

>> reporter: long lines. i want to show you what's happening outside the moose lodge in wilmington. people have been voting in wilmington all their lives say they have never seen lines as long at this precinct. this is short. this is about 30 or 40 people in line. they have at least 75 or 100 since polls opened at 6:30 this morning. we spoke to tons of voters. why is it here? it's a purple county in a purple state. both campaigns have been working very hard. we spoke to voters on both sides. all of them say at the end of the day they just hope the country is a little closer to normal. >> i hope it's a harris-walz run away. i have several friends that are trumpeters. no problem with that. they vote where they want to vote. the main concern is when you see me broke down, stop and pick me

up. i don't care who you voted for. i want to be a community again. >> i feel there's a lot of hatred out there and i would like to see less of that. less violence. all that stuff. it would be nice if people would learn to speak their mind but also respect other opinions. >> reporter: keep in mind most voters in new hanover county where we are and across the state have voted early, but the lines are very long. the campaigns are also out here. we have a democratic tent. republican tent and there are workers handing out sample ballots to voters as they are in line and it looks like it will be nonstop. the polls close here at 7:30 p.m. and it looks like it will have a line like this, if not longer, throughout the entirety. that gives you an idea of how motivated people are on both sides. back to you guys. >> miguel marquez in wilmington. let's get to nick valencia in lawrenceville,

georgia. what are you seeing? >> reporter: good morning. there was also online at the door of about 25 people starting at 7:00 this morning. must've been confused that they could not vote in person here. this is the county registrar's office picked it was an option to vote early in person but not on election day. i want to give you a tour. it's mainly operations and administrative center on election day and voters turned away were helped by volunteers goes i will show you here , given information for their precincts. 156 presents throughout gwinnett county. the consequential county for the republican candidate and democratic candidate in the race. georgia has become a battleground. republicans dominated this until 2020 when joe biden became the first democratic residential nominee to win since 1992. is going to be a busy day and busier as the day goes on. this is where the tabulation will happen and that glass bowl area and this is the man at the center of it all. that manifold, the election supervisor. thank you. >> it's been a quiet morning so we like to see that. it's

been smooth so far. feeling good. >> reporter: tabulation starts at 9:00 a.m. what will happen and when we see the official batch of numbers coming out of gwinnett county? >> a team is sequester starting at 9:00 a.m. they will start closing out the scanners from the advanced voting locations. it helps in the prep center in the back. 300,000 people voted on the scanners from advanced voting so they will start closing those out and run the tabulation tapes and start reading in the memory cards that will be a process ongoing all day until we can publish results after 7:00. >> reporter: and you guys scattered records for advanced in person voting. what do you attribute that to? >> i think it's voters moving back to the traditional boating pattern gwinnett people love in person voting and advanced voting. we did a good job of making sure people got out there to vote before the were any lines . we have very few lines for the 300,000 voters. >> reporter: we know you will be busy today. what a county is

one of those counties in georgia in the center of it all. >> a county the democrats need to win big if they want to win in that state. thank you to both of you. kate? >> battleground pennsylvania and the bataclan county of bucks county. we are outside bensalem high school with three precincts that vote here. a lot of the traffic in action and we have someone dj'ing because it's that cool here. joining me now is former republican congressman from pennsylvania charlie dent . someone who knows bucks county and the area so well. what are you feeling and thinking about as everyone is heading here today? >> i'm looking at this county, bucks county, one of the color counties of philadelphia. the most competitive county. joe biden one by four or five points in 2020 so we are watching what will happen. i suspect kamala harris will win this county because there are a lot of soft republicans. even though the registration is

slightly more republican. >> that's been a trend since '20. >> the party out of power often does pick up registrations remember this county is one where we've had in suburban philadelphia what i would call soft republicans. these are people who are registered republican but often functionally democrats in presidential elections and the opposite was true in the southwestern part of the state registered democrats then more functional republicans and more people have aligned their voter registration with their voting habits. that's changed over the years but that's where we are today. this will be the most competitive county. kamala harris needs to run up the score here. >> it's not just winning. it's running up the margin. >> correct. everywhere. remember what happened in 2020 and pennsylvania. donald trump did better and one county in 2020 dan 2016 and that was philadelphia. everywhere else he did marginally worse. this is where kamala harris has to

win big in these color counties. that was the difference for joe biden in 2020. >> they say bucks county is a bellwether. how box will go, maybe the commonwealth will go. who are the candidates trying to turn out specifically in bucks county? who have they been targeting and who are they speaking to? >> in terms of voters? look . you have a strong congressman here, brian fitzpatrick . an incumbent and is expected to win. and a guy like brian fitzpatrick knows there are ticket splitters in this county so he needs to get not only the republican vote to pick up independents and some democrats and he has a long and established brand, but it's hard for candidates like him you are a bit more moderate to prevail. so he has to talk to the center of the electric. unlike the presidential candidates, or trump any way who is double down on his face and that's all he seems to be talking to . >> we were talking about it all

fair piccolo propensity voter that the trump campaign is hoping to help them get it over the finish line here. >> this makes me nervous. if i'm a candidate i don't want to rely on the least reliable voters piccolo propensity voters, people who may vote who may be only vote in presidential years, if that. they are trying to pull these people out. i'm not sure how successful they will do it. the harris campaign is also trying to pull out these voters too but i hate to put my faith in my campaign in the people who are least reliable and that's what it seems like trump was trying to do. we will see if he will be successful. i think it's a tough slog. >> what are the early signs are watching for in pennsylvania? we lived through it in 2020. pennsylvania can because of the rules, the returns can come in slowly, especially with mail-in ballots. what are you watching for early here? >> well, i keep looking at the turnout of women and that's what i've been seeing to make

sure these women voters are coming out in the numbers we are told. that is a good omen for kamala harris. we saw that in some of the early votes . women are coming out and heavier numbers and it seems to me while everyone is talking about the economy as the top issue, and i think it is, i'm not sure it's the most motivating. this abortion issue is the most motivating issue. look what happens post-dobbs. democrats over performed in the midterm and many special elections. they have run ahead of her they should have. not that special elections will dictate what happened today, but it's a lot of races where they have over performed so this is the first residential race post-dobbs and that's the x back here we need to think about and were not talking about it enough? mimic the unscientific poll. we spoke with two women who said they voted for kamala harris and the issue was abortion rights and them saying you don't get to tell me what to do with my body and that's why they wanted to

show up this morning. >> i'm not at all surprised by that. i think that's what we see in many places. right now , the other county to watch in pennsylvania is north of us in northampton county which is the ultimate bellwether county. that county will likely , whoever wins that county will win the state and probably the presidency. you could say the same about erie county and watch lackawanna county where scranton is . >> it's anybody's game this morning as there just getting underway. it's great to see you. thank you for coming by. nittany lions, apparently. pennsylvania pride here. overview. >> i am in cedarburg where it's just bustling. wonderful city people in this town take their civic duty really seriously. and of course it's because it's election day in america. there are more than 79 million ballots that have already been cast because they

voted early. we take a deep dive into the key blue wall states including wisconsin and the counties everyone is watching today. and kamala harris and donald trump must now wait, like we all have to, to find out whose message has resonated more with voters. in your times is category their final pitches this way. a grim trump and an upbeat harris. a new report this morning that russia is suspected a plot to start fires on board planes heading to the u.s. and canada. we will talk about that coming up.

this is justin. this justice department has reached an agreement to keep monitors outside of texas polling places . and in st. louis a judge ruled that justice department monitors can observe election sites. we are also paying attention to the blue wall states. pennsylvania, michigan and wisconsin. joining me now is omar gimenez. you are looking at this . tell me what you can. >> wisconsin is one of those blue wall states. the states trump one in 2016 and biden flipped in 2020. let's start in wisconsin. the polls are open but before we got to today more than 1.5 million ballots

were returned already. that's a little over 40% of the active voters and well early boating bond that was down slightly, early invalid cast was up 40%. women outpace men in the early vote, as they did in all the blue wall states. when you look at the map. we are watching the margins in milwaukee and dane county where democrats typically win big but also watching the west and northern suburbs of milwaukee , which have been historically republican for trending more democratic in recent years. those counties led the state in early turnout. the question is, when will we know? they can start processing early ballots now that polls are open and milwaukee the election commission estimates all election day votes will be counted by close to 11:00 p.m. eastern or earlier. absentee ballots likely overnight. in 2020 cnn projected the race for president within 24 hours of polls closing. let's look at other blue wall states, in particular michigan. polls are

already open here. before we got here over 3 million michiganders voted early or absentee. that's about 44% among active voter rolls. look at the counties of wayne county, home to detroit where more people lived than anywhere else in the state. we are looking at the margins there. biden won 68% of the vote in 2020 but we will watch macomb county in the suburbs which went for trump in 2016 and 2020 but obama in 2012. in the western part of the state in muskegon county outside grand rapids and went to biden by 500 votes in 2020 out of the more than 90,000 votes cast. the secretary of state said she hopes to have final results by midday wednesday. and last but not least, basically most, pennsylvania. more electoral votes up for grabs than any other battleground states. polls are open. 1.7 million absentee and mail-in votes have been returned but let's look at the counties that could make

a difference . especially when it comes to the margins. philadelphia county but also the suburbs of montgomery, bucks, chester, delaware . caller counties went to biden in 2020. the same story west of pittsburgh and allegheny county and if you look in the northwest there is erie which biden flipped in 2020 by les 10 2000 votes. remember it was this project and in 2020 that triggered the call for the presidency and it could play that role at this time around. the secretary of state stressed patients. have never had final official results on election day. >> all right. thank you so much. appreciate . in wisconsin we are in cedarburg and there are people lined up way outside of the polling place. it's an extremely busy time and as we learned from the clerk, this place votes about 90% of active voters . we are expecting 95%

potentially today. back to you. >> all right. coming up for us, high alert for election day. extra officers with bomb sniffing dogs. how security has been stepped up at polling locations across the country and we have new details on how both donald trump and kamala harris are planning to spend the day as america votes . you are looking live at pictures in wilmington, north carolina. voters lining up. america getting out to vote. we will be right back.

san francisco's leadership is failing us. that's why mark farrell is endorsing prop d. because we need to tackle our drug and homelessness crisis just like mark did as our interim mayor. mark farrell endorsing prop d, to bring the changes we need for the city we love.

san francisco's leadership is failing us. that's why mark farrell is endorsing prop d. because we need to tackle our drug and homelessness crisis just like mark did as our interim mayor. mark farrell endorsing prop d, to bring the changes we need for the city we love. welcome back to our special election day coverage. you are looking at grand rapids, michigan. voters with ballots in hand going to the scanner. voting happening in michigan and across the country as many states have polls opening at 7:00 a.m. eastern . this morning we have never reporting from inside the trump campaign about how they are feeling today and we are standing by to see if the former president will vote soon this morning in florida. alayna treene is

standing by in west palm beach. what do you hear from team trump this hour? >> reporter: when i talked to his advisers they say they are cautiously optimistic and i think that's all they can be at this point. they recognize how close this race is. that is not changed over the last several weeks. while they say they are cautiously optimistic of course there is some underlying anxiety about how today could go. this is not going to come as a surprise but they say their main focus and the thing that matters today in these final hours is turnout. that is what this hinges on for both campaigns. i'm going to review what one senior trump adviser told me about this to give you insight into how they are feeling this morning. he said, quote, we feel that we are in a position now where if the people who we think are going to turn out for president trump turnout than he ought to

win so it's a matter of achieving that. it's close. it's really close. they added a disclaimer that he said i know it sounds ridiculous that i'm saying this is all about turnout but he said that's the only thing that we are focused on today. i want to get into the specifics because turnout and general, we understand, is an issue. they have been poring over the early boating data over the last several days that they are arguing have given them some spots for encouragement but also spots a very pick one thing that has been clear is donald trump is a problem with women and that is a problem they have not been able to solve as we are here on election day. but they tell me they are encouraged somewhat by some of the data they have seen of how men, specifically male democrats , are not showing up in the numbers they expected they would for the harris campaign. they have said they feel encouraged by some of the signs that black voters and urban voters are not turning out as much as they thought. but role voters are. these are some of the tea leaves they are

reading. i cannot emphasize enough that we have no idea what will happen. the trump campaign does not know what will happen and polls do not close for several hours. everyone is waiting to see how this will turn out. this is what they are doing today at mar-a-lago. >> yeah. a lot of tea leaves reading happening across the country and throughout the campaigns. thank you so much. kamala harris spent her last day of campaigning here in pennsylvania where we are sitting this morning and this morning she is starting in washington, d.c. and eva mckend as live where the campaign election watch party site will be at howard university in washington. what are you hearing from the vice president 's team and what they hope is the final message she has left with voters? >> reporter: kate, the vice president telling supporters in this close contest every single

vote matters. she ended her campaign in philadelphia which she described as the foundation of our democracy on the rocky steps to illustrate that the underdog can eventually claim the victory and we were with her and pennsylvania yesterday as she was crisscrossing the state and it really illustrated how she has run her campaign more broadly , trying to appeal to such a diverse coalition of voters. everyone from alexandria ocasio-cortez to liz cheney under the same umbrella. the bottom line . the message is that she wants to be present for all of america now it's time for voters to decide. listen to how she made this argument. >> america is ready for a fresh start. ready for a new way forward where we see our fellow americans not as an enemy, but as a neighbor. and we are ready

for a president who knows that the true measure of a leader is not based on who you be down but based on who you lift up. >> reporter: and, kate, when i spoke with her over the weekend in atlanta she told me that ultimately she believes disagreement is healthy and that is how it would inform a future, potential presidency. but we will hear from the vice president today. she's doing a series of radio interviews. meanwhile governor walz will be campaigning in harrisburg, pennsylvania. and then it ends here where it began at howard university. a big homecoming for her this evening. kate? >> absolutely. thank you so much. busy and long day ahead for you as she is in d.c., which where the watch party will be for kamala harris. we

watch as voters are heading to the polls here at bensalem high school in bucks county, pennsylvania. back to you, john. >> and is not just the bensalem high school in bucks county. we are live that polling places across the country opening doors to voters . mandy k and rene marsh are talking to voters in florida and virginia. >> and we are in broward county where we have seen a steady stream of voters coming into this voting place. the polling place. we spoke to one first-time voter from puerto rico. wait till you hear what she has to say about her vote today. >> and i meant fairfax county, virginia, where the foot traffic is also steady . i will tell you what voters are saying is top of mind once they cast their ballots.

it is as busy as ever here at the community gym where voting has commenced in cedarburg, wisconsin. across the country people are lining

up to do the same thing because it's election day in america. our team of reporters is spread out across the country speaking with voters. randi kaye is in parkland, florida. and rene marsh as at a site in burke, virginia. let's begin with randi. what do you see there so far? >> reporter: good morning. we see a steady stream of voters in parkland, florida, and broward county. we are talking to several of them. the issue here is people are coming. there's two important ballot measures here , in addition to who they want to vote for for president. already 8 million floridians have voted early or sent in their mail-in ballots. the issues here on the table are certainly one is amendment four which is the abortion amendment and amendment three which is whether or not they should legalize recreational marijuana. and it's a question of who is coming to vote. as you know there's a large

patient population in florida. the harris campaign , democratic national party did a big ad by here because there are about 350,000 haitians in broward and miami county and miami-dade county and there is the puerto rican vote. 1.2 million puerto ricans live in the state of florida and you recall those comments by that comedian at the trump rally at madison square garden talking about puerto rico being and i would've garbage . we spoke to one first-time voter here as she was heading to vote . she is puerto rican and listen to what she told me. >> it's my first time voting. women who would you like to win? >> trump. >> mean. i am puerto rican. i was like, i don't really like that. i don't know. i really don't know, honestly. >> reporter: as a puerto rican you are okay with that? >> no. definitely not. you know, like, people, like, everyone has opinions . if they

don't like puerto ricans, it hurts, of course, but at the end of the day i'm okay with who i am and at the end of the day i want to be able to have a better life in the future. >> reporter: she thinks trump in office at the white house and she would have a better future and she said this was a family decision. they spoke as a family and talked about this and this is what they decided to do. she does believe she did not really get any clear answers from harrisburg asked her why not kamala harris and she said when harris was asked about what she would do to help people she did not hear a clear answer from her. >> all right. thank you. now to my friend rene marsh and virginia where early voting wrapped up with surprising numbers. what are you expecting there today? >> reporter: the polls here have been open for 2 1/2 hours and we're certainly seeing a steady flow . i just spoke with

two precinct leaders here and they say within the first 2 1/2 hours they have seen hundreds, close to 600 voters come in and they are pleased with those numbers. as far as speaking with folks here and casting their ballots, i will say i have spoken to mostly harris supporters. when you speak to those who have cast their ballot for harris and asked them what are the top issues, top of mind for them? they say democracy and abortion however , we have found within a crowd of people casting their ballots in northern virginia trump voters, as well. and when you talk to them about their top issues, not surprisingly, they say immigration and economy. we spoke to one family who came out as a family to cast their ballots and here's what they had to say. >> the top issue for me was the right to choose, abortion rights, women's healthcare. we have two little girls and we want to make sure they have rights and freedoms and safety experiment we have two girls

here and i want to make sure their rights are taken care of and they don't have to worry about anything. >> reporter: of course , 2.3 million absentee ballots have already been cast here in the state of virginia . i have been speaking with officials at this precinct . the polls here will be open until 7:00. after they close, they say, they have procedures in place where they will begin the process of counting how many ballots were cast and then, of course, those ballots will be taken to the county for tabulation. again, what we see here is steady turnout and the stress levels and anxiety levels amongst people on both sides are extremely high. >> yeah. it's lovely to see both of you and randi are talking to whole families who have come out to vote and do their civic duty and that is a good thing. thank you, both, so much. appreciate your time this morning.

with us now is scott jennings, political commentary and maria cardona , democratic strategist. we have been talking about how difficult it is on the morning of election day to have any real analysis because it's hard to tell. we need to wait a few hours but is there any sense of where the momentum is ? does either candidate have any extra bit of juice heading into election day? >> so i think given everything i have seen with the latest polls , with the early vote data, with the conversations i've been having with groups going door to door in some of the key battleground states , i do believe that vice president harris has the momentum here at the end . and what i'm seeing within that momentum , what is it pushing people to go to the polls and break for her? we have seen and the early data that the voters who have decided in the last two weeks

are breaking for the vice president. i think that a lot of what we have been hearing from donald trump come at the madison square garden hate rally, the insult to puerto rico, calling it an island of trash -- but it's not just that. it's everything else. i know we have heard stories and talk to folks from his campaign and heard about folks from his campaign that are frustrated because he can't be on message. i think that is crystallize for voters. also what another four years will look like. >> scott, whether the late breaking voters , undecideds are breaking toward harris, have you talked to anyone in the trump campaign that has a similar or different you to that? >> yeah. they have a different view. they think the early voting data looks better for republicans than it has in years past. i have resisted the urge to over read this or read the talking points because '24 is different than '20. we were in a pandemic and people voted differently. i don't know. the honest answer as we sit here this morning is , we don't

really know. the polling got really close. all these forecasters ended up at a coin flip. but the trump people do feel like they succeeded at a couple of things. one, convincing low propensity republicans to participate early. and, two, they feel like they tracked down the selection in the month of october . harris had a great rollout and lead for a good chunk of the fall but they feel like she had a rough october and they tracked it down. here we have arrived on election day and functionally a 50-50 race so i am as excited as anyone else to watch the magic wall pick >> good october but do they have as good a first few days of november? late october into november? >> the question really to answer it you have to know how many people were truly undecided as we got into the last few days of the election. because trump is in the election and everybody has an emotional, visceral reaction to trump going into it already, i've been skeptical there were

that many people out there going, i need to research donald trump a little bit more. the real issue is the trump turnout the low propensity men? the people not connected to the news who don't do much in politics. then he turned them out or not? we will find out. >> on the early vote data, because it's not party talking points. i did do a deep dive or two friends of mine who are analysts on early vote data. scott is right. this year is very different from 2020 and even 2022 and you can't extrapolate and make comparisons and then try to divulge what is going to be the endgame. you can't do that so you're right about that, scott . but what you can do is make comparisons a party to party and then look and see who those voters are. two things have emerged. both parties are down in early vote from what they were in 2020. we expected that because it was a pandemic and we talk to groups of voters

come of for example, there are a lot of voters in the black community who have said they will vote on election day. a lot of women say they will vote on election day because they are excited about doing it because they can and they cannot in 2020. that's number one. the second thing is you can look at the early vote data and compare to see were those of voters voters who voted before in 2020? a lot of the voters that republicans have seen or are in the early vote data are voters that voted in 2020. right now there is no data that shows or proves the strategy for low propensity voters that republicans have hung their hat on is actually coming to fruition? beaming as we were joking. they will be zero undecided voters later tonight but the voters will by definition have decided pick >> my election day advice for every american is , please for

the love of god, ignore early exit polls pick up someone in your life calls you today and says i've got early exit polls, hang up on them. delete the contact out of your phone. go to a movie. whatever. please, i beg of you, do not lose your marbles over early exit polls today. that is my election day advice? beaming and for the people who have not gone to vote, please go vote. we have safe, fair, free elections. our system is safe and secure. please go vote pick >> this is been a public service announcement. thank you to both of you. kate? >> that was amazing. and also, scott, you said don't lose your marbles. as if anyone has any marbles left after this election cycle. that's very optimistic of you. you are so cute. let's get back to it. across the country as voters are arriving at the polls, election officials are preparing for everything. a lot of work leading up to this date today and a lot of hard work happening as we speak. you are looking at live pictures in milwaukee, wisconsin.

the country's costliest strike in 25 years is over. new details inside the offer that boeing workers just accepted.

raking overnight. inc. workers at boeing voted to accept the company's most recent offer. the workers rejected two previous contract offers the final agreement and the costliest strike in more than 25 years. the strike stretched for more t than 50 days. the new deal includes an immediate pay raise but does not restore the traditional pension plan they lost in 2014. workers were returned to work on wednesday. also , western officials tell the wall street journal that russia is likely behind the plot to start fires on cargo and passenger planes heading to the united states and canada. in july, two incendiary devices exploded at dhl facilities in germany and the uk and western officials say it is unlikely test runs. the kremlin has denied any involvement. u.s. government official told cnn there is no current threat to u.s.-bound flights. espn analyst and

former nfl safety jason kelce is apologizing after an incident that happened at penn state where he was on campus for espn's college game day on saturday. as he was walking through a crowd, a fan at him and directed a homophobic slur at him about his brother, travis, who is dating taylor swift. kelce smashed someone cell phone and repeated the slur back . kelce admits he is not part of his response. >> i'm not happy with anything that took place. i'm not proud of it and , you know, in a heated moment i chose to greet hate with hate and i just don't think that's a productive thing. i really don't. >> penn state police say they are investigating the incident. sarah? >> thank you. polls have been open for under an hour and battleground wisconsin with

heightened security measures and effect in cedarburg, a picturesque town, by the way. it's beautiful. already we've seen a bomb sniffing dog to the suite before the precinct open. that is significant because they've never had to do this before but they are taking extra precautions this year. the vote here is expected this year to surpass 90% of those registered voters. this place takes voting very seriously. joining me to discuss more with one of the hometown voters here, heidi rath. thank you for being here. i see you have your voted. you've done the thing. give me a sense of how busy you've seen it, maybe compared to 2020? >> i feel there are a lot of workers. everything is running smoothly. i was in line for maybe five minutes and i already got to vote. it was quick and efficient. everybody should come out and vote pick >> got right through. this place, voters take it very

seriously. a huge number of people come and pick 90% is higher than most of the country. why was it important for you to come today and what were the issues? >> you can't really complain if you don't come and vote. that's my opinion and i'm just voting for the future for my daughter and i hope it goes well no matter what happens. i just hope everybody comes together and we can move past this. >> do you have any sentiment about what is happening during this election season? it's been a rough and tumble season. >> it's definitely divided the country and i hope that everybody can just come together once this is done today. >> in the tunnel cedarburg when you look around you and you get here, i noticed people are saying hello to each other. have you seen people you haven't seen since last election? this is the only place in town where people come to vote. >> i've seen a lot of people and it's nice to see everybody from all over cedarburg we all run into each other and it's nice to see everyone come out and vote. i'm sure a lot of people that early voting but either way come as long as you vote, that's your choice. >> cedarburg has a long history of voting republican since 1936 but it flipped in 2020 . tell

me he abutted for and why? beaming i will tell you who i voted for and i will tell you why. i'm just voting because i think that it's the right thing to do and i think that we need to keep her children in mind. that's what i think. >> it's wonderful to have you here pick many people want to keep their vote secret and you certainly can hear . they put it into these machines and it will be counted. we will find out what the answer to everyone's question of who one , probably overnight. heidi, thank you. thank you for doing your civic duty. had a great day. that's the scene here in cedarburg . it has slowed down a tad but we are expecting another russia voters but we are expecting, potentially, a historic turnout here in wisconsin. >> all right. we are watching the results come in and as you can see as it stands at 8:57, 8:58 in the morning , it's

time right now. 0% for vice president harris and 0% for donald trump there are two numbers that are wrong. it's not zero votes to zero votes anymore because we do have votes tabulated from new hampshire. i can push in here and you can see way up here in dixville notch , they actually voted and released the results pick three votes for kamala harris and three votes for donald trump tickets tied to 50-50. dixville notch does this as a publicity's bond and it worked. i want to show you what we are watching tonight looking back at 2020. not new hampshire. let's go to pennsylvania because there were two counties in pennsylvania that called it and voted the same way had the election correct in 2016 went donald trump won and in 2021 joe biden one. it erie county and northampton county. i want to give you a sense here. joe biden one north hampton by 2000 votes in 2020. in 2016 donald trump 15 5000 votes biden was

able to flip that. obviously kamala harris wants to do the same here and erie county, which we talked about, as close to 50-50 as you can get almost anywhere. joe biden narrowly edged out donald trump by 2000 votes in 2020. in 2016 it was donald trump by 2000 votes. keep your eye on those two counties in the commonwealth of pennsylvania, which may very well be the most important state in this election. we have a new hour of cnn new central starting now. happening now, it is election day in america. you might have heard. the race is close. we have some live pictures from some places where people are voting. this hour polls with now opening in colorado, nebraska, new mexico, utah. congratulations to the mountain west. donald trump and d vance will

both vote today. vice president harris and tim walz have already voted. harris is trying to be the first woman ever to win the white house. and donald trump trying to be voted out of office and voted back in. we heard from both candidates last night. >> you get out the vote, they can't do anything about it. we win. in other words, to make you feel a little guilty, we would only have you to blame. >> your vote is your voice and your voice is your power. are you ready to make your voices heard? >> and i'm john burton in new york, sarah sidner in new york, kate bolduan. this is "election day in america. "

polls have now been open for one hour and one minute here in wisconsin. it has been bustling. we are in cedarburg, wisconsin, a town of just about 12,000 people, which for decades has always voted republican until 2020 when 19 people decided the vote here. they are expecting a potentially historic turnout of voters from 90 to 95% of registered voters. and we've been seeing a steady stream of people come in. wisconsin obviously one of those blue wall states. the question is, will that wall be broken by donald trump or will harris be able to keep the state? we will see what happens. 20,000 people voted to make it so that biden won back in 2020. now everyone is waiting as they come through these polls and talk to the poll workers to see what the count is going to be. that count, by the way, probably won't be known until late

into the night, potentially tomorrow morning. kate? >> all right, sarah, thank you so much. we are here in pennsylvania, battleground pennsylvania. first we want to show you some new video just in from ohio. we have video, i'm told, of jd vance arriving in cincinnati to his polling location. this is just moments ago. jd vance arriving to vote himself in person. on this election day. that in cincinnati, ohio. now back here in pennsylvania, polls have been open for two hours now. pennsylvania is the biggest electoral prize of the battleground states. 19 electoral votes, which is why this is the state, the place that both campaigns have spent the most time throughout the election season. we're outside bensalem high school in bucks county, pennsylvania. this is a critical swing county just north of philadelphia where both campaigns are hoping to run up their margin because this could be such a tight race in the end, or not, as we keep

saying. we have heard from both trump voters and harris voters here at bensalem high school this morning. one voter we met is scott, who's lived here for ten years, and he says he's voting for kamala harris. what would you say if there was one main issue that drove your vote, what was it? >> it's always been having the most fit, sane commander in chief. >> what about donald trump is not winning you over? because this is -- in bucks you've got, you know, almost 50- 50 when you're looking at it. >> correct, you do. he acts like a child to me. he's unfit. and name- calling, just not what i'm looking for in a president at all. >> polls close here at 8:00 p.m. , so we have a full day of voting ahead of us here. let's get the very latest from both of the campaigns right now. cnn's alayna treene checking

in with team trump. been getting great reporting all morning long. what are you hearing? >> that's right. one thing i want to say off the top here, kate, as you showed video of jd vance going to vote in person. any moment right now we're by waiting to see donald trump do the same here in west palm beach where he'll be casting his vote. stay tuned for that. we're expected to see it at some point this hour. but, look, behind the scenes donald trump's top advisers and those closest to him are huddling with him at mar-a-lago. they are poring over some of the data. obviously watching a lot of the news. one thing that is very certain for everyone, nobody knows what is going to happen. however, they are doing what they can to try to parse through the data they have already. really the main focus, and i've talked with you about this all morning, but the main focus for them is turnout. it seems, you know, of course it's turnout. it's not a novel idea. i think the reason they keep emphasizing that today is because this election as of now is a coin flip. it is incredibly close. really they have no idea

what will happen, but they say what this hinges on all together is going to be how many of their supporters actually turn out. those who are not sitting this out but feel motivated enough to go to the polls and try to make a difference. i want to read for you, kate, what one senior adviser told me because it is telling. he said, quote, we feel like we're in a position now if the people we think are going to turn out for president trump turn out, then he ought to win. it's a matter of achieving that. it's close. it's really close. now, i will say to get a little bit more specific here, the key things they are looking at are the core demographics they have been targeting. first of all, we know a major demographic they have struggled with, that donald trump has tried to court but has not been able to do so well, honestly, is women. we saw in early voting data that women were far outpacing men when it came to early voting. that is one challenge that they recognize is presenting -- they are presented with today.

however, they gue male democrats specifically maybe are not turning out for harris the way they initially anticipated. they said that is a sign of encouragement. that's one thing. one other quick thing i want to bring up, kate, is that ground game we've seen been an issue with the trump campaign as well. they have outsourced a lot of that to groups run by charlie kirk and elon musk's pac. today is their judgment day, is how donald trump's campaign is framing that. so, keep an eye on that as we hear -- we may hear from trump today or others. keep an eye on that as we look through and ahead to when the polls close. kate? >> absolutely, alayna treene, thank you for your reporting today. sarah, i'll send it to you. >> thank you, kate bolduan. we'll hear from vice president kamala harris in a series of radio series before she heads to her alma mater for a watch

party. eva, she hopes she resonated enough with women voters to make her the first president. what are you hearing. >> reporter: they sure are, sarah. that's indicative of how she has run her entire campaign, trying to cast a wide net, trying to appeal to everyone from the likes of liz cheney to andrea ocasio-cortez, all under the same umbrella. you saw a big push with country over party, republicans for harris, and also not alienating progressive voters by talking about expanding medicare and remaining disciplined on perhaps the most pressing issue for most americans, and that is bringing down costs. they hope a mix of these arguments, as well as talking about preserving democracy will ultimate win the day. take a listen to how she closed out her campaign. >> we are the promise of america.

i see it in the women who refuse to accept a future without reproductive freedom. and in the men who support them. i see it in republicans who have never voted for a democrat before, but who put the constitution of the united states above party. >> reporter: listen, the campaign says they feel confident they have multiple pathways to 270, but it is important to remain calm throughout this process as it could take several days to get the results. sarah? >> eva mckend, i know you had aa with kamala harris one-on-one. a lot of interesting points made there. thank you for your reporting from there on howard university's campus. >> remain calm. good luck with that.

with us now, cnn's david urban, jamal simmons and gloria. what's new, guys? >> there's this weird cognitive dissidence which is so little one can do if you work in a campaign or even political journalism, yet the stakes are so incredibly high, gloria. >> yeah. you're just waiting for the resolution. you're waiting for something to happen. you're waiting even for one state to be dispositive and say, okay, georgia, that's early. let's see. what does that mean for either candidate, right? and you're trying to game out how each of them can get to 270. and what's the road to 270? hers is the blue wall. they both need pennsylvania. his is pennsylvania, georgia, north carolina. it's a tough day because the votes are being cast right now and you just have to sit back and watch it happen,

happily. >> happily, good luck with that. chris, you live inside the numbers. and i mean that like positively. what will you be looking for tonight and when? >> so, there are a couple of counties that i would say keep your eyes on. bucks county, obviously one we have already talked about earlier today. >> kate's there. >> it's a county that used to be 50-50. i believe went for biden by four points. it's the kind of place where trump needs to get it back to 50-50 if not win. keep an eye on that. i'm from florida. i'm keeping an eye on osceola, florida. that is not a battleground state but a county that has a large puerto rican population. if you want to see if that madison square garden rally had any effect. the hardest thing for someone in my work to do is don't get swayed by the anecdotes. people will say, there were three-hour-long lines at this polling place. these are anecdotes. not data. keep calm

and -- >> and early exit polls. >> tread so carefully. >> the anecdotes are great. i have a county that's like that, hamilton county in indiana. not a swing state. hamilton county went for trump in 2016 by 20 points. in 2020 it went for trump by 7 points. this year 34% of voters voted in the primary for nikki haley. if kamala harris does well in a place like hamilton county, peeling away some nikki haley voters, that could be a trend across the country of haley voters being positive for her. >> the line thing i get every election, i witnessed it myself. i participated. i got suckered in. you go, this is the longest line i've ever seen in my entire lifetime, david, and then we lose the precinct, the ward, the county. don't be swayed. people are sending me pictures of their lines and polling place and saying, this is a trump place, let's go, right? i'm not going to get sucked in. i do agree in pennsylvania which is going to be dispositive here

tonight. we were talking about this off air. philadelphia county will be really county. it's going to matter, the overall vote, number one, the top line number, and then the net philadelphia county is going to be important because kamala harris needs a giant number. 500,000, roughly, votes. 500,000 net votes out of philadelphia county. people carry the state. biden had a big number. he had 605. obama had 590. trump has been increasing his vote in philadelphia county. people say back when he went to the sneaker convention in philadelphia or he had a rally in downtown philadelphia and 100% democratic ward, why did he do it? this is why he did it. because today, tonight, he may end up with 150,000, 160,000 votes in philadelphia county which will eat into kamala harris' number. chronically, erie county, 2,000 vote margin. this is a game of inches. tonight we'll find out who moves the ball one inch,

another inch and that's how this victory will be achieved. >> you know what they're going for, they know these numbers are going to be tougher out of some of these cities, but they have a bigger card to play in some bigger counties like where kate is right now because there will be a lot of women who vote for kamala harris for a variety of reasons. if they can make the case there -- >> specifically on bucks county, right, so clinton won narrowly. biden increased his lead. in the past four years, guess what's happened. republicans have flipped the county. republicans are up by a couple thousand votes. that's going to be incredibly interesting. >> this whole race, though, has been about cherry- picking voters. do you go for women? do you go for older women? we saw that in the iowa poll, that older women went, you know, overwhelmingly by 2 to 1 margin for kamala harris. do you go for young men? because, you know, that's who donald trump has been

trying to appeal to. they're low propensity voters. >> jd vance is voting in cincinnati. i believe he's speaking. let's listen. >> for all the locals out there, we voted for bernie marino for the united states senate. if you want the policies of donald j. trump in the united states senate, then you want bernie moreno. i hope people will get president trump over the finish line. i hope people in ohio will get imprern moreno over the finish line. i feel good about this race. i felt good about my own race a couple of years ago when i voted in this exact same spot. hopefully it goes as well for president trump and me as it went for me in the state of ohio. i appreciate you being here. happy to take a few questions. you can obviously see my kids bouncing around here. there's usha. we'll take a few questions but we're going to hit the road, go back home and head off to palm beach.

>> reporter: senator, regardless of the votes tonight, what's your message to potentially your supporters if it doesn't go the way you want it to go? >> our message, first of all, we expect to win. if we don't win, as you said, half the country will be partially disappointed. my attitude is, the best way to heal the rift in the country is govern the country -- >> jd vance in ohio saying what almost any candidate would say no matter what party when they cast a vote. >> i feel good. >> i feel good. i think we're going to win. that's what you say. two interesting things that have happened. one, there are diametrically opposed theories in the election. on. one hand kamala harris has been trying to appeal to women voters and disaffected men. some may be very wrong here. the second thing is in the closing arguments their strange alignment. donald trump saying ridiculous things. kamala harris saying, look at donald trump say ridiculous things. they have the same closing

message. >> right now this is going to be a question of is this election a reboot or realignment? you have kamala harris put together the obama coalition and a few more women. she turns out younger voters for her, she puts back together large numbers of black voters, latino voters and she reassembles. the realignment is possible. donald trump doing better among young men, among latino voters and suddenly you see education and gender become the big dividing lines rather than age and race. we don't know which way it's going to go. whether it's a reboot or realignment will tell us a lot. >> this morning we saw randi kaye talk to this young puerto rican voter, female voter in florida. first time puerto rican voter. donald trump, shocking. last night in pittsburgh, the trump rally, support president trump, roberto clemente, saint of puerto rico, one of

the most famous sports figure, on the podium endorsing donald trump full-throatedly. jim brown, football icon, african american. to the point made, this coalition trump's building is not just, you know, white guys without a college degree anymore. >> the flip side of that is the suburban, affluent bucks county voters that kate talked to that would have been republicans a few years ago. >> the coalition trump has put together there's a realignment in politics generally. >> it's easy to get anecdotally on election day. people are standing in line. you want to talk to them. and we do. >> what do you do? la, la, la, la. wait until the votes close. great to see you all. words of warning from the district attorney in philadelphia to anyone threatening to interfere with the election. and boston, massachusetts, 20 years ago the boston red sox won their first world series. today they're voting there.

stay with us. this is our special live coverage. it is "election day in america. "

going all out in pennsylvania. both kamala harris and donald trump spent their final day of the campaign speaking to voters in the commonwealth. now the question is, which candidate will win the biggest prize of the battleground states which is pennsylvania's 19 electoral votes, which is why we are here in pennsylvania for election day. one plplace that will play a big role in deciding that, the biggest and most populous city in the commonwealth, philadelphia. joining us is philadelphia's republican city commissioner, seth bluestein. thank you for coming on. in is a big day for you all. it came with a ton of preparation leading up to today. how are things going so far? are you hearing about any issues? >> thanks for having me, kate. everything's looking pretty good so far. it looks like a normal, typical election day. >> i mean, and could you ask for anything more than that? absolutely not. then tonight after polls close, that's when the real action begins, we have to say.

we know when it comes to philadelphia and how philadelphia, counting in philadelphia, the pace of counting and bringing together all of the votes in philadelphia was the focus of the world back in 2020. is philadelphia going to count faster in 2024? >> yeah, we started precanvassing our mail ballots as soon as the polls opened at 7:00 a.m. today and we're going to count the ballots much faster than 2020. first, our voters, a lot have transitioned back to voting in person at the polling places. so, there will be fewer mail ballots to count this year than they were in 2020. we've also purchased a digital ballot extraction equipment to open up the envelopes quicker. we have more people working than we've had in the past. >> all of that adding up to philadelphia is set to

count faster than it did last time. seth, we're not in the game of betting, that is for sure, but given the equipment and the man power you have -- you've been able to add to the process, do you think there is a chance that people will wake up tomorrow with a final word out of philadelphia? >> well, ultimately whether or not a race can be called comes down to the margin of the election. so, it's hard to predict when people will be able to wake up and know the result out of pennsylvania. but what i can say is it won't take four days until the saturday after the election for us to count the bulk of the mail ballots. that will be done much quicker. hopefully if everything continues to go smoothly, by the middle of the day on wednesday. >> are you on in the middle of it on the floor in the convention center in 2020, and i was the one hounding

you, standing outside the convention center in 2020. that's a huge improvement of pace for those who doesn't remember what went down last cycle. tell me about what is known so far about mail- in ballots this time around. i know it's fewer than in 2020, but who is voting by mail-in? >> the mail- in ballots in philadelphia are still predominantly democratic registered voters. you know, the republican voters did make an effort to vote by mail, so they didn't go down by the same percentage as the democratic voters did. but we'll have to see if those voters are coming out and voting in person at polling places or if turnout is going to be down a little bit from 2020. we won't know that until the end of the night. >> yeah, is there any expectation that turnout just, overall total turnout will be bigger than we saw in 2020?

>> it's really hard to predict this early in the election day. if you're basing it just off the mail ballot numbers, we wouldn't think so. but again, it's possible those voters really want to vote in person now that we're not in a pandemic environment. so, we'll have to see towards the end of the night, you know, how those numbers are lining up. >> seth, just finally, it was those days in between when polls closed and there was a final word out of philadelphia that allowed for conspiracy theories to be born and for people to stoke fears in the process of what was happening in that lag time. what is your message to anyone who would -- is already suggested that cheating has occurred or wants to call into question the integrity and the security around the voting and the counting and the process in philadelphia this time? >> the election in philadelphia and across the commonwealth

is going to be free and fair and safe and secure. i am completely confident in our ability to run the elections fairly, and all of our voters' ballots are going to be counted, they're going to be counted accurately and every single eligible voter is going to have the opportunity to have their voice heard by the close of polls at 8:00 p.m. today. >> seth bluestein, the man who is going to be in the middle of it all once again. thank you so much, commissioner, for coming on. we really appreciate your time. good luck today. >> thank you. >> i'm going to head back over to sara in wisconsin. >> all right. thank you so much, kate. joining me now to discuss is washington county clerk, ashley reichert. thank you so much for being here this morning. what are you seeing and experiencing there in washington county this morning and when it comes to absentee voting, which has been off the charts, it seems? >> right. it definitely has been off the charts, especially for washington county.

we have roughly 57% on average turnout for absentee voting. some communities are averaging over 60%, which is something unheard of, even surpassing 2020. which is absolutely fantastic. for us, we actually lead initiatives earlier this year to promote election integrity. one much our initiatives were funding extra extended hours for municipalities to offer in- person absentee voting in the evenings and weekends. our clerks are absolutely amazing. every single municipality was part of it and they contributed to the increased turnout for us. >> can you give us some sense of whether or not you think this will be an historic number of people voting, and whether or not you think the blue wall will stand or will crumble?

>> so, in washington county, i think we'll definitely have record-breaking turnout. i think even in the state of wisconsin we're seeing record- breaking turnout for this election. more people engaged. engaged as election inspectors, engaged as poll watchers, which is all absolutely fantastic to see individuals get involved in the election process and learn how it works in the state of wisconsin. i definitely think we'll have a high conservative turnout, so we'll have to see after the polls close what that means for the state of wisconsin. >> ashley, thank you so much for joining us this morning and sort of giving us a look into a very important county here, washington county, wisconsin. i appreciate that. i am now going to bring in a first- time voter. she came with her mom, mother and daughter. there's ella. come over and visit me. and this is ella and this is celeste. you were both here -- first of all, what made you decide to vote for the very first time in 2024?

>> i think women's rights are very important for -- especially for being a biracial african american. i stand for everyone behind me. this is for women's rights. i think it's important. so, let's win. let's do this. my mom raised me very well. and this is really important. >> what has this been like for you? i see you getting emotional. what is it like to come in here with your daughter, side by side, and vote here in cedarburg. >> it's an incredible thing. it's the first time in the history of our country that she's able to vote for a woman. not just a woman, but one that looks like her. i think that's an incredibly emotional thing. i think the reality of it didn't set in until this morning when we were getting ready to walk out the door. but it's phenomenal. it's an historic moment. i think in particular in consideration of the election and just how decisive it's been and how -- well, i mean, it's a little chaotic, right? it hasn't been clean and friendly. i'm not okay. i'm quite overwhelmed and also incredibly proud.

>> you said it's been chaotic. it certainly has not been wisconsin nice, we can all agree on that. >> i don't know if it's been nice anywhere at all, has it? >> can you give me a sense of, for you, compared to 2020, what your feelings are? obviously you're here with your daughter. this place votes like almost none other. it's about 90% of registered voters come in and do their duty. for you, how important was it to show up today? >> i think it's always important to show up for all of our elections. this one in particular. it was incredibly important for me. again, i think just because of this moment i'm sharing with ella, and it's also historically significant. as she said before, we're both big women's rights advocates and we believe in just the power of regular people. you know, we've talked about this quite a great deal and how we just need to kind of go in the direction or pick that person that aligns most with the life that we're trying to go towards. so, it was just a clear, i think, decision for both of us as women, young women and

old women alike. >> girl, you ain't old. you look great. >> well -- >> celeste, ella, thank you for sharing your stories with us. >> absolutely. >> and congratulations on your very first time voting. appreciate you both. >> thank you so much. >> have a great day. >> there are people clapping for them because they came out, they voted and they're very proud to see another member of the city of cedarburg out here voting. michigan, of course, is another one of the important swing states up for grabs. we will take you there live to see how the voting is going there this morning. take a look at this line of people waiting to hand in their absentee ballots just outside of atlanta. election day in america, my friends, is off to the races.

san francisco's leadership is failing us. that's why mark farrell is endorsing prop d. because we need to tackle our drug and homelessness crisis just like mark did as our interim mayor. mark farrell endorsing prop d, to bring the changes we need for the city we love.

san francisco's leadership is failing us. that's why mark farrell is endorsing prop d. because we need to tackle our drug and homelessness crisis just like mark did as our interim mayor. mark farrell endorsing prop d, to bring the changes we need for the city we love. all right. welcome back. you're taking a live look right now of two polling sites in america today. grand rapids, michigan. they are voting. boston, mass, voting as well. we'll also show you a live look at atlanta, georgia, and

wilmington, north carolina. voting happening across the map. north, south, east, west. voting is happening. the polls are open. right now voters are lining up at polls across michigan, as we were just showing you grand rapids. michigan is one of the seven battleground states who will decide who becomes the 47th president of the united states. jocelyn benson says she is hopeful that election day in michigan will be peaceful, but that officials are prepared for anything. cnn's kylie atwood is joining us from a polling site in grand rapids. what are you seeing? what are you hearing? what are officials telling you? >> last night jocelyn benson said she expects to see the unofficial results in michigan by midday tomorrow if not sooner. expressing optimism that this state is going to be able to swiftly produce the results statewide. one key reason for that is because they're now allowing

preprocessing of those mail- in absentee ballots up to eight days before election day. so, that takes off some of the pressure, some of the work that the county clerks will have to do tonight. we just got an update from her office. 3. 3 million voters in michigan cast their ballots before election day. that makes up 48% of registered voters in the state. that's a pretty big chunk, kate. we should also note that voting is obviously happening here today. i want you to listen to two voters we spoke with here at this church in kent county, michigan, who told us why they're voting for harris and why they're voting for trump. who did you cast a ballot for today? >> donald trump. >> reporter: what's your reason? >> i think i just believe in his values. >> reporter: which ones? >> mainly all of them. i don't agree with how he comes across at times, but i think he gets the job done. i think he did it before. and i believe he can do it again.

>> reporter: who did you vote for today? >> i voted for kamala harris. >> reporter: why is that? >> i have three daughters, four children overall. women's rights is pretty important to them and my daughters -- i'm sorry, i'm getting a little emotional. i didn't think i was going to do that. their bodies, their choice kind of mentality. i want them to grow up in a world that's welcoming to everybody. yeah, that's why i cast my vote today. >> reporter: now, kate, here at brookside church just eight miles south of grand rapids, michigan, i want to show you what we're seeing here. these are voters who are checking their information with the clerks. they're getting their ballots and going to go over to cast their ballots and put them in a tabulator. it only takes a few minutes. lines haven't been really long today as far as we have seen. obviously, we know a lot of people in michigan cast their ballots early. that could be one of the reasons for that. but we'll continue to watch what happens here in kent

county, particularly because it is a county that both the harris and trump campaigns are watching closely. it was one that trump won in 2016, that biden won no 2020 mirroring the results across michigan. kate? >> another critical county in that critical state. great to have you there, kylie. thank you from grand rapids, michigan. john, back to you. >> it's great to see what was happening in grand rapids behind kylie. the process at work there as it is across the entire country. now, the first swing state where the polls close is georgia. it happens at 7:00 p.m. with us is the former mayor of atlanta, keisha lance bottoms. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> what's the vibe in georgia? >> people are excited. a lot of people voted early, nearly half of the eligible voters voted early. we're close to passing the

2020 numbers. i think in georgia and across the country people are ready for this election to be over. we are ready to move on as a country. we've heard that in the closing messages from the vice president. >> i guess there's no real way of knowing, but four years ago georgia wasn't actually called -- we weren't able to project a winner until after we projected the winner of the presidential race. it took a long time. do you feel like it will take that long in georgia this time? >> i don't think it's going to take that long. the secretary of state has been very adamant in making sure that the elections run smoothly. although, as i was sitting here, i got a text from a friend who said her polling place has been evacuated because of a bomb threat, which is really unfortunate. there's been this elections board in georgia that's tried to call for a hand count of millions of votes, et cetera. at each turn the secretary of state has pushed back. so, early voting went very smoothly. i expect we're going to get results early from georgia. >> again, you know, we've heard there have been stories

like that about polling places, about threats being called. we're trying to track them down right now. hopefully it will turn out to be nothing and people can get back and cast their votes as necessary. fulton county, atlanta, where you were mayor, turned out in just huge numbers for president biden four years ago. there had been a sense up until the final weeks of this campaign that maybe vice president harris wasn't getting the numbers she needed to in some of these urban centers. what changed or didn'ge in regards to that in the closing days? >> well, you know, the vice president has been to georgia. i lost count. somewhere around 25 times. so, she's probably closer to 30 times during the entire time that she's been vice president. she was just there a couple of days ago, so she is pushing hard in our state. we know the vice president. she has very close personal ties in georgia. but on top of that, she's really leaned in to making sure that people in our state know

her, know what she stands for, how she has delivered for our state. and i think that's going to pay off. >> you know, since 2020 there have been republicans who have won in georgia, there have been democrats who have won in georgia statewide. has anything really changed over four years that might point in a certain direction? >> trump has not done well in georgia. he lost georgia in '20. we sent senator warnot back and donald trump back, the other candidate, he backed the other candidate in the governor's race who didn't win. so, he doesn't do well in georgia. again, as we remind people what's at stake here, i believe that people will support vice president harris. she's done a great job. she's done all that she can do. we've knocked on more than a 1. 5 million doors in the state of georgia.

people are still phone banking and knocking on doors as we speak. and she's been there to make the case for herself. >> just a few hours to go. mayor lance bottoms, great to see you in person. thank you. kate? >> we're going to show you live pictures of burke, virginia, a suburb of the nation's capital. people heading in to vote. we'll have many more live pictures for you as we watch people turn out across the country to have their voice and their vote heard. some of donald trump's final message and mood before election day. last night it was dark. even visiting his old grudge with nancy pelosi. what that means today? we'll be back.

all right. thank you for joining me back here again in cedarburg, wisconsin. it is a picturesque town where people vote in large numbers. they're expecting potentially about 95% of registered voters to come and vote in this city. it is, of course, a town in one of the blue wall states, or so-called. we're paying close attention to what is happening here. this is one of the states trump won in 2016. then biden flipped in

2020. in cedarburg alone, they have not voted democrat until 2020. they had always voted republican back to 1936. so, we are watching this very closely as a potential harbinger of what's to come for the entire state. joining me, chairman of the wisconsin republican party. thank you very much. we've seen the crowds come in. people are enthusiastic, es especially here in cedarburg. what are your hopes and worries today when it comes to your candidate? >> well, a lot of it for us, wisconsin is not a party registration state. we're one of the few, i think, that aren't. so we've been pushing very big vote early campaign for the past two years. we saw substantial early vote throughout the state of wisconsin. you know, not as big as you saw four years ago because we were in the pandemic, but still there are republican areas that i think a lot of people anticipated, so we're encouraged about that. but the truth of the matter, and the reason i push early vote traditionally the last two

years, is republicans, and i've been blunt about it and outspoken about it, republicans can't, you know, keep going in election day 100,000 votes behind and expect to make it up in 13 hours. it's just simple, in my mind. simple arithmetic. the truth of it is, we're seeing big turnout, early turnout throughout the state on mail- in and early vote. we're seeing -- i'm hearing anecdotally, pretty big turnout throughout the state. i was with the president yesterday, and i was with jd vance in la crosse. this gives you an idea of why we're a blue wall state. we've had 12 races in 24 years in wisconsin that have been decided by less than 30,000 votes. turnout is important. >> in 2020 it was 20,000 plus votes. i want to mention, we heard from one of the tabulators that one of the machines is down. they are fixing it as fast as they can, but they have two machines here, so people just have to wait a little

longer. we should mention that. i want to talk to you about donald trump, he is again sowing this doubt that there's going to be tampering with this election. do you share that concern with him when it comes to wisconsin? i know there's like a 42- step process just to count the absentee ballots here. >> yeah, wisconsin, we don't actually have voting machines here. we have tabulators, as he mentioned, so they litically count paper ballots statewide. one thing we did the state republican party here, we put 6,000 poll workers together. in wisconsin you have to recruit poll workers the year before. so we recruited almost 6,000 poll workers across the state. a lot of them have shifted out, thousands of them today, also thousands of poll watchers, people literally watch and observe, and a couple hundred lawyers. so, we're in much better position, i think, than we were in 2000 or 2022 to ensure it's a safe election in wisconsin. that's my focus. i've done some statewide recounts. i don't want to do another one.

we will if we have to, but really our focus is making sure the process is open and transparent and there are records there. if we have all of that, i don't have the concerns that some do. >> you were not charged but you were named in the georgia indictment when it comes to trying to bring fake electors to mess with the election. is that going to happen again this time? >> the only reason thatthat -- that -- well, so the issue with the electors is separate than what's going on today. i'm confident about the process we've got here. i really am. i know lots of clerks statewide. wisconsin is very local election oriented. we have over 1,850 polling places across the state. >> and they count them in each polling place so they don't go anywhere. >> you do have several counties, about 36 or so that have central count that the clerks use for their efficiency more than anything else. but i've always said, i'm more comfortable in the results if the process is open, if

places like this can be observed by our observers, and that we're in the room when the count is done. if i have those three factors, i feel a lot better, but, you know, close elections tend to get recounts. i've been involved in some before, as have the democrats. >> we've seen it before and everyone is hoping we won't see it this time. i really appreciate you coming in and hanging out with me in cedarburg, wisconsin. it's a great town. back to you, john. >> we are standing by as the polls -- the in- person polls are about to open out west in several states, including the key battleground of nevada.

i'm covering the trump campaign and this is cnn. polls open almost everywhere. reporters on the ground almost everywhere. let's start in wilmington, north carolina. miguel? >> reporter: long lines here all day long. 6:30 the polls opened. this is the shortest we've seen them so far with officials expect more. lots of

energy out here. the democrats have attend. republicans have a tent out here. lots of signs and information for voters as they go into vote. officials inside say they expected to be busy all day long. despite the fact that most people have already voted early. >> reporter: i'm here in fairfax, virginia , and also seeing a steady flow of voters coming out here. they are being met by both sides. fairfax democrats in fairfax republicans , as they head into cast their ballot. i've spoken to manny harris supporters but also have spoken to several trump supporters. when you talk to the harris supporters they say abortion and democracy other top issues. when you talk to the trump supporters they say economy and immigration, but they are all here. high energy and also stress levels are high. >> reporter: i'm isabel rosales in atlanta as we enter

the third hour of election day voting at this particular polling site. all smooth. no line. the longest we saw was just after the polls opened with 20 people back. right now it's good. all smooth. i did speak to the first person in line who said she was not sure if she was going to vote but ultimately decided to do that and how one reason was reproductive rights. >> isabel rosales out there in the field. kate, over to you. >> hello. we are in pennsylvania. i don't know why i was surprised . we have been and bensalem high school all morning meeting with voters . we met with trump voters and harris of voters which is fitting because of bucks county where we are is one of those critical swing counties in pennsylvania . how bucks county go could say a lot about how pennsylvania is going to go with its big prize of 19