good morning. it is 5:00 a.m. on the east coast. 2:00 a.m. out west. you're back with nbc news coverage of decision 2020. we're going all night long here. i'm kate snow. let's take a look at where things stand at this hour if maybe you took a nap or went to bed for a while. here is where we're at. vice president joe biden with 224 electoral college votes. the president with 213.

those numbers don't tell the full story, though, because look at all the gray on that map. those are states that have not yet been projected by nbc news, by our decision desk. we don't have enough information or the race is too tight. we'll go through them in a moment. you can see a lot of red states and blue that were expected. a lot of tossup states are still outstanding including pennsylvania, one of the most critical tossup states. too early to call at this hour with 74% of the vote in. in georgia another race we've been following all night long. you've heard chuck todd say if you were with us earlier we're waiting for metro areas, areas around atlanta to come in. north carolina, the same situation. a lot of votes still yet to be counted. too close to call by our metrics. in michigan, it is too early to call that race. you see president trump with a lead but, again, only 77% of the vote in right now. in arizona we can say that joe

biden is leading in the state of arizona but, again, it is too early to call. we have standards at nbc. we wait for enough votes to make a determination. and wisconsin, another one of the northern states we're going to be watching closely in the coming hours, they are still counting votes. it is too close to call there. in nevada too early to call at this hour. the difference of 25,000 votes, just about 79% of the vote. in maine, too close to call although joe biden in the state does have the lead at this hour. and in alaska too early to call at this hour. 36% in. taking a look at the full map of the u.s., you can see the blue states, the red states, and you can see all those gray states are still outstanding and will need a lot of time. in some cases potentially days.

steve patterson is in battleground, michigan, one of those states we have not been able to project yet. steve, you've been up all night talking to folks. what's the sense on the ground for, "a," how long it will take to get any resolution and, "b," which way it might be going? >> reporter: first of all the first thing made abundantly clear is michigan was never going to be decided on tuesday night. that's been made clear from the secretary of state to city clerks to township managers. the rough estimate coming into the week we wouldn't have anything clearly verified by about friday. that's been pushed forward because of the diligence and staffing up of workers push to get these ballots verified. the crush of absentee ballots coming in that tuesday night was never realistic for the state of michigan. and michigan has already

shattered records. the secretary of state saying probably 5.2 million votes cast overall when you look at the total picture. michigan workers have never dealt with anything like that adding on to the 2.5 million in-person votes. that's for a number of reasons. first of all, the spike in the coronavirus, which has led to this influx of absentee ballots, is surging in several communities throughout the state. the second is the republican state legislature which basically said that these ballots can't be counted, these absentee ballots can't be counted until the day of election day which means this was always, again, going to be pushed to the end of the week. the secretary of state now saying we are likely not able to get anything, even an unofficial count until later on tonight. 7:00 p.m. tonight, when we'll

see a clearer picture but, again, several more days until we get real verified results in the state of michigan. that was always what it was going to be. that's normal in this area. >> if people remember in 2016, that was a state democrats thought hillary clinton would have no problem carrying, and it was -- i remember the moment we found out election night 2016 that she was going to lose it. >> reporter: yeah, 0.23%, less than 11,000 votes separated those two candidates in the trump victory. specifically focusing on big urban areas, democrats wanted to shore up the vote in places like detroit, nearly 80% black. there were several campaigns focusing on this area.

they were worried because of the absentee ballots and worried, frankly, about voter turnout. they did not turn out the way they did in 2008 in that historic election or 2012 like they should have in 2016. the city clerk was estimating a 50% voter turnout. that's going to be more like 55% to 53% which will shatter the record set here for 20 years. detroiters did show up. michiganders did show up to the polls in record numbers. again, we're not going to know the full picture until at least a few days from now. >> americans showed up at the polls. steve patterson, thank you so much for staying up all night for us. appreciate it. to maura barrett in pittsburgh, pennsylvania, of course a state that we are watching so closely this hour. reminus again, pennsylvania as a

whole is going to be counting absentee and mail-in ballots for several days per the supreme court. >> reporter: exactly, kate. a state law prior to election day ruled any ballots postmarked by election day, so anymore before 8:00 p.m., they will continue counting them as they come in anytime before friday at 5:00 p.m. we went into election day knowing that it was likely pennsylvania would not be called because election officials in all 67 counties will be processing and counselling ballots throughout the next three days, so we still have quite a ways ahead of us, kate. i'm standing outside of the warehouse here in allegheny county, where they were counting ballots until early hours this morning, about 2:00 a.m. the county decided to take a break. these 200 workers processing ballots decided to take some rest because they've been going nonstop since 7:00 a.m. they originally had told us they

were going to be working nonstop but in shifts. this is the same group of people that had been working all day. what we've been hearing from election officials prior to election day they were not going to trade speed over accuracy, and that's what we're seeing here. allegheny county will restart counting and reporting at 10:00 a.m. >> and is there a thought, maura, some of those ballots being counted now, the mail-in ballots, might be different than what we're seeing when we look at the numbers so far for allegheny county? >> reporter: absolutely and that's the picture we're seeing mostly across the state as well. there were nearly 3 million mail-in ballots requested across pennsylvania. and when you look at how the voter registration played out 2 million of those were democratic. and so the joe biden campaign definitely leaning on waiting to see how these mail-in ballots will come in because we were expecting they would lean democratic. that leaves about 6 million registered voters that could have voted in person yesterday, so we'll see how those numbers

ultimately come in. on the other side the donald trump campaign focusing on getting their in-person turnout in the more rural, conservative counties in the center part of the state hoping to balance out whatever margins joe biden might be able to eat into in the coming days as we get these results especially in philadelphia and allegheny counties. >> all right, maura barrett, thank you for sticking with us. appreciate it. let's go to susan. we tried to go to her earlier. she's with the lincoln project. she's a republican strategist. susan, nice to see you. thanks for staying up. maybe you got a nap in. i sure didn't. not yet. as we head into wednesday morning now, there were folks who thought joe biden -- vice president biden might have sealed the deal last night, that it might have been over that quickly. i think there are some democrats disappoint that had it wasn't. where do you see the state of play as we head into the morning?

>> well, kate, i should tell you i was one of those people that i thought at this hour we would have have seen a decisive win for joe biden. but we're not in a bad position as far as joe biden goes when we look at the map. i know nbc has not called arizona for joe biden but it does look like it's trending that way with the majority of the vote in. and that's a pickup. that's good news for biden. i think there were democrats and some republicans like myself who were hoping to see georgia, which still could flip but it's less likely or north carolina bring some early news that would have led us to believe biden would have won. we still have michigan, wisconsin, and pennsylvania in play. and michigan, we just saw -- i'm sorry, wisconsin, we saw milwaukee come in and now joe biden is leading in votes just by 11,000 but this race is far from over. and just when you start doing

the math it's worth noting that it is possible that joe biden can still get to 270 without pennsylvania. >> let me ask you a hypothetical. if vice president biden does become president, what happens to the republican party? who is the standard-bearer? there's such a split. you represent the split from president trump. what happens next? >> i'm not sure. to be honest, like i said, i was hoping for a decisive joe biden victory, and that would have helped lead to the end of trumpism. and now we know it's still alive and it will be for some time to come, and i think it's incumbent on people like myself and other republicans to continue to call out what i call trump enablers, those who know better and still defend the president. so there's a lot more work to be had. but if vice president biden is elected it will certainly make my job easier.

>> you certainly are on that side of it. susan, thank you for being with us. appreciate it. we'll take a quick break and will be back with more decision 2020 coverage. we've made a lot of breakfasts. and along the way, we noticed something was missing. a warm cinnamon roll for breakfast, or with breakfast. a fluffy blueberry muffin, from the drive thru you're already driving through. a glazed apple fritter, which might find its way into your coffee. these are options every breakfast-haver should have, and now... they do. meet the new bakery sweets at mcdonald's ♪ ba da ba ba ba vicks vapopatch. easy to wear with soothing vicks vapors for her, for you, for the whole family. trusted soothing vapors, from vicks from america's number one serum brand.

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good morning. we are back on this wednesday morning with our decision 2020 coverage. we're going to look at wisconsin. we have more votes in. you might have heard chuck todd talk about milwaukee county. 89% in. we've got -- and now to

milwaukee county. a lot more votes in. chuck would call it a dump of votes in the system. that's going to be very significant when it comes -- if we could flip back to the state numbers again -- when it comes to looking at the state of wisconsin we see biden up by 0.3 percentage points, still too close to call, only 89% of the vote in. that milwaukee county vote is helping joe biden at the moment. and it may be very, very tight in wisconsin. let's go to carol lee who is covering the biden campaign for us and talk about what we just saw there. that's good news in wisconsin. >> reporter: yeah, this is essentially, kate, what the biden campaign has been urging patience for for telling his

supporters that they should wait for all the votes to be counted, that this race is far from over. the biden and trump campaign have been preparing supporters for this scenario. a scenario in which the early returns show the president in the lead and then waiting for those mail-in ballots to be counted that are likely to go more in joe biden's favor and so the vice president's campaign, what they're saying now this is a, quote, slog, they're ready for this to take some time. they've been aware of that from the beginning, but for them all their focus is on that blue wall. everything you've just been talking about, pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, and also a little bit on the sunbelt where you still have outstanding north carolina, georgia, arizona. arizona's critical the biden campaign would like to flip that state. president trump won it in 2016.

but now it's a waiting game and potentially a legal game as we heard from the president last night falsely claiming that he had won. and so the biden campaign is geared up for that but really waiting to see these updates from those key states, pennsylvania, michigan and wisconsin. >> carol lee, thank you for that update. appreciate it. let's bring in david jolly who is with us. we haven't spoken all night. i assume you've been up all night. have you had any breaks? >> right. >> as you look at wisconsin, let's talk about that first since we were just talking about it and the numbers from milwaukee county, boding well for joe biden. a president a few hours ago saying he's going to win wisconsin. what about that blue wall, and can trump do what he did in 2016? >> it looks like the wall is starting to crack. the ballots that came in in milwaukee, we may see a similar situation in michigan with votes that are about to be dumped in

the detroit area and a few other counties that would skew towards bid biden, waiting on metro atlanta and georgia. it very well may be that here in the coming hours of this morning we see biden take a lead in those states considered the blue wall. pennsylvania might not be dispositive anymore. biden may be able to get to 270 without pennsylvania. given the president's comments that he intended to challenge these results legally, the time to challenge it would have been last night to prevent the ballots from being counted. there's no precedent for that, it would have been wrong and rightfully a lot of people have denounced the president's intent. once the votes are counted the president's claims are going to get even more tricky to try to undo ballots that have already been counted. >> yes, legally speaking. saying that, do you still suspect they will try that? they have fleets of lawyers at

the ready. >> i anticipate they'll do something. from four years of this president he makes these broad statements and then it turns out that staff has to implement it on a much smaller scale. what i would say to a lot of people who rightfully denounced the president's comments, don't worry about him behaving in an autocratic way. the president of the united states does not have an autocratic authority to command the disposition of our elections. he is operating as a candidate, and just like candidate biden, he has certain redress options available to him to go before a court and make his case. but there really appear to be very little to no claims he could validly make before a court so, look, warren christopher in 2000 during bush/gore said this is not a constitutional crisis. this is how a free society holds free elections. they go to a court for certain determines determinations. trump may do that but i don't think will be successful at it.

>> he may have friendly courts because of what republicans have been able to do in our judicial system. i want to ask about congress. we haven't talked much about the house tonight but it does look like democrats maintain their majority but maybe not as much as it was before. and republicans look to be doing pretty well in the senate. certainly with the races we've called so far we don't see a democratic takeover in the senate. >> this is a much tighter night nationally, i think, than anybody really anticipated, including the presidential race. very tight. the idea of biden winning handily certainly did not happen. there were significant thoughts that the senate would go to democrats. i don't think that happens. and then the house, democrats lost seats. if there's a bright lining for republicans tonight it's the republican house members picked up seats and, importantly, kate, many of those are female republican, newly elected. on the house side they have expanded their representation among women.

that is a good thing regardless of one's party affiliation. >> it is changing. thanks so much for being with us. appreciate it. get some rest. we'll take a quick break and be back with our decision 2020 election coverage. geico makes the claims process so easy... ...i can file and manage my claim, all on the geico app. it's not just easy. it's giving-your-dog -your-fitness-tracker easy. oh, good boy. yes, you got it! woo! already got my 40,000 steps today... can i get a what what! no pain, no gain! haha... it's geico easy. with fast and convenient claims service. look how fast i'm running! good boy, chester. nature made helps you win the night. our extended release melatonin helps you fall asleep and stay asleep. nature made. the #1 pharmacist recommended vitamin and supplement brand.

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welcome back to nbc news decision 2020 coverage. 5:25 in the morning on the east coast. but in europe it's a lot later. it's midday over there. the whole world watching tonight's u.s. election. let's bring in international

correspondent kier simmons in london. what are people making of the stalemate that we have, this wait and see? >> reporter: yeah, you're right, kate. everything that you guys have been watching, people have been watching around the world, either through the day in asia and australia, through the night here in europe. it was in the early hours statements from president trump and vice president biden came out. and the nature of the trump presidency demonstrating that america can make decisions that really rock the world has meant that there is polarization everywhere. so, for example, in israel we're hearing people saying they really hope president trump is re-elected, in many parts of europe the opposite, the hope this is the end of the trump presidency. not everywhere, though. the slovenian prime minister, the first european leader, is very right wing, to congratulate president trump calling it a triumph and sending by tweet his congratulations.

but, kate, also the indecision at this stage is worrying many politicians in europe. in germany the biggest economy in europe, really the leaders of europe, politicians there, former ambassador saying the polarization in america is bad news for the european-american alliance because it risks indecision, challenges of that nature. while america's friends are worrying, america's foes are trying to leverage this, if you like. in russia they're talking about american chaos. in china, the chinese government saying it's not taking sides, but chinese state media trying to disparage american democracy, kate. >> keir simmons with us from london. i'm sure the world will continue to watch as this gets sorted out over the coming hours and days. we'll take a quick break.

(musica) it is 5:30 a.m. on the east coast, 2:30 a.m. on the west coast. it's been a long night. let's look where things stand, those races that are still outstanding for the president. right now you see the road to 270 there and here is the map. all those gray states still waiting to be decided. many of th a