and happy election day. i'm andrea mitchell at msnbc election headquarters in new york, as millions of voters across the country join those millions more who have already voted, shattering all records for an american election. the candidates could not be more different in their approaches to the big challenges facing our country. a pandemic nearing an even darker hour. an economy on the edge. unemployment, racial inequality, and a partisan divide ripping communities apart. after phoning supporters from the white house today, president trump will meet with campaign staffers at his virginia headquarters and national republican committee operators to rally the troops one last

time. >> we feel very good. we've had crowds nobody's ever had before. i think that translates into a lot of votes and we'll see very soon, it reminds me, i hope it reminds me of four years ago. tremendous changes have taken place over the last week. >> at what point will you declare victory? >> when there's victory. >> joe biden going to church today, visiting his son beau's grave site, then to his childhood home in scranton where he wrote on the wall, "from this house to the white house with the grace of god." he is making a series of local stops across pennsylvania, a state which could be the key to victory for both sides. >> we can do it. thank you, thank you, thank you. >> thank you, joe! >> both candidates using every minute into late last night at their rallies.

>> get your friends, get your family, get your neighbors, get your co-workers, and get out and vote. most important election perhaps in the history of our country. >> my message to you is simple. the power to change this country is in your hands. in your hands. >> with your help, your devotion, and your drive, we are going to keep on working. we are going to keep on fighting. and we are going to keep on winning, winning, winning. >> i believe it should be loud and clear that it's time for donald trump to pack his bags and go home. >> and we have correspondents across the country in critical battleground states. but we begin with co-hosts of "weekend today," nbc

correspondent peter alexander at the white house and kristen welker in philadelphia. peter, the president is sounding optimistic today, a little hoarse from those rallies yesterday. what's the reality in trump world about their expectations? >> reporter: andrea, you played one of the quotes from the president this morning on fox & friends when asked when he will declare a victory, he says, when there is victory. he goes on to say, "if there is victory, i think we'll have a victory tonight." the parking lot is insisting he's not playing games but you get a sensitive hsense of his mindset, but the president is focused on pennsylvania where they'll be receiving mail-in ballots over the next three days, that process upheld by the supreme court. the president said last night it would cause chaos and create cheating and saying on twitter that it would induce violence in the streets. twitter even flagged that tweet on that topic. the secretary of state in

pennsylvania saying the president knows that it is very difficult to cheat or commit fraud on the elections there. but this is because the president is heavily focused on that state of pennsylvania, not the only one, his aides and allies tell me he thinks those crowds will translate into turnout for him in key places like florida. they're confident about georgia and north carolina, ohio certainly. but wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, those ones look a lot tighter for the president. notably, president trump has been trying to turn attention away from this issue of the pandemic. we heard him last night again saying we're rounding the corner on this. notably, andrea, as the president said that, we also heard from "the washington post" the words of dr. deborah birx, the president's white house coronavirus task force coordinator, contradicting the president, saying that we need to take much more aggressive action as we head into what she described as the most concerning and deadly stage of this pandemic, andrea. >> indeed, and he's a bit behind

his schedule, although he doesn't have a whole lot on his schedule early today. right now, kristen welker is in philadelphia where joe biden is getting off the plane there, which is a key part of winning the state. the large part of the community there in philadelphia did not turn out in significant enough numbers for hillary clinton. kristen welker, you know very well, you're looking down of course at these pictures also of joe biden arriving, getting into his car. he's going to make a number of unscheduled stops, we don't know all the places hale visit today, he was at the carpenters' union hall in scranton as well of course as his childhood home in scranton. kristen, what do we know about the outlook from their campaign? >> reporter: that's right, his stops in philadelphia are going to be aimed at energizing voters. in terms of how the campaign is

feeling at this hour, i was just talking to some campaign official who say they feel confident they've left it all on the field. there has been a lot of focus on pennsylvania in the closing hours of this campaign. vice president biden here overnight in pittsburgh with lady gaga. as you mentioned, earlier today he was in scranton, his childhood home, in fact he visited the home where he spent some of his early years, andrea, and he wrote this, i'll just reiterate it, i know you read it at the top of the show, to remind our viewers, he wrote "from this house to the white house by grace of god, joe biden, 11/3/2020." there you see it. so feeling nostalgic today, going back to the place where it all began for him, andrea. why so much focus on pennsylvania? the biden campaign says they don't need to win this state in order to win the white house. but it will all but block president trump's path to reelection. that's part of where there has been so much focus here. now, there has been focus on

other key states as well. throughout the midwest, they're feeling confident there. that's part of why they're feeling cautiously optimistic, andrea. >> kristen welker and peter alexander, thanks to both of you, a beginning of a long day, a long night, you guys have been up for a long night already. let's break it all down with robert gibbs, former press secretary of the obama administration and spokesman for candidate obama's 2008 campaign. "washington post" national political reporter robert costa, moderator of "washington week" on pbs and of course pennsylvania native. and "washington post" columnivity eugene robinson who hails from south carolina, another big state with a big race there. robert gibbs, give us your analysis on the big picture and what you're seeing in the south. that southern path, what will happen in florida, georgia, importantly, and north carolina, if joe biden wins any of those, and certainly georgia is

something they're looking at very closely and north carolina has real opportunities, that could really block the president's path to victory no matter what happens in pennsylvania. >> yeah, absolutely. i think we're talking about some of these states, particularly georgia. texas has got a lot of press in the last few days as well. we're talking about those states, that demonstrates that joe biden has multiple paths to put together the 270 electoral votes. if you're sitting in donald trump's headquarters today, you understand you can't just be good today, you have to be perfect. they've got to win florida, georgia, north carolina, texas, arizona, that whole sun belt sweep, along with iowa and ohio. and if they can win all those, which is certainly possible, but if they can win all those, then we're into the upper midwestern states of wisconsin, michigan, and pennsylvania. and we know based on how those vote counts are going to go, the fact that they can't count those early votes until, in many places, starting this morning, then it's going to take several days. i think we'll get a sense in

that sun belt sweep, at 10:00 eastern tonight, what do we know in terms of whether this is going to get an earlier wrap-up or is this going to go into next week in that upper midwestern battleground. >> james carville was talking to us yesterday at this time that he thinks it is going to be known in the 10:00 hour. he does think, because of the early reporting in florida, georgia, north carolina, and the extraordinary work that has been done in georgia in particular by stacey abrams over the years, he was suggesting that we really are going to know something serious, something very important that early rather than -- >> well, again, if you're trump, you have to win all those states, right? so if north carolina comes in, if georgia comes in and it's biden, it's almost all but certain that donald trump's path to reelection is over, right? so i think we'll be watching that 7:00 eastern hour as the majority of florida closes, the panhandle at 8:00, and about an

hour after some of those polls close, a lot of those states, florida has a lot of practice in counting these early votes. you'll see a lot of votes go onto the board and we'll get a sense starting in those hours about an hour after the polls close, in those three important states, what direction this election is going in. >> and robert costa, the president has taken every opportunity to spread false claims about mail-in balloting, especially in pennsylvania which has had more lawsuits. again, he did it on the tarmac in kenosha, wisconsin just last night. >> i'm very concerned about pennsylvania. philadelphia is known for bad things happening with voting. i'm very concerned when the court allows you to go outside of the november 3 date and they allow you to could all sort of things for an extended period of time. bad things will happen. >> casting shade on the supreme court, robert, and philadelphia voters, but that's not what the

law says, that's not what experience tells us. we don't get these votes counted, the mail-in ballots and the absentee ballots, robert, until days later. >> there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud. and every vote should count. at news organizations, we're going to be patient to make sure the counts are in and correct before any kind of declaration is made. for president trump, it's all about what his campaign calls game day voting. they have not encouraged mail-in balloting. they believe republican voters, even in a pandemic, will turn out for president trump. and what they've been trying to do in the closing days is rally that white voter in different rural and exurban areas with president trump's message of his own grievances and going to rally after rally and saying he identifies with them and their grievances as he espouses his own. there's a lot of risk in this strategy, even republicans acknowledge to me.

because of the pandemic, some senior voters may not turn out. and if they don't trust the postal service, they may end up staying home. it is, as they say, about turnout for both sides. for the trump campaign it's especially about turnout today. >> you've been spending a lot of time in pennsylvania. what is your feel for the way the keystone state is going? >> i've been talking to a lot of my sources in pennsylvania's first district, the collar counties of philadelphia. there seems to be an erosion of support for president trump, anecdotally, because of the pandemic, among women in the philadelphia suburbs, senior voters. but my sources in western pennsylvania say president trump's turnout in the pittsburgh area, in central pennsylvania, remains very strong, perhaps even close to 2016 levels. so that means it all comes down to northeastern pennsylvania. that's why the biden campaign, vice president biden was there today. will those working class democrats, union democrats, bob casey democrats, a little more conservative, if northeastern

pennsylvania, turn on president trump? that's the question of the day. >> that's exactly what my sources there are saying. we've both been talking to all these people. but again, it's an election day question that we won't know for quite a while. eugene robinson, we have a mix of anxiety over 2016 from democrats. democrats are feeling more confident than they were four years ago but very nervous. i want to ask you about south carolina, about your home state. because there was an interview on "morning joe" today, i think we have that tape, with jaime harrison who talked about his roots, and he's always been a happy warrior, i've known him since he was working for jim clyburn, but this was a really different note we saw from him about the historic nature of his race against lindsey graham. >> my grandfather could not always vote here in south carolina. and i named my eldest son after

him. one of the last things i did with my grandfather in 2004 was to go vote and he passed away a few weeks afterwards. my eldest son is named after my grandfather. to go with him and mark the ballot, it meant a whole lot. it meant a whole lot. >> what would it mean to you from south carolina, with your mom and your roots, to see two black senators from south carolina? if that's what happens. >> that would be absolutely extraordinary in the state where the civil war began, and the state that was in the grips of jim crow segregation when i was a little kid. in south carolina, the idea that south carolina would have two black senators is just -- i'm

gobsmacked at the idea that this actually could happen, also that it could happen. jaime harrison, incredibly well-financed, has been shown by polls to be in a statistical tie, basically, with senator lindsey graham. this is in the context of south carolina still being, i believe, a republican state. i believe president trump will carry the state. but lindsey graham has had some problems from both sides, both from the trumpy side and the non-trumpy side of the republican party in south carolina. and jaime harrison has proved just to be an extraordinarily talented candidate. he's been a really good candidate for south carolina who has run on local issues, local connections, constituent services, sort of bread and

butter politics in every corner of the state. he has not neglected the northwest corner of the state which is whiter, more conservative, around greenville, spartanburg, he spent a lot of time up there trying to get every vote he can out of that corner of the state. obviously this is a race that i'm going to follow. i mean, jaime harrison is literally my homeboy, from orangeburg, south carolina. we'll see how this impose. this is the closest race lindsey graham has ever had. >> and it would require a lot of ticket-splitting because lindsey graham was probably aided among conservatives there by his role in the supreme court nomination that he rammed through almost singlehandedly. so it's election night, could be election night or week or month, we don't know, but let's see what happens. i'm so glad to start it with you guys. robert gibbs, robert costa, eugene robinson, thank you all.

that southern swing, georgia could be an early indicator of what's to come tonight. what are voters saying? and biden campaign senior adviser symone sanders has an update on the campaign's closing strategy. you're watching special election day coverage on "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. (a mix of announcer voices) we are heading towards the 2020 presidential election, ....how to ensure your vote counts......because of covid-19 ......polling locations ......confusion is high.. (fisherman vo) how do i register to vote?

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we're gonna call our friends. we're gonna harass our neighbors. we'll call people we owe money, people who owe us money, people we're mad at, people we broke up with. we're calling them to action. >> stacey abrams firing up voters on monday as democrats hope her groundwork will help turn georgia from red to blue. this year there are two senate seats on the line that could hold the key to control of the senate. nbc news reporter priscilla thompson is at a polling

location in duluth. priscilla, what are you seeing so far today? >> reporter: andrea, no long lines here but certainly a lot of enthusiasm on the ground. i just spoke to a man, 36 years old, and this is his first time voting in an election. he tells me that he made the decision very last-minute. he wasn't sure up until very recently, which is why he showed up to vote today. take a listen to what he said. >> every voice, every vote counts. i'm a plaqblack man, it's a lot going on with our community. it's a lot going on in the world. that push, to be personal, i don't feel like trump has been -- has been right, basically. >> reporter: and that's something that i've heard from a couple of black voters that i've spoken to here in gwinnett county. it's interesting because ten years ago, this county did not look the way that it does now. it was a primarily white county,

largely republican. now these demographics are changing and it could help dems pick it up this time around. >> priscilla thompson, thanks for being with us on election day. joining me now, biden campaign senior adviser symone sanders. happy election day, i hope it's a happy day as you get results. how important is pennsylvania? >> it's great to be with you today, andrea. we're excited about election day. we feel good coming into today. we had a very raucous and exciting geotv weekend where we knocked on over 1.3 million doors and sent millions of texts. we feel good. we feel as if we're coming into election day with as many paths to 270 as possible. president trump doesn't have as many paths. he'll need to overperform what he did in 2016 in places like

georgia, north carolina, michigan, and arizona, if he wants to make up the gap in order to be victorious. that's not saying there's not a path for the president. but we feel confident about our path. you asked about pennsylvania. we feel good about pennsylvania. but it is going to be close. and there is a path to 270 for our campaign without pennsylvania. but we are playing to win. >> is georgia a part of that path to 270 without pennsylvania? >> absolutely, absolutely. in georgia, over the last three days of early vote, we saw a 67% increase in african-american voters who voted early in the last three days. that says to me that there's enthusiasm on the ground, andrea. and there's enthusiasm for our campaign. as you know, vice president biden, former president obama, and senator kamala harris were all campaigning in georgia. your reporter, i just saw, was in duluth, senator harris was there on sunday.

we feel good about our options in georgia and feel like we can win georgia. we don't have to win georgia but we believe it's in play. voters, when they go to the ballot box and check that box for joe biden and kamala harris, but also check that box for jon ossoff and reverend rafael wa warnock. >> there is some complaining that you guys were not competing actively enough in miami-dade, for instance. what about black turnout and trying to persuade the cuban americans as well that all those false charges of joe biden is a socialist are nonsense? >> to be clear -- >> -- the people of color and the tloolatino vote and black v in miami-dade? >> i know the president and his allies would like to assert vice president's values and senator harris' for that matter, but

voters know that vice president biden and senator harris are patriots while the president has done nothing but sowed chaos and division and failed the american people in his attempt, if we can call it that, to coral this virus. as it relates to florida specifically, we do feel good about florida. it is close, again. it is competitive. but we think we can win there. but again, we do have a path to 270 on florida. our campaign has invested a significant amount of resources in the state. every principal in our campaign has barnstormed florida in the last couple of weeks, specifically in this last week in the closing days. we think we can be competitive. the numbers are looking good. and we're just looking forward to folks getting out there, get to go the polls. the last thing i'll say, andrea, if people are in line today, stay in line. you have the right to vote. the lines are long, bring a sandwich with you, a box lunch, a bottle of water. the people will be heard across

the country today. regardless of what the president tries to say, it will be the people of america who decide who the next president of the united states is. >> symone sanders, thanks so much, good to see you. and pennsylvania predictions. in 2016, former governor ed rendell warned of trouble for the hillary clinton campaign in his home state. what is he seeing today? we'll talk to him in a minute. this is a special election day edition of "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. reports" only on msnbc there are ordinary eggs... and the best. which egg tastes more farm-fresh and delicious? only eggland's best. with more vitamins d and e and 25% less saturated fat? only eggland's best. better taste, better nutrition, better eggs.

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welcome back. all eyes are on pennsylvania today because winning that state is critical for president trump's path to victory or it could be joe biden's easy way to block the president's reelection if everything else works out for him. joining me now, nbc's rehema ellis is at the fillmore in south philadelphia. rehema, what are you seeing from voters there? >> reporter: i want to tell you what happened this morning at 5:45. the line was wrapped around the block, andrea, people were concerned they would have to wait, so they came in early. then they came in here where there's been a sporadic turnout of voters. what's important to tell you is this. four years ago, 62% of the eligible voters in this region

turned out to vote. already they've had 50% turn their votes in in mail-in and just this morning, they've had 20% of those eligible voters voting in person right here. so they've already exceeded the voter turnout from four years ago. what's on their minds? covid-19 and police reform. what's on the ballot here in philadelphia? a question about reforming police and eliminating stop and frisk. but all officials are telling everyone, we've got a lot of mail-in ballots and it's going to take time, be patient and be calm. andrea? >> indeed, thanks so much, rehema ellis in south philly. joe biden has a narrow edge in pennsylvania. nbc news/massist polls shows joe biden leading by five points, down from a poll in september. joining me is former pennsylvania governor ed rendell who was with me right here on election day in 2016. ed, let me remind you what you told us then, you said that

hillary clinton was in trouble, you didn't like the way the votes were turning out in the suburbs. two weeks ago you were a little more optimistic for joe biden saying that biden was cutting off the president's margin in some of the rural counties that trump carried so strongly in 2016. you said that and increased voting in the suburbs, the collar communities around philly, could be enough for biden to win depending on turnout. so what are you seeing today? >> more reinforcement for that judgment, andrea. the turnout, as rehema said, is spectacular. it's barely past 1:00 -- excuse me, 12:00, and we've got more votes in the district in south philly than we had four years ago. the mail vote, if you get 10% of the democrats to drop and 10% of the republicans to drop and give biden the slight lead among the 10% of the republicans to biden,

slightly biden among the independents, biden should win the mail vote by almost a million-vote margin. it's going to be very hard given the turnout in philadelphia and in the philadelphia suburbs, which is very good today, it will be very hard for donald trump to get anywhere near that million-vote deficit that he'll have. but of course we remind everyone, the mail vote in pennsylvania won't be counted until friday. so i suspect donald trump will be leading pennsylvania by midnight tonight. >> in the suburbs, the women who did not vote for hillary clinton in large enough numbers, we're seeing a 20 to 22-point gender gap in our latest nbc news/"wall street journal" poll nationally. what are we seeing in the suburbs in philadelphia, those important counties? >> a perfect example, andrea, bucks county, hillary clinton won it by two points. i've seen a republican poll that has joe biden up nine points.

he's gained seven points. overall in the suburbs, hillary carried the four collar counties by 180,000 votes. i think joe biden will carry them by at least 300,000 votes. when you combine that with the fact that joe biden, because he's a working class guy, not a park avenue guy, joe biden is cutting into the margin in the rural areas, where hillary lost 70/30 in one rural county, joe is going to lose 64/36, and he'll shave four, five, six points off those margins in every rural county in the state, that should add up to a four or five-point win for joe biden. >> ed rendell, no one knows pennsylvania better on the democratic or republican side, you know it so well, thank you so much. rhetoric versus reality. president trump trying to sow doubt in our electoral system. ahead, we're separating fact from fiction. and next up, north carolina a must-win for president trump.

this is a special election day edition. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. let me tell you something,

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wcau, our affiliate station in philadelphia. >> america has found out the president is trying to rip it away. we're going to add a public option. we're going to make it cheaper for people, make it more available. we're going to make sure we're in a situation where we're dealing with the pandemic. i've laid out clearly how to do it. it's just a very different -- in four years, so much has changed. i'm not running -- the only thing that's going to be similar is hopefully the integrity of the white house, hopefully the decency and the fact that we tell the truth. but there's a totally different set of circumstances this time.

>> reporter: your stance on expanding the supreme court, you did say you would tell them before the election. so here we are, are you open to expanding the supreme court? >> i have told them. i told them two weeks ago. and that is that i'm still not a fan of court-packing. i don't think that's the way to go. but what i've done, i'm going to do, if i win, when i'm declared winner, we're going to put together a group of constitutional scholars, liberal, conservative, and mainstream scholars who in fact are going to make a recommendation within 180 days of what if anything should be done to augment or change the way in which the courts now function within the constitution. and depending what they have to say, i may in fact adopt it, may not adopt any of it. but there's a whole lot of things that have been put out there like the university of pennsylvania law school and other law schools -- >> reporter: you would be open to anything they might come up

with? >> i'm open to what they might say. >> reporter: thank you so much for your time, mr. vice president. how are you feeling? >> i'm feeling good, pennsylvania is my home state, we just went to scranton, we'll finish up in delaware. i feel good about it. i feel good about it. >> reporter: thanks for your time. >> thank you. >> as joe biden is saying, he's feeling good, his home state of pennsylvania adopted -- his native state, of course he ended up moving to wilmington when his father lost his job when he was 7 years old. there he is in pennsylvania, he will be there throughout daylight, his team will get together in philadelphia tonight of course with running mate kamala harris. the fight for north carolina, meanwhile, is critical, very close. big focus on the turnout of black voters in this battleground state. it's also a closely-fought senate race that could determine the control of the senate. nbc's trymaine lee is in durham, north carolina. what are you hearing from voters

there? >> reporter: so far it's been a relatively slow day. so many folks have come out early to vote. those who have come out said they wanted to be here today to vote on election day. they didn't want to mess around with sending mail-in ballots or absentee, they wanted to be here today. and top of mind was handling of covid-19. certainly racial justice was on the line too. also, that after four years of president donald trump and the winking and nodding at white supremacists, folks wanted to come out and make their voice heard with the possibility of playing a role in the outcome of the election. >> trymaine, any word on that incident over the weekend when children and others involved in a peaceful protest, according to reports from people at the scene, were pepper-surprised while trying to protest and then go to the polls, and a lot of people didn't get to vote. >> reporter: andrea, it's pretty shocking, even in a state with a long history of voter

suppression and intimidation. police out of nowhere started pepper spraying a crowd of elderly folks and kids, trying to exercise their right to vote. a federal lawsuit has been filed by the lawyers committee for civil rights under law, alleging that the rights of those folks marching to the polls were violated and they allege excessive force against the police department and the sheriff. it's a pretty concerning image that we saw, not just image alone, right, but folks in this very high stakes, important election, including that senate race you mentioned earlier, were trying to exercise their rights and those rights were snuffed out. >> a hard-fought senate race where thom tillis was hanging on, the democratic candidate had his own sex scandal along waith way. we'll have to see what happens in north carolina. president trump is again suggesting that the counting should stop tonight before all those early votes are included.

>> i think it's a terrible thing when ballots can be collected after an election. i think it's a terrible thing when people or states are allowed to, uh, tabulate ballots for a long period of time after the election is over. >> and that is raising the prospect of lawsuits, which he has also signaled, possible protests and other delays. joining me now is paul submitting, the vice president for litigation and strategy at the campaign legal center and a professor at georgetown university law center, and jeremy bash, former chief of staff of the cia and the pentagon. paul smith, you just heard the president. has the country ever formally declared a winner on election night with all those outstanding absentee ballots? >> no, there's no process for a formal declaration of a winner for actually several weeks. the states take their time counting the votes, certifications are done, and then of course the electoral college meets. what we're used to on election night is networks declaring a

winner and often the loser conceding but that's all a very unofficial process. >> as we saw with bush and gore, there was actually a concession from al gore that was taken back, then it was litigated for more than 30 days up to the supreme court. paul, let's talk about the legal issues here, because you've got a supreme court that is obviously now, with a new republican conservative, is potentially a 6-3 supreme court. but that's not the way they've been coming down so far. we haven't seen her vote on a case yet, but in any case there have been some different rulings so far in wisconsin and pennsylvania. >> right, they've gone back and forth on whether to allow

treason. but it's an unprecedented situation where, a, an american president is accusing his predecessor of treason. >> and more than that, andrea, the president has called for his opponents to be jailed. he's unleashed the justice department to interfere in criminal cases to benefit the president's political cronies. and of course he's called into question the validity, the sanctity of the american vote, the crown jewel in our democracy, the election of a president. and to paul's point and to the discussion earlier, we have to have patience. we have to have calm. if the scenario unfolds tonight where we don't know who is president and it comes down to pennsylvania, a state whose legislature and whose supreme court has said that votes that come in over the next couple of days must be counted and must be as part of any final tally, we may not know the results for a few days. now, most of the people that i

talked to inside the biden world believe that we'll have a very good sense of the trajectory of the race nationally tonight. but if we're in a situation where it comes down to president preside -- pennsylvania, i do expect president trump to go to the supreme court. although i think paul is correct that the supreme court will stay out of it, because that would be judicially andethical ethically correct, but we can't have the president calling for chaos and undoing the will of the people. >> let me just play what bob bauer, who is leading the legal team for the biden campaign, what he had to say to rachel maddow last night. >> everybody knows what they're up to. election officials know what they're up to. the courts know what they're up to. we'll see whether they try it. if they try it, it will be one of the most clumsy, doomed to

failure legal initiatives i've seen in my entire career. >> paul smith, what's your response to that? >> well, we all know what he's thinking of trying to do but he really doesn't have a path to make it happen. it's important to understand that the vast majority of the ballots that are going to be counted in pennsylvania in the next few days, if we end up having to wait that long for a verdict, will be votes that were cast days, weeks ago. they've just been sitting there piling up. this is not about allowing people to vote late. it is true that under the law as it currently stands, a few ballots may trickle in in the next few days if they were postmarked or mailed by today. but that's not the issue. they may even take that issue back to the supreme court. but the bottom line is we have millions of people who have already voted, voted early as they could by mail, and those ballots will be sitting there tonight, waiting to be counted. whatever the president says or does won't change the fact that those ballots need to be counted. >> and jeremy, one of the things that we have to be concerned about or maybe have to be concerned about is what's

happening from overseas. for the first time you have a director of national intelligence who is a political partisan and who has been shaping statements. how much does that concern you? the intelligence community and what they're going to do. >> it's it's concerning. first of all, i do think the apolitical nature of our military is a blessing from our founding fathers. and as the entire senior leadership of the military has pointed out, they'll play absolutely no role, nor should they in any way in enforcing the outcome of the election. this is -- we've had a tradition of a peaceful transfer of power and i don't expect that to change. i'm, of course, as you noted, worried the intelligence community has become highly politicized. and if the dni, the director of national intelligence walks out and makes some declaration at odds with the facts, that's going to be highly concerning. just back to paul's point about trickling in votes. i hope that's right, although i just have to say, there are about 500,000 votes outstanding

in pennsylvania. if the margin of error tonight is 80,000 or 90,000 votes, which is not inconceivable, we still have maybe 250,000 votes yet to come in, then it's going to be important that we wait, that we let that process pan out, that we let those votes be counted and not have the courts jumping in to prevent the pennsylvania authorities from doing their sworn duty. >> indeed, last time the margin that president trump won by was 44,000 in pennsylvania. jeremy bash, paul smith, thanks very much. history is being made in this election. and it's the direction that the country will take that is gripping the nation and the world. that's why the one person we wanted to talk to is nbc presidential historian michael beschloss, author most recently of "presidents of war." michael, thanks for being with us on election day. >> thank you, andrea. can you believe it's here? >> it's here already. it doesn't feel like it's here because we don't know how long

it's going to last. but what historic precedence are there for a nation this divided and polarized and what we can learn from the way the nation recovered after those elections? >> we have elections. the idea is if there are differences among the american people, the election should be about that. take a look at 1940 for instance. franklin roosevelt was running against wendell wilke. he was saying we should stay out of war with germany and japan. hitler and the imperial japanese and roosevelt was saying, i think we have to be prepared and we have to have a draft. he was very courageous. if that had not happened, if wilke had been elected or roosevelt had been less courageous, we might not have been prepare forward world war ii. there's some chance the united states would have had to live in a world dominated by the cruelty of nazi germany and the imperial japanese. >> what about sbh of the more -- the older examples. let's talk about the civil war. abraham lincoln. >> absolutely.

if you take a look at something at an election which had a difference, 1860 was an election that decided whether we would as a country be half slave or half free. the fact abraham lincoln won meant there would be a civil war that would extinguish slavery, the evil of slavery and bring the nation together. the other thing, when there's an election that's that important you want to have a high turnout. for instance, 1960 when john kennedy was running against richard nixon, it was the highest turnout of modern times. almost 63%. you go up to 2016, you think there were big differences between hillary clinton and donald trump. the turnout four years ago was only about 55%. maybe one of the silver linings of what we've seen this year is that we may have a turnout that rivals some of the highest in history. >> have we come up with a new model for the way americans

vote? do you think everything will go back to election day, start to finish? we've always had early voting in some states out west. colorado has done it, oregon and others. now it seems as though people are getting used to this idea of early voting and early mail-in voting. >> that's the way it should be. why should someone be penalized because they may not be able to get off their job on election day and, therefore, are not able to vote? that's putting it at a disadvantage, a lot of americans who do not deserve that. we as a society have to make it possible for everyone to participate as much as possible. and that's why when you see some of the things that donald trump has said, even in the last 24 hours about stopping the counting of the votes which would in many cases, violate the laws of the 50 states. that is entirely out of keeping with anything we've heard from any previous president on an election day or before. >> when fdr was running against hoofer in terms of the way he

brought the country together, you know, really a completely different model of what the role of the federal government should be with the new deal. >> right. >> how well did he bring the country along? >> he brought it along magnificently, and that's the reason we remain one country, although people in 1932 as you suggest had real differences over whether the government should get involved in rescuing americans from the ravages of the great depression. and that was because president roosevelt, once he was inaugurated, saw part of his job as, you know, proposing policies that would be controversial. you always have to do that in a crisis. but at the same time, he knew that just as important a part of the president's job is to unify americans and serve as chief of state. and that's something i hope that we understand and it's very important for our presidents to return to. divide americans, yes, but also

remember that the founders wanted our president to be the symbol of american unity, not to divide us. >> michael beschloss, as always, thanks so much for the context. really appreciate that. and that does it for a special election day edition of "andrea mitchell reports." please vote if you haven't already. make sure you've got a mask and a plan. msnbc's special election coverage beginning at 4:00 p.m. eastern with nicolle wallace and chris hayes at 5:00. then at 6:00, brian williams, rachel maddow, joy reid and nicolle wallace and steve kornacki at the big board. i'll be part of the team on your local nbc station along with lester holt, savannah guthrie and chuck todd at 7:00 p.m. eastern. for now, chuck todd is up next with "mtp daily" only on msnbc. . we worried over loved ones, over money, over our planet,

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if it's tuesday, it is election day. ballots are being processed, voters are voting. a staggering 100 million people already voted. all across america, a lot of democracy is in action. welcome to tuesday. and not just any tuesday. election day tuesday. it's "meet the press daily." i'm chuck todd at nbc news' election headquarters right here in new york city. the big day is here. biden has been making stops in pennsylvania on his way back to delaware where he'll watch the returns tonight. president trump will be at the white hous