i and they can also decide the balance of the senate. >> we're all going to do a little -- fund raise and send stacy a cape, she needs a full cape, she's ha superhero. thank you. we are approaching, now, the top of the 8:00 hour here on the east coast. four critical states, pennsylvania, georgia, arizona, nevada all still officially too close to call. all in with chris hayes is up and here he is, is he going to pop into the box? >> i'm here. >> chris, i don't see you, i only see me. there you go, chris hayes, take it away, my friend. >> thank you, joy, very much, good evening for those of you who are just still rolling with us, i am chris hayes, it's now been three days since election night. as apology just said we're still waiting for the final call in the 2020 presidential election. nbc news has not yet projected a winner but at this point it does seem only a matter of time. even as trump's campaign is engaging in desperate legal efforts in multiple states the electoral vote picture looks

worse and worse for the president. even donald trump's own inner circle appears to be coming to grips with the reality of the situation. breaking news just a little while ago. "the wall street journal" reporting this, quote, on thursday night advisers warn mr. trump to prepare to lose, according to a person familiar with the conversation, he expressed little interest in that advice. aides and advisers have also urged the president to recognize that no legal effort will be enough to make up mr. biden's advantage in votes. right now, by our count, joe biden has 253 electoral votes compared to 214 for donald trump, 17 short of the magic number of 270 that would make him the president-elect. biden has numerous pathways to get there, including simply winning pennsylvania where biden continues to expand his lead as the mail-in votes continue to be tallied. if he takes that state, that's the ball game, that's 270. everything else is academic. the former vice president still

continues to lead nevada, still too close to call with biden leading, biden also leading in arizona. if biden were to take nevada and arizona independent of the other states that would combine to deliver him the 270 electoral votes to take the white house. we're also keeping an eye on georgia. georgia is fascinating. georgia is a state that democrats haven't won since 1992. biden passed donald trump there this morning in the wee hours by about 500 or 600 votes. a bunch of reports out from various counties in the state, biden's now in front by more than 4,000 votes. even shows up in the decimal place there, .1 percentage points. the secretary of state is promising a recount because it is almost certainly likely to end up within the span of a recount. biden himself, former vice president, had been expected to speak tonight if news outlets declared him the president elect. that has not happened. many reports he may speak this evening. we're going to stay tuned and stay watching all of this. i want to turn to the man who's

been breaking down all this from the start, with remarkable clarity, the one and only steve kornacki. we've got some updates. we've had some updates in pennsylvania. where we at? >> i think the big one in the last hour was the pittsburgh area, allegheny county and they started the day and went through much of the day with 35,000 uncounted mail ballots there in allegheny county. remember, they had been prohibited yesterday, thursday, from going through those ballots. there had been a whole issue, a court stepping in on a mailing error, with these ballots. so today, and not just today, today at 5:00 p.m. was when they could begin reviewing just about all of these 35,000 ballots that are there. so that's a big chunk that they're only getting to right now. they did release out a small share a short while ago. biden got more than 70% of that share that was released in allegheny county, no surprise, joe biden has been averaging 75% of all mail-in ballots across

the state that have been reported in. but that update there from allegheny county boosted joe biden's lead, it had been 16,000 and change, that update came from allegheny county, now biden's lead moves to 19,000 and change, with more significantly more mail votes to come from allegheny county where pittsburgh is, more absentee a mail ballots to come from philadelphia, that's where biden's been winning that mail vote by 9-1 and also more mail bo ballots to come, smaller reports from counties around the state. but the consistent pattern has been that biden gains votes every time mail ballots are released. you can expect that 19,491 vote lead for joe biden statewide is going to grow as the mail ballots complete counting up the mail ballots. it will grow, it should grow significantly. at that point the only outstanding piece of business there in pennsylvania will be the provisional ballots, the main outstanding piece of business will be the provisional

ballots. this one is a bit of a confusing area, i think this afternoon. we think there are something on the order of 100,000 provisional ballots in pennsylvania. the number could be a little bit less than that. that's a ballpark figure. that is a higher figure, significantly higher figure than you would normally get for presidential election in pennsylvania, about 100,000 even if it was -- again, if it was short of that. typically the provisional ballots are a heavily democratic batch of votes, indeed when you look at where these provisional ballots are, we were showing 17% of them come from allegheny county which only accounts for about 10% of the population. that's something you would typically see with these ballots coming from democratic areas but this year the whole situation with the mail-in election, covid, people in republican areas potentially who wouldn't normally be voting provisionally, if they had a

mail-in ballot at home and threw it out, lost it, didn't care to use it, went into their polling place to vote like normal on election day they had to cast provisional ballots. there is a question there, of we know in general, people who voted same day, people who voted on election day in pennsylvania, that was disproportionately a trump group of voters. so how many of these 100,000, or whatever the exact number is, how many of them were republicans in a situation like i'm describing there, they happened to have a mail-in ballot, but they didn't bring it to the polls with them, they -- you know, you could come up with a create your own scenario, though, but the point is, that pool of provisional ballots, whatever exactly it is, when you consider that biden's lead here is going to rise significantly, we are talking -- i'm giving you an argument here for this pool of provisionals, may be different than we've seen in past pools of provisionals. it may be more competitive between the parties. republicans may do better in

that pool than we've expected. but what trump's going to have to do is not be competitive, not do better, he's going to have to be dominant. >> there is the key point to me on these two pools. the mail-in votes are coming in and they've been quite consistent, in these dominant margins, adding to the amount. once that's tallied there will be a lead for joe biden, we don't know what it will be, but probably tens of thousands more votes than we have now. that's a safe thing to say. at that point the path for the president would be an overwhelming majority of the remaining provisional ballots, despite the fact that a whole bunch of them are cast in democratic strongholds, that the polarization of who votes on election day was so intense that even in places like philadelphia and pittsburgh, he's winning huge margins of those people casting the provisional ballots. >> right, exactly. it has to be overwhelming. he needs to -- >> right. >> this number would have to be -- when biden -- the biden

lead increases here as all the mail comes in. i said earlier, there is some question here, i think, and we're trying to get clarity on this, there is some question, the state lists right now still about 100,000 uncounted mail absentee ballots. now, if all 100,000 of those mail absentee ballots are counted and joe biden's winning 75% of them, which is his average statewide, that would be annette gain of at least 50,000 votes. and 50,000 plus 19,000 would be almost a 70,000 vote lead for joe biden. and he has a 70,000 vote lead here then trump has to get 85% of the provisional votes. so the question is, though, the number of counted -- if you take that absentee pool are they all going to be counted or is a chunk of them not going to be counted, can that lead be lower? that might be a variable too. but it's very uphill,

absolutely. >> that's super useful, as everything you continue to do, day and night, joining me, rebecca ballhouse, the white house reporter that broke the story that trump's advisers are telling the president there is no legal way to cut into joe biden's vote advantage. rebecca, i've seen a lot of, you know, stuff floating around. this is the best, most precise reporting i've seen. what are you learning and what are people telling and what are those discussions like? >> there's a growing divide between what the president and his campaign are saying publicly and what a lot of the people around the president are telling each other and telling him privately. so what we've been hearing is that in the last 24 hours or so a growing number of aides have talked privately to the president and amongst themselves about the fact that he really needs to prepare himself for the prospect that he may lose or is likely to lose this election. we have also, you know, the legal effort is continuing, the

trump campaign put out a statement from the president today saying he intended to fight until the very end, essentially. but i think what aides are really realizing, and some are telling him, is that no matter how many legal challenges they -- here, it's not going to overcome the number of votes by which he lacks joe biden. >> that sentence in your piece about the sheer fact, and we've been sort of trying to stress this, legal challenges can work on the margins and we saw it in bush v gore when you're talking about 500 votes, a thousand votes, recounts i've covered where it was 35 votes, you can't do it with 50,000 votes, 40,000 votes. 70,000 votes. there's not a thing to do. legally. and it sounds like that basic fact has been presented to a president who i think thought that the courts could bail him out no matter what the numbers were. >> yeah, i mean, i shouldn't say that there are some aides who still do think that it's possible that these legal

challenges could sway the outcome here. i don't think it's everybody who is just doing this for show but i think there are a growing number of people who just feel like they're doing this, maybe to point out some anomalies in the voting system and, you know, the rationales that you're pointing out problems that could be fixed in the future but i do think that increasingly they don't think that this is going to be something that wins him the election. >> whose job is it in that white house to tell the president it is over or when it's over, if it's over? >> you know, that's a very good question. i think we would expect it to be his closest aides who present him -- so jared kushner, mark meadows, hope hicks. and then the campaign manager bill steppian. i think we've seen so far that, you know, he is sitting in the white house, he's got past couple days, calling, i think, you know, everybody in his phone book and trying to get their

take on what happened. i certainly don't think that it's everybody who's telling him that this is over. you know, some people like to give him bad news more than others. but i do think that that is something that he's hearing more and more and at the same time i think that people don't expect him to concede this race certainly until the legal issues have been proved. so they're saying this to him but it's not going to change his behavior. >> rebecca, great reporting as always, thank you. we're keeping our eyes closely on those closely watched, ever updating results out of pennsylvania, which could elevate joe biden immediately to presidency. it would fully deny donald trump a second term. nbc news correspondent rehema ellis. where are we at on this friday night in the city of brotherly love? >> reporter: they're counting

through the night. >> god bless them. >> reporter: and forget about the weekend. if they have votes to be counted they're going to be counting on saturday, they're going to be counting on sunday. the secretary of state who oversees elections has said that the majority of mail ballots have been counted. listen to what's still out there, as steve was pointing out. we've got 102,000 plus mail-in ballots, statewide, that have not yet been counted. here in philadelphia alone it's looking like something like 23,000 mail ballots that haven't been counted. then on top of that we've got those segregated or separated ballots which they have not yet started counting yet. the question is, how many of them are there? we're waiting to find out information on that. so these are large numbers. and if they continue to do what they've been trending to do, which is to go into biden's camp, it could be decisive but we can't say until we know. what they're going to do is just keep counting these ballots. >> all right, rehema ellis in philadelphia. there was a sort of festive

street atmosphere down there in philadelphia today. you've seen some of that in new york city as well. one other person who a lot of folks on twitter have been following obsessively. dave wasserman on the political report, working with the nbc news decision desk. dave joins me now. when you look at these four outstanding states. north carolina aside, the time lag, they're not going to have updates until november 11th. the four we're talking about, pennsylvania, arizona, georgia and nevada, we find ourselves on this friday in a position in which all four of those show biden leads. you don't want to say stop the count if you're the president. what's your assessment of the trajectories of these states and what it means for 270? >> well, biden is ahead in all four of them and probably has an easier route, at this point, to 306 electoral votes which is the same number trump won in 2016, than trump has to 270 electoral votes. now, in pennsylvania there could be around 100,000 provisionals.

trying to get a handle on that number. but so far the provisionals that have been counted in a few really red rural counties are performing close to the election day vote but we think there may be disproportionate numbers of those provisionals in the larger cities which would favor biden and might come out in the wash. the irony of the president's attacks on what he sees as nefarious things that are happening in democratic run cities is that those cities happen to be some of the only places where he's actually doing better than his 2016 numbers. you know, i dove into the numbers in milwaukee today. he actually improved his vote share in the city of milwaukee by two points for 2016 and turnout there was flat. the big difference was in the suburbs and we're seeing this in pennsylvania and michigan too, in the suburbs of milwaukee, when you include the milwaukee county suburbs outside the city,

plus washington, and the wow counties, trump is carrying them by only 54-45 as opposed to in 2016 when he carried them 56-40. that margin differential accounts for biden's entire lead in the state of wisconsin and then you move over to pennsylvania and see the same pattern going on in montgomery county, in chester county, in the allegheny county suburbs of pittsburgh. this is a clear trend where trump has done marginally better among nonwhite voters who live in central cities and that's been his only bright spot on the map. >> these are levels versus rates. we're talking, you know, losing the city 88-12 as opposed to 90-10, somewhere in that range but an improvement on 2016 even though the vast majority, and that's why we're seeing those numbers pile up the way they are, it also, i think, i mean obviously i think the conspiracy theories are facially nuts but the idea that like they're rigging it but just in a way

where trump's performance is a little better seems a little tough to stomach. >> that's right. and look there is clear evidence from the polling pre-election and from the results we've seen in other states that trump, you know, has margin ally improved his share among younger african-american men, that he did better with hispanic voters, though clearly much better in south florida and in south texas than in other metropolitan areas. we should note that. but still, the meaningful gains for biden that are accounting for his leads in these states and his victory in michigan and wisconsin are these suburban voters who came out in greater numbers than they did in 2016, and some of them defected from trump to biden. >> what do you think of the status of the votes in arizona and nevada since we talked about pennsylvania, georgia i think is also in a little different category, they're nearing the

end, automatic recount, that's a very thin margin, you know, as it is, table that for a second. arizona, nevada feel like states that we could get calls in. whereas, you know, georgia is so close i don't think that's probably going to happen there, it's an automatic recount. what's your sense in nevada and arizona? >> i don't speak for our entire decision desk team on these matters, but when we did get the ballot count in from maricopa county, the updated returns, they were not on pace as steve kornacki and others have said for what trump would need in the remaining ballots to be able to overtake biden's margins. of course we're waiting for more results to come in, we're exercising extreme caution, given the stakes. >> let me ask you, can i ask you a really frank question because i think people are -- have this question and i'd like to just say it to you and i know you work the decision desk and i admire you and john tremendously. there is a sense out there that the caution being exhibited by

news organizations of making these calls is a product of fear of the president, that were it not donald trump out there looming over everyone, were it not that we expected a tantrum, that news organizations would have made these calls already, and i just want to bring that up to you because it is a thing people are saying to hear your response to it. >> i don't really have a comment on that. we're looking at the numbers as soberly as we possibly can. and it's up to the team as a whole to make a determination. and we're going to ensure that when a call is made we have 99.5% confidence. >> there you go, that's that magic number. as we noted before, it's a very weird election in which these kinds of ballots move in such different ways. i think it's obviously made them more difficult to project forward and caution and prudence has been the watch word. dave wasserman, thanks for being with me. >> thanks, chris. nevada, megan mes early, we

got more votes today, what are we expecting? >> so we got still less votes than we were hoping for. we got about 39,000 votes out of clark county today in total through two batches ask then we got about 8,000 votes in the rurals. there are about 123,000 ballots left. mail ballots have been breaking for joe biden in clark county about 2-1 and that's been most of the ballots that are outstanding right now. that's also most of that 123,000 ballots that are left. most of those are from clark county, that includes about 55,000 mail ballots, so we're expecting again those to probably keep breaking for joe biden over donald trump. we have 60,000 provisional ballots. we have a scattering of votes out in the rurals and washo county as well. the way things are trending joe

biden has only been expanding his lead in nevada. started off .6% early hours of wednesday morning, opened up a percentage point. now at about 1.8% lead. wider and more comfortable for team biden but still, you know, has been a little bit too close to call looking at the number of votes that are out there. >> so when we talk about the numbers of votes that are out there. i mean my read on this, and, again, like you're the expert on the state, my understanding is there's not an obvious pool of obviously overwhelming trump votes that are out to be -- yet to be counted. is that a fair way to say it? >> that's correct, yeah, so the way that we've seen numbers break down we did see numbers come in from rural nevada, that is trump country, breaks 2-1 for trump over joe biden. the problem is, there aren't that many rural votes left, there's probably only about 8,000 votes between washoe county where reno is, that leans

to joe biden and the rurals themselves. there's not much room for the president to pick up ground in nevada. >> megan, thank you so much for that update from nevada. more on that tight race in georgia. want to go to priscilla tampson live in atlanta. we've gotten updates from state election officials there. what's the latest there, how much vote is out and what happens next? >> chris, with 99% of the vote count already in all eyes tonight are turning to those military absentee ballots and those provisional ballots cast on election day. today was the last day for folks to get those military absentee ballots or for the counties to receive those ballots postmarked by election day. and counties are also working through around 14,000 provisional ballots. those are folks that voted on election day, and maybe didn't have a ballot id or had some sort of issue that they had to remedy before that vote could be counted. we just learned a little while ago that fulton county, the largest county in the state, is

expected to release vote counts for around 3,800 provisional ballots. we're going to be watching that very closely. but beyond that, we're -- state officials are turning their attention to the possibility of a recount. we have heard the secretary of state mention that this is almost imminent, very likely to happen. once these vote -- once these results are certified on november the 20th, if joe biden and donald trump are still within a 0.5% margin, at this point they are within 0 p.1%. either one can request a recount. officials hope it will only take a week but the timelines can begin to draw out. it's very possible we may not have a definitive answer here until around thanksgiving, or later. chris? >> quick follow up, was it fulton county has 3,800 provisionals they're going to report out, do we know when

they're going to do that? >> they just held a meeting and said it would be coming tonight. not sure what time exactly. but they've been very hard at work there. i would expect that to be coming soon. >> that will be interesting in a couple different directions in terms of provisional ballots, how they swing and given the background of what fulton has been doing. priscilla thompson, thank you very much. it's certainly a different looking map for republicans in 2020. michael steel is a former chairman of the rnc and he joins me now. two trends that we've seen, michael, that i think are pretty interesting. the president continuing to lose ground in large metropolis areas, holding steady or maybe slightly improving in a few cities, although that's not true across the board, really getting -- in the suburbs and finding new votes in unlikely pockets but largely finding a ton of new trump voters who turn out through huge swaths of rural america. >> yeah, i mean, it's the one

thing that still remains a fascination in the body politic is how trump is able to mind these votes that no one seemingly can find or really connect with, whether they're in the political system itself or in the polling community. and it's not just, you know, among those who are trying to sort of dig at the grassroots of it. it's just throughout the entire system he has a way of connecting with this very disparate group of people and touching particular cords with them that resonates. i mean, the whole push near the end, chris, with white suburban females resulted in 55% of white women, of voting for him in this election. so there is a connection, despite everything else that people may say, think or feel that he makes. >> well, you're referencing those exit polls, which were still a little grain of salt on, they haven't been weighted yet,

particularly since we just went through another terrible polling mess. i feel like i've put my hand on the hot stove. my question for you is, i don't know if you've been excommunicated from internal conversations in republican politics and conservatism. but it's been striking to me, two things, one over the last three days, because there has been no call i've watched democrats spin a win into a loss, while republicans spin a loss into a win. i mean, it's really remarkable. like donald trump's going to lose by 6 million or 7 million votes and there were bad house losses but if you went to someone day before election day, bad news for you, max rose and -- but donald trump's going to lose. you know, mostly democrats would take the bet. i don't know why we're -- and then on the republican side i wonder, are there recriminations, are there like how have we lost seven of eight popular votes in a row. who do we need to be reaching

out to? >> i think that's going to come. you know, it's not something that happens in the immediate aftermath. particularly while the votes are still being counted. people on both sides are trying to advance the advantage that they have. if you're biden, and try to claw back from biden votes that you think you need and so you're keeping those respective narratives going. there will be, i think for both parties, because there's a lot of concern about, you know, how the democrats underperform the way they did and how the republicans, while they performed well, they still couldn't hold the white house. and i think a lot of us would contend, if there was a different candidate in the white house, the outcome may have been different so there's a lot of waiting against trump because of trump. where for the democrats that's a different conversation. it is about how their message resonates with a wider swath of the american population and they still can't seem to close that deal. >> michael steel, thank you so

much. still to come, joe biden is knocking on the door. trump campaign keeps coming up empty in court. supreme court just said about the trump push to stop counting in pennsylvania, next. don't worry, they're going to love you. oh my gosh you made it! oh shoes! i thought y'all got lost or something. did you put some ah, kale in the greens? oh thank you! we didn't forget about you! welcome to the family. thank you. wooooow. i love it! (laughter) thank you dad! (awith your next new vehicle? what kind of value are you looking for with subaru, you get kelley blue book's 2020 best resale value brand, 2020 lowest 5-year cost to own brand, and most trusted brand for six consecutive years.

no wonder kelley blue book also picked subaru as their 2020 best overall brand. a trusted brand and a proven value. it's easy to love a subaru. get 0% apr financing for 63 months on select new 2020 models, now through november 30th. ♪ ♪ ♪ this is the feeling of total protection now that we protect your identity, and mobile phone, as well as auto home and life you've never been in better hands allstate click or call for a quote today

earlier today republicans in pennsylvania asked the supreme court for an emergency order to stop the ongoing counting of mail-in ballots that arrived just after election day, just a little while ago justice samuel alito issued an order that the ballots must continue to be segregated but did not direct the counting to be stopped. the latest in a flurry of challenges the trump campaign have brought in. seven active lawsuits in pennsylvania and nevada. joining me now for more on where those stand, ari melber, the

host of the beat. and vini at a gupta, the president and ceo of the leadership conference for civil and human rights. ari, start with the supreme court. you had a secretary of state who had ordered all these counties to segregate out these ballots in case there's a legal challenge. what did the republicans -- the trump campaign want from the supreme court and what did they get? >> they got very little. this is the whole thing. sometimes we have those complex supreme court situations. this is not one of them. this is the whole ruling. chris. and as you aptly pointed out, because i know you've become practically a lawyer by osmosis, the very first thing here is a citation to what pa is already doing, to the secretary of state, putting aside, as you mentioned, any ballots that were mailed on time and were voted on time but still being counted in that three-day window, going up until tonight. this is kind of a, hey, make

sure you're doing what we said, yeah, we're doing it, okay, what the republicans were pointing out is there was a concern that maybe some parts of the state this wasn't being done. this adds a little more legal reenforcement to that what plan was. but the secretary of state, as you point out, chris, says, no, they're doing that and more importantly we learned yesterday, and for viewers who have been watching constantly, as some of us have, the number of votes in this bucket don't look to be enough to make up the margin. while any lawyer will tell you, hey, we care about everything up to the end but if you're not lawyer and following the vote count this doesn't help trump. >> that's a great point. one of the things we've been trying to get our arms around is how many of these ballots there are. it doesn't seem, from the indication we have, that there are a ton of them. we don't have -- and what does ton mean. not thuhundreds of thousands of ballots floating out there. let's talk about the legal strategy at issue here. one of the things an election

lawyer said to me, and it was maybe ned foley or others, he says the recipe or successful litigation is you get a lead and get in there to get them to, you know, stop once the count is certified. so you defend it. but you can't litigate from behind, you know, a bunch of votes. what do you think of this strategy we've seen displayed here? >> it's a strategy of desperation. i really think it's really about sowing seeds of disinformation through the sticky tack litigation around the country. the litigation is frivolous, it's baseless. and even if -- but the interesting thing here is the trump campaign neither has the law nor the facts on its side. it doesn't have the law on its side and today's 1.5 page order by justice alito to double down on what pennsylvania was already doing, it amounts to really nothing. but they also don't have the facts on the side. so even if they have the law on

the side the votes at stake in many of these litigations wouldn't change the outcome of the election. i think we have to call this for what it is, this, to me, really is a last-minute kind of effort, desperation, optics. the american voters have expressed their voice, the american voters will determine the outcome of the election. the courts are not going to determine the outcome of this election, the counting is happening. we should all be really grateful to the local election if i recalls that have been staying up all night, night after night, trying to do their jobs with a ton of distraction and noise around them, but ultimately the voters are deciding this election. >> yeah, chris, could i make one point to you? >> yeah. >> speaking just as a legal nerd, we get excited when there's big, juicy, interesting cases, not everyone does. but we do. and i know as a journalist you do sometimes. like, hey, there's something really big and thoughtful here. there's a new issue. we're tracking, obviously, every

state case. we just went through pa. i got all the other ones. they fit now on just this page. >> right, yes. >> and we just talked to pa, i'll tell you very briefly, chris, arizona had a very weak sharpie case. it was tossed. nevada had a case about the procedures for authenticating signatures. they denied the request to block things, what's called a tro. georgia had a case about absentee balloting, dismissed. north carolina, no major cases, wisconsin, no major cases, just for a recount. finally michigan they requested them to stop counting ballots in detroit. as you know, chris, the legal theory you don't want detroit to vote against you, and that was tossed. there's not a lot of good, juicy stuff here. >> thank you for saying it that way. that is very, very well expressed. you know, because sometimes, look, sometimes there are big juicy, you know, and can be scary legal issues that come

before the court. we're not really seeing that. and what strikes me here is that what we're seeing, the legal architecture of a democracy in free and fair elections in transition of power is distinct in some ways from the sort of performance of it, through democratic traditions. it is the case that the law doesn't care about when networks call things and a concession speech and about all that stuff. that's nowhere in the law or the constitution. if all of us that's the stuff we think about as the election being over. we're in a weird space between the law space it's not a another few weeks, things get certified. votes come in, we're used to something that isn't actually legal about when an election is done. >> that's right. people are like today asking, oh, my god, what happens if trump doesn't concede? and the reality is, the constitution doesn't demand a concession. the concession has always been part of the performance of a peaceful transition of power. trump, unfortunately for months

has shown himself to be who he is and refusing to commit to a peaceful transfer of power. nobody should be surprised. everything that is playing out in this moment was entirely predicted in all of the scenario planning that any of us were doing. this is literally to the playbook. but ultimately, you know, votes are votes. and the american democracy will turn on the voters and the outcome of these elections regardless of how trump feels about the outcome or not, this is an election that the american voters are going to decide. he doesn't need to give a concession speech. the votes will speak for themselves. >> ari melber, ms. gupta, that was great in clarifying and thank you for the work you're doing. and the city of philadelphia, two men with weapons and q-anon paraphernalia, arrested near a vote center last night. what can you tell us?

>> with qanon, you never know if it's foolish or frightening. in close contact with the fbi and also with local police, there was information about two men and a woman driving up from virginia to philadelphia. someone was worried about it. and provided information that they might be up to trouble. those individuals came to philly and very late at night went to a place far from where they were going to stay for the evening. that place happens to be very near the convention center in philly where the votes are being tallied and where we may be determining the next president. they thought it was a good idea to get out of the vehicle, two of them, with handguns in their possession. and turned out that in the back of this hummer, which is a vehicle they drove, was an ar-style rifle, what some people would refer to as an assault rifle with about 160 rounds total in the vehicle. so, you know, it is certainly a

disturbing situation. it is not clear, like i said, whether this is more foolish than it is frightening. but that's kind of how qanon is in general, they are in custody, they are being charged with gun offenses and possibly some other offenses, maybe even including an election crime and we're working on that. and my office will be seeking to have them detained with very substantial bail until we can get to the bottom of what all the other investigative leads will bring us. >> are you confident about the security of the folks, the many folks, the civil servants, who are in that area? i mean, i think that so far, you know, if we look at this glass half full, not a lot of people in there right now, look at this glass half full, you know, this has been a remarkably smooth election in some ways in terms of all the work that everyone had to do to get us to this point. there are some concerns the president's rhetoric and rhetoric of others around the president would lead people to

do the kinds of things that these individuals may have been doing, are you confident about the security of the situation? >> well, you know, i think you raise a good point. election day was actually very, very smooth. we did not -- despite a lot of preparation by the police and our office we did not have any kind of significant intimidation, we didn't have a bunch of militia people showing up, you know, showing firearms, anything of that sort and yesterday the biggest invasion that the crazy right wingers could muster was one neo-nazi and one proud boy and then it got darker last night when these two guys decided to take a drive and that drive, as i understand it, occurred after the speech by the president. you know, we all know that the greatest domestic terror threat in the united states right now is not jihadis from another country. the greatest domestic terror threat is white men of extreme right wing affiliations, some of

them members of hate groups and many of them have had military training. yes, it's concerning but i also think we shouldn't blow this up and assume that it connects to any other individuals, that there was any kind of a concerted effort or that this was necessarily more than people who are frankly freightened to go into any city that is diverse unless they have firearms that are ready. our investigation is going to be very thorough and we're going to find out one way or the other. will i be surprised if they're haters? no, i won't be surprised at all. but the real experience on the ground in philadelphia has been people dancing in the street, elmo dancing in the street, you have rabbis dancing in the street on one side, and then you have rather docile trump supporters on the other side. i think philly is showing itself as a great example of democracy and we shouldn't be put aside by this. >> if someone described it as a rave-like atmosphere and i saw gritties out there, of course, always wonderful to see, it

means american democracy is on the forward march. larry krazner of philadelphia, thank you so much. we're expecting new numbers out of arizona in a few minutes, which could give us a clearer picture of who will end up claiming the electoral votes. 11 electoral votes, don't go anywhere. is this a new buick? i secret santa-ed myself. i shouldn't have. but i have been very good this year. wow! wow! wow! this year, turn black friday into buick friday all month long. now during buick friday, pay no interest for 84 months on most 20-20 buick suv models.

they have businesses to grow customers to care for lives to get home to they use stamps.com print discounted postage for any letter any package any time

right from your computer all the amazing services of the post office only cheaper get our special tv offer a 4-week trial plus postage and a digital scale go to stamps.com/now and never go to the post office again! right now, according to nbc news, arizona still too close to call but joe biden is leading there and we're expecting a big batch of votes from arizona at the top of the hour. let's go to steve kornacki, the big board, with a look at where it stands right now. steve, what's the deal? >> chris, this is a potentially big one. less than 20 minutes away from it. if you've been watching the election coverage this week, all these different states, getting an update from pennsylvania or other states coming in anytime. they say that and they make you wait. that's not the case in maricopa county. when they tell you the votes are

coming, at 9:00 p.m. eastern, they mean business. that's the one thing we've been able to rely on this week. they are telling us, 9:00 p.m. eastern they're going to have another batch of votes. they've been reporting these things out in chunks of like 60,000, 75,000. i think we really do, 15, 20 minutes, have a big one coming from maricopa county. here's why it's so important. statewide in arizona, joe biden's lead is 36,800 votes. donald trump has been cutting away at that. here's the key. trump needs to win the bulk of the remaining vote in arizona if he's going to catch biden. maricopa is going to tell us if he's on pace to do that. there are about 240,000 votes left statewide to be counted here. and again, we may be getting like a quarter of them in this next installment, maybe even more potentially. the bulk of those votes, about two-thirds of them, left statewide, come from maricopa county. so what we want to see here is, donald trump at this point needs to be winning 60% or more,

probably a little bit more of the remaining votes in arizona if he's going to have a chance of overtaking joe biden. so we want to see, basically, what's the number in this new updated maricopa county? we've had a couple caydays, trus basically hitting the number he needed. >> yep. >> this morning, they had a big update from maricopa. trump missed it significantly. and i don't want to get too technical or weedsy here, but the basic suggestion here is the reason he missed it so much this morning is they've moved to a different sort of category of ballot here as they near the finish line. >> correct. >> and it's less favorable to trump. and that seems very possible. and if he comes in well under 60% again with this update, i think that will go from possible to probable, and at that point the idea of trump catching biden in arizona will go to improbable. so that's why this is such -- the number to look for here is 60%. is trump getting 60% or more when we get this update? >> that is so well explained. again, not just the number, is he getting it, but also if he's

above or below it, right? what's he missing by because that's both -- in terms of the numbers, and it's also in terms of what it might indicate about the outstanding ballots. >> that's right. again, arizona is a big state here. this is like two-thirds of it right here in maricopa county. i want to just give you -- i know you're staying on arizona, but i do think this is important. got an update from pennsylvania. we got more votes that just came in, and joe biden's lead has now pushed above 20,000. >> oh, wow. >> it's now 21,705. we got more votes from delaware county, you know, just outside philadelphia. it's one of these counties we've gotten several updates from them today. again, just what we saw here, this is going to continue, i think, through the night. 3,000 votes here, 2,000 votes there. maybe occasionally a big one from philadelphia or from allegheny county where pittsburgh is. but biden's lead now has crossed 20,000 in pennsylvania. >> all right. steve kornacki, thank you for that update. i want to bring in nbc news reporter vaughn hillyard who's in scottsdale, arizona, with the

latest perspective there. you're in a state that has received -- well, you're in scottsdale and receiving kudos from steve kornacki for their keeping their word on their reports. >> reporter: we're expecting about 73,000 new votes to drop here out of maricopa county. steve is absolutely right. they're going to be dropping here at the top of the hour. i feel like kind of what we're looking at here, chris, is, you know, sort of what the sports world went through. the nba finals is happening in pennsylvania. meanwhile here in arizona, it's the bottom of the ninth here. essentially every republican official that you talk to in the state of arizona tells me, you know, this is the moment here tonight. one telling me that we need quite a moment to even stay in this ball game here. that is the stakes of what we're looking at at this 7:00 p.m. batch. it's because when we're looking at maricopa county, there's 160,000 outstanding votes here in the county. we're expecting 73,000 tonight. but all 160,000 that are remaining are all similar

ballots. essentially these were ballots that folks received at home in the mail but then hand-dwlielivd to their polling location on election day. so this 73,000 should look like the additional 90,000 that will be released tomorrow. that is the significance here. >> right. >> and the president did not hit his mark today. steve mentioned that 59% mark. in maricopa county, he hit about 53%. when you look at the non-maricopa counties, the president needed to hit about 75%. he hit more like 60%. so not only in maricopa did he not hit his mark but also in the rural counties today he didn't hit his mark. he needs that to change in the next ten minutes. >> not to pump up the drama here, but this is genuinely like a moment where we're going to know a thing that we don't know now. if that batch comes in and it's significantly under what he needs, it's -- i wouldn't call that dispositive for the result, but it just then starts to make arizona look out of reach. and given what we know about the remaining votes in nevada, just to keep in mind that arizona

plus nevada is 270. >> reporter: and we should note that there is not a single lawsuit here in the state of arizona. i talked with the arizona gop chairwoman kelli ward. trump ally david bossie was also in town. i said at this point is there any evidence of concern that would lead you to litigation? and not a single issue was brought to anybody's attention, and yet again today on friday, there has not been a single issue that has led to a lawsuit here in the state. so that is why these republican officials here have said let the votes be counted. >> wow. >> reporter: well, that's what's happening. they just thought the trump train would continue. instead you could say this has turned into a trump trolley out here in california. >> kelli ward, who was dubbed by other republicans, chem trail kelli for her conspiracile thinking, telling vaughn hillyard that everything is on

the level is striking. with us now, shannon pettypiece, nbc reporter for nbc news digital. sha sha sh shannon, let me begin with you on this strange interregnum and what it means for the politics of the country at this moment as we inch ever closer to a decision or an announcement of some kind that's distinct from the legal -- you know, what legally happens. what do you see unfolding? >> well, normally you would expect at some point the president to make a concession speech and the typical transition to occur, and you would expect as a white house reporter to maybe have a relatively normal, calm two months ahead of you. that does not necessarily seem to be the expectation. now, will it go differently? i don't know, but nobody is banking on that. we are sort of in this gray zone. obviously the president has talked a number of times about

how he might not get behind a peaceful transfer of power when we ask him that, he often says, we'll see. but i will say, you know, within the white house and the administration, there are a lot of staffers now, i get a sense, who are starting to think about their future past trump. they are going to want to take jobs on the hill. they are going to want a job in another administration. they're going to want to get jobs in the private sector. and i do get a sense that they are in a bit of a reflective mood, sort of looking back, you know, on this experience they have, but also looking forward to what comes next and how are the next two months going to reflect on them as part of this administration. and so for all of the president talking about not wanting to, you know, concede, not wanting to give up this power, within the administration, they have been following all the steps you would normally see for a transition, following the law mandated by congress, the regular reports, ombs, sending a letter to the department and moving in that direction.

so whatever the president might want to do, there's also whatever the staff and the administration, those around him, are going to want to do. >> that's a great point about there's a lot of people involved in the presidential transition. i should say my wife, kate, wrote a great piece in the atlantic about this, that civil servants matter a tremendous amount. they can go forward in parallel to the president as he sulks. ben, the biden campaign announcing they are going to speak tonight. you're a former speechwriter. what do you say amidst this strange interregnum? >> well, i think that it's obviously difficult for him to declare victory completely when that has not been called. but at the same time, i think he has to begin to move the country towards a new chapter where he is preparing to govern. and i think he'll be talking about bringing the country together and moving past this moment we're in and towards the moment where he's going to assume office on january 20th

because to build on what you guys were just talking about. my recollection of the 2008 campaign i was on for obama, the next day we began making plans to govern. within a week i was in an office in washington for the transition. usually there are teams from the transition that go in and are meeting with counterparts at the white house and the departments and agencies of the u.s. government. we are in a covid crisis. we are in an economic crisis. every day that is lost for joe biden to begin to pursue that governing agenda is going to put him even further behind for january 20th. never mind his concern that donald trump's efforts to delegitimize this election result also makes that task of governing that much harder. if you have a large chunk of the country that has been told that this election is illegitimate, if the republican party doesn't stand up against that type of rhetoric, it makes that job of transitioning even harder. so i think the task tonight is to begin to move the country forward, begin to bring people together, begin to leave behind the toxicity of this election, and frankly to make it turn towards governing and solving the nation's problems whether

it's covid or the economy. >> i wonder if we see, you know, shannon, when you talk about staffers thinking very near term what they're going to do with their careers, which, man, do i have thoughts about that i want to share here. but, you know, whether you see other movement by other institutional players too, like if there's a kind of domino effect. >> well, i mean there's a number of people in this administration who would like to be contenders in 2024, and i don't know and i don't know if they know how to properly position themselves for that. mike pompeo, secretary of state, someone who has often talked about a 2024 candidate, the vice president, just a few examples. we don't really know -- i mean should, you know, joe biden become the next president, what position donald trump is going to have in the republican party. and there is a big sense that he is going to remain the

republican kingmaker and the most person in the republican party. and how these players are going to position themselves in that, i think they're all trying to figure that out right now. >> ben rhodes and shannon pettypiece, thank you for making time. thank you at home for joining us tonight. one thing before we go. if you're out celebrating, should you have occasion to celebrate this weekend, the country is in the midst of a pandemic raging out of control. if you celebrate, please do outside and as safely as possible. we set a new record for cases today. please, please, please be careful. msnbc's coverage continues now with nicolle wallace. good evening, nicolle. >> thank you, chris. great show. thanks to all of you at home. we're so -- it's night four of our ongoing election coverage. i'm nicolle wallace in for rachel. if you didn't see rachel's twitter feed, you might not know that she had a close contact test positive for covid. she's tested ne