>> well, john erpenbach and frid risser were talking investigation.nd as i said a few minutes ago, i don't think these people are going to let this go whatsoever. sources are telling me there are people who are thing county closely. i think it's going to be in the news for weeks to come. as i said, you can't make it up and i don't think we're going to have a real decision here for quite some time. it's one for the archives new york doubt. and i think that's very aggressive on the part of mr. tate, who has worked tirelessly to get a successful outcome for the democrats. he knows the landscape as good as anybody in this state. i think it is a statement that's very accurate in that position. >> ed schultz joining us from madison, wisconsin. thank you, ed. >> and rachel, i just want to tell you, you got a ton of fans out here. >> it's all my relatives. [ applause ] >> you need to know that. great to be with you. thank you very much. >> i appreciate it. thanks, you guys. all right, i love you, too. >>> one race still too close to call, the race for distric

joining us for the second time tonight is wisconsin state senator john erpenbach, who you may recall is one of the 14 democrats in the state senate who left the state earlier this year in an attempt to halt passage of the union-stripping bill. senator erpenbach, thank you for joining us again, sir. >> thank you, rachel. >> the best democrats could do is to go 3-3 tonight, three wins and three losses. right now we do not know what has happened, what the final result is going to be in the alberta darling race. do you have any further information for us about what we have to expect there about when things will come in and what we should look for? >> well, we've been told now by waukesha county that we won't know for at least an hour what the results are in waukesha county. which is simply ridiculous. they have the same voting machines everybody else does. and it's coming down to waukesha county yet again here in the state of wisconsin. so that's real frustrating. if you recall, in the supreme court race we had here in wisconsin a short time ago, jo ann cloppenburg was officially declare

senator erpenbach, i see you are among friends tonight. how is the mood there in madison? >> it's good, rachel. i'd like to introduce you to madison, wisconsin. madison, wisconsin, rachel maddow. [ cheers and applause ] >> that is very, very, very impressive. >> they love ya. >> i guess i'm moving. >> yeah, you should move to madison. you'd love it here. >> i have a feeling that might be a good idea. senator, what do you think is going to happen today? we heard confidence from the democratic party the last couple of weeks, but in recent days we've heard a lot of caution these races are likely due to be close, if not in some cases impossible for democrats to get some pick ups. >> right, i do think we'll do very well tonight, three or four seats is possible, but we're in uncharted territory if you look at any election cycle and that usually means a lot of trouble for incumbents and undecides usually break 2-1 for the normal challenger. what we're dealing with, we've never been in this territory before so we don't know what to expect. i know we had thousands of people through

senator erpenbach, good to see you. >> good to see you too and welcome back. >> thank you. things are going great for your side of things coming up to tuesday's elections. what are your expectations for these elections, what do you think is going to happen? >> well, i tell you what, rachel, we could win anywhere from two seats to four or five seats, it depends. it is close in two seats and we are ahead in three other seats. keep in mind, we're ahead in republican areas, republican state senate seats, some of these seats have been held by a republican for over 100 years so just the fact that we're leading in three of them and it's a tossup in three other seats it says a lot for what we're trying to do. >> one of those democrats has successfully defended his seat, two more, what do you think about those races? >> we have bob wirch in southeastern wisconsin, it is built on labor tradition, goes way back as far as labor families are concern. bob should be in good shape. jim represents northeastern wisconsin and he's been working real hard. i've been up in his district now four

. >> john erpenbach, senator with us tonight.oughts on these last two races going head to head, too close to call. what do you make of them? >> just the fact that as john said sandy pasch is doing as well as she's doing in what is really a pretty hardcore republican part of the state says an awful lot about sandy pasch's support. but more importantly, it sends a much larger message because i think when you take this issue of collective bargaining and medicaid and everything that the governor's tried to do in the state of wisconsin, you take it statewide, that should probably scare the hell out of scott walker, if he's seeing what's going on in roberta darling's district. >> i think people across wisconsin and people across the country that are following this closely, john, are realizing how heavy a lift this is for democrats in the challenge. these are all republican districts, obviously. although president obama did win them in 2008, walker won them when he won election in 2010. so how do you dissect this at this point? i mean,

. >> john erpenbach, senator with us tonight. your thoughts on these last two races going head to head, too close to call. what do you make of them? >> just the fact that as john said sandy pasch is doing as well as she's doing in what is really a pretty hardcore republican part of the state says an awful lot about sandy pasch's support. but more importantly, it sends a much larger message because i think when you take this issue of collective bargaining and medicaid and everything that the governor's tried to do in the state of wisconsin, you take it statewide, that should probably scare the hell out of scott walker, if he's seeing what's going on in roberta darling's district. >> i think people across wisconsin and people across the country that are following this closely, john, are realizing how heavy a lift this is for democrats in the challenge. these are all republican districts, obviously. although president obama did win them in 2008, walker won them when he won election in 2010. so how do you dissect this at this point?

jon erpenbach, we'll have him on "the ed show" later tonight, we have the ground game, boots opt ground, but we don't have the money they have. this is a battle of two titans going at it in two different ways. obviously, you can't underscore the impact the tea party groups have had here the last five days, and that's why it's so hard to judge what's going to happen in some of these other districts other than the 14th, which we were talking about. a lot of it is unpredictable. what does a great turnout mean? does that mean the citizens united money worked, does that mean republicans have awakened to support a governor in the 30 percentile when it comes to approval? this race has everything. it is so futuristic, it is so on the cutting edge, it is transforming how politics is going to be run, i think, in this country. and it is a real message to ohio with senate bill 5 that is now finally on the ballot, where they got far more signatures than they needed. it's a real message to michigan where rick snyder and his radical agenda and some of the things they have passed in that state such as

john erpenbach, great to have you with us tonight. senator. >> good to see you. >> good to see you. we are being told now that district 2 has been called and senator bob cowles has won that race over nancy nusbaum. so that was, as we said in our first segment tonight, that was one that was expected to be won by the republicans. your response. >> it doesn't surprise me. that was probably one of the tougher districts that we're dealing with here in the recalls. and nancy worked really hard. obviously had some personal tragedy here toward the end of the campaign. but just the fact that she decided to do what she did says a lot about nancy nusbaum. and i'm really, really glad she ran. >> okay. we'll have more from madison, wisconsin when we come back here on "the ed show" on msnbc. stay with us. [ male announcer ] this is the network. a network of possibilities. excuse me? my grandfather was born in this village. [ automated voice speaks foreign language ] [ male announcer ] in here, everyone speaks the same language. ♪ in here, forklifts drive themselves. no, he doesn't have it. yeah,