Election Day 2012
Local and National Coverage of November 6th
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MISSOULA, Mont. – It is 7 a.m. and the polls have just opened in Montana. Voters in this state of about a million people will finally be casting ballots in the most expensive U.S. Senate race in state history. The contest pits incumbent Democrat Jon Tester against the state’s sole U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg in a pricey battle that has subjected voters to more than 100,000 ad airings and thousands of mailings from the campaigns and outside groups. The outside money in this campaign has been so significant it prompted an entire Frontline investigation into what's been going on out here. -
Harbinger of a long night? "As is tradition, the small New Hampshire hamlet of Dixville Notch held its vote right at midnight Tuesday, and its residents rendered a split decision, with President Obama and Mitt Romney receiving five votes apiece," reports our Morning Line political blog.
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LEXINGTON, Ky. - From Renee Shaw, host of Connections, a series exploring Kentucky’s diverse minority communities, and host of election night coverage - A discussion with three Kentuckians about the presidential race: a Democrat, a Republican, and one independent who feels jilted by both choices. They discuss messages, policies, advertising, the impact of the debates, and parse out worse-case scenarios of a statistical tie in the electoral college vote. http://www.ket.org/cgi-bin/cheetah/watch_video.pl?nola=kcwrs+000809&altdir=&template= -
DENVER -- This is Megan Verlee, politics reporter for Colorado Public Radio. CPR will have a team of journalists in the field today and working as late as necessary tonight to report on the races, the results, and the conduct of the election itself here in the Centennial state. -
Reid Wilson of the National Journal: Pollsters are looking at the same data but coming to vastly different conclusions about Hispanic, young and other voters. In every election, the electorate grows and non-white voters increase, he said, and it will be interesting to see which pollsters interpreted the election outcome correctly.
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On the other side of Pennsylvania, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports on Election Day photo ID confusion, court orders and robo-emails. -
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CARY, N.C. -- Election officials report large crowds when polls opened and a steady turnout after that. It's predicted 69 percent of the state's 6.6 million registered voters will cast ballots. Forty-one percent of those registered voters have already taken advantage of early voting. -
The Guardian (UK) presents Election 2012 in graphic novel form.
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NEW YORK CITY -- How are New Yorkers who don’t speak English as a first language learning about relocated poll stations? It wasn’t until about 6 p.m. on Monday that the NYC Board of Elections finalized where residents in hurricane-stricken areas of South Brooklyn would vote today.
An improvised poll location in a Coney Island school is right across the street from a massive housing development with five high-rises, some with as many as 30 stories. However, two Russian women from there said many Russian-speaking voters did not know where to vote.
Raiza Kletkina said through a translator that she would alert her neighbors to the new polling place but said it might be hard for many of them to get there. “We have no elevators, no heat,” she said. -
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Very cool gif of the changing colors of the American political landscape since 1960 - www.princeton.edu
by Alex Bruns via Princeton.edu 11/6/2012 8:13:01 PM -
One of the closest U.S. Senate races today pits Republican Linda McMahon against Democrat Chris Murphy in Connecticut. Talking Points Memo and the Hartford Courant report that McMahon is using a quirk in election law to describe herself as an independent. Her sample ballot handed out to poll-goers even tells voters to choose McMahon and Barack Obama, the presidential candidate she didn't endorse.
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U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS -- A non-binding referendum is on the ballot: "Are you in favor of the legislature enacting legislation that allows for the production, processing, manufacturing and distribution of industrial hemp in the Virgin Islands?" Feedback on the issue has been mixed. -
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The Citizen Media Law Project has a chart outlining each state's rules for photography and video inside polling places. Use it to see if it may be illegal for you to post your filled out ballot on Instagram and other social media sites.
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DENVER -- The Colorado Secretary of State's office says voters are on pace to break 2008's turnout numbers, when 92 percent of the state's active voters cast ballots. "There's a steady stream" at polling places, according to spokesman Rich Coolidge. Coolidge says there have been a few "hiccups" reported in the crucial swing counties of Arapahoe and Jefferson, with election judges misinterpreting Colorado's voter ID requirements and poll workers who misread their poll books. In general, says Coolidge, "So far so good."
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LOS ANGELES -- This is Zach Behrens, Editor-in-Chief of blogs at KCET-TV in Los Angeles. It's an interesting year for California because of a new law playing out for the first time in a statewide general election: The top two vote-getters in the primary, regardless of party affiliation, went on to today's general election. That means there are some districts where voters have to choose between two Democrats or two Republicans. This affects both statewide and congressional races (Example: In Congressional District 31, where Democrats have the advantage, two Republicans are facing off). And perhaps one of the most interesting state propositions is 37, which would require many food products to be labeled if ingredients include genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
We'll also be following statewide races with live results starting at 8 p.m. PST. -
Just up in our livestream: Some voters in the battleground state of Pennsylvania were confused about whether they could vote without a state-issued photo I.D. Ray Suarez reports. Watch his report above.
But in early October, a judge postponed the controversial requirement and ordered the state not to enforce it. -
That Pennsylvania requirement was one of a number of voter identification laws litigated in recent months, and largely put off by the courts to be decided after this election. Campaigns and outside groups will have thousands of lawyers at polling stations and campaign headquarters ready to challenge any irregularities.
On November 5, Jeffrey Brown spoke with Curt Anderson, an Associated Press legal affairs writer based in Miami, and Michael Waldman, president of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, a nonpartisan public policy institute, about controversial voter I.D. laws and other possible legal issue that could arise and cause confusion at the polls. -
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Very Houdini-esque - www.nationaljournal.com
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Earlier today, President Obama made a phone call to a campaign volunteer during a visit to a campaign field office in Chicago. Photo by Jason Reed/Reuters.
by PBS NewsHour via Newshour.s3.amazonaws:80 11/6/2012 9:32:41 PM -
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NEW YORK -- The running theme in New York City today is how difficult is has been to vote, given that many new polling stations were not announced until late on Monday. But a Coney Island voter bucked the trend.
“It takes too much energy to complain,” said Ramona Beard, a big grin across her face and her arm around her daughter. “My daughter just got her bachelor’s degree! Other people are living out of boxes and I still have my apartment, my clothes, my sneakers. I’m happy to be alive.”
“It was devastating but I’m like, ‘God, I thank you,’ because we didn’t lose everything,” she said. “I don’t have a lot but I have the power to vote.” -
Mitt Romney got a surprise endorsement from musician Meat Loaf at a high school rally last week.
The shot above is of Meat Loaf watching as Romney speaks during a campaign rally on Thursday in Defiance, Ohio. Photo by Justin Sullivan / Getty Images.by PBS NewsHour via Newshour.s3.amazonaws:80 11/6/2012 10:12:29 PM -
Keep track with our electoral college count online ... and off.
by Meena Ganesan via Instagr.am 11/6/2012 10:25:12 PM -
Here’s a look at the House and Senate races to keep an eye on tonight.
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BOISE, Idaho -- Here's some insight into what Election Day is like for folks in the west. At 4 p.m. mountain time, four hours before southern Idaho polls close and five hours before polls close up north, the first polls close in the east coast. Then starts the downhill rush to call races and make predictions -- sometimes before the last voters here even get to cast their ballots. (NOTE - this post was updated to reflect some earlier incorrect time math...)
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A Chicago woman’s contractions were five minutes apart when she arrived at her polling place. Despite already being in labor, 21-year-old Galicia Malone, a first-time voter, stopped to cast her ballot on her way to the hospital. Huffington Post has the story.
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Voters cast their ballots at UAW Local 14 in Toledo, Ohio. Photo by J. D. Pooley/Getty Images.
by PBS NewsHour via Newshour.s3.amazonaws:80 11/6/2012 10:34:33 PM
