2022 midterm elections live updates: GOP ‘will accept’ results
Candidates are making last-ditch efforts to sway undecided voters in the last few days before the Nov. 8 election, with the current and former presidents lending their voices to campaign rallies.
On Sunday, President Joe Biden heads to Westchester County, N.Y., where he’ll campaign with Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul. She is in a tightening race against Republican challenger Lee Zeldin.
It comes a day after he joined former President Barack Obama for rallies in Pennsylvania, where former Republican President Donald Trump campaigned, as well.
A handful of races will determine which party controls both congressional chambers. While Republicans are expected to take over the House of Representatives, the Senate is a toss-up.
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While the issues of the economy, inflation and abortion rights have been driving voters to the polls across both parties, inflation could cost the Democrats the midterms – including losing both the House and Senate to the GOP.
How long will it take for Pennsylvania results?
Though it is unlikely the closest races will be called in Pennsylvania on Election Day, the country probably won’t be waiting as long for the commonwealth’s results as it did in 2020.
The areas that didn’t finish counting until Saturday two years ago are predicting they’ll be finished on Wednesday this year.
That’s the takeaway after reports from Acting Secretary of State Leigh Chapman and election directors in Pennsylvania’s biggest counties.
In 2020, it took four days of counting mail-in ballots before Joe Biden won the presidential contest in Pennsylvania, with the state’s 20 electoral votes sending him to the White House.
Election officials are not anticipating the wave of mail-in votes this year, and midterms tend not to yield as high of a turnout as presidential years. But the mailed ballots that come in cannot be opened until Election Day, according to Pennsylvania law.
“This delay does not mean anything nefarious is happening. It simply means that the process is working as it is designed to work in Pennsylvania and that election officials are doing their job to count every vote,” Chapman said.
– Candy Woodall
Unrelated bomb scare puts voting on hold in East Harlem
In New York, an early voting site in the predominantly Black and Hispanic neighborhood of East Harlem was temporarily closed late Sunday morning because of a bomb scare. The threat was unrelated to voting, said NYPD spokesperson Detective Arthur Tsui.
The New York Police Department alerted the New York City Board of Elections, which initiated emergency protocols.
“Staff along with a handful of voters were escorted out safely,” the Board of Elections tweeted. The Board of Elections said an all-clear was received and voting has resumed around 1 p.m.
– Ken Tran
NH Gov. Chris Sununu: ‘Heat is too high all across America’
Commenting on the recent attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi and rising political violence in the United States, New Hampshire Republican Gov. Chris Sununu said “the heat is too high all across America.”
Sununu, who had to cancel his own inauguration ceremony…
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