Will We Have a President-Elect Tonight?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcoming twenty four to seven News national correspondent Rory O'Neil
the program, Rory, good to have you.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Back, Good morning, good morning, Happy election dig.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Yes, sir, indeed, what about we know a little bit
about the situation hereon Douglas County. Brian Cruz, Douglas County
Election commissioner said, you know, it's a typical here that
probably about Friday, we'll know for sure about the totals.
What about the national picture, Rory, particularly Trump, Harris, when

(00:30):
do you think we'll know?

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yeah, Pennsylvania is the one we're really focusing on. But
don't forget Arizona either. You know, we heard from officials
in Maracopa County they say it could take ten to
thirteen days to count the ballots in Arizona. Pennsylvania. They're
bogged down by the rule that says they couldn't start
even opening the envelopes for absentee ballots until a few

(00:54):
hours ago. They've got more than a million of those
to go through. Last time, it took about four days
or Pennsylvania to come up with a result. They say
they have some new technology, more workers on hand. They're
hoping to get that number of days down a bit.
But if this raises as close as we think it is,
this really could take a while to figure out who wins.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
I think Trump asked a good question. I think it
was yesterday or last nineties. So what's going on inside
those machines for seven to thirteen days? I mean, come on.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
Well, in some cases, let's take Pennsylvania, they were going
to change the law after twenty twenty to let them
at least open the envelopes and start the process of
those absentee ballots, the mail in ballots beforehand, but the
two chambers of the House and Senate are controlled by
opposing parties, and they could never get a deal done.
In Arizona, it's a new election law there that lets

(01:46):
people gives them five days to correct a ballot that
may have been found in error. The signature didn't match
or whatever it was, so it gives them five extra
days to go back and correct it. Now we're talking,
by the way, about the final totals here, and in
many cases, you well know that news organizations often call
the winner. Yeah, well before we get the final vote total,

(02:08):
so we may have enough statistical information to call a
state for Paris or Trump. But again, and when the
margin evera has been so small, we may have to
wait to get even more of that absentee ballot data
to be able to be sure.

Speaker 3 (02:21):
All right now, there is genuine panic in some of
the Donald Trump circles over this poll released by the
veteran pollster in Iowa, Jay and Seltzer. And she's not
just some lunatic who put together some poll in the
basement of her Clive, Iowa condo. She's done a lot
of them over the years. She actually had Trump beating

(02:42):
Hillary Clinton in twenty sixteen when most other polls did not.
And she says that Kamala Harris is going to win Iowa.
Number one, Roy, do you believe it? Number two is
in an outlier? Number three? What about her data which
says older women are going to break for Kamala Harris
in Iowa and across the country.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
I believe it in that. I believe that she has
put together a great series of polls. I'm not exactly
sure that there is a margin Harris margin that's that high,
but a couple of polls had said that race in
Iowa is closer than we suspect, and a lot of
it relates to the new abortion laws that went into
effect in Iowa between her September poll and the one

(03:27):
that came out Saturday, and they're seeing much more motivation
by women to come out and vote, and that may
be helping Harris. Democrats are also saying, hey, look at
where Iowa's going. That's a good, high quality poll. Voters
in Iowa aren't too different from voters in Wisconsin and Michigan,
so maybe we can read something into that with this
quality poll in Iowa. That's what's got Democrats excited.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
Well another, I mean, do you think it's going to happen?
I mean, she's been right on a lot of polls.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yeah, well, I mean that's why it was such a surprise.
I think it's a little optimist pick for the Harris team.
But also keep in mind that poll said forty seven
to forty four, so that leaves nine points that are
up there, either for the third party candidates or undecided.
So again, you know, she didn't say that it was Harris
by a majority. It was forty seven forty four, still
within the margin of error, and again, with nine points outstanding,

(04:19):
Iowa could still easily go for Donald Trump.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
There's another minute here with twenty four to seven News
Rory o' neil, Roy, what kind of challenges do you
expect we'll see.

Speaker 2 (04:29):
Well, a lot of it has to do with people
who were being kept off the voter rolls or they
were trying to attempt to purge voter roles. Those were
a lot of the lawsuits about that. The custody issues
surrounding some of the absentee ballots, how they're process and
where they go. A lot of these lawsuits are just
going to go away. We've seen more than two hundred
filed in this election season, most of them in the

(04:50):
state of Georgia after they adopted a bunch of new
election rules there. You know, I think we'll have to
wait and see what some of the issues are. If
people are saying they couldn't vote today, they were turned
away at the polls, or something else may have happened,
Let's see what develops today. But I think a lot
of the previous losses are going to fall by the wayside.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
It's going to be a long night regardless. Rory, thanks
great to have you on. Thanks, I have a good
election day. Rory O'Neil, twenty four to seven News Correspondent,