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American Morning
America Votes 2002: The Final Hours
Aired November 04, 2002 - 09:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Right now the election outlook across America seems to boil down to just four words, too close to call.
And CNN's senior political correspondent Candy Crowley joins us now with the very latest on the country's most crucial races.
Good morning -- Candy.
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula. I'm up in your neck of the woods, by the way. I'm keeping...
ZAHN: I heard that.
CROWLEY: Right.
ZAHN: We came down here, you traveled north.
CROWLEY: Absolutely.
ZAHN: Good frequent flier mileage this month.
CROWLEY: You got it. You got it.
Listen, there are so many close races we couldn't possibly -- you don't have enough time left in your show. But let me - let me tell you about a couple of them.
It always sort of starts with Minnesota because there has been so much tragedy and so much interesting going on in that state. There were two polls out recently from two different newspapers in Minnesota, one of them had Mondale, Walter Mondale, the former vice president, up by six and the other had Norm Coleman up by a similar amount.
So we now go into what is a very critical time and they're going to have a debate this morning. That debate could prove critical, because, first of all, it's within 24 hours of polls opening and because we do know that debates can move whole. So this comes at quite a time, and it certainly will be on the evening newscasts in Minnesota. So that's one of our too close to calls.
I think, secondly, you'd have to look at New Hampshire. This was -- is currently a Republican seat. It is between John Sununu and Governor Jean Shaheen. Absolutely a toss-up, according to the University of New Hampshire's survey that we saw. We have it at Sununu, 46, Shaheen, 45. It does not get any closer than that. They would truly, truly love to have this pick up in the Democratic category. It looks to Democrats like Jean Shaheen may be able to pull it out. In all of these races, as we will tell you, probably repeatedly, it will come down to who actually comes out to vote.
Thirdly, sort of a surprise in some ways, but I will tell you that Republicans always suspected the Senate race in Georgia would be down to the wire and indeed it is. This match is of Saxby Chambliss, who is currently a congressman from Georgia, with Max Cleland, who is the sitting senator. He's the Democrat. Cleland is a popular guy down there, but Chambliss has put on a very good race.
He got himself in some hot water with a commercial -- the famous Osama bin Laden commercial which seemed to suggest to a lot of people that Max Cleland perhaps was not on -- was sort of weak on defense. This is a man, of course, that lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam. So that kind of backfired on Chambliss, but he's recovered some ground. It is very, very close there. As I say, Republicans have said for the past couple of months, watch Georgia, watch Georgia and we will be - Paula.
ZAHN: And tell us what you're going to do at the real vote desk tomorrow night.
CROWLEY: Real vote desk, what we're going to be looking at these close races. What CNN has done is there'll be two systems that will track a lot of information, both past election information and real votes as the count begins to come in. There's something called the Voter News Service, so we will have that information. And CNN, in addition, has sent hundred of people out into the field in 10 states where we expect the closest of races. We'll be analyzing that data. And that's where those -- what we expect to be the toughest of calls will be made probably later rather than sooner.
ZAHN: We'll be spending a lot of time talking with you. Thanks -- Candy.
CROWLEY: OK.
ZAHN: Enjoy the Big Apple, at least for another day.
CROWLEY: Thanks, I will.
ZAHN: For more election coverage, tune in this afternoon at 3:00 Eastern for a special two-hour "Inside Politics with Judy Woodruff."
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired November 4, 2002 - 09:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Right now the election outlook across America seems to boil down to just four words, too close to call.
And CNN's senior political correspondent Candy Crowley joins us now with the very latest on the country's most crucial races.
Good morning -- Candy.
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula. I'm up in your neck of the woods, by the way. I'm keeping...
ZAHN: I heard that.
CROWLEY: Right.
ZAHN: We came down here, you traveled north.
CROWLEY: Absolutely.
ZAHN: Good frequent flier mileage this month.
CROWLEY: You got it. You got it.
Listen, there are so many close races we couldn't possibly -- you don't have enough time left in your show. But let me - let me tell you about a couple of them.
It always sort of starts with Minnesota because there has been so much tragedy and so much interesting going on in that state. There were two polls out recently from two different newspapers in Minnesota, one of them had Mondale, Walter Mondale, the former vice president, up by six and the other had Norm Coleman up by a similar amount.
So we now go into what is a very critical time and they're going to have a debate this morning. That debate could prove critical, because, first of all, it's within 24 hours of polls opening and because we do know that debates can move whole. So this comes at quite a time, and it certainly will be on the evening newscasts in Minnesota. So that's one of our too close to calls.
I think, secondly, you'd have to look at New Hampshire. This was -- is currently a Republican seat. It is between John Sununu and Governor Jean Shaheen. Absolutely a toss-up, according to the University of New Hampshire's survey that we saw. We have it at Sununu, 46, Shaheen, 45. It does not get any closer than that. They would truly, truly love to have this pick up in the Democratic category. It looks to Democrats like Jean Shaheen may be able to pull it out. In all of these races, as we will tell you, probably repeatedly, it will come down to who actually comes out to vote.
Thirdly, sort of a surprise in some ways, but I will tell you that Republicans always suspected the Senate race in Georgia would be down to the wire and indeed it is. This match is of Saxby Chambliss, who is currently a congressman from Georgia, with Max Cleland, who is the sitting senator. He's the Democrat. Cleland is a popular guy down there, but Chambliss has put on a very good race.
He got himself in some hot water with a commercial -- the famous Osama bin Laden commercial which seemed to suggest to a lot of people that Max Cleland perhaps was not on -- was sort of weak on defense. This is a man, of course, that lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam. So that kind of backfired on Chambliss, but he's recovered some ground. It is very, very close there. As I say, Republicans have said for the past couple of months, watch Georgia, watch Georgia and we will be - Paula.
ZAHN: And tell us what you're going to do at the real vote desk tomorrow night.
CROWLEY: Real vote desk, what we're going to be looking at these close races. What CNN has done is there'll be two systems that will track a lot of information, both past election information and real votes as the count begins to come in. There's something called the Voter News Service, so we will have that information. And CNN, in addition, has sent hundred of people out into the field in 10 states where we expect the closest of races. We'll be analyzing that data. And that's where those -- what we expect to be the toughest of calls will be made probably later rather than sooner.
ZAHN: We'll be spending a lot of time talking with you. Thanks -- Candy.
CROWLEY: OK.
ZAHN: Enjoy the Big Apple, at least for another day.
CROWLEY: Thanks, I will.
ZAHN: For more election coverage, tune in this afternoon at 3:00 Eastern for a special two-hour "Inside Politics with Judy Woodruff."
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
