The race to claim Pennsylvania is too close to call. 20 electoral votes are up for grabs and they become a vital part in winning the race for the White House. President Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden are in a close race to become the next president. With 64-percent of Pennsylvania's vote counted, the President leads by ten points. However, mail-in votes are still being counted across the state and will continue to be until Friday.
With only about three-quarters of polling places reporting, Republican Lisa Scheller holds an eight-point lead over incumbent Democrat Susan Wild in the 7th Congressional District race. Wild had a big lead in recent polls, but says those polls, at the end of the day, don't mean anything. "There's only one poll that matters and that's the one that comes in after everybody has voted. It used to be the poll on Election Day, but that's no longer the case. It's after every single vote has been counted. That's the poll that matters," Wild says. Scheller expects to hold the lead when all the votes are finally counted. "The mail-in ballots, the polls are closed and they're beginning to count them. I have a lot of confidence that Republicans will prevail and people who love freedom and our personal liberties are going to prevail," Scheller says. Scheller's lead is about 25,000 votes.
Like Pennsylvania's presidential race and the Lehigh Valley's Congressional battle, some local state House races remain undetermined yet. Incumbents Steve Samuelson, Zach Mako, Jeanne McNeill, Joe Emrick, Ryan Mackenzie, Michael Schlossberg and Gary Day all appear to have won re-election. Newcomers Milou Mackenzie and Ann Flood are also holding healthy leads and have been declared winners.
None of Pennsylvania's row office battles have been officially decided yet. With three-quarters of polling places reporting Republicans lead all three contests. Heather Heidelbaugh holds an eight-point lead over incumbent Josh Shapiro in the Attorney General's race. Incumbent Joe Torsella is trailing Republican Stacy Garrity by 13 points in the state treasurer election. Timothy DeFoor has a healthy lead in the race for auditor general. He leads Democrat Nina Ahmad by 16 points, but again, only three-quarters of polling places are reporting results.
Gov. Tom Wolf and Secretary of the Commonwealth Kathy Boockvar say there were no widespread significant problems amid high turnout at the polls and more than two-and-a-half million mail ballots cast. The governor says he's proud of how Pennsylvanians conducted themselves. Voter registration here exceeded nine-million people.
Two Republican lawmakers are calling on Secretary of the Commonwealth Kathy Boockvar to resign over a dispute regarding mail-in ballots. State senators Jake Corman and Joe Scarnati say Boockvar allegedly gave conflicting information to counties in regards to set aside mail-in ballots received after 8pm on election night and before 4pm on Friday, November 6th, but then told them to start counting all ballots as soon as possible. Boockvar says she has no intent on resigning and that the two senators should resign for not allowing Pennsylvania to start pre-canvassing ballots early as 46 other states have done.
New Jersey Democratic Sen. Cory Booker is holding onto his job. He easily beat out Republican Rikin Mehta and three independent candidates. Gov. Phil Murphy congratulated Booker on his win, calling him a tireless voice for justice and opportunity.
New Jersey is moving ahead with legalizing marijuana. Voters Tuesday approved a constitutional amendment to allow people 21 and over to buy recreational marijuana. Now that a majority of New Jerseyans have given their approval, the law will take effect sometime next year. New Jersey joins 11 other states and the District of Columbia.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health added 2879 new COVID-19 cases Tuesday, pushign the commonwealth's overall total to 214,871 since the pandemic began. Tuesday marks the highest single-day increase in cases thus far.
New Jersey continues to see nearly 2000 daily COVID-19 cases. Gov. Phil Murphy is reporting just over 1800 new positive cases adding to the Garden State's total over 240,000. He's also reporting 18 new confirmed deaths, adding to the state's 14,000-plus deaths. Murphy was reminding people to wear masks and social distance as they were heading to the polls since we're still in the midst of a pandemic.