Florida

Virginia’s Republican lieutenant-governor Winsome Sears said she could not support Donald Trump if he again ran for the White House, telling Fox Business Network in an interview that the former president has become a “liability” for the GOP:“A true leader understands when they have become a liability. A true leader understands that it’s time to step off the stage, and the voters have given us that very clear message… I could not support him.”—VA Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears (R) comes out against Trump’s 2024 candidacy pic.twitter.com/0g1plfHJmu— The Recount (@therecount) November 10, 2022
The comments are significant considering Sears did something last year that Trump hasn’t done in more than six: win an election. Voters in the Democratic-leaning state elected Sears as the running mate of Glenn Youngkin in his gubernatorial campaign, and she made history as the first woman and first person of color to serve as Virginia’s lieutenant governor.Her comments also underscore the tension among Republicans over Trump’s influence on the party, particularly since many candidates he backed did not fair well in Tuesday’s midterm elections. Voter turnout this year was the second highest of any midterm since 1940, according to the Washington Post, which analyzed AP and US Elections Project data. About 112.5m people – or about 47% of eligible voters – cast ballots in the midterms. In 2018, about 50% of eligible voters cast ballots, according to the Post.And according to researchers at Tufts University, about 27% of eligible voters 18-29 turned out:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}This 2022 youth turnout is likely the second-highest youth turnout rate for a midterm election in the past 30 years, behind only the historic 31% turnout in 2018. Votes cast by young people made up 12% of all votes in this election, nearly matching the 13% youth share of the vote from the 2014 and 2018 midterms, according to National Election Pool surveys.Joe Biden just spoke in Washington to thank Democratic volunteers for their work in securing the party a better-than-expected night in Tuesday’s midterm elections.He noted that several Republicans who embraced baseless fraud claims about his own election win in 2020 ended up conceding their races without much drama:President Biden says none of the 2020 election deniers contested the results of the 2022 midterm elections when they lost:“Tuesday was a good day … for democracy, and it was a strong night for Democrats.” pic.twitter.com/NZlZwNsyIL— The Recount (@therecount) November 10, 2022
He also linked the surprising support many Democrats received to the party’s pledge to preserve abortion access:President Biden touts the overwhelming support for abortion rights during the 2022 midterms:“Women in America made their voices heard, man … Y’all showed up and beat the hell out of them.” pic.twitter.com/Kc2qZUAwu1— The Recount (@therecount) November 10, 2022
He closed by touting his own legislative accomplishments, including moves intended to lower the country’s fiscal deficit:President Biden: “I don’t wanna hear from Republicans calling Democrats big spenders. We’re the ones bringing down the deficit. They’re the ones that blew it up over four years.” pic.twitter.com/5N7j0ExfT0— The Recount (@therecount) November 10, 2022
The Guardian’s Maanvi Singh is now taking over the blog, and will cover the rest of today’s elections and politics news.The Senate’s Democratic leader Chuck Schumer isn’t banking on his party continuing to hold the chamber for another two years.Bloomberg Government reports that Schumer intends to prioritize confirming Joe Biden’s judges and other nominees before the year ends and the new Congress begins:🚨Scoop: Senate leader is preparing to pull the defense authorization bill off the floor and instead focus on federal nominees and judges and majority next year is still in limbo. Instead annual defense bill will materialize as an informal conference bill @business @BGOV #NDAA— Roxana Tiron (@rtiron) November 10, 2022
Democrats still have a path to keeping the Senate majority, particularly if Mark Kelly in Arizona and Catherine Cortez Masto in Nevada win their races. Counting is ongoing in both.Even as some Republicans blame him for their party’s struggles in Tuesday’s election, Morning Consult has new data out that confirms he remains the most-liked man in the GOP, though perhaps not as popular as he once was:2024 National Republican Primary:Trump 48% (+22)DeSantis 26%.@MorningConsult, 1,691 RV, 11/2-7https://t.co/AdYWBaSMK0 pic.twitter.com/PZ1AJdcudQ— Political Polls (@Politics_Polls) November 10, 2022
Trump’s most recent popularity peak came in August, after his actions had received scrutiny from the January 6 committee and his resort searched by the FBI as part of its investigation into potentially unlawful retention of government secrets.It may not be until Saturday that the outcomes of Nevada’s razor-thin Senate and governor races are known, The Nevada Independent reports.That’s based on comments made at a press conference by Joe Gloria, registrar of Nevada’s most-populous county Clark, where Las Vegas is located. The outcome of the two races is expected to hinge on votes from its residents, who tend to lean Democratic:Gloria on today’s numbers:He notes that Clark reported results from about 14k mail ballots last night.He says there are still more than 50k ballots that must be counted in Clark.”Majority of mail should be counted in Clark County by Saturday.”— Sean Golonka (@s_golonka) November 10, 2022
Yesterday, Gloria said Clark received 12.7k in mail on Wednesday, and in the afternoon, the county announced it received 56.9 from Election Day drop boxes.The 14k reported yesterday was apparently Monday drop off and Tues mail. But Gloria now says there are 50k uncounted.— Sean Golonka (@s_golonka) November 10, 2022
Meanwhile, NBC News reports a Trump adviser says the former president still plans to announce another run for the White House on Tuesday:A senior Trump adviser just confirmed Tues announcement & said “The media, the corporate elites, and political establishment has all moved in unison against Donald Trump at their own peril. It’s like they want to recreate 2015-2016. Let them. We are doing it again. Buckle up”— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) November 10, 2022
Invites for Trump’s announcement should go out today.— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) November 10, 2022
Virginia’s Republican lieutenant-governor Winsome Sears said she could not support Donald Trump if he again ran for the White House, telling Fox Business Network in an interview that the former president has become a “liability” for the GOP:“A true leader understands when they have become a liability. A true leader understands that it’s time to step off the stage, and the voters have given us that very clear message… I could not support him.”—VA Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears (R) comes out against Trump’s 2024 candidacy pic.twitter.com/0g1plfHJmu— The Recount (@therecount) November 10, 2022
The comments are significant considering Sears did something last year that Trump hasn’t done in more than six: win an election. Voters in the Democratic-leaning state elected Sears as the running mate of Glenn Youngkin in his gubernatorial campaign, and she made history as the first woman and first person of color to serve as Virginia’s lieutenant governor.Her comments also underscore the tension among Republicans over Trump’s influence on the party, particularly since many candidates he backed did not fair well in Tuesday’s midterm elections. Montana has become the latest state where voters said no to further abortion restrictions by rejecting a law that was meant to stop the killing outside the womb of babies who survive a failed abortion – which is already illegal.The so-called “born alive” law would have allowed medical providers to face criminal charges if they don’t take “all medically appropriate and reasonable actions to preserve the life” of infants, according to the AP.The defeat puts Montana among the ranks of Republican-leaning states where voters have rejected attempts to further tighten down on abortion access following the supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade in June.Here’s more on the failed law from the AP:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Health care professionals and other opponents argued the proposal could rob parents of precious time with infants born with incurable medical issues if doctors are forced to attempt treatment.
“Today’s win sends a clear message to state leadership: Montanans demand our right to make private health care decisions for ourselves and our families with the help of our trusted medical teams — and without interference from politicians,” said a statement from Hillary-Anne Crosby, a spokesperson for an organization called Compassion for Montana Families that opposed the measure.
The outcome comes after a series of wins for abortion rights supporters in states around the country where abortion was directly on the ballot during the midterm elections. Voters enshrined abortion protections into state constitutions in Michigan, California and Vermont. They also voted down an anti-abortion constitutional amendment in conservative Kentucky, just as voters did in Kansas in August.
Supporters said the proposed Montana law was meant to prevent the killing of infants outside the womb in rare occurrence of a failed abortion, something that is already is illegal. Penalties for violating the proposed law would have included up to $50,000 in fines and up to 20 years in prison.
At least half of U.S. states have similar post-abortion born-alive laws in place, according to Americans United for Life, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that opposes abortion, aid in dying and infant stem cell research.
“This initiative would have criminalized doctors, nurses and other health care workers for providing compassionate care for infants, and, in doing so, overridden the decision-making of Montana parents,” said a statement from Lauren Wilson of the Montana Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.Adam Gabbatt has taken a look at the latest round in the long-running American political parlor game, ‘Has Rupert Murdoch Finally Dumped Trump?’:On election day, Donald Trump was clear about how his efforts to support Republican candidates should be seen.“Well, I think if they win, I should get all the credit,” Trump told NewsNation. “If they lose, I should not be blamed at all.”Unfortunately for Trump, he did not get what he hoped for. Instead the former president has seen conservative news outlets, the Rupert Murdoch-owned ones in particular, turn on him, in some cases with gleeful abandon.“Trumpty Dumpty” blared the front page of Thursday’s New York Post, the tabloid Murdoch has owned since 1976. Editors went so far as to mock up Trump as Humpty Dumpty, his enlarged orange head stuffed into a white shirt and a signature red tie.Next to the picture of Trump as an egg perching precariously on a brick wall, the text goaded: “Don (who couldn’t build a wall) had a great fall – can all the GOP’s men put the party back together again?”The Post cover offered the most visceral insight into Murdoch’s thinking, and its contempt was far from an outlier in the mogul’s news empire.“Trump Is the Republican Party’s Biggest Loser” was the verdict of the Wall Street Journal editorial board. A subheading added: “He has now flopped in 2018, 2020, 2021 and 2022.”The piece was just as scathing as the headline, running through nine races this November the paper said Trump had effectively tanked through his continued election denial, his various wars with more moderate Republican candidates and his general unpopularity nationwide.“Since his unlikely victory in 2016 against the widely disliked Hillary Clinton, Mr Trump has a perfect record of electoral defeat,” the editorial said.“The GOP was pounded in the 2018 midterms owing to his low approval rating. Mr Trump himself lost in 2020. He then sabotaged Georgia’s 2021 runoffs by blaming party leaders for not somehow overturning his defeat.”It added: “Now Mr Trump has botched the 2022 elections, and it could hand Democrats the Senate for two more years.”Has ‘Trumpty Dumpty’ taken a great fall from Rupert Murdoch’s grace?Read moreAlexandria Ocasio-Cortez is not happy about how Democrats performed in her state, New York, in the midterms – a series of House losses helping (probably) hand the chamber to Republicans, though Kathy Hochul, the governor, did fend off an unexpectedly strong challenge from her Trumpist opponent, Lee Zeldin.The New York City congresswoman popularly known as AOC told the Intercept: “New York, I think, is the glaring aberration in what we see in this map … what happened in New York really bucks a lot of the trends in what we saw nationwide.“… I think, in New York, the way that those campaigns were run were different than the way a lot of winning campaigns across the country were run. And I think the role of the state party had very strong national implications. If Democrats do not hang on to the House, I think that responsibility falls squarely in New York state.”Identifying key election themes in New York, Ocasio-Cortez said: “I think policing was a big one, I think the choice among certain Democrats to … amplify Republican narratives on crime and policing, running ads on it … validating these narratives actually ended up hurting them much more than a different approach. I think that what we saw in other races was that they were able to really effectively center either their narratives and the narratives that they wanted to run with, whether it was abortion rights, whether it was democracy, whether it was … other key and top priorities.“I think Democrats in New York, they did a couple of things. They ran ads around that were explicitly very anti-defund [the police], which only served to reinvoke the frame and only served to really reinforce what Republicans were saying. If we’re going to talk about public safety, you don’t talk about it in the frame of invoking defund or anti-defund, you really talk about it in the frame of what we’ve done on gun violence, what we’ve done to pass the first gun reform bill in 30 years. Our alternatives are actually effective, electorally, without having to lean into Republican narratives.“… And I think another prime mistake is that in New York state, [ex-governor Andrew] Cuomo may be gone, but … much of his infrastructure and much of the political machinery that he put in place is still there. And this is a machinery that is disorganised, it is sycophantic. It relies on lobbyists and big money. And it really undercuts the ability for there to be affirming grassroots and state-level organising across the state.“And so … you’re leaving a void for Republicans to walk into … it’s a testament to the corruption that has been allowed to continue in the New York state Democratic party.”Josh Hawley, the senator from Missouri who may or may not run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024 but definitely did run from Capitol rioters on 6 January 2021, even after raising a fist to the mob, thinks Republicans did not do as well as they might’ve done on Tuesday night because they didn’t run on his populist, not to say Trumpist, principles.He tweets, in a message at least partially counter to the emerging consensus that Republicans suffered (if probably winning the House and maybe winning the Senate can be called suffering) because voters wanted to rebuke their Trumpist drift:Washington Republicanism lost big Tuesday night. When your “agenda” is cave to Big Pharma on insulin, cave to Schumer on gun control & Green New Deal (“infrastructure”), and tease changes to Social Security and Medicare, you lose— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) November 10, 2022
A refresher on how Hawley ran, as shown by the House January 6 committee, is here.Video of Josh Hawley running, meanwhile, is here:01:08 More

It may be a while until we know which party will win control of the House and Senate. But so far, the 8 November midterm has been full of surprises. Democrats have showed surprising strength in key races, defying what was broadly expected to be a Republican sweep amid high inflation and low approval rating for Joe Biden.
Two of three Virginia Democrats in districts considered bellwethers for the national mood have won reelection, in what was an early sign of good news for Democrats.
Democrat Josh Shapiro bested 2020 election denier Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania’s governorship race.
Democrat John Fetterman declared victory in his race for Pennsylvania’s Senate seat. Maryland elected the first Black governor in its history, Democrat Wes Moore.
Florida’s voters tilted further towards Republicans, reelecting firebrand governor Ron DeSantis and senator Marco Rubio.
From Washington to New York, Democrats defied Republicans’ rosy predictions that they’d fall apart this year, even in their traditional strongholds.
JD Vance won the Republican Senate race in Ohio, dashing Democrats’ hopes of picking up another seat in the chamber.
Michigan voters reelected Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer, and Democratic representative Elissa Slotkin in a hard-fought race. They also backed a ballot measure enshrining reproductive freedom.
Voters in Vermont and California also backed abortion rights measures.
Maryland’s Wes Moore will be the state’s first Black governor, and in Massachusetts Maura Healey will be the first out lesbian governor in US history.
Our Politics Weekly America team have been working through the night in the US to produce a special edition of the podcast looking at the early results. Jonathan Freedland is joined by Joan E Greve, columnist Richard Wolffe, and Chris Scott of Democracy for America, to look at what we know so far. You can listen to it here.No sign of the red wave – yet: Politics Weekly America midterms special Read moreSix-term Republican representative Mark Amodei has defeated Elizabeth Mercedes Krause, as expected, in Nevada’s rural northern district where no Democrat has ever won, the AP reports.The second congressional district was considered the only safe seat for either party among the four in the western battleground of Nevada, where three incumbent Democrats faced stiff challenges on Tuesday.It may be a while until we know which party will win control of the House and Senate. But so far, the 8 November midterm has been full of surprises. Democrats have showed surprising strength in key races, defying what was broadly expected to be a Republican sweep amid high inflation and low approval rating for Joe Biden.
Two of three Virginia Democrats in districts considered bellwethers for the national mood have won reelection, in what was an early sign of good news for Democrats.
Democrat Josh Shapiro bested 2020 election denier Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania’s governorship race.
Democrat John Fetterman declared victory in his race for Pennsylvania’s Senate seat. Maryland elected the first Black governor in its history, Democrat Wes Moore.
Florida’s voters tilted further towards Republicans, reelecting firebrand governor Ron DeSantis and senator Marco Rubio.
From Washington to New York, Democrats defied Republicans’ rosy predictions that they’d fall apart this year, even in their traditional strongholds.
JD Vance won the Republican Senate race in Ohio, dashing Democrats’ hopes of picking up another seat in the chamber.
Michigan voters reelected Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer, and Democratic representative Elissa Slotkin in a hard-fought race. They also backed a ballot measure enshrining reproductive freedom.
Voters in Vermont and California also backed abortion rights measures.
Maryland’s Wes Moore will be the state’s first Black governor, and in Massachusetts Maura Healey will be the first out lesbian governor in US history.
Earlier, Democrat Wes Moore made history by becoming the first Black governor of Maryland. He replaces Republican Larry Hogan, a moderate who managed to twice win election in what is otherwise a solidly blue state.The newly elected official assured the electorate “I hear you” and “this is our time” in his victory speech. Referencing his time in the army, Moore promised to “leave no one behind”. Joe Biden had joined Moore in a pre-election rally in Maryland the evening before election day. Here is the video clip.01:06Michigan voters enshrined protections for abortion rights, the AP projects.Voters approved a ballot measure affirming the right to make personal reproductive decisions without interference, and negating a 1931 ban on abortions.“Today, the people of Michigan voted to restore the reproductive rights they’ve had for 50 years,” said Darci McConnell, a spokesperson for Reproductive Freedom for All, which put forth the ballot measure. The measure marks a “historic victory for abortion access in our state and in our country – and Michigan has paved the way for future efforts to restore the rights and protections of Roe v Wade nationwide,” McConnell said.California resoundingly votes no on sports betting, Guardian tech reporter Kari Paul reports.Voters in California voted overwhelmingly to reject two gambling initiatives on Tuesday, marking a decisive end to the most expensive ballot proposition battle in US history.The two propositions would have expanded gambling access in the state in different ways: Proposition 27 aimed to legalize online and mobile sports betting while Proposition 26 would have allowed casinos and the state’s four horse tracks to offer sports betting in person.The online sports betting initiative was put on the ballot by sports betting companies including DraftKings and FanDuel, while Proposition 26 was funded by a coalition for Native American tribes.Nearly $600m was spent advocating for the propositions, more than double the record amount spent by gig economy firms such as Uber and Lyft in 2020 to classify their workers as contractors and block them from benefits and protections.Californians overwhelmingly rejected both propositions, with 84% voting no on Prop 27 and 70% voting no on Prop 26.State Democrats had opposed Proposition 27, but were neutral on Proposition 26. Democratic governor Gavin Newsom was neutral on both proposals. The California Republican party opposed both proposals.Democratic representative Elissa Slotkin has won reelection in a hard-fought Michigan race against Republican Tom Barrett.In 2018, Slotkin flipped a seat that was held by a Republican and won again in 2020 in a district that backed Donald Trump. She was seen as vulnerable once again this year, and the race was one of the top two most expensive races nationally, with both parties spending tens of millions on TV ads and mailers.Slotkin, a moderate who previously worked as an intelligence and defense department official who worked for both Democratic and Republican presidential administrations, was supported by Republican senator and Trump critic Liz Cheney.California voters have rejected a ballot measure that would have levied a wealth tax to fund the transition to electric vehicles.The measure, Prop 30, failed after California governor Gavin Newsom heavily campaigned against it, siding with Republicans over his fellow Democrats, environmental groups, firefighters and labor unions. In misleading ads against Prop 30, Newsom claimed it was a corporate carve-out for Lyft, the ride-hailing company that has backed the measure and helped fund its campaign.The environmental and public advocacy groups that developed the measure cried afoul. The measure had no provisions to specifically benefit rideshare companies, and Lyft only joined the effort to promote Prop 30 only after local groups developed the bulk of it.Among the biggest donors to the “No on 30” campaign were wealthy Californians who had also propped the governor’s campaign.Newsom this year issued an executive order banning the sale of new gas-powered vehicles by 2035, and allocated $10bn to the effort to subsidize electric vehicle purchases and build out charging infrastructure, but environmental groups said the funding will quickly fall short.Josh Green, a Democrat and Hawaii’s lieutenant governor, has won the race to be the state’s next governor, the AP projects.Green defeated Duke Aiona, a Republican and former lieutenant governor, by what appeared to be a wide margin. Aiona had run for the office twice before. At his election night party, Green told supporters, “Tonight is the first day of that new era where our leaders must start doing more to listen, to care and to work on issues that matter to all of us, that matter to you.”On the campaign trail, Green said he would address the housing shortage in the state by advocating for building 10,000 new units and cracking down on vacation rentals. He also pledged to fight for reproductive rights, noting his opponent’s opposition to abortion protections.BREAKING: Crowds cheering at Democratic HQ as it’s official — Josh Green beats Duke Aiona in landslide on first printout with 66% of the Hawaii vote #HIGov #ElectionNight @KITV4 pic.twitter.com/6Lh2hCS2Vq— Tom George (@TheTomGeorge) November 9, 2022
Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader, addressed supporters after an hours-long delay.The California congressman projected confidence that Republicans would take the House despite several dozen seats still undecided. “When you wake up tomorrow, we will be in the majority and Nancy Pelosi will be in the minority,” he told supporters in Washington.After a few key Democratic wins dashed expectations of an easy Republican sweep, McCarthy pointed to GOP wins in contested races in Texas and Virginia. Democrats have also kept seats in key Virginia districts, as well as contested seats in Kansas and Rhode Island.In Nevada, tight races might not be known for days, officials said. Dani Anguiano reports:Nevada Democrats and Republicans have urged patience as residents await to hear the outcome of several razor-thin elections, including the Senate race, one of the tightest in the country.Full results will not come in tonight, officials have said, and may not be known for several days. By 11:30pm PST, returns showed incumbent Catherine Cortez Masto ahead with about 51.2% of the votes to Republican Adam Laxalt’s 46% with 47% of precincts reporting, a lead expected to shrink.“I am confident in the campaign that we have built to win,” Cortez Masto said. “I am so grateful to every Nevadan who knocked down doors, who made phone calls and stood up and fought for our state.”The votes are still being counted. We know this will take time and we won’t have more election results for several days. I am confident in this team. I’m confident in the campaign that we’ve built to win. ¡La lucha sigue!— Catherine Cortez Masto (@CortezMasto) November 9, 2022
Laxalt, Nevada’s former attorney general who unsuccessfully ran for governor in 2018, said “we are exactly where we want to be in this race.“When we win this race, I’m gonna support our police and fight to make our streets safe again. I will not rest until we’ve secured our southern border,” he said. “We’re in for a long night and even a few days but we’re confident we’re gonna win this race and take back Nevada and take back America.”Sam Levine in Detroit reports: We don’t have all of the results yet, but election day did not appear to go particularly well for election deniers in competitive races.In Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano, who played a key role in Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election, lost his re-election bid to Josh Shapiro, a Democrat who put defending democracy at the start of his campaign. Jocelyn Benson, Michigan’s secretary of state who staunchly defended the 2020 election results also defeated Kristina Karamo, who rose to prominence after she spread false claims about fraud after ballots were counted in Detroit in 2020.“Well, well, well, democracy has prevailed,” Benson said as she took the stage at a Democratic victory party in downtown Detroit around midnight Wednesday. “Today Michigan voters showed the world that they will vote for truth over lies, facts over conspiracy theories, real results over empty promises.”Election deniers also lost races to be the top election official in New Mexico and Minnesota. Votes were still being counted in Nevada early Wednesday morning, where there is also a closely-watched secretary of state race.Democrat Tony Evers has won reelection for governor in Wisconsin, the AP has projected.CNN had previously called the race in a crucial battleground state. Evers defeated Trump-backed construction executive Tim Michels, and will be a key counterbalance against the state Republicans’ efforts to take control of the election system. Michels had said he would try to decertify the 2020 presidential results in Wisconsin, despite there being no legal mechanism to do so.Evers has been a key veto against Republican legislators’ efforts to disrupt election systems. That veto power may not hold if Republicans win a supermajority in the legislature, but it’s unclear if they will.Evers campaign was boosted in its final days by a visit from Barack Obama.“Some people call it boring, but as it turns out, Wisconsin, boring wins,” he said in his victory speech.The AP has called a few more House races in favor of Democrats. In a fiercely contested race in New York, Democratic representative Joseph Morelle fended off a challenge from Republican former police chief La’Ron Singletary. In Michigan, Hillary Scholten defeated former Trump administration housing official and far-right election denier John Gibbs. And in Ohio, Republican representative Steve Chabot lost his seat to Democrat Greg Landsman.New Mexico’s Democratic governor Michelle Lujan Grisham has won reelection, defeating Republican challenger Mark Ronchetti.Lujan Grisham honed in on the issue of abortion access. “Tonight New Mexico said ‘no’ to a political crusade that wants to turn women into second-class citizens,” she said in a victory speech.A former member of Congress and state health secretary, she was favored to win. Ronchetti, a former television meteorologist who never held elected office, had sought to distance himself from his party’s far-right policies, but fell short.Organizers claimed victory after Michigan voters appeared well on their way to approving a constitutional amendment that would significantly expand voting access and make it much harder for anyone to try and overturn the results of an election.The Guardian’s Sam Levine in Detroit reports:The measure, Proposal 2, establishes a fundamental right to vote in the Michigan constitution requires at least nine days of voting access and drop boxes, and allows voters to sign an affidavit if they lack photo ID, among other measures. And most significantly, it prevents officials from certifying an election based on anything other than the vote tally. That’s a huge deal in Michigan, where boards of canvassers nearly refused to certify the vote in 2020 at the county and statewide level without solid evidence.With 62% of the vote in early Wednesday, yes votes for the measure led 57.7% to 42.3%The measure’s passage marks the latest victory in a significantly growing grassroots voting rights movement in Michigan. In 2018, voters approved a constitutional amendment creating an independent redistricting commission and allowing for automatic and same-day registration.“Michigan voters clearly support ensuring every voice is heard and every vote is counted in every election no matter what political party or candidate we support, where we live or what we look like,” Micheal Davis, executive director for Promote the Vote, the coalition behind the amendment, said in a statement.Nancy Pelosi has issued a statement hailing an unexpectedly good performance by Democrats, even as votes are still being counted:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}While many races remain too close to call, it is clear that House Democratic members and candidates are strongly outperforming expectations across the country.
As states continue to tabulate the final results, every vote must be counted as cast.
Many thanks to our grassroots volunteers for enabling every voter to have their say in our Democracy. More