Nov. 3, 2022 US election coverage

More than 30.1 million ballots have been cast in 46 states, according to data from elections officials, Edison Research and Catalist.  

Pre-election voting has been ahead of the 2018 pace in the states where data is available for the last three cycles. However, it’s still too early to know if overall turnout will reach 2018 levels, as voting patterns may have changed in the last few years. 

Texas has now crossed the 4 million vote mark. More than 3.5 million votes have been cast in Florida. Almost 2.8 million votes have been cast in California and Georgia has just crossed the 2 million vote mark. 

Some voter data comes from Catalist, a company that provides data, analytics and other services to Democrats, academics and nonprofit issue-advocacy organizations and is giving insights into who is voting before November.

Former President Barack Obama warned Arizona voters Wednesday night that democracy is at stake if their state elects the slate of Trump-endorsed election deniers topping the ticket. But the voters who turned out for his Phoenix rally said they are determined to make sure that doesn't happen.

GOP gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake, Senate nominee Blake Masters and Secretary of State nominee Mark Finchem all won their primaries in part by echoing Trump’s falsehoods about the 2020 election.

Keith Greenberg, a registered Republican from Maricopa County, said in an interview that he wasn’t voting for Democrats in this election, he is voting against the Trump ticket.

“The Republican Party today is not the Republican Party I’m a part of,” said Greenberg, who described the 2020 election as fair and honest. “That’s more like the American Nazi Party, and I can’t put up with that – the lie.”

If the Trump ticket wins, “it means that the state of Arizona has lost its mind. And this is no longer a safe place to live. If Mark Finchem wins and says, ‘Well, I don’t care what the people voted. I’m going to do this,’ then what’s the point? We’ve lost our democracy,” Greenberg added.

Joann Rodriguez, a registered Democrat from Maricopa County, said it was scary that “radical Republicans” in her state were able to elevate candidates like Lake and Masters.

“What are they running on, aside from Trump’s talking points that the election was stolen?” Rodriguez said. 

She was angered by the right-wing activists who showed up to monitor ballot drop boxes late last month – some of them armed, masked and wearing camouflage. 

She noted that “a lot of Trumpers” are still driving their trucks with Trump flags around her neighborhood in Glendale, Arizona. “They’re walking around with guns on their hips, showing up at the ballot boxes or showing up at the election sites – for what reason? I mean, do they think that their intimidation tactics are going to work?” 

Michelle Gonzales, a registered Democrat from Maricopa County, said she believes that people came to see Obama Wednesday night “so they could feel hopeful” about the democratic process amid all the noise.

“With everything, all the rhetoric going on, I think it’s important to really hear from someone – that we trust and we believe in – that we can be hopeful about this election,” she said. “I just want to believe that people want to believe in something better – that they have morals and values that we all should have as human beings and not elect these liars and con people.”

Ohio Senate candidate Tim Ryan said he "doesn't need" the national Democratic Party to bolster his campaign, and he thinks the party requires leaders who can tackle both the economy and upholding democracy.

"The national Democratic Party has never been really good at strategic political decisions. So, you know, it's not a surprise here. Thank God that I have enough experience that I built this campaign not needing them, and we really don't want them at this point. We're going to do this thing with all the grassroots people we have here. ... We've built a robust machine here in Ohio that doesn't need the national Democratic Party, and it's going to give me a level of independence that most senators don't have," Ryan said to "CNN This Morning" on Thursday.

The comments from Ryan — who is pitted against J.D. Vance, an ally of former President Donald Trump, in a tight race — underscore his efforts to cast himself as a more moderate candidate and distance himself from the national Democratic Party, including President Joe Biden, whose approval ratings are sagging. With the midterms just around the corner, Biden and former President Barack Obama have descended upon states that have critical elections, but neither has turned up in Ohio.

Ryan was also asked about ticket-splitting in Ohio, with voters who may cast their ballots for him and also GOP Gov. Mike DeWine.

"We have so many two-time Trump voters who aren't for the insurrectionists and aren't for all the craziness and the insanity but they're voting for me because I'm talking about the pocketbook issues they care about," Ryan said.

"They don't want the extremism of J.D. Vance, and so there are a lot of Republicans that are saying 'look, we have to come together, I don't want the extremism on either side and I'm going to vote down the middle.' And that's what's happening here in Ohio, and so there are a lot of DeWine-Ryan supporters. And again, we have to work together, like we have to stop this insanity of thinking that you have to agree with somebody 100% of the time," he added.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the Republican focus on crime ahead of the 2022 midterm election was clear hypocrisy, telling CNN that the party is not “concerned about voter safety, they just want to keep voters scared.” 

Clinton, who will headline a political rally on Thursday night with an event for New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, lauded President Joe Biden’s efforts to combat inflation as “truly impressive” but said it is “more challenging to get that focus on the future” than to stoke grievance.

Clinton’s most pointed attacks for Republicans, however, centered on crime and the reaction some Republicans have had to the attack on Paul Pelosi, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband.

Clinton said she agreed that crime should be a concern but said Republicans “don’t want to solve a problem, whether it is crime, inflation or anything else — they just want an issue.”

“They are just trying to gin up all kinds of fear and anxiety in people,” Clinton said “They are not dealing with it. They are not trying to tackle it. So, I view it as an effort to scare voters.”

The former secretary of state, who said former President Bill Clinton spoke to Nancy Pelosi after the attack, targeted Kari Lake, the Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate who notably made a joke about the attack on Paul Pelosi shortly after it happened. 

Clinton called the Republican response to the attack “sadly a real indicator of where we are in our country right now that you would have people on the Republican ticket like the woman running in Arizona laughing about an attack on anyone, let alone an 82-year-old man whose wife happens to be second in line to the presidency.”

Clinton, despite being one of the best-known Democrats in the country, has been one of the party's least-visible surrogates at campaign rallies in recent years. Her event with Hochul will be the first candidate-specific rally she will headline this year. That New York Democrats are asking for her help to juice turnout in Manhattan underscores the deep anxiety coursing through the party as Election Day nears, with Hochul locked in a close race against Republican Lee Zeldin.

Clinton said the tightness in the race between Hochul and Zeldin was “more of a turnout issue” and that the former Democratic presidential nominee expected the Democrat to win on Tuesday.

Clinton said the same issue was facing Democrats across the country, including the Biden administration, which now has to convince their actions now will make their future better.

“It’s really difficult to tell people what is going to happen in the future when, understandably, they are focused on the present,” said Clinton. “So yes, people are worried about the cost of living, they are worried about the economy, along the Republicans have absolutely no plan to do anything about that. … It is more challenging to get that focus on the future.”

Watch a portion of the interview:

With just five days to go until Election Day, it is another big day on the campaign trail.

Here's a look at some of the key events happening Thursday afternoon:

President Joe Biden will take on Republican-led efforts to challenge his administration’s plans to extend student debt relief to millions of Americans when he travels to Albuquerque, New Mexico on Thursday, attempting to highlight another policy contrast with the GOP in the closing days of the election.

In an appearance at Central New Mexico Community College, the President will talk about his administration’s efforts to “lower college costs and provide extra breathing room” to student borrowers, a White House official said, while also warning of “disastrous consequences for middle-class American families if Republican officials succeed in their plan to rob tens of millions of borrowers of their opportunity to receive debt relief.”

Republicans have argued the plan is too costly. The debate comes as voters heading to the polls say their top concern is the economy.

The President’s student loan forgiveness remarks will come ahead of his appearance at a campaign rally to help boost New Mexican Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who is locked in a tough re-election fight against Republican gubernatorial nominee Mark Ronchetti in a state the Biden won by double digits.

More on Biden's student loan forgiveness program: Nearly 26 million people have submitted their information to the Department of Education to be considered for loan forgiveness, according to the White House, with 16 million applications expected to be approved by the end of the week. But the President’s student loan forgiveness program remains tied up in the courts, creating uncertainty over when or if that relief will ultimately be extended to applicants. 

A federal appeals court put a temporary hold on the student loan forgiveness program last month, pausing its implementation while the court considers a challenge brought by six Republican-led states. The Biden administration has argued it should be able to carry out its policy while the appeal plays out.

The Biden administration is also facing lawsuits from Arizona’s GOP Attorney General Mark Brnovich, and conservative groups such as the Job Creators Network Foundation and the Cato Institute.

The President has expressed confidence his plan will be upheld by the courts, predicting student loan borrowers will begin receiving relief within weeks.

The speech in New Mexico follows a similar event last month when the President traveled to Delaware State University, one of the country’s historically Black colleges and universities, to promote his loan forgiveness plan as officials have hoped the issue will motivate young voters heading into the midterm elections.

Rep. Tim Ryan, the Democratic nominee for US Senate in Ohio, aired a new ad Thursday with an explicit appeal to independents and disaffected Republicans, highlighting his 2016 challenge to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and adapting Donald Trump’s “America First” mantra. 

He continues, “Let's turn the page on this era of stupidity, and reject the extremism, and get back to being Americans first.” 

Ryan has made a determined effort to appeal to voters outside the Democratic base in the race against J.D. Vance in Ohio, a state that has trended increasingly red in recent election cycles. Ryan’s campaign has run dozens of ads showcasing his independence and examples where he’s bucked his party. 

Republicans have been compelled to respond to Ryan’s messaging tactics. Vance launched an ad last month, saying Ryan “pretends he’s a moderate, but votes 100% with Biden [and] Pelosi.” 

And Senate Leadership Fund, a top GOP super PAC which has spent $28 million in the race, also aired an ad featuring soundbites of Ryan saying “I love Nancy Pelosi” in an interview, charging that he’s “devoted to the liberal agenda.” 

Ad spending in this race: Ohio’s US Senate race has drawn over $66 million in ad spending since Labor Day. While polls show Ryan has kept the contest close, national Democrats have been reluctant to commit resources to the race, and Democrats have been outspent $37.9 million to $28.1 million in that stretch. 

President Joe Biden's failure – whether it is all his fault or not – to quell inflation and the worries of a nation already demoralized by a once-in-a-century pandemic created the electoral conditions that look likely to restore Trumpism to power, in the form of a volatile, extreme GOP majority in the House of Representatives at least, with the Senate still on a knife’s edge.

Throughout history, inflation has often been a pernicious political force that breeds desperation in an electorate and seeds extremism as a potential response. That’s why politicians fear it so acutely and why it is so curious that the Biden White House initially didn’t take the surge of prices that seriously, repeatedly insisting that this was a “transitory” problem caused by Covid-19.

Elections should be about more than one thing. Voters can walk and chew gum at the same time. Biden’s argument is implicitly that while inflation will fall, and economic damage can be repaired, the current election – and its legions of anti-democratic Republican candidates – could cause political wreckage that is beyond mending.

“This year, I hope you’ll make the future of our democracy an important part of your decision to vote, and how you vote,” he said. “Will that person accept the outcome of the election, win or lose?” he added, at the end of a campaign in which several GOP nominees have not guaranteed they would accept voters’ will.

But in the heartlands of Pennsylvania, the suburbs of Arizona and cities everywhere, the gut check issue is still about feeding a family. This is an election more about the cost of a cart full of groceries or the price of a gallon of gasoline than America’s founding truths.

As Scottsdale, Arizona, retiree Patricia Strong told CNN’s Tami Luhby: “The price of everything was better during Trump,” adding, “We were looking forward to retirement because everything was good.”

What polling shows: In a new CNN/SSRS survey published on Wednesday, for instance, 51% of Americans said inflation and the economy was most driving their vote in the midterms. Abortion – the issue Democrats hoped would save them next Tuesday after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade this summer – was the only other concern in double figures, polling at 15% of likely voters. And voting rights and election integrity – the focus of the president’s speech on Wednesday night – polled at only 9%.

The fight for control of the US Senate could come down to Georgia — again.

For the second time in less than two years, the Peach State, which elected two Democratic senators in the last election cycle, is home to a contest that has gripped both national parties and potentially holds the key to the fate of President Biden's agenda.

This time around, though, at least one key characteristic of the race has been reversed: Democrat Raphael Warnock has gone from challenger to incumbent, trying to fend off Republican nominee Herschel Walker. The former football great, recruited and endorsed by former President Donald Trump, has run an uneven campaign and spent the past month beset by controversy, but is still running neck-and-neck with Warnock with early voting in high gear and Election Day nearing.

A Warnock victory would likely foreclose Republicans' path to a majority in the Senate, which is currently split 50-50 with Vice President Kamala Harris casting a decisive vote. That reality, coupled with headwinds — in the form of economic angst and Biden's low approval ratings — familiar to Democrats across the country, has helped coalesce Republicans behind Walker. 

The most recent polling of the race, from the New York Times and Siena College, showed no clear leader, with 49% of likely voters supporting Warnock to the 46% backing Walker — a difference well within the survey's margin of error. Another poll, from Fox News at the end of October, also found a remarkably close contest, with Warnock at 44% and Walker at 43%. If neither candidate notches a majority of the vote, the race would be decided in a Dec. 6 runoff.

Walker, whose candidacy has endured a stream of gaffes on policy, has more recently been contended with allegations from two women who say he had pressured them to have abortions. Warnock, meanwhile, initially sought to steer clear of directly addressing the controversy. But late last month, he launched a television ad titled "Hypocrite."

"For you, Herschel Walker wants to ban abortion," says a narrator, before playing comments the Republican made supporting no exceptions to a national abortion ban. "But for himself," the narrator then asks before playing news reports about the allegations.