Election Day is here: Voters set to decide control of Congress

Election day is here. Voters head to the polls across the country after one final push from the candidates and President Trump. Now, it's the voters' turn. Plus, explosions on an Iranian island. U.S. officials confirm American strikes on the eve of the election. And a last-minute Supreme Court loss for Trump. The justices reject his bid to set aside thousands of California mail-in ballots just hours after the request was filed. The stories that matter. The facts you can trust from across the country to around the world. This is Unbiased Updates from Straight Arrow. Hey everybody, I'm Christian Bryant. It's Tuesday, November 3rd and Election Day is here. After months of campaigning, Americans are heading to the polls to decide who controls Congress and the direction of the country for the next two years. The final arguments have been made, President Trump has delivered his closing pitch, and now the decision belongs to the voters. Let's get you caught up with this extended election edition of Unbiased Updates. More than 57 million Americans had already voted before Election Day, according to the University of Florida's Election Lab. That's nearly as many as the entire early vote in the 2022 midterms, with millions more ballots still to come. And Monday night, President Trump made his final appeal from Washington's Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. He urged the voters who put him back in the White House in 2024 to turn out again, this time to keep Republicans in control of Congress. But he also acknowledged the history working against his party. Because if the people that voted for me and voted in the last election where we had such a great victory, if they go out and vote just a good portion of them, we will win in a landslide. Now, that doesn't happen because usually whoever the sitting president is, Republican or Democrat, good or bad, good president, great president, bad. For some reason, the sitting president doesn't win the midterms, but we gave this a very strong. shot Vice President J.D. Vance spent his final day campaigning in Ohio, calling this the most important midterm election of his lifetime. He said he's confident Republicans will hold Congress, but acknowledged the outcome is no longer in their hands. I feel good about tomorrow, but obviously it's in the hands of voters. So all I'd say is to remind the voters, particularly in Ohio, that Sherrod Brown is a career politician who spent 50 years in Washington delivering for Chuck Schumer. John Husted has delivered for the people of Ohio. I think they're going to re-elect them, but it's up to the voters now. And across the country, some of the most consequential Senate races are coming down to their final hours. In Michigan, Republican Mike Rogers and Democrat Abdul El-Sayed closed their campaigns with appeals to a deeply divided electorate. The races also exposed divisions within the Democratic Party after Congresswoman Haley Stevens endorsed Rogers over her party's own nominee. It's really about the heart and soul of the country and who we want to be. And what country we want to give to our kids. And you think about that. What happened is doors started opening for us. People knew something was wrong. Mean, angry, divisiveness could not be the way in the future for our great state. I believe that we have the opportunity to breach those divides. Divides of geography, of race, of sexual orientation, gender identity, of faith. To build together what we only can have together. That's what this campaign has been about from the very beginning. And while they think that somehow their intimidation tactics and their division is going to pull us apart, they don't know us like we know us. Royal Oak, when they come for us, we won't back down. In Texas, a state Republicans have dominated for decades, the Senate race has become a major test for both parties. Democrat James Tallarico says the Republican effort to defeat him shows just how competitive the race has become. Republican Ken Paxton is warning his supporters that the party's grip on Texas is at risk. In the final days of this election, they are coming at us with everything they've got. The billionaire mega donors, the super PACs. They are spending more than 300 million dollars to try to stop us. That is the most of any Senate race in American history, and more is on the way. They are scared. They are terrified. They see what we see, that we're about to win this election tomorrow night. Texas has never been this close to slipping away. We have never been this close to losing everything that we hold dear. Our jobs, our livelihoods, our way of life in Texas. If Texas falls, we don't have another Texas to move to. Every poll shows this is going to come down to the wire. In Alaska, the final days of the Senate race have been dominated by a controversy over two candidates with nearly identical names. A New York Times report links people working with Democratic candidate Mary Peltola's campaign and National Democrats to an effort to recruit another Dan Sullivan, the same name The senator is accusing his opponent of trying to mislead voters. My opponent has literally been caught as the Republican incumbent. in the biggest election cheating scandal in Alaska history and she is bleeding support. People are pulling Pantola signs out of their yards, right? They are saying, hey, wait a minute, I did not sign up for corruption. Paltola denies knowing about the effort and says she has no interest in tricking voters. And in Maine, Democrat Troy Jackson is trying to unseat longtime Republican Senator Susan Collins. His closing message focused on turnout and what he says voters can change in Washington. Washington. Up and down the state, people are showing up like I've never seen before. And that's how we're going to change this government, together. We can make so much of a difference. We can make so much a difference here in the state. We can make so much a difference in D.C. The first polls close at 6 p.m. Eastern in parts of Indiana and Kentucky. From there, results will be coming in across the country, with the final polls in Alaska coming in at 1 a.m. Eastern Wednesday. And in some of these races, it could take longer to know who won. So buckle up, folks. Just hours before Election Day, the U.S. launched new airstrikes on Iran. American officials say the strikes were defensive, but they come as President Trump continues to talk about a possible deal with Tehran while threatening more military action. U.S. officials say the military struck targets on Iran's Qeshm Island Monday near the Strait of Hormuz, a critical route for global oil shipments. One official tells ABC News the strikes were in response to an Iranian attack on an American Officials say this was a limited operation, not the start of a new major offensive. But it's not an isolated incident. The U.S. has carried out other limited strikes in recent weeks as Iran has stepped up attacks on commercial shipping in the Strait. And Monday night, Trump was still raising the possibility of a much bigger attack, this time on a suspected underground nuclear site known as Pickaxe Mountain. Now we might have to go after Pickaxe, but that's not a big deal. We can do it. Literally, we can do that in... Iran's Revolutionary Guard also claims it shot down two American reconnaissance drones over Qeshm Island, but a U.S. official disputes that claim. And while both sides continue talking about a possible diplomatic deal, American forces are still carrying out strikes inside Iran. The Supreme Court has already dealt President Trump a setback in his fight over California's mail-in ballots. The justices rejected an emergency request from his administration Monday, just hours after it was filed. The Justice Department wanted California to set aside The U.S. is not the only country in the U.S. that has more than 20,000 U.S. citizens. But California officials questioned the accuracy of that list and warned that eligible voters could have their ballots wrongfully excluded. The Supreme Court rejected the request in a one-sentence order without explaining its reasoning. No justices publicly dissented. The decision follows a string of losses for the administration in lower court. On Friday, a federal appeals court ruled 2-1 against the Justice Department's request. The two judges in the majority wrote, If the United States believes different procedures are necessary for vote-by-mail ballots, we believe it should take that suggestion to Congress, not the courts. The administration had argued that once the disputed ballots were mixed with other votes, there would be no way to separate them. But the Supreme Court's decision leaves California's existing ballot counting procedures in place for today's election. As voters head to the polls today, we're also looking at what happens once the results start coming in tonight and how candidates respond. Earlier, I caught up with our senior politics reporter Ozzie Pabra outside the Capitol here in Washington to talk about what he's watching on election night and beyond. What is it that you're going to be watching for tonight, election night And in the days that come, whether it's the races, whether it's how candidates are reacting to the results. Big picture, I am looking at whether the mechanics of democracy go forward or if anyone tries to interfere with it. You said big picture. This feels like existential. Yeah, it is existential. And I do not mean it as hyperbole or joke. Can you can you break that down? For 250 years, In sometimes very imperfect ways, people in the United States have elected representatives. Many people have lost elections. Many voters saw people they didn't agree with take power and enact policies that they opposed. And yet, society and the country was able to see another day coming, to see another election, and to have this fight continue. In some ways, democracy wins if it continues. And the only way democracy loses is if it stops or if somebody changes the rules to make it ineffective. So how many races do independent election observers call? They're not official calls, but when the Associated Press and Fox News' Decision Desk and other outlets call races, it is because very smart people looking at very specific numbers with a lot of historical context say the numbers aren't there. I'm also looking at, obviously, voter turnout. Uh, how do candidates in Georgia do, a very contested, uh, state where, except for the lieutenant governor in the Senate, the statewide candidates are all Black women, uh, and Georgia had not elected a Black woman to a statewide partisan office in its history until December, first time ever. But what I'm really looking at are the races that get called because of either blowouts or because the decision isn't so clear, and whether candidates accept it. And what I'm also watching is how the federal government, which has been very active in raising questions of election integrity, and to call it an existential question is exactly correct. And if it sounds like something you never thought would be happening in 2026, it is. When we think back to this midterm cycle and the days and weeks and months and years to come, I mean, what will this cycle be remembered for? Whether or not the results are accepted. Now, I know in Alaska, the Mary Peltola campaign has been linked to an effort to bring in a essentially phony candidate. Which she has denied, you know, having any part in it. The thing that is sort of being lost in that conversation is just how frequently things like this happen. This is not the only campaign that has ever been involved with or the only race that has ever seen something like this. Stacking the ballot, as it's called. So this happens. This happens. But I feel like there's a but. This happens. The but is always, do you get caught with your hand in the cookie jar? And is that cookie jar illegal? Or is it just unethical? If it's unethical... Are these illegal cookies? Yea or nay? If they're illegal cookies, you're in trouble. If they are merely unethical cookies, I have news for you. This is Washington. That's considered the appetizer. So how much this is indicative of politics in 2026, I think is something historians are going to work through it. Anything else you want to leave us on? Final thoughts? There actually is. There's a lot of promises that that candidates make on a campaign trail. I will only serve two terms. I will never vote for a tax hike. And a lot of times reporters, advocacy groups, voters feel a sense of confidence that the question they just asked and the answer they just received is rock solid. I wish there was at least one more follow-up in a lot of those exchanges to ask the question, if you change your mind, if you break this promise, what are you willing to do to make amends for it? What should voters expect from you? Should you resign because of that? Because we hear this every election cycle. Promises are made. Promises are not always kept. Yes. And in the American democratic system, You vote for a person and they're in office for two or four years with the full amount of power, whether or not they got 50 votes plus one or they went in the landslide. So the question about how people stick to their promises and how much are they willing to hear people they disagree with, I think is something that could help voters and candidates and policymakers if that was part of the conversation more. And less about whether or not people feel humiliated over a certain outcome. Our many thanks to Ozzy for that interview, and we will certainly be keeping a close eye on all the races across the country. Now to some other news we're following. Federal investigators say a private jet that crashed in South Florida, killing all nine people on board, may have been breaking apart before it hit the ground. And they're now taking a close look at the severe weather the pilots encountered just before the crash. The Learjet was flying from Austin, Texas to the Bahamas Sunday when it plunged into a neighborhood near West Palm Beach, erupting into a massive fireball. Just minutes earlier, the crew reported ice buildup and turbulence at 35,000 feet. The pilots then declared an emergency as the plane rapidly lost altitude. The crash left a massive crater and scattered debris across the area. And investigators say there's evidence parts of the jet may have broken off before impact. Dan, as I indicated, we do have... Some indication that the aircraft was breaking up before impact and so Some of this is yet to be determined. We may find parts of the aircraft some distance away from the actual impact site. I don't think we're far enough along here to know what we found. We're finding debris, but we haven't identified parts yet. Recovering the wreckage is proving difficult, with much of it buried in the impact crater. About 600 nearby residents have been displaced. One person on the ground was injured. Among the nine people killed were Texas businessman Adam Robinson, His wife, Helen Sharp, and their two young children, four-year-old Emma and two-year-old Charlie. Investigators say it's too early to determine what caused the crash. A second trial is now taking shape for Lindsey Clancy, the Massachusetts mother accused of murdering her three young children. Prosecutors say they intend to retry her, but haven't decided whether to pursue first-degree murder charges again. Clancy was back in court Monday, two months after her first trial ended with a hung jury. Eleven jurors favored acquittal, just one voted to convict. Her attorneys argue she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and was not criminally criminally responsible for the children's death. Prosecutors say she knew what she was doing was wrong. At Monday's hearing, prosecutors also asked the judge to limit what attorneys can say publicly about the case, arguing that comments from the defense could influence a future jury. But things got heated when Clancy's lead attorney, Kevin Reddington, began questioning the conduct of one juror who voted to convict. Judge William Sullivan interrupted him after he identified that juror by name. You don't bring your background ...into a jury room and suppress it, as was done in this case. This gentleman, Mr. Duransville... I'm going to stop you. No, you're not going to stop me. Well, no, I am. No, you're not. All right, then this hearing's... No, because there's no need to bring out that jury... It's all over the Internet. That's through the Internet. That's through other people. There's no need. The judge didn't rule on the requests Monday. He's considering a retrial as early as March, with another hearing set for Nov. 16. The defense is also asking him to dismiss the charges entirely, arguing that a second trial would violate double jeopardy protections. Finally, this morning, after nearly 22 years in space, a NASA telescope that spent its life watching some of the biggest explosions in the universe is about to make a fiery return to Earth. The Swift Observatory launched in 2004 on a mission to study gamma-ray bursts, some of the most powerful explosions in the cosmos. But intense solar activity has been pulling it closer to Earth, and an attempt to rescue the satellite failed. Still, it's had quite a run. Swift was only supposed to last two years. Instead, it kept making discoveries for nearly 22 years. It was designed for two years of science. Here we are, almost 22 years later, able to answer questions that I think, you know, people at the start of the mission hadn't even envisioned when it had started. And so I think the overwhelming sentiment is really one of appreciation, of gratitude, of pride in what we've been able to accomplish. Swift spotted more than 2,000 gamma-ray bursts and 1,400 exploding stars during its time in orbit. NASA expects it to re-enter Earth's atmosphere Wednesday, with most of the telescope burning up on the way down. An AP report called that a cosmic cremation. And I'm going to be thinking about that for the rest of the day. Less noise, more news. Watch Unbiased Updates at SAN.com or our app. Or join our audience on YouTube, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. We're glad to be a part of your morning routine. And a reminder, you can email us here anytime. We actually read those emails. So hit us up, UnbiasedUpdates at SAN.com. We love hearing from you. Folks, that's unbiased updates for this Tuesday election day for the unbiased updates team and all of us at Straight Arrow. I'm Christian Bryant. Thank you so much for watching. Have a good one and we'll see you back here tomorrow.