Americans Head To The Polls For Crucial Midterm Elections.

Well, it's Election Day in America, with polls on the East Coast just moments away from opening. At stake, control of the country's Congress and the opportunity to greenlight or stymie Donald Trump's agenda for the last two years of his presidency. Live now to US correspondent Catherine Firkin, who is in Washington, D.C. And Catherine, it's shaping up to be one of the biggest turnouts in midterm history. Good evening, Ursula. Yeah, we have seen a huge turnout for these midterm elections. 57 million Americans have already cast their vote. And of course, it is now election day. Polls are set to open in about an hour's time, and we are expecting millions more to head to the ballot boxes. Now, in terms of what's driving people to get out and vote, not too many surprises. Pretty much everyone I've spoken to across the country is talking about the economy. People People generally pretty unhappy with just the cost of basics. The cost of petrol, the cost of groceries, household prices going up, inflation is rising, and generally people are blaming President Trump for that. They're pointing to the war with Iran, also issues like trade wars and tariffs. And the other big issue that I keep hearing from voters is immigration. That does tend to be a much more divisive issue, split down party lines. Trump loyalists I've spoken to are pretty happy with some of those extraordinary immigration rates we've been seeing across the country. While people on the left tend to feel immigration has gone Way too far. Some people even describing it as a source of national shame. Now, no matter which way you look at those issues, it certainly does feel like these midterms are a referendum on President Trump's leadership. Ursula, if you believe the polls, it looks like we are going to be seeing a big swing to the Democrats. But, of course, as we know, polls can be wrong. They have been wrong before, particularly when it comes to President Trump. So it's certainly going to be fascinating to see what happens today. And Catherine, there are some unusually competitive seats this cycle. What races should we be watching? Yeah, there are some really fascinating races right across the country. One I'm particularly interested in is Kansas. That's about as far from a swing state as you can get. That is typically a ruby red state. And the fact that we are even talking about it tells you that something quite extraordinary is happening there. There we are seeing a really tight Senate contest between the Republican incumbent and the Democrat challenger, Adam Hamilton. I think Texas is also another really interesting Senate race. Again, we should be seeing a republic. Thank you. California is very competitive, that's due to redistricting efforts and shifting demographics and of course we've also just seen that big legal challenge in California where the Trump administration was trying to get 20,000 ballots to be thrown out or at least cast aside because they said they had evidence that some of those voters were not US citizens but we have just seen California's highest court throw that challenge out so those ballots will be counted but certainly I don't think that's going to be the last legal challenge we see these midterm elections, not when the environment here is just so heightened. There's all this talk about election security and fraud. It's certainly a fascinating time to be on the ground here in the US. It certainly will be. US correspondent Catherine Firkin, thank you.