Election Day: MN school funding vote, key Senate races

We are under half an hour away from polls opening up for the 2026 midterm election. And Fox 9 has full team coverage, of course, of the races that matter to us all. Hannah Flood is standing by live in the Live Center tracking key Senate races across the country. But not just candidates. Voters will be deciding on today. Shane Wells has more on a constitutional amendment that is also on the ballot here in Minnesota. Good morning. Yeah, good morning. So voters will decide whether to increase funding going to Minnesota schools. Without raising taxes, this money instead would come from the permanent school trust fund, which has been around since Minnesota became a state. It collects funds from rents and royalties on millions of acres of public land. And over the last 15 years, it's grown from 675 million to more than 2.3 billion. But the formula that distributes the money, it hasn't changed. Right now, districts receive 2.5% of the funds, of those values, and if the measure passes, that would rise to 4.5%, or from $68 to $101 per student. Advocates say the change would send an extra $28 million to schools across the state. One of the ways I like to think about this is that the money has already been collected to the trust. This is just a modern way of distributing it. We know that districts are really pinched with inflationary costs, whether it's labor, diesel costs, construction costs, Thank that we know that any dollar amount is gonna help our public schools. We want to show you what this question looks like on your ballot. So supporters are warning voters to not skip it because Blake votes will count as no. So there it is right there. you. If it passes with a simple majority, it will go into effect on July 1st of next year. Good heads up. Yeah, everybody will see it. Thank you for the information. On the national level, we know a lot of eyes on the balance of power in the House and the Senate. So this is the current breakdown of the U.S. Senate. Democrats have 45 seats with two independents who caucus with them, so essentially 47. Republicans hold 53 seats, and there are 35 seats up for grabs today. So Democrats need to gain at least four seats in order to take control. There are some races that have been identified as possible flips right now. Let's focus on Texas. Not normally a state considered a battleground, but this year has proven competitive there. Hannah Flood joins us from the Live Center tracking some of these crucial races for us right now. Now, Hannah, let's talk Texas. There's a lot of talk about it. Yeah, yes, there is. Who will be Texas's next senator? To give you an idea of how big this race has become, it is the most expensive non-presidential race in U.S. history. So a lot of money going into this, a lot of eyes on it. This is a race between Democrat James Tallarico and Republican Ken Paxton. A brand new New York Times-Siena poll shows Tallarico is leading this This race, 50 points to 43, so still looking very tight. Two other polls released yesterday show a narrower margin between these candidates. This is monumental because Texas has not elected a Democrat to the Senate in 38 years. Both candidates were making their final pitch to voters yesterday talking about the cost of living. One of the complaints I hear though is that everything costs more, whether it's gas or groceries, it's the electric bill, everything's up except our paychecks. In the last election, Texans voted to lower costs. They voted to lower grocery prices. But now corrupt tariffs are raising prices at the checkout line. So the Texas Secretary of State Office says 7.4 million Texans have already cast their ballots during early voting. That's about 40 percent of registered voters matching the modern midterm record for Texas set back in 2018. Experts say the high turnout was largely driven by this very high stakes Senate race. We'll be highlighting a few different key races happening around the country throughout this morning. Coming up at 7, we are taking a look at the Iowa Senate race. Tom McGillick. All right, Hannah, thank you. And, of course, Fox 9 has full election coverage all day today, all the way until the results are in. So stick with us here both on the air, of course, and streaming on Fox Local.