Outstanding. With key states yet to be called, the presidential contest between Joe Biden and Donald Trump remained a tossup.
■ All eyes are on Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
■ The New York Times: The remaining Pennsylvania vote looks to be overwhelmingly for Biden.
■ When Fox News called Arizona for Biden—long before other networks—things got tense.
■ The Times maps Biden’s possible paths to victory.
■ Vox explains how one measly Electoral College vote in Nebraska could flip the whole thing.
■ Trump ranted on Twitter overnight, “We want all voting to stop,” but, as the AP explains, the voting is over and only counting remains.
■ At least two Republicans and a flock of cable news anchors dumped on Trump for declaring victory prematurely.
■ CNN: The delayed results show the system is working.
■ BuzzFeed News has “a running list of unverified, misleading, and fake claims” about the election.
■ The Onion: “Seizures Induced In Millions Of Americans As CNN Map Strobes Wildly Between Blue And Red.”
■ Ex-Sen. Al Franken’s tweet: “What do we want? Patience! When do we want it? Now! Patience! Now! Patience! Now!”
As for the Senate … Which party would control it in 2021 remained uncertain.
■ But its Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, will be back.
Congressional squeakers. Incumbent U.S. Rep. Sean Casten has declared victory in a close race with Republican troll Jeanne Ives (2018 link).
■ Rep. Lauren Underwood of Naperville—2018’s youngest Black woman ever elected to Congress—was locked in a dead heat with ice cream magnate Jim Oberweis.
■ A racist Republican who supports the crackpot QAnon conspiracy movement has won a House seat from Georgia.
City-suburb schism. The Sun-Times’ Mark Brown says the outcome of the race for Cook County state’s attorney reveals the Chicago area can still split along racial and geographic lines.
■ One Chicago ward supported Trump for president.
■ In a first at the Illinois Supreme Court, Justice Thomas Kilbride has lost a retention fight—defeated in large part by money from Republican champion billionaire Ken Griffin.
■ All the Cook County judges up for retention*—except one who’d already quit—were on track to keep their seats.
The State of Chicago. Several Illinois counties voted Tuesday in support of a scheme to separate the city from the rest of Illinois, creating a 51st state.
■ The Sun-Times’ continually updating election tally tracks the vote across Illinois.
■ The outcome of the “Fair Tax Amendment” referendum to allow higher tax rates for wealthier Illinoisans may not be known for weeks (update) is: It failed.
■ The Tribune rounds up the results of suburban referenda on subjects including taxes, recreational cannabis and police funding.
■ Vox: Election Day brought a nationwide rejection of the war on drugs.
■ Across the country, a “rainbow wave” of LGBTQ candidates ran and won.
■ Mississippi voters approved death for their Confederate-themed flag.
Historic surge. The percentage of voting-eligible citizens who turned out nationwide could be the highest in 120 years.
‘A COVID storm.’ Gov. Pritzker says Illinois remains in the thick of the fight against the coronavirus, and he’s appealing to local governments to enforce pandemic safeguards.
■ He says the ban on indoor dining in Chicago could last three weeks.
■ One Chicago suburb has fined three restaurants for defying the ban.
Reader cuts. Its ad revenue collapsed in the pandemic, the alt-weekly Chicago Reader has instituted pay-cuts and furloughs for three months as it transitions to a nonprofit reader-supported funding model.
■ Reader writer Maya Dukmasova, on a two-week furlough: “If you love our journalism …”
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