Election day
Early voting has set records in Central Texas this year, but huge crowds are expected to cast their vote today on Election Day. Travis County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir tells KVUE we should expect at least 100,000 votes cast today.
“If we can equitably distribute our voters all throughout the 178 locations, and there shouldn’t be much of a line anywhere at all,” DeBeauvoir says.
There’ll be 178 polling sites open today. As for early voting totals, she expects to provide those numbers by 7 p.m. tonight.
Meanwhile, Austin Mayor Steve Adler is urging patience as we await election results. Mayor Adler is hoping everyone who hasn’t voted yet will cast a ballot today and then be patient while all those votes are counted.
“So we go to sleep, we don’t know who’s won, and we’re still counting votes several days later. That’s okay, that’s how the process is supposed to work in those instances,” Adler says.
Since more people are using mail-in ballots, that could mean a longer time for results to come in. However, Adler says everyone who votes deserves to have that vote counted.
Austin City Council seats
Austin City Council District 6 is among the seats very much in play this year. The incumbent, Jimmy Flannigan is up against two formidable challengers; Mackenzie Kelly and Dr. Jennifer Mushtaler. Kelly appears to have much more momentum than Mushtaler. Many experts believe that no matter who may win there, Flannigan will have a very difficult time holding that seat.
Austin City Council member Greg Casar, meantime, is fighting to keep his District 4 seat. Casar is leaning on his success to push council to progress and change touching on the defunding APD movement.
“We’ve made transformational changes to our budgets to start to rely less on mass incarceration and more on the kinds of public services that prevent crime and violence in the first place. We need violence prevention, mental health and community services,” says Casar.
Rather than addressing his two opponents on the ticket as they have, Casa takes aim at the state and federal government as the obstacles to Austin’s progressive moves.
In total, five seats on the Austin City Council are up for grabs today. District 6 and 4, but also 2, 7 and 10 and all but one of those seats has an incumbent vying for another term. In District 2, Mayor Pro TEM Delia Garza is not seeking another term on the council because she’s running for the position of county attorney.
Texas Senate race
One of the more contentious races across Texas has been between MJ Hegar and Texas Senator John Cornyn. Both have been making last minute pushes this week. Hegar continues to claim Cornyn wants to strip people of their health care.
“His actions have been leading for us to be the 50th in the nation for access to healthcare,” says Garza.
Cornyn says it’s patently untrue. Although he says he’s very opposed to Obamacare,
“You know how much the premiums on the Affordable Care Act has gone up the last six years? 57% in Texas alone,” says Cornyn.
Polling still puts Cornyn as the favorite as we head into Election Day.
Texas up for grabs
A lot of people believe Texas is very much up for grabs today on the presidential side of things. Political scientist Mark Jones says if President Trump hopes to secure victory in the state tonight, he’ll have to win smaller cities like Lubbock, Tyler and Midland.
“He needs to do well in those population centers well in the rural areas and well in the suburbs, because he’s going to get crushed in most of the urban areas,” Jones says.
Historically, the majority of voters in those areas hit the polls on Election Day, meaning it could be a late night of vote counting. Many polls show Trump and Biden in a virtual tie heading into this final day of the election season.
Post-election preparation
Austin is no different than other big cities across the nation. With some businesses worried about post election violence, several businesses on Congress Avenue have boarded up their windows. At a news conference last month, Austin Assistant Police Chief Joe Chacon said all APD officers are on tactical alert this week and they’re ready to respond to any situations.
“We certainly respect people’s right to peacefully assemble and to be able to voice their opinions. They just have to do it within the law,” Chacon says.
He says Austin police will be there just to maintain the balance and make to keep the peace if anything were to happen.
This news and more on News Radio KLBJ:
https://omny.fm/shows/klbjam-flash-briefing-1/am-newscast-11-3-20
