2022 midterm election results

Polls will remain open for one extra hour in Bell County, Texas, because of technical difficulties with check-in machines, the county’s public information officer said in a press release Tuesday afternoon. 

The Bell County Elections Administrator asked the county attorney to petition a district court judge to issue a court order for polls to stay open.

Judge Jack Jones, of the 146th judicial district, ordered polling hours be extended until 8 p.m. local time Tuesday, according to the court order.  

This morning, check-in machines at eight of the county’s 42 voting centers were not working due to synchronization issues tied to Sunday’s time change, Bell County Public Information Officer James Stafford told CNN Tuesday morning. 

"This issue led to delays in the opening of those facilities and long waits for some voters,” Stafford said in a press release Tuesday afternoon. “To ensure that every Bell County voter is given the opportunity to cast their ballot, the Bell County Elections Office has requested and been allowed to extend voting hours county-wide until 8:00 p.m.”

Polling results will be delayed this evening as a result of this, the release said. Bell County is in central Texas and includes Killeen, Texas. 

A man was arrested Tuesday afternoon after threatening voters with a knife in a Milwaukee suburb, briefly forcing one polling place to close.

Police in West Bend, Wisconsin, responded at about 12:35 p.m. CT to a report of a man armed with a knife at West Bend Community Memorial Library, which is a polling location. The man demanded that staff “stop the voting,” the West Bend Police Department said in a press release. 

The 38-year-old man, who was not immediately identified by authorities, was arrested without incident, and no injuries were reported, police said.

Voting at the polling site stopped for just more than 30 minutes while officers investigated, the police said, but the location has since reopened. Police said that “charges will be forthcoming.”

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger says he expects that many counties across the state should be able to report results quicker and earlier than they have historically due to the state voting bill passed in 2021.

Improvements in SB 202 have clarified that county election officials can begin pre-processing and early tabulation of all ballots, including all early voting and absentee ballots, before polls close at 7 p.m. local time on Tuesday, he said at a press conference on Tuesday.

Roughly one-third of the state’s 159 counties are participating in early tabulation, including most of the largely populated counties in Atlanta and the Atlanta suburbs, according to state election officials.  Any precinct election officials who are involved with tabulating will be sequestered at their county office until polls close to prevent information leaks.

Turnout across Georgia continues to be extremely strong on Election Day, Raffensperger said, adding that the average wait time to vote has been roughly two minutes across the state so far.    

“What we are really seeing has been an election that has been very calm and quiet and smooth,” he added.

 An outage earlier Tuesday of the Nevada secretary of state’s website has been resolved, and there is no evidence it was caused by malicious activity, Nevada officials said. 

The outage was due to a technical issue, IT administrators said in a report that the Nevada secretary of state’s office shared with CNN.

“Once the cause was determined, service was manually restored through the device’s backup and the state is now back online,” the report said. “Service will be restored through the primary firewall after the conclusion of the election.”

If you're just joining us, here's what you need to know to get up to speed on the state of the midterms race and what to watch for next.

What's at stake: The 2022 midterm elections will decide control of Congress, dozens of statewide positions and ballot measures on key issues in many states.

Take a look at CNN's hour-by-hour guide on when polls close for each state.

What the results could mean for America: At every election, candidates tell voters that this is the most critical election of their lifetimes. This time they may be right.

A Republican wave would sweep in scores of candidates who swear by ex-President Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. The former President would likely weaponize a Republican-controlled House against Biden ahead of the 2024 presidential vote; Rep. Kevin McCarthy – who would likely become Republican Speaker if Republicans win – has not ruled out impeaching Biden, despite the absence of any evidence that he’s committed an impeachable offense.

A surprise Democratic victory would allow Biden to build upon his social, health, and climate change legislation, and to balance out the judiciary with liberal judges after four years of Trump’s conservative picks.

Joining us from abroad? If you're following the US midterm elections from another part of the world, read this helpful guide on what to know and what to watch.

What to look for tonight: Watch Harry Enten's quick explainer ahead of Election Night to get up to speed:

House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy and his team have been working on a victory speech for the last couple of weeks as he remains extremely confident that they will take back the House tonight.

While he has prepared remarks, he's expected to riff a bit as well. His team expects he may take the stage in the 11 p.m. ET hour if the night goes as they expect.

It's expected that Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel and potentially former House Speaker Newt Gingrich could speak as well. 

McCarthy has raised an enormous amount of money and stumped in about 40 states in the last few months — even as late as last night and today for two House challengers in Virginia, Jen Kiggans and Hung Cao, who Republicans believe will help them take back the majority.

The goal for Team McCarthy: Picking up at least 20 seats. If they clear that bar, they will consider it a very good night, giving them a comfortable governing majority. If the party picks up fewer, Republicans won't be view tonight as strong of a showing as they hoped. which could spell problems for getting their agenda through Congress.

There have been isolated incidents of e-poll books going down in Detroit, Michigan, according to Jake Rollow, a spokesperson for Michigan Department of State.

Rollow said he has heard a "couple reports" that e-poll books in Detroit have gone down, but "not that many."

Kristina Karamo, the GOP nominee for Michigan Secretary of State, tweeted misinformation on Tuesday, claiming that there was “fraud” and a “crime” in Detroit because some voters who showed up to their precincts were told they already voted absentee.

Former President Donald Trump already picked up Karamo’s claim, and said on his Truth Social account, “the absentee ballot situation in Detroit is REALLY BAD. People are showing up to Vote only to be told, “sorry, you have already voted.” This is happening in large numbers, elsewhere as well. Protest, Protest, Protest.”

But remember: Rollow from the Michigan Secretary of State’s office has already addressed this and said the issue had already been resolved.

Every precinct should have a paper backup of the voter registration list in case there are issues with the e-poll book, Rollow said. "It obviously could take a bit longer just to look somebody up on paper rather than looking them up on your computer, but it shouldn't impact a voter's ability to vote in any way."

"There's no reason to expect that it would be, you know, taking place more broadly or in any way, you know, connected across jurisdictions," Rollow said, adding that officials would look into the issue to make sure.

As of 8 a.m. local time this morning, 2,016,147 absentee ballots had been requested in Michigan, and 1,716,264 had been submitted, Rollow added.

Polls in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, will stay open until 10 p.m. ET tonight, per an order from county judge Lesa S. Gelb.

In the order, Gelb said voters in the county were “disenfranchised and denied the fundamental right to vote … through no fault of their own.”

Attorneys petitioning for the extension of time cited a paper shortage at polling locations, that ultimately resulted in the inability to print paper ballots and necessitated the use of emergency and provisional ballots, resulting in delays for voters.

The judge ordered that all election officials be immediately alerted to the extended voting hours.

Luzerne County is located in Northeast Pennsylvania, and encompasses Wilkes-Barre, the county’s largest city.

The North Carolina Board of Elections voted unanimously to allow three polling precincts to close an hour later in North Carolina after their opening was delayed on Election Day.

Wilson County's Sanoca Fire Station, the Gaddys Community Building polling precinct in Robeson County and the Ransom precinct in Columbus County will all close at 8:30 p.m. ET, the board voted. 

Voters would vote with provisional ballot after 7:30 p.m. ET, said the board during a meeting Tuesday on the issue.

We're "talking about less than a half dozen precincts today and there's over 2,600 precincts here in North Carolina. So, what we're about to do is just to make sure that polling places are open no more and no less than the statutory. The statutes require us," said Damon Circosta, chair of the North Carolina Board of Elections ahead of the vote.

Extending the closing "offers consistency amongst all three of those precincts and it makes sure that we're not staying. Keeping our election workers there so terribly late at night, so it's balancing the needs of the voters with the needs of election administration," said the chair.

The Gaddys Community Building polling place in Robeson County "opened approximately one hour late because the building was locked and the voters did not have the correct access code to enter the building," North Carolina State Board of Elections (NCSBE) Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell said.  

"Additionally, three sites in Columbus County were delayed in opening due to the check-in computers not being connected properly to the printers and therefore the workers were unable to print the voters' authorization to vote forms," she said. 

NCSBE will start releasing initial results at approximately 7:30 p.m. ET for all counties where the polls close at that time.   

In all less than 45 voters were impacted and several returned or were offered provisional ballots, according to the board.