With approximately 99 percent of the vote counted, Jim Webb has just opened a miniscule lead over Republican Sen. George Allen in Virginia. Webb has been closing on Allen for the last half hour, and the latest results from Virginia elections officials put him about 3,000 votes ahead in a race in which more than 2.2 million votes have been counted so far.
In other Senate races we're still watching, the news for Democrats is mixed. In Missouri, with about half of the precincts counted, Republican Jim Talent is leading Claire McCaskill by about six percentage points. In Tennessee, Republican Bob Corker is leading Harold Ford Jr. by about three points with almost 90 percent of the precincts reporting. In Montana, Democratic challenger Jon Tester holds an eight-point lead over Republican Sen. Conrad Burns, but just a handful of the votes have been counted there.
Meanwhile, the Republicans are still clinging to hope that the networks have called Maryland too early for Democrat Ben Cardin. Cardin has already declared victory, but RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman tells CNN that the Washington Post has backed away from its call for Cardin.
Republican Michael Steele isn't giving up. "You have worked too hard . . . for us to slow this train down now just because some TV station wants to make a projection with one percent of the vote in," Steele told supporters earlier tonight. "I just wanted to come down and let you know that I still have a lot of fight in me. They don't call me Steele for nothing."
Shares