Extra: Bill Hemmer On The Nail-Biter In North Carolina
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This is the Fox News Rundown Extra. I'm Dave Anthony. Today, we continue with our focus on each battleground state considered toss-ups in the presidential election. This week, North Carolina.

which has 16 of the 93 electoral votes considered up for grabs for Vice President Harris and former President Trump in the Fox News Power Rankings. There were four Trump events across North Carolina in two days that started this past week. Fox's Bill Hemmer joined us to break down voting in that state. Region by region, demographic by demographic in North Carolina, and as usual...

Bill was thorough. So thorough, we had to trim some of it out for the Rundown podcast we posted on Wednesday. But, you know, we don't have to worry about that today. There is no time restriction on a weekend extra, so you are about to hear my entire discussion with Bill in full. We hope you like these extras and come back for more. And for the Rundown during the week, twice a day, thank you for listening, as always. And now Bill Hemmer on the Fox News Rundown Extra.

Joining us again on the Fox News Rundown is Bill Hemmer. You can watch him 9 to 11 o'clock weekday mornings, America's Newsroom with Dana Perino. Also, when it comes to elections, Bill will be there, election night, at the map, touching the screen, going around the country with all the different voting results. And today we're going to focus on...

on North Carolina, one of the toss-up battleground states in the Fox Power rankings. First of all, good to have you back. Thank you, John. Good to be with you. So North Carolina is one of these states where you can look at one poll and see Trump by two or three or one, and then another poll that has the exact opposite. It is as close as it can get. Yeah, it sure is. It appears to be that way.

North Carolina historically has been somewhat elusive for Democrats, not for Barack Obama. But, you know, he won two terms, but only won North Carolina once.

which is very interesting. And they've been trying to like get over the hump. Right, and Trump won it twice, right? Yeah, that's right. Well, yes, correct on that. And closer in 2020 than in 2016. And it appears, just based on a lot of research, Charlotte is Mecklenburg County, one of the most populated counties in the whole state.

and they haven't been able to close the deal in Mecklenburg County. And if they can, they're going to have a real good shot at winning the state. Now, there are a lot of variables out there.

And we can get into this, you know, whether or not Helene affects what's happening in western North Carolina or what the early indications are saying on the early vote. But you're talking about an urban area, and that has been traditionally in all of these states, right, that are battleground states. Democrats need to do well in those populated cities. Yeah, what I find interesting about Mecklenburg is it's not just urban. It's also suburban. And the counties that surround it also.

They've always been a reliably Republican, but we don't know how they're going to vote with Trump going after a third term. I will say, as of this conversation, in North Carolina, the in-person vote, which is something I look at

every day. Sort of, kind of obsessed with it actually. This is the early voting stuff. Well, there's a lot of really smart people you can follow on X and they're professors and they're political scientists, they're mathematicians, statisticians, and you can follow how they're evaluating this, but I just want to get this number out. Okay. As of our conversation right now, there is just shy of a million people who have voted in person and different states will put this information out in different ways.

In Georgia, for example, they will break it down according to race, white and then black. Okay. And that's how they do it. North Carolina doesn't get that specific. But as of now, you've got an advance vote of well over a million people in the state of North Carolina who have voted. And when you talked about black and white...

The former president seems to be gaining momentum with minority voters. He had the event with Latinos in Miami. A poll that came out this week has an 11-point lead over Vice President Harris. Now, obviously, Harris has a big lead among black voters, but particularly among black men, she seems to be lagging what Joe Biden did in 2016 and 20. The only thing I would say about that, it appears that you're right, that your statement is accurate, right?

We really, we're not going to know. And as we said, you're skeptical. Well, we're two weeks away and you just, you don't want to jump the gun on anything. Um, in my view and for, for six months and we've been watching these polls, Dave and all the really smart people say, yeah, this is where the spread is right now. But over the next six months, these numbers close and everybody comes home or maybe they will. But if they don't, it's going to be a,

a really good opportunity for Trump to pick up voters in a state like North Carolina that in most elections that we've observed over the past 24 years hasn't necessarily gone that way. So that's a bit of the drama that's held within the numbers.

From the Fox News Podcast Network, subscribe and listen to the Trey Gowdy Podcast. Former federal prosecutor and four-term U.S. congressman from South Carolina brings you a one-of-a-kind podcast. Subscribe and listen now by going to foxnewspodcast.com. You've talked about suburban voters like in Mecklenburg County. There has been a large gender gap in the polling pretty much nationwide.

The support's there for men, for former President Trump, but like a mirror, it's just the same for women, for Vice President Harris. Is this as much of a gap as you've seen? It could be. I'm definitely as big as I've seen in the polling, but whether that turns out that way, I don't know. If it does, yes. You know, women are on one side and men are on the other. But since we're talking about North Carolina, I think it's good for listeners to understand that, you know,

You know, when you're looking at that map, you know, it's a beautiful state, right? You've got the coastline on the east and you've got the mountains in the west. But in between there, you've got Charlotte at the bottom, a little bit of a triangle to get this in your head. Due north of there is a county called Guilford, and that's Greensboro. And then east of there is Raleigh, and that's Wake County. And they kind of make a bit of a triangle of sorts.

One of the things that I'm most curious about, and similar to Georgia, but for the sake of this conversation, North Carolina, how have the demographics in North Carolina changed since 2020? We got an indication of that a little bit in 2022, but not at the presidential level. And I don't know if there is a hidden factor in there that we have not seen since the census of 2020. Is this all COVID related? No, I think...

It is, yes, going back to 2020. People moving out of Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, going to a lower tax state, a state with better weather. Right. Maybe better job opportunities. Or you take your job with you and work remotely. You could do that. Or maybe younger people have decided to move there. We know that's the case in metro Atlanta. That was apparent in 2020. How similar is it in a state like North Carolina? I just don't know what that intangible is now. All right. You talked about the mountains.

We had Hurricane Helene a couple of weeks ago, and it was obviously devastating to the Asheville area. And they're still dealing with that now and the recovery and the cleanup could take a long time in the rebuilding for people. It's become, of course, a big political issue with the storm response and former President Trump's been there and he's calling it a terrible response and he'll do better.

We don't know what that factor is in this race either. Yeah, so I've crunched the numbers. 2020 is our best comparison for the sake of this conversation. There were 25 counties affected in western North Carolina. Of the 25, the most populated is called Buncombe. B-U-N-C-O-M-B-E. That's where Asheville is located. Okay.

Buncombe is one of these blue dots you find in America today where a lot of progressives, liberals or Democrats choose to live in a particular county. Dane County is a really good example in Wisconsin. Also, south central part of the state, heavily Democratic, just like Buncombe. Surrounded by Republican surrounded by red, not exclusively red, but pretty close to it.

So Buncombe had a net gain off the top of my head. I think it was 43,000 votes for Joe Biden in 2020. But the other 24 counties, two dozen counties, were a net gain for Trump by about 270. Wow. That's a big difference. Maybe 260. But by my calculation, it was a net gain in those 25 counties for Trump.

by 220,000 votes. Well, you know how close the state was. I think it was 74,000 in the end in favor of Trump. So could it be a factor? Yes. What I'm seeing though, just anecdotally from our reporting that we've been there and our reporters on the ground,

Even on Monday, when early voting started, the lines were long. That was Asheville. That was Buncombe. Yeah. And every time we talk to people more and more, they give us the indication. And on our program on Tuesday morning, we had a fellow on there from Buncombe, but he was clearly a Trump supporter because he was at his event that happened on Monday. And he gives us the indication. He goes, every day we're getting better. OK. Every day it's cleaner.

Every day we're getting more junk off the street. So you got two more weeks of that. And A, ask yourself this. Are you more inclined to make sure your vote counts or are you dissuaded by the factors of Mother Nature that you've been dealt with? Yeah. And maybe more roads open, maybe more areas and make it easier for people to get to a polling place or to do that.

But do you think the politics of the storm response? I mean, that's the toughest thing to gauge, whether people are more motivated. They're angry. I've heard people say, I haven't seen FEMA. And then FEMA's like, well, we're all over the state. I just don't know. Maybe. Could be a factor. Yeah.

Haven't thought about it specifically, but maybe it shows up in the exit polling or maybe I chose up in the voter analysis Right to see it's hard to put really hard to predict There's there's a guy you know I mentioned all these smart people that you can follow on X There's a fella named Patrick Ruffini and he's really Intel He's got a sub spec a stack that I read look if you're a nerd about this stuff You want to subscribe to it? He did an analysis this week of North Carolina and some of the stuff is what you would expect but some of it was a bit of a surprise and

And what he talked about was the eastern half, sorry, the eastern quarter, the eastern third, let's call it a quarter, half of the state and how dynamic it is.

One of the counties that flipped between 2016 and 2020, and flipped counties is something that I'm always looking at. Like in Pennsylvania, you got Erie up in the north that flipped by a point or two for Biden, and you got Northampton in the far eastern part of the state. So you're talking about flipped from Trump to the Democrats. Or Biden to Trump. I think there's three of them in North Carolina, I believe. One flipped from Biden to Trump. But two others, I believe, flipped from Trump to Biden. One of them is called New Hanover.

It's in the southeastern corner of the state. That's where Wilmington is. They've got a college there. And so they attract a little bit of this semi-blue dot, I would argue. But right below it, there's a county called New Brunswick. And this is where all the barrier islands, the beaches that you find of North Carolina, where the snowbirds go to retire. The snowbirds or the northerners or Midwesterns go to vacation during the summertime. That is one of the fastest growing counties in America. And nobody even knows about it. So...

There is a chance that you could get one of these surprise votes. And that's what Feeney did, is he went north of there and to other areas that have more of an African-American population. Or they have a rural population, prominently white, that trends toward the Democratic Party. So there's a real mixed bag over there.

And frankly, I think as we sit here right now, there's a lot of votes up for grabs in that part of the state. So that's something we'll watch on election day. It is interesting. You talk about rural white a lot of times. People immediately think, well, that must be Trump, right? Because he does well with voters in rural areas. He does well, especially with men who don't have the college education or more of a blue collar. Well,

One of the things that he points out is the difference between rural voters in North Carolina and rural voters in Georgia. But they're right next to each other. Many times they're white on both sides, but the white voters in Georgia vote in force for Trump, and they have proven that. The white voters in North Carolina can be a little different, so it's just something to watch.

Yeah, you know, it is interesting because you go through all these different battleground states. Do you have a harder time gauging North Carolina or any of the other ones, or are they all equally difficult? Well, you know, I've been really nerding out on the early posts. Yeah, well, you have the whole map and you have to touch the screen and everything. Here's what I'm thinking as of today, and all this could change. I said this to our team two days ago. I said, is there a chance that we actually know who's going to win?

as we go into the morning of election day? Because early voting is so significant. So there's some data points out there, and I'm not saying this is true. This is not empirical. It's just something to think about. Most observers in the state of Georgia believe if you want to win a statewide vote as a Democrat, you have to hit 30% of the vote of African Americans.

And so we've had one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, I think nine days of early voting in Georgia. Let me just consult my... So you've had in-person vote, which I'm really big on, by the way. The ballots requested and the ballots sent, the numbers are out there. Okay, fine. But the breakdown is difficult to know. But in-person voting tells me a lot. And they've had 1.3 million as of Tuesday morning. That's a ton of votes out there.

And so because Georgia reports based on race, which is not always the case, you can see where the black vote is. And as of yesterday, there's a thing called souls of the polls on a Sunday, black churches. The message is we go to church and then we go vote. Right. And vice president Harris went to churches in Georgia. That's right. On Sunday. And I think she'll be back again this coming Sunday. Um,

But the margin did not change precipitously. I think it was around 27.2 African-American and jumped to like 27.5 based on a professor in Louisiana named John Kuvlin who watches this stuff very carefully. So, I mean, maybe there's something, some tea leaves that we can read. I think the same is true for this discussion regarding North Carolina. You're going to see this in-person vote and where it comes from.

You might be able to devise some clues based on that. And your question is very good about Western North Carolina. We're going to know whether or not the early in-person vote, the EIV, is the equivalent of what it was in 2020. And so there's going to be some clues in there is just my point. But no conclusions. And I want to emphasize this.

Look, Republicans have shown a tendency already to be more enthusiastic to vote than Democrats have. However, we do not know today whether that enthusiastic early vote still would have happened eventually or on Election Day. And you talk about mail-in voting.

there are it's easier with early in person voting you cast your ballot and that's pretty much it the mail-in you might in north carolina i mean you have to attest you have to have uh there's rules on that you you have to have some certification on your vote and and it's not just just send it in the mail like and what i mean is you could more easily challenge a mailed-in ballot

Uh-huh. That's what I'm... So that's the difference why early in-person voting might not be as easily challenged as a mail-in vote. Say, what if you didn't do the... So there's something on the ballot you didn't do perfectly. Right, right. It's a good point. I don't know how it shakes out, but... But in North Carolina...

They have a voter ID law. If you vote by mail, you have to get the signatures of two witnesses and a copy of their identification in the ballot envelope. It's pretty strict. So again, we don't know what that would mean. Yeah, that's right. It seems like it could be open to more challenge. Listen, North Carolina is going to close in the 7 o'clock Eastern Time hour. Okay. And if they count fast, we...

We might have some early clues. Do you think Georgia? You know, look, Georgia's been under the gun for four years. OK. They've got an excellent Web site that was that was redone by the secretary of state. Is it Georgia? Yeah. I would encourage your listeners to go to it and check it out if you want to nerd out on this stuff. And, you know, the pressure Georgia was under in 2020 by all sides. And it's still there.

And and Democrats made a big deal of the voter law that came after that and called it like a Jim Crow 2.0. And they said that they were trying to suppress the vote in that state. Have you heard much about that since? Not yet. Not yet. You think it's lurking? I think the changes they made so far have proven to be a better system than they had before. And I mean, look at the numbers. It's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot.

I wanted to show you this. All right. So yes, we Fox power rankings. You're handing me a slip of paper. Okay, go ahead. Harris with 226 projected electoral votes. Yes, sir. With 219, 93 up for grabs in these seven battleground states. You can take two different scenarios and make it 269, 269 and have a tied electoral college. Gotcha. Okay. My question here is you have Trump's

Pennsylvania 19 is that Georgia and or got it. Not and or, or Georgia or. And this is either. OK, they split Georgia, North Carolina. Brilliant. And then Pennsylvania goes to Trump.

Michigan goes to Trump, Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, and one of the other, Georgia, North Carolina. Very good. I love it. Where'd you get this? I was just looking at the map. You just do the map out. That's really good. And the other scenario is there. Do you have a copy of this? Because I want to take it down because we're going to do rehearsals today. Take this with you. I want to check your math. The question for you is that congressional district in Nebraska, that one electoral vote accounted for in here. In this district?

in this projection, in both of the scenarios of a tie, it's

It's given to Harris, the Nebraska district. OK, so that's Omaha. Right. That's not considered right now a battleground. That's one of these blue dots that we mentioned. Right. But if it were to shift to Trump unexpectedly, that could even also lead to a scenario of a tie. Yes. Because you can make the math out to 70. I'm keeping I want to run into the ringer. I mean, nobody's prepared for that, Bill. Yeah, you're right. You're not wrong about that.

So North Carolina, if you had to go, who needs it more? I think the easiest way to understand it for Harris is to sweep the blue wall. Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, game over. I think for Trump, the easiest way to understand it is Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania. He wins those, it's over. That's right. And so North Carolina... That's right.

So you think he needs it more? For Trump to lose North Carolina, he's got to go shopping out west, which he can do. You know, Arizona's got 11 electoral votes. Nevada has six. Or he goes up into that blue wall and steals one of those states. And in all likelihood, if it's not Pennsylvania, he probably... He's won Michigan before. Yeah, but Michigan's won less than North Carolina. You can't take it off the table. You need all the votes you can get. Right. Wisconsin, historically...

You know, with the exception of 2008, Wisconsin has been a very close state. Back in 2000, we were banging our heads against the wall in Tallahassee, Florida, trying to figure out whether it was Bush or Gore. Wisconsin was decided by like 0.2 percentage points. And then in 2004, between Kerry and Bush, no one even paid attention to it. It was 0.4 percentage points. Wow.

That's remarkable stuff. Ohio was the big one in that race. 118,000 votes. He gave it to Bush that night and gave him a second term. Yeah. So we'll see. North Carolina, certainly one of the states up for grabs. Thank you for my souvenir, my memento. Thank you for my homework. All right. Bill Hemmer, you can watch him on America's Newsroom 9 to 11, Monday through Friday on the Fox News Channel on election night. He'll be at the wall touching the screen, going through all the results. Good to have you. Thank you, brother. Thanks a lot. Thanks. See you, Dave.

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