if you look back several months ago, when he put out an executive order raising the minimum wage for workers who work for federal contractors. there was outrage. it shows you, for example, that the lgbt community has much more pull politically now than low-wage workers do. that s a remarkable shift from 2004, you know, when one of the republican tactics to win the white house that year was to put as many gay marriage bans on the ballots across the states as they could to draw out even gel call voters. it s gone from something they saw as a weapon on offense to something they don t want to talk about after the president issues a executive order. on the congressional order, there appears to be silence. not from rick perry who doubled down and then some on comments last week comparing homosexuality to alcoholism. this is part of his exchange
in our rockie mountain newsroom tonight where 59% of all voters have requested mail-in ballots. that s a record. how is it effecting the races there in denver and beyond? well, shep, it makes them more expensive. one candidate here told us he figures he has to peak with voters by october 12th. that s when the ballots are mailed out and he has to maintain that as the votes are pouring in and that means spending more cash on tv ads now. they also have to keep their volunteer base energized and convince voters to send those ballots back asap. the secretary of state s office tells us by election day morning most of the votes are already. in shep? shepard: campaigns know how they are doing? well, as the ballots are received, they are scanned but not tabulated and that information is public. the campaigns can do internal polling call voters and ask them what they did. to be clear, official results aren t released until after the polls close on election day.