this is a historic moment in this state s history. and because of your hard work, because of your dedication, we sit here tonight leading a 42-year incumbent. that s tea party challenger, chris mcdaniel, addressing his supporters last night in mississippi. he s going to be in a runoff election against incumbent republican senator, thad cochran, on june 24th. joining us now is casey hunt, nbc political reporter. she s just back from jackson, mississippi. boy, your arms must be tired. just flown in. you were in mississippi last night. i know, we talked from cochran headquarters and you were saying that everybody was kind of on all ten toes, a little stressed out about this. they must be worried about the
the little things that you do for me go to facebook.com dawnsaveswildlife. this is a historic moment in this state s history. [cheers and applause] and because of your hard work because of your dedication we sit here tonight leading a 42 year incumbent. [cheers and applause] that s tea party challenger chris mcdaniel addressing his supporters last night in mississippi. he s going to be in a runoff election against thad cochran on june 24. joining us now is casey hunt. she s just back from jackson, mississippi. boy, your arms must be tired. you ve just flown in. i know we talked from cochran
reporting. at this point, chris mcdaniel has a slight, slight edge at 50%. that could flip because it has been flipping a. we watch these returns come in. there is so much nervousness here at cochran headquarters as you can imagine. as you watch on the ground, it is hard for both campaigns to really track the voter turnout. really track how well each side can do. because, this is in many ways unprecedented. the reason i say that is because, thad cochran has been in the senate as wolf mentioned for 36 years. when he won, he was the first republican since reconstruction to win in mississippi. he hasn t had a primary since. so there has been any precedent for this kind of race. only on the presidential level have you seen the focus on republican turnout and in small numbers and in primary. that s why it is hard i talked to people running both
he did extremely well. you know, that nursing home controversy, mika, sort of blunted what was a very quick upper momentum which is how we ended up in this extremely too close to call situation. that frankly nobody expected. i was at the cochran headquarters last night, and it s pretty they re, they re having to get up and running really quickly. and i think the question is cochran ready to run that. the jury is still out. he s not out in the campaign. he s surrounded by the advisers who basically run the campaign for him. so it s going to be interesting to see how he moves forward. the other thing is, this is going to turn into a huge test for those outside groups it that have been out there spending millions for mcdaniel. particularly the club for growth, the other tea party
be neck and neck. but nail-biting like this, maybe not so much. i think our understanding is about 80% of the precincts are reporting. at this point, chris mcdaniel has a slight, slight edge at 50%. that could flip because it has been flipping a. we watch these returns come in. there is so much nervousness here at cochran headquarters as you can imagine. as you watch on the ground, it is hard for both campaigns to really track the voter turnout. really track how well each side can do. because, this is in many ways unprecedented. the reason i say that is because, thad cochran has been in the senate as wolf mentioned for 36 years. when he won, he was the first republican since reconstruction to win in mississippi. he hasn t had a primary since. so there has been any precedent for this kind of race. only on the presidential level have you seen the focus on