that is a very, very, very important state for al gore, and now the pressure is on george w. bush. florida is called for vice president al gore and gore s march to the white house picks up momentum. that sent a little bit of a shock wave of panic through the headquarters. karl rove to his credit recognized that there was something wrong with the results. and i d also suggest that florida has been prematurely called. first of all, i thought it was a little bit irresponsible of the networks to call it before the polls closed in the western part of florida. as the day progressed on november 7th, you got nothing but good news. florida, pennsylvania, and michigan in his column. we had set up a speech prep room for al gore to practice his victory speech. i told eli addy, who was the speech writer, that we also needed the alternative version.
decision to shut the polls despite unprecedented voter turnout couldn t stop carnahan s victory in missouri, but it may have impacted other races. al gore was only one of two democrats in missouri that were running statewide who lost that night. what was intriguing to me and i always thought this was overlooked, al gore barely lost missouri. if he carried missouri, it wouldn t have mattered if he carried florida or not. an american presidential race has entered a new round of campaigning after election day because there is still no clear winner and there are still votes to be counted in florida and beyond. everybody in the election business says if you get a very, very, very close election, it exposes all kinds of problems. we have a voting system in this country that s still a mess.
apparently, al gore is still planning to be here and give this speech which we certainly expect will be a concession speech. i called carter in the motorcade and said, we can t concede. he said to me, by the way, where are you? i m in the hotel. i missed the motorcade. you have to get here. my assistant drove me. when i got to the perimeter, i pointed to my secret service badge and jumped over parameters. the vice president wasn t answering his phone. i ve just been given a two-minute warning for the appearance of al gore.
high-fives, a lot of tears. we went back up to the state capitol, which was beautifully back-lit. it was 40 degrees and raining and a miserable night. nobody cared. just won the presidency of the united states. al gore stood up and said let s get this thing over with. i m going to go down, put my suit on, we re going to the war memorial, and i m conceding. that began a bit of a comedy of errors. brian, we are expecting the vice president to show up any moment. the vice president called bush and conceded before he left for the war memorial. we did see some dejected types walk away, but the vast majority of people stayed here. i missed the motorcade and i got a call from a network correspondent saying don t concede. the florida numbers are wrong.
in a country of more than 275 million people, the presidency may be settled by a few hundred votes and no one is just sure when. these voters want a new election. election day headlines of voter fraud, hanging chads, and dubious results will continue to dominate the news for weeks to come. we knew there were issues in florida. i don t think at the time we had any idea the u.s. supreme court would determine who the president was going to be. i, george walker bush, do solemnly swear that i will faithfully execute the office of president of the united states. that i will faithfully execute the office of president of the united states. what happened to al gore is a once in a million kind of thing. thank you, thank you, thank you, and god bless you all. thank you and good night. hillary s success in 2000 was clearly to many, many, many people, and it certainly was to me, breaking the glass ceiling