analyst. and the host of way too early, jonathan lemire. white house bureau chief of my politico. and host of the circus, john heilemann. good to have you all. polls open in less than an hour in georgia, where one of the most consequential primaries of the midterms is taking place. there are several state and congressional races on the ballot, but the ones we re closely watching are the republican primaries for governor, secretary of state, and senate. the new york times describes the background of today s races like this. quote, georgia s got everything. disputed elections, rapid demographic change, celebrity democrats, a restrictive new voting law, an open criminal investigation into donald trump s meddling in the 2020 election, a deep rural-urban divide and unending drama between the trump wing of the republican party and the local gop establishment. that s a lot. former senator david perdue, whose loss in the state two years ago helped give democrats control of
all right. breaking news overnight in ukraine, where a devastating months long battle in the key port city of mariupol, ukraine, has officially ceded control on russia. we ll have more on the deal that is right now allowing the city s final defenders to safely evacuate that steel plant. we ll also go live to buffalo this morning as president biden prepares to visit the grieving city in the wake of saturday s deadly mass shooting. it comes amid new reports about the suspect s alleged plan to turn the massacre into a spree. we will talk to a top member of the white house national security council on that. and it is primary day in pennsylvania. the senate race there has been rocked by twists and turns in the key final days. for the democrats, the leading candidate, john fetterman, is recovering from a stroke. on the republican side, an unexpected surge on the far right from kathy barnette. we ll be watching to see how trump-backed dr. oz performs tonight. good morning
Riden the red wave. big turnout here at the morning glory. come join us and see you at the polls. they are open now in florida. back to you guys. brian: let s go out to lawrence he is live with a great vest in smokehouse, barbecue in gainesville, georgia. lawrence, say something imprevisich. lawrence: well, it s great to be in the poultry capital of the world. that s very impressive. great to be here in georgia, guys. you guys may be wondering why it s so close when it comes into the walker race vs. the kemp race. and when i talk with folks and you know he was going against stacey abrams before the reason why response to the pandemic and able to business owners. they say they know brian kemp now that s why he is up by 7 points. looking at walker race it s going to be a dead heat. these folks are fired up and some of them are going to vote today. and they think they can be the
Digit lead over stacey abrams which may suggest, not the prospects of democrats across the country, but that georgia, despite joe biden s victory there in 2020, georgia may not be as purple, let alone blue, as people thought and it may be it s a light red state that joe biden was able to claim because of the nonaffection of suburban white republican georgians who were so disgusted by donald trump that they walked away from donald trump, but may be coming home to the republican party in this race, in the kemp race and they re stick with herschel walker. that may tell us something about georgia, not the whole country. georgia is one case, a tight
He wants to claim that it was stolen the next time. and so, the first step for him is personnel, right? it s replacing politicians like governor brian kemp, and secretary of state brad raffensperger, who are political allies, republicans, who simply didn t go along with a plan. and on the eve of the primary election tomorrow, where this is the key thing that trump is focused on, kemp looks safe for now. raffensperger, secretary of state, the man who once the election, we don t know. that could be a real race. the guardians of the national she s been covering elections including the run for georgia primary tomorrow. ian bassin executive director of protective mockery, cnn profit election. also serves as associate white house counsel to president barack obama, and they both join me now. amy, i wanna start with you. there s been so much focus on the kemp race, understandably. high profile, you know, you ve got vice president, former vice