U.S. News

After scandals and allegations of insider trading, Sen. Kelly Loeffler has lost her attempt at winning her appointed seat in the U.S. Senate.

According to the Cook Political Report and NBC News called Rev. Raphael Warnock the projected winner, defeating Loeffler after midnight on Wednesday morning. NBC determined that it was not numerically possible for Loeffler to win.

Long before it became clear that Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) was going to lose her appointed seat, and Jon Ossoff was narrowing the lead of Sen. David Perdue, there was Stacey Abrams.

Democratic candidates Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff served as a contrast to the likes of Loeffler and Perdue, both of whom were accused of insider trading for questionable stock trades this year. But the key to Democratic turnout proved to be a substantial organizational structure in the state from the years-long effort of Abrams and her staff of organizers.

Appointed Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) isn't doing well at the end of the night of the Georgia runoffs and many are asking why she hasn't conceded already.

"It's going to be another late night," she said to a small group of supporters. "There are a lot of votes out there, as you all know. We have a path to victory, and we are going to stay on it. ... This is a game of inches. We are going to win this election."

It might be a few weeks until the inauguration but, "Late Night" host Seth Meyers is already celebrating life without President Donald Trump.

"I know Trump is going to keep giving rallies after leaving office because it's either that or pay for therapy, but it just won't be the same," Meyers said.

On Tuesday, The Washington Post reported that outgoing President Donald Trump is still clinging to a baseless legal theory that Vice President Mike Pence can throw the certification of the electoral count to him on Wednesday — and Pence's team is bracing for the president to turn on him when that doesn't happen.

"Vice President Pence and his team have huddled for hours with the Senate parliamentarian. They have studied historical examples of other vice presidents who have presided over election results," reported Ashley Parker and Josh Dawsey. "And they have begun anticipating the ire of President Trump — likely to come in the form of angry tweets — in the aftermath of Wednesday's certification of the electoral college vote count before a joint session of Congress."

Republican pollster Frank Luntz warned Republicans that it was going to be a difficult 48 hours for them, first from the Georgia election and second for the GOP battle in the House and Senate.

He also noted that there are multiple billboards erected in Republican areas in Georgia telling people not to vote for either Republican Senate candidate because they hadn't done enough to help save President Donald Trump from his 2020 loss.

At Tuesday's Washington, D.C. rally protesting the results of the presidential election, far-right webcaster Alex Jones took the stage to proclaim that he will not submit to a Biden presidency no matter what the law says.

"Whatever happens to President Trump in 15 days, he is still the elected president of this republic," said Jones. "And we do not recognize the communist Chinese agent Joe Biden."

The city of Detroit has officially filed its motion to sanction President Donald Trump's ally-attorneys Sidney Powell and L. Lin Wood.

According to Reuters reporter Brad Heath, the motion isn't just about sanctions. However, it asks that Powell and Wood also be sanctioned for "false and frivolous claims while seeking relief with massive implications for our democracy."

On Tuesday night, ahead of the polls closing in the pivotal Georgia Senate runoffs, public broadcasting reporter Stephen Fowler reported that the Georgia Republican Party had barred his newsroom from obtaining the credentials to cover the watch parties for Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler.

"Local news is disappearing from many of these communities, and your denial is disturbing and against the spirit of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution," said Georgia Public Broadcasting senior officials in a statement. "We respectfully disagree with your decision to prevent us access to the Republican candidates in one of the most important elections in state history."

On Tuesday, pro-Trump attorney Lin Wood took to Twitter to claim that the Georgia elections were rigged by "communists" — and that they engineered it to be a split result between incumbent Sen. Kelly Loeffler and challenger Jon Ossoff.

Wood also claimed, with no evidence, that these communists were responsible for blocking Rep. Doug Collins, a Republican challenger to Loeffler, from advancing to the runoff in the first place.

One Rural Georgia county is proving to have some enlightning information about the Senate runoff in the state Tuesday.

In Early County, with nearly all of the votes (82 percent) in, Jon Ossoff is doing even better than he did in November.

The polls haven't closed in Georgia yet as voters decide the make-or-break election for Republicans. While exit polls have numbers out, they ignore a whopping 3 million previously cast ballots in the state. So, the election-night conversation turned to news station loyalty based on the numbers cruncher of choice: CNN's John King or MSNBC's Steve Kornacki.

There's a slate of Kornacki loyalists who led to a flood of celebration for his non-stop dedication to the 2020 election results. The MSNBC host pledged ahead of the election that he wouldn't leave the studio until a winner was called. As the results crept into its third-day colleagues were taking over for him so he could catch a nap in his office.

On Tuesday, during the rally of Trump supporters in Washington, D.C. protesting the results of the election and demanding it be overturned, one of the speakers led the rallygoers in a chant of "Victory or Death!"

Republican rhetoric has grown angry in recent weeks, with Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) even suggesting there could be a civil war if Democrats win the Senate runoffs in Georgia.