WASHINGTON,
November 5 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - U.S. voters decided the
fate of Congress Tuesday, November 5, with Republicans and Democrats
kept on tenterhooks over one of the closest midterm election battles in
decades.
With
the floundering economy topping the agenda and a showdown with Iraq also
looming, the struggle for control of the Senate and House of
Representatives was too close to call in many seats that could decide
the future balance of power, according to polls, reported Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
President
George W. Bush voted at the small town of Crawford near his Texas ranch,
and amidst predictions of a low turnout, encouraged supporters of both
parties to cast ballots.
"I
hope people vote. I'm encouraging all people across this country to
vote," said Bush, who was to head back to the White House to hear
the results that could decide the future of his policy program and
affect his chances of re-election in 2004.
Bush,
his personal prestige heavily invested in the outcome of today's
balloting, blitzed through four states with competitive House and Senate
contests as both parties prepared the most extensive get-out-the-vote
operations seen in any recent off-year contest, according to The
Washington Post.
Nine
Senate races - four held by the Democrats and five by the Republicans -
remained in doubt on the next-to-last day of an election in which small
shifts will dramatically affect the balance of power in Washington
during the final two years of Bush's first term.
In
the House, Democrats will need to win an overwhelming percentage of the
close races to gain the six seats necessary to take back the majority
for the first time since 1994, with Republicans speaking more
confidently about making history by gaining seats.
All
435 House seats are up for reelection this year, along with 34 of the
100 Senate seats. There are also 36 gubernatorial elections at stake,
with Republicans likely to lose the majority they have enjoyed in the
statehouses since the 1994 landslide election.
Bush
admitted in speeches on the last day of campaigning Monday, November 4,
that the election would be "settled by a relatively small number of
votes."
Traditionally,
the President's party loses seats in a mid-term election. However, Bush
is determined to have his party recapture the Senate and hold the House
to clear the way for his legislative agenda.
Polling
booths opened at 6:00am (1100 GMT) in the states of Connecticut,
Indiana, Maine, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Virginia and shortly
after other states. Alaska was to be the last state to close at 0400 GMT
Wednesday, November 6.
Computerized
voting systems were used in many states, including Florida where ballot
foul-ups held up the 2000 presidential for five weeks.
This
time the Florida vote went smoothly.
One
elderly lady emerged from a voting station in Miami Beach, brandishing
her registration card and shouting "last time I couldn't
vote!" - the electronic voting machines malfunctioned there during
the September 10 primary.
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Bush carries his Texas voter registration card after casting his ballot
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Voters
trudged through the snow to get to the polls in Minnesota state, one of
the six to eight most closely fought Senate seat races that could decide
the Senate battle.
Democrat
former Vice President Walter Mondale has been brought out of retirement
to take on the Republicans' Norm Coleman after the death of Democrat
incumbent Paul Wellstone in a plane crash 10 days before the vote.
Election
officials reported a heavy turnout shortly after polling stations opened
with people waiting up to 45 minutes in snowy Minneapolis.
Rival
party workers waited outside polling stations across the country. But
most voters had already made up their minds. "I want to make damn
sure that the Republicans get a beating," said Democratic voter
Daniel Cotlear as he walked out from a polling booth in the wealthy
Washington suburb of Bethesda, AFP reported.
A
low turnout was expected, notwithstanding Bush's whistle-stop tour of 15
states in five days and a major get-out-the vote campaign by leading
Democrats such as former President Bill Clinton and Senate Majority
Leader Tom Daschle.
Bush
is trying to buck the historical trend that sees the President's party
lose congressional seats in midterm elections.
Only
two Presidents, both Democrats, strengthened their party's position in
Congress in mid-term elections; Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1934 and
Clinton in 1998.
Republicans
are in the majority in the House, holding 223 of the lower chamber's 435
seats. But they are even with Democrats in the Senate. Each party has 49
seats, with independents in the other two seats, including one nominated
to temporarily take Wellstone's seat.
Defeat
for the Republicans could harm Bush's re-election hopes in 2004.
"His
taking a high-profile role does invite people to vote on his policies.
That could cut either way," said Jack Nagel, a political science
professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
If
Democrats retain a majority in the Senate, the atmosphere is likely to
be "poisonous, ugly and mean-spirited," said Thomas Mann, a
senior fellow of governance studies at the Brookings Institution
