November 7, 2000, the day of the Bush-Gore presidential election,
was one of the newsiest days during the Flyer‘s 20
years-and-counting, and we had it covered in our November 9th issue,
with senior editor Jackson Baker at Al Gore headquarters in Nashville
and staff writers Rebekah Gleaves (Nashville) and Ashley Fantz (Bush
headquarters in Austin) also on the scene.
Reporting on “the closest presidential election in American
political history,” Baker described the “war whoops” heard when the
television networks declared Florida for Gore-Lieberman late Tuesday
and the weary uncertainty that gripped the Democratic faithful the next
morning at the downtown Sheraton Hotel.
“Not only do we not know who the next president of the United States
is, we have no idea for certain when we will know,” Baker wrote,
citing “gremlins in the nation’s political machinery” that conspired to
make Election Day moot and prophesizing “40 days and 40 nights of
uncertainty.” A close call, as the December 12th Supreme Court decision
that essentially decided the election came 35 days later.
Meanwhile, a couple of states west, Fantz experienced an “Austin
all-nighter” amid a “state-fair-like brouhaha” where “security holdups
and Russian breadline waits did not slow down the Bush supporters.”
Fantz reported on the cascade of boos that erupted in Austin when the
network’s Florida call went to Gore and the ultimate fatigue that
settled in when everyone realized that the endless night would yield no
answers.
