Thanks to you at home for joining me on this very special election Tuesday.

The polls have just closed in the election for New York's third congressional district

and it would not be election night without our own Steve Kornaki at the big board who we will be going to in just a moment as those results start rolling in.

At this time, perhaps not exactly surprisingly, NBC News is characterizing the New York House 3 special

election race as too early to call. Now if New York's third congressional

district does ring a bell for you.

That is probably because the District found itself in the national spotlight,

while it was represented by Republican Congressman and Serial Fabulous George Santos, a man who was not a Broadway producer, nor a champion

volleyball player nor the victim of an assassination attempt, but pretended he was all of

those things and more. Now back in December the House gave George Santos

the boot. They expelled him. And today New York's third congressional district is

in the national spotlight for another reason.

On the surface level, this is a local race

between Democrat Tom Swazi and Republican Mazi Pillip.

Mr Swazi is a three-term congressman from the district

who left that seat to run for governor

and is now coming back trying to take back his old seat. The Republican in this

race, Massey Philip, is a member of the local NASA County legislature and she's been framing much of

her campaign around her position as a legal immigrant willing to take a hard line

on what she calls illegal immigration.

But this race is about a lot more

than just these two candidates

...