In South Carolina Mitt Romney interrupted John McCain’s concession speech and tonight he did the same thing to Rudy Giuliani who was giving a past tense laden speech in Florida. I don’t doubt that the Romney camp wasn’t happy to hear rumors of a potential endorsement by Giuliani of McCain tomorrow and may have feared that it was going to take place tonight. With that said, the guy could have been a little more gracious and let Giuliani have a moment.

In Florida some of the polls close at 7:00PM Eastern and some close at 8:00PM. The official Florida site is releasing vote totals so I am posting as they come in.

Drudge has the exit poll number:

McCain 34.3%, Romney 32.6%, Giuliani 15.3%, Huckabee 12%

ABC News has some of the exit poll information. Economy #1 most important issue for voters.

More from FOX:

Senior Citizens– McCain 40, Romney 31, Giuliani 18, Huckabee 7

Veterans– McCain 37, Romney 36, Giuliani 14, Huckabee 8

Hispanics– McCain 50, Giuliani 26, Romney 16, Huckabee 5

Good morning all. The polls are open in Florida, record turnout has already occurred based on reports in the Democratic absentee voting and I will have the returns as they come in tonight.

With none of the candidates campaigning, no real television ads on the air and the states delegates stripped, Democrats in Florida have been returning absentee ballots in record numbers.

From Marc Ambinder:

The state Democratic Party says that 96,286 absentee ballots have been returned, up from 93,909 in 2004. 100,000 ballots have yet to be returned. Combining the number of early voters (121,693) with the number of absentees requested, you get 316,940 — more than the total Democratic vote for each of the three early states.

Last year Florida moved its primary up in violation of D.N.C rules and as such was stripped of its delegates. As part of the backlash the democratic candidates promised not to campaign in the state directly. (Meaning the candidates themselves or running ads etc.) However as part of a national media buy the Obama campaign is now running advertising in the state and the Clinton camp released the following statement:

The Obama campaign today began airing paid television advertisements in a national cable buy that include advertising in the state of Florida. There is no question that these ads are a clear and blatant violation of the early-state pledge that Senator Obama and the other leading Democratic candidates signed last year.

The early state pledge was crystal clear in its prohibition against any kind of campaign activity (outside of fundraising) in states that do not adhere to the DNC calendar. There is no ambiguity. Among the list of prohibited activities are “electronic advertising that reaches a significant percentage of the voters in the aforementioned state.” (According to Nielsen, there are 6,6 million TV households in Florida that receive CNN through either local cable systems or satellite dishes. This represents 92% of all Florida TV households.) The Obama campaign knows this, but has chosen to violate the pledge regardless.

Just last week the Obama campaign snubbed the people of Florida in a memo that stated that Florida did not matter in the nominating process. After consecutive losses in New Hampshire, Michigan and Nevada, they appear to be changing course.
Senator Obama’s flagrant disregard for the pledge that he signed is disturbing and calls the integrity of the pledge into question.

The Obama camp said it would be impossible to buy national ad time and exclude Florida.

“Both national cable networks told us it would be impossible for us to run advertising nationally that excluded only Florida. For that reason we consulted with the South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Carol Fowler who told us unequivocally she did not consider this to be in violation of pledge made to the early states,” said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

Obama himself claimed “The DNC has consistently said that we have not broken that pledge”. ABC News reports that the DNC made no such claim and since the pledge was made to state party leaders has remained silent on the vow from candidates to skip the state.

Clinton support Gov. Tom Vilsack said

“It raises the issue of what other pledges and promises he’s making to Democrats across the country that he doesn’t plan to keep.”

Meanwhile the fight over Florida actually began last week when the Obama campaign charged that the Clinton camp was showing “signs . . . that she may be planning to campaign in the state, inquiring about large venues and increased organizing activity.”