Elections

Citing civil unrest in Philadelphia, Walmart has moved all of its guns and ammunition off the sales floors in its stores as a “precaution for the safety of our associates and customers.”Walmart, which is the nation’s biggest retailer and sells firearms and guns in about half of its roughly 4,000 stores in the United States, said in a statement on Thursday that the move was motivated by “some isolated civil unrest.”In an email, a company spokesman said the move was prompted by the protests and looting that have roiled Philadelphia this week after police killed Walter Wallace Jr., a Black man with mental health issues who approached them while carrying a knife.In June, Walmart made a similar decision to remove firearms from its sales floor during the widespread protests over the killing of George Floyd by a Minnesota police officer. The decision on Thursday was earlier reported by The Wall Street Journal.“It’s important to note that we only sell firearms in approximately half of our stores, primarily where there are large concentrations of hunters, sportsmen and sportswomen,” Walmart said in a statement. “These items do remain available for purchase by customers.” More

Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, on Thursday became the latest Republican politician to be fooled into making a campaign video on behalf of a Democrat.Mr. Christie is one of many of Mr. Trump’s current and former associates available for hire on Cameo, an app that allows users to commission personalized videos from minor — and increasingly major — celebrities.The video, which cost $200, was framed as a jovial message to a person named Greg, who Mr. Christie was prompted to encourage to return to New Jersey, Greg’s former home.What Mr. Christie did not know was that the video was meant for Greg Gianforte, the Republican nominee in Montana’s governor’s race. It was commissioned by the campaign of Mr. Gianforte’s opponent, Mike Cooney.Mr. Cooney’s staff ordered up the Cameo video on Wednesday, and Mr. Christie turned the assignment around quickly, delivering it that evening. (The celebrities available for hire on Cameo are told who to address in their video, but usually do not know the identity of the recipient.)“Think about everything we got back here,” Mr. Christie says in the video, cajoling “Greg” to return to New Jersey. “We got Taylor ham. We’ve got Bruce Springsteen. We’ve got Jon Bon Jovi. We’ve got the Jersey Shore. We’ve got the boardwalks.”“We’ve got all that stuff back here that is waiting for you, but more than anything else, Mike and your whole family, they want you back here,” he added.Then he jokingly threatened to retrieve the addressee himself, if he wouldn’t return willingly. “I don’t think that’s what you want, Greg,” Mr. Christie said.On Thursday, Mr. Cooney posted the video on Twitter, framing it as a “special message” for his opponent.Mr. Christie responded by telling NJ Advance Media that he had been hoodwinked, and he tweeted about the incident, emphasizing that he was on Cameo for the benefit of a New Jersey-based charity.“Shame on @CooneyforMT,” he said in his tweet, stating his support for Mr. Gianforte. (With five days to go, the Montana governor’s race is tight; in a poll released on Wednesday, Mr. Cooney and Mr. Gianforte were tied.)The idea to prank Mr. Christie originated with Mr. Cooney’s campaign manager, Brad Elkins, who spotted the former governor on Cameo. The move was meant to emphasize a message that Mr. Cooney’s campaign has been pushing: that Mr. Gianforte — who was born in California and spent his early adulthood in New Jersey — is an outsider, with outsider values.“It’s been a fun day,” said Matt Fidel, a campaign spokesman.Other Trump associates have been susceptible to pranks like the one organized by Mr. Cooney’s staff. In the last several months, Rob Flaherty, the digital director of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s presidential campaign, has commissioned Cameo videos from one of Mr. Trump’s former campaign managers, Corey Lewandowski, and Sebastian Gorka, a former White House adviser, as well as the president’s longtime friend Roger Stone.Each video was made to pump up “Joey” (Mr. Biden) before his debates with Mr. Trump.Mr. Flaherty tweeted the first clip, from Mr. Lewandowski, on Sept. 29; the one from Mr. Gorka, on Oct. 15; and the final one, from Mr. Stone, on Oct. 22. (The second debate was canceled after a disagreement over Covid-19 safety protocols.)In the first video, Mr. Lewandowski lamented to “Joey” that “some people out there” are “spreading some nasty rumors about you.”“Don’t let ’em get to you,” Mr. Lewandowski advised. “Take the fight right to them.”Mr. Gorka chose what he called “an old Latin saying” to get his point across.“Nil carborundum illegitimi, don’t let the bastards grind you down,” he said. “We have a republic to save, keep doing what you do. God bless America, MAGA.”And Mr. Stone encouraged “Joey” to talk trash about his opponents, using a ruder word. “Good luck to you Joey,” he said.Mr. Flaherty was inspired by Caitlin Legacki, a former campaign press secretary for the New Hampshire senator Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat. Ms. Legacki had previously pranked Mr. Lewandowski, commissioning a pep talk from him for Ms. Shaheen and one of her spokesmen, Josh Marcus-Blank.But Steve Bullock, the current governor of Montana, was even earlier to the trend than Ms. Legacki. In the fall of 2019, he posted a Cameo featuring the former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci.“We support you, Steve B. I know you’ve got a tough race ahead of you, but you’ve done this before. You know how to win,” says Mr. Scaramucci in the video, unwittingly addressing Gov. Bullock — who was then campaigning to be president — and referring to himself as “the Mooch.” “I’m behind you 100 percent. See you at the finish line.”In response to the prank, Mr. Scaramucci teased Mr. Bullock about his fund-raising capacity, said that the money he made would go to charity, and wished the Montana governor a Happy Halloween. More

Joe Biden is leading ​Donald Trump in the national polls for the presidential election.
But that doesn’t guarantee ​the Democratic candidate victory. Hillary Clinton also had a clear lead over Trump in the polls for almost the entire 2016 campaign. She ended up losing in the electoral college.
​Because the presidential ​voting system assigns each state a number of electoral college votes, which​ go to the state’s victor regardless of the​ margin of victory (with the exception of Nebraska and Maine), a handful of swing states will ​probably decide the election and be targeted heavily by campaigners.
Each day, the Guardian’s poll tracker takes a rolling 14-day average of the polls in ​eight swing states.
In order to track how the race is developing in the areas that could decide the election, six of the eight states we focused on were those that flipped to Trump​ in 2016 after backing Barack Obama in 2012. Arizona and North Carolina were also added due to what they might tell us about a shifting electoral landscape – they could emerge as vital new swing states this year.
We must caution that the polls – particularly some swing state polls – severely undercounted Trump supporters in 2016. We are not certain, despite assurances, that they they have corrected this​. Additionally, they may be over-counting Democratic support (more people may say they will vote for Biden than actually turn out).
We present the latest polls with those caveats in mind.
The national polls
The latest polling average puts Biden ahead of Trump nationally.
While the national poll tracker is a poor indicator of how the crucial swing states will sway the election, a strong polling lead across the country can point to how the race will develop.
Each day, the Guardian’s national poll tracker takes a 14-day average of national voting intention polls.
On Tuesday 3 November 2020, Americans will vote for their next president, with a choice between ​Donald Trump, the Republican incumbent, or his Democratic challenger, Joe Biden.
Methodology
The Guardian poll tracker tracks the latest polls in eight crucial swing states. For Biden to win, he needs to reclaim some of these swing states.
The Guardian is collating polls in each of these ​states, as well as another set of national polls. Polls are assessed for their reliability by looking at factors such as their sample size.
Our polling average is a 14-day rolling average: on any day, we collate any polls published in the last 14 days and take a mean average of their results.
If any ​company ​has conducted multiple polls in the last 14 days, we average out their polling results in order to give them just one entry. After this standardi​zation process, we take a mean average of these daily entries to present the polling average.
This article was amended on 28 October 2020 to clarify that Maine and Nebraska are alone in assigning their electoral college votes in proportion to the popular vote. More

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The US economy bounced sharply back from the record-setting slump at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, according to government figures released on Thursday, handing Donald Trump a key talking point days before the election.
According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis gross domestic product (GDP) rose at an annualized rate of 33.1% between July and September and was up 7.4% compared to the previous quarter. The previous record was a 3.9% quarterly increase in 1950.
Trump was quick to claim credit, tweeting the figures were the “Biggest and Best in the History of our Country, and not even close.”

Donald J. Trump
(@realDonaldTrump)
GDP number just announced. Biggest and Best in the History of our Country, and not even close. Next year will be FANTASTIC!!! However, Sleepy Joe Biden and his proposed record setting tax increase, would kill it all. So glad this great GDP number came out before November 3rd.

October 29, 2020

But the numbers show the US still has a long way to go to escape the devastation wrought by Covid-19 and were boosted by extra unemployment payments, business loans and direct payments, none of which have been replenished for the fourth quarter.
The news comes just five days before the US election and is the last major economic release before polls close. Even before the figures were released the Trump campaign released ads boasting: “FASTEST GDP GROWTH IN HISTORY.”
Big issues remain for the economy, however. The growth rate announcement came on the same day that the labor department announced that another 751,000 people filed for unemployment claims last week and the unemployment rate, at 7.9%, is twice as high as it was in February before the pandemic struck the US.
A closer look at the numbers shows that the US’s economic woes are far from over. Thursday’s figures follow an equally historic slump in the second quarter. The US economy shrank by a revised annual rate of 31.4% between April and June, its sharpest contraction since the second world war, as much of the country went into lockdown to control the virus.
The annual rate suggests the economy will continue on its current trend for the rest of the year. But such huge swings make the annualized figures misleading – no one expects such massive losses or gains to continue but most economists expect the US economy to be smaller at the end of the year than it was at the beginning.
Gus Faucher, chief economist at PNC, said the figures represented “real growth” but added “there is still a long way to go before we get back to normal.”
The decision to reopen much of the economy has provided a considerable boost, especially to consumer spending, which drove much of the recovery. But it comes as coronavirus infections are soaring in the US. Covid cases hit new highs over the weekend and the US now has the largest number of infections, more than 8.6m, and deaths, over 225,000, in the world.
There are also signs that the recovery has slowed in recent months. Unemployment claims remain at historically high levels and the number of new jobs being created has dropped month on month. The economic situation for women, people of colour and teenagers remains difficult. The unemployment rate fell to 7.9% for the US population overall in September. For Black Americans it was 12.1% and for Black teens (16-19) it was over 20%.
GDP is the broadest measure of the economy and includes personal consumption, business investment, government spending and net exports. The figure has often been criticized as a measure of economic health – GDP growth has, for example, done little to address growing income inequality.
For some still feeling the impact of the pandemic and its attendant recession the latest GDP news was little comfort, especially as Congress remains deadlocked over further stimulus relief.
Tim Swartz in Mesa, Arizona, stopped receiving unemployment benefits on 5 September after the unemployment office flagged an issue with his payments. When the pandemic hit he had to stop working as an Uber and delivery driver to care for his five children, including one with special needs. His wife works full-time as a medicine technician at a facility for Alzheimer’s patients.
“I cannot get any answers from anyone on the phone or through emails. I’m behind on rent and utilities,” Swartz said. He has now received an eviction notice. “I’m not sure how we will pay the outstanding balances for rent and utilities,” he said.
“Many of us are losing hope along with everything we have worked so hard for,” said Swartz. Three of his children had to recently return to online learning after exposure to classmates who tested positive for coronavirus, further delaying his return to work. “Without any relief package to help keep the economy going I don’t see much growth in the near future and unfortunately even darker times ahead for American families.” More

The Fox News host Tucker Carlson has been mocked for his attempt to explain why he could not produce some documents he had promised relating to Joe Biden.He said the only copy of the papers, which he claimed added to claims about Biden’s son Hunter, had been lost.In a segment delivered to camera, Carlson said:
On Monday we received from a source a collection of confidential documents related to the Biden family. We believe those documents are authentic, they’re real, and they’re damning … We texted a producer in New York and we asked him to send those documents to us in LA … He shipped those documents overnight to California with a large national carrier brand … But the Biden documents never arrived in Los Angeles. Tuesday morning we received word from the shipping company that our package had been opened and the contents were missing. The documents had disappeared.
He went on to say of the delivery company, which he did not name:
They searched the plane and the trucks that carried it, they went through the office in New York where our producer dropped that package off, they combed their entire cavernous sorting facility. They used pictures of what we had sent so that searchers would know what to look for. They went far and beyond. But they found nothing, those documents have vanished. As of tonight the company has no idea – and no working theory even – about what happened to this trove of materials, documents that are directly relevant to the presidential campaign.
Carlson’s show has been one of the main conduits of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, attempting to expand the narrative about his dealings in Ukraine and China and castigating other media outlets for not paying enough attention to claims made recently in the New York Post.Carson’s story of the lost documents cut little ice on social media:BREAKING: Documents Tucker Carlson never actually had that would allegedly blow up the election were so important that they were sent via DHL, and now can’t be found despite copiers, iPhone cameras and security cameras. 😂😂😂 https://t.co/9yKkDAUh2v— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) October 29, 2020 More

In 2016, white evangelicals made up a quarter of all US voters. And 81% of them voted for Donald Trump. Oliver Laughland and Tom Silverstone head to the pivotal battleground state of North Carolina to see if Trump’s religious base is showing signs of crumbling. They meet extreme evangelical pastors, travelling progressive preachers and the moral movement leader Rev William Barber
Watch other episodes of the Anywhere but Washington video series  More