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      US elections live: about 58m people have already voted; Harris leads Trump in two crucial swing states, new poll shows

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      With six days until the 2024 election, more than 57.5 million Americans have already voted as of Wednesday afternoon, according to the Election Lab at the University of Florida.Of the 57 million, just over 30 million voted early in-person and about 27 million voted by early mail.In an op-ed for the Guardian, Bernie Sanders, the independent senator from Vermont, addresses progressives concerns about voting for Kamala Harris given the administration’s support for Israel’s war.He writes:
      I understand that there are millions of Americans who disagree with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on the terrible war in Gaza. I am one of them.
      While Israel had a right to defend itself against the horrific Hamas terrorist attack of 7 October 2023, which killed 1,200 innocent people and took 250 hostages, it did not have the right to wage an all-out war against the entire Palestinian people.
      It did not have the right to kill 42,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of whom were children, women and the elderly, or injure over 100,000 people in Gaza. It did not have the right to destroy Gaza’s infrastructure and housing and healthcare systems. It did not have the right to bomb every one of Gaza’s 12 universities. It did not have the right to block humanitarian aid, causing massive malnutrition in children and, in fact, starvation.
      And that is why I am doing everything I can to block US military aid and offensive weapons sales to the rightwing extremist Netanyahu government in Israel. And I know that many of you share those feelings. And some of you are saying, “How can I vote for Kamala Harris if she is supporting this terrible war?” And that is a very fair question.
      And let me give you my best answer. And that is that even on this issue, Donald Trump and his rightwing friends are worse. In the Senate and in Congress Republicans have worked overtime to block humanitarian aid to the starving children in Gaza. The president and vice-president both support getting as much humanitarian aid into Gaza as soon as possible.
      Trump has said that Netanyahu is doing a good job and that Biden is holding him back. He has suggested that the Gaza Strip would make excellent beachfront property for development. It is no wonder Netanyahu prefers to have Donald Trump in office.
      But even more importantly, and this I promise you, after Harris wins we will, together, do everything we can to change US policy toward Netanyahu – including an immediate ceasefire, the return of all hostages, a surge of massive humanitarian aid, the stopping of settler attacks on the West Bank, and the rebuilding of Gaza for the Palestinian people.
      A Pennsylvania judge on Wednesday sided with Donald Trump’s campaign and agreed to extend an in-person voting option in suburban Philadelphia, where long lines on the final day led to complaints voters were being disenfranchised by an unprepared election office.A lawsuit demanding an extension of Tuesday’s 5pm deadline in Bucks county until today was filed this morning after long queues outside the county’s election offices on the last day for applications led to security guards cutting off the line and telling some of those waiting they would not be able to apply.Videos of the scenes were widely circulated on social media, fuelling rumours of voter suppression.The Trump campaign was joined by the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the GOP Senate candidate Dave McCormick in the lawsuit alleging that voters waiting outside election offices for mail ballots were turned away empty-handed and ordered to leave after the deadline expired at 5pm on Tuesday.“This is a direct violation of Pennsylvanians’ rights to cast their ballot – and all voters have a right to STAY in line,” the Trump campaign said.Judge Jeffrey Trauger said in a one-page order that Bucks county voters who want to apply for an early mail ballot now have until Friday.The queues for late mail ballots were a result of Pennsylvania not having an early on-site voting system at designated spots, as is the case in some other states. Instead, voters can apply for ballots on-demand at election offices before filling them out and submitting them on the spot, a procedure that takes about 10 minutes.The flood of late applicants overwhelmed electoral workers in Bucks county’s administration building in Doylestown, leading to a long queue which was cut off at around 2.45pm on Tuesday, according to CBS.Protesters interrupted Harris about 8 minutes into her remarks here.It was difficult to hear what they were saying, but I could hear the word “genocide”.The crowd began chanting “USA!” and Harris reminded the crowd that democracy was on the line in this election. “Ours is about a fight for democracy and your right to be heard. That is what is on the line in this election,” she said. “Look, everybody has a right to be heard, but right now I am speaking.”After another protester interrupted a few minutes later, she said: “At this particular moment it should be emphasized that unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe people who disagree with me are the enemy from within. He wants to put them in jail. I’ll give them a seat at the table.”Shawna Barnes, a 45-year old healthcare worker from Philadelphia, said she’s concerned that men aren’t supporting Harris in this election. When she’s knocked on doors, she’s noticed that the women are often all in, but the men are “iffy”.“Black and brown women are going to come out and support. White women of course are going to support. The men are just kind of like afraid,” she said as Mr Brightside by The Killers blasted on the sound system. “I don’t think it’s about gender, I just think it’s fear.”Kamala Harris is speaking at the Pennsylvania Farm Show Complex & Expo Center in Harrisburg, where she is promoting her economic proposals.”We stand for working people, we stand for middle class growth and strength,” Harris said.She derided Donald Trump’s tariff proposals, and warned that he would dismantle the popular Affordable Care Act. “We know what’s on the line. We know that Donald Trump will try, like he has so many times to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, which would throw, millions of Americans off of their health care and take us back to when insurance companies could deny people with pre-existing conditions,” she said.Donald Trump’s team is reportedly considering withholding federal grants from police departments that decline to work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to ease deportations.NBC News reports that the former president’s team is working on plans to force sanctuary cities such as Chicago, and states such as California to work with the federal government to help Trump deliver on his promise of mass deportations.The Guardian has not independently verified NBC’s reporting.Withholding funding from police departments who decline to work with Ice will undoubtedly face legal challenges. During Trump’s presidency, several states sued the administration after it cut off grants to sanctuary cities, and appealed a court decision that sided with Trump – running out the clock on Trump’s term before the supreme court could issue a final decision on the matter.With six days until the 2024 election, more than 57.5 million Americans have already voted as of Wednesday afternoon, according to the Election Lab at the University of Florida.Of the 57 million, just over 30 million voted early in-person and about 27 million voted by early mail.I spotted Minerva Ortiz-Garcia, 68, walking around with a small Puerto Rican flag before the rally started so I stopped her to ask what she thought of the racist joke a speaker made before Donald Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday.“I feel horrible. I’m Puerto Rican, I actually started to cry,” she said. “How could someone say that about an island that is trying to survive [Hurricane] Maria?”Ortiz-Garcia, a flight attendant, lives in Easton, which is in eastern Pennsylvania, a part of the state that is extremely competitive and has a huge Latino population. She said she thought many Latino voters in her part of the state were waiting for Harris to reach out to them directly.“I think that people want her to say something directly,” she said.I’ve been chatting to a few voters at a Kamala Harris rally here at the Farm expo building in Harrisburg, where there’s a vague smell of horses as the crowd swag surfs and dances to Motown hits such as We Are Family and Aretha Franklin’s Respect.I just spoke with Corine Wherley, a 38-year-old librarian from Harrisburg who is attending her first political rally ever. She said she decided to come to the rally because she was so alarmed by what she heard during Donald Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday.“A lot of it was the rhetoric around ‘this secret’ and other things like that they’re planning on doing,” she said, referring to Trump’s comment that he has a “little secret” with House speaker Mike Johnson, that many took to be a plan to contest the election. “They’re like: ‘I can do whatever I want,’ and I think that’s what scares me.”Puerto Rican reggaeton singer Nicky Jam has withdrawn his support for Donald Trump after comedian Tony Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday.On Wednesday, the singer posted a video on social media saying: “The reason I supported Donald Trump is because I believed it was what’s best for the economy in the United States, where a lot of Latinos live … a lot of immigrants that are suffering over the state of the economy … With [Trump] being a businessman, I felt it was the right move.”He went on to add: “Never in my life did I think that a month later a comedian would come to criticize my country, to speak poorly of my country, and therefore I renounce any support to Donald Trump and move aside from any political situation. Puerto Rico deserves respect.”In September, Nicky Jam made an appearance at one of Trump’s rally during which he was misgendered by the former president.“Do you know Nicky? She’s hot!” Trump said to the crowd, adding: “Where’s Nicky? Where’s Nicky? Thank you, Nicky. Great to be having you here.”The battleground states for the White House overlap significantly with the states where Democrats are fighting to keep or gain majorities in state legislative chambers, noted Heather Williams, president of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC).“While the overlap has opened some opportunities for unprecedented collaboration, this environment has also produced steep challenges for state legislative candidates to get their message out, especially through paid communication,” Williams told reporters on a press call today.Williams noted that the Harris campaign was now spending more on paid ads each week than the DLCC’s entire budget for this election cycle, which is $60m. The gap in resources could heighten the risk of “ballot rolloff”, the phenomenon of voters only filling out the top of their ballot without continuing down to lower-level races.“Our historical data indicates that, in presidential years, we face the challenge of ballot rolloff most acutely,” Williams said. “Communicating and educating voters on who their state legislative candidates are is incredibly important to mitigate underperforming the top of the ticket.”Although much of the country is focused on the presidential and congressional races, the results of this year’s state legislative elections will have vast consequences on Americans’ everyday lives.On a press call today, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) reported that state legislative control appears to be a true toss-up in several battleground states, reflecting the neck-and-neck nature of the presidential race.“Right now, just 12 legislative seats are deciding six legislative majorities in the biggest battleground states across the country, and all our polling shows that this election will be incredibly close,” said Heather Williams, president of the DLCC.Democrats are looking to maintain their narrow majorities in state legislative chambers in Michigan, Minnesota and Pennsylvania while attempting to regain majorities in Arizona and New Hampshire. The new legislative maps in Wisconsin also represent a key opportunity for Democrats.“The stakes couldn’t be higher, as nearly half of Americans currently have their rights protected by Democratic majorities in state legislatures,” Williams said.“Decisions on fundamental freedoms are happening in the states, and many of the dangers of Project 2025 and Trump’s MAGA [’Make America Great Again’] agenda will continue to advance through our statehouses no matter the outcome at the top of the ticket.”A new CNN poll shows Kamala Harris leading over Trump by 6 points in Wisconsin and 5 points in Michigan, key battleground states.Harris leads Trump by 48% to 43% among likely voters in Michigan and 51% to 45% in Wisconsin.The candidates are tied at 48% in Pennsylvania.The vice president’s slim advantage is due in part to “relatively strong performance among White voters and White voters without college degrees, two groups which traditionally break Republican,” CNN said.Here’s a look at where things stand:

      Kamala Harris held a campaign rally in Raleigh, North Carolina, this afternoon. “Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe people who disagree with me are the enemy,” she said.

      Kamala Harris said that she strongly disagrees with criticisms of people based on who they voted for. Speaking on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday following Joe Biden’s “garbage” remarks, Harris said that Biden had “clarified his comments”, adding, “I strongly disagree with any criticism of people based on who they voted for.”

      Arnold Schwarzenegger, the actor and former California governor, has announced he is endorsing Kamala Harris. He joins a running list of Republicans crossing party lines to vote against Donald Trump.

      The supreme court has paused the ruling by a lower court that would have restored voting rights to approximately 1,600 voters in Virginia. In its brief order, the supreme court wrote: “The application for stay presented to The Chief Justice and by him referred to the Court is granted.”

      Virginia’s Republican governor Glenn Youngkin has hailed the supreme court’s ruling, calling it a “victory for common sense and election fairness”. Youngkin had ordered state officials to identify and cancel the voter registration of alleged non-citizens unless they could prove their citizenship in two weeks.

      Tim Walz appeared on Good Morning America, saying, “We know it’s going to be close but we’re going to win this thing.” Speaking to host George Stephanopoulos, Walz said, “We’ve got the better ground game, we’ve got the excitement, we’ve got the momentum on our side.”
      “I see the promise of America in all the young leaders who are voting for the first time,” Kamala Harris said.“You’ve only known the climate crisis and are leading the charge to protect our planet and our future. You young leaders who grew up with active shooter drills, who are trying to keep our schools safe, you who have known fewer rights than your mothers and grandmothers and are standing up to fight for freedom to make your own decisions about your own bodies. None of this for you young leaders is theoretical. This is not theoretical for you. It is not political for you. For our young leaders, this is your lived experience, and I see you, and I see your power, and I am so proud of you,” she added.“Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe people who disagree with me are the enemy,” Kamala Harris said.“He wants to put them in jail. I’ll give them a seat at the table,” she added.“We have an opportunity in this election to turn the page on a decade of Donald Trump, who has been trying to keep us divided and afraid of each other. We know that is who he is but, North Carolina, that is not who we are,” Kamala Harris said.“It is time for a new chapter where we stop with the pointing fingers at each other, and instead let us lock arms with one another, knowing we have so much more in common than what separates us,” she added.Kamala Harris is now on stage in Raleigh, North Carolina, for a campaign rally.Stay tuned as we bring you the latest updates.Donald Trump is claiming – without evidence – that Pennsylvania is cheating and has filed a lawsuit against Bucks county.In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote that the state is “cheating, and getting caught, at large-scale levels rarely seen before”.He did not specify what constituted the state’s cheating.In a separate statement, Trump’s campaign announced on Wednesday that it has filed a lawsuit against Buck county for “turning away voters.”Again, without evidence, the campaign claimed that voters were being turned away early, saying:
      “The Pennsylvania Department of State made clear if voters are in line at a county elections office by 5:00PM, the counties MUST give voters the opportunity to apply for their mail-in ballot. Pennsylvania voters were turned away as early as 2:30PM.” More

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      ‘Why isn’t Trump doing a little better here?’: Arizona election on a knife-edge

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      Mark Kelly removed his sport coat and leveled with a crowd of Democrats gathered at an Indigenous-owned art collaborative in downtown Phoenix on a sweltering afternoon, days before early voting opened.In 2020, Joe Biden had won the state by just more than 10,000 votes – his narrowest margin of victory – “way less than 1%”, the Arizona senator stressed for emphasis.“This entire election could come down to Arizona,” he said. “I am not overstating this: it could come down to your friends, your neighbors, your community, your tribal members.”As the clock ticked down to yet another exceedingly close presidential contest, Kelly urged everyone in the room to redouble their efforts – to knock on one more door, attend one more phone bank, register one more voter. This, he said, was how Democrats prevail in once ruby-red Arizona.A former astronaut who flipped and defended his Senate seat in back-to-back statewide races, Kelly added wryly: “It’s not rocket science. If it was, I could help.”The senator’s call to action underlined a message both parties have been stressing for months, and especially in the final weeks before election day, on 5 November: even if Republicans hold the advantage on paper, Arizona could tip in either direction.Arizona is one of seven swing states that will probably determine who wins what White House in November. While Donald Trump has a narrow edge over Kamala Harris in the state, the Cook Political Report, the non-partisan election handicapper, has rated the presidential race a “toss up”.“Arizona is not a blue state,” said Samara Klar, a professor of political science at the University of Arizona. “A Republican candidate should be cleaning up in Arizona. So the question is – why isn’t Trump doing a little better here?”The Trump era has seen a remarkable winning streak for Arizona Democrats. They claimed the state’s open Senate seat in the 2018 midterm cycle. Two years later, they won the state’s other open Senate seat and its 11 electoral college votes, when Biden became the first Democratic presidential nominee since Bill Clinton to win the state in 1996. (Before that it was Truman, in 1948.) In 2022, Democrats narrowly swept the top three statewide offices.Their success in the birthplace of Barry Goldwater’s conservative movement is something of a political paradox. Republicans hold a solid advantage in voter registration, with about 35% of voters registering as Republican, 34% as unaffiliated and 29% as Democrats, according to data from the Arizona secretary of state. Arizona was hard hit by inflation and rising housing costs, while immigration is top of mind in the border state – both issues that favor Republicans.View image in fullscreenYet Ruben Gallego, a Democratic congressman, has maintained a stable lead over his opponent, Trump ally Kari Lake, in the US Senate contest to replace the Democrat turned independent Kyrsten Sinema. Two congressional races are seen as coin-flips. And Democrats could turn the state legislature, a long-sought prize after Republican dominance in the modern era.Underlining the sometimes-conflicting impulses of the purple state, Arizona voters are poised to approve a ballot initiative that would empower local and state officials to enforce immigration law, while choosing to enshrine abortion rights into the state’s constitution, months after a ban that would have outlawed the procedure from the moment of conception.Klar, the political scientist, says long-term demographic changes – rapid urbanization around Phoenix, an economic boom that’s brought an influx of tech jobs and college-educated transplants, and the rising political clout of a relatively young Latino electorate – have made the once Republican stronghold more competitive over time. Even if Trump prevails in Arizona, there is a growing sense that Trumpism will have cost his party.Trump’s rise electrified a segment of Arizona’s conservative base that has long had an appetite for his brand of anti-immigrant populism. But he also shattered old GOP alliances – disparaging the venerated Arizona senator, John McCain, even after his 2018 death from brain cancer, and feuding with the state’s then governor, Doug Ducey, over his refusal to overturn Trump’s 2020 defeat in the state.That tension has exploded in the party primaries, where Republican voters keep nominating candidates in Trump’s image – far-right extremists like Lake who parrot his election denialism. But these Republicans have struggled to broaden their appeal to the state’s moderate and independent voters.“Arizonans view themselves as free-spirited, non-partisan, independent – that kind of Goldwater-McCain thing,” Klar said, adding that voters here like “centrist, moderate candidates”. In the Trump years, it has been Democrats, not Republicans, reaching for McCain’s “maverick” mantle.Among those disillusioned by their party’s turn are Lynn and Roger Seeley, self-described “McCain Republicans” who recently attended a Gallego event in a suburb east of Phoenix last month.“The Arizona Republican party is not the same Republican party,” said Lynn Seeley, who plans to vote for Gallego and Harris in November. “It just doesn’t represent me any more.”Yolanda Bejarano, the chair of the Arizona Democratic party, said Democrats have steadily chipped away at Republicans’ dominance in the state by building a coalition that, she predicts, will achieve their perennial dream of winning control of the state legislature.“I’m confident that we’re going to see a bluer Arizona come November,” she said.With voting under way, there is an edge of violence. The final weeks before election day saw a man arrested for planning an “act of mass casualty” and shooting at a Democratic office on multiple occasions, while a mailbox with ballots inside was set on fire and threats were made against Republicans visiting the state.Arizonans get the pitchAcross the sprawling Phoenix region, one of the fastest-growing in America, rival Trump and Harris campaign signs dot xeriscaped yards – a mark of Arizona’s true battleground status.In the final months, a who’s who of presidential candidates and high-profile surrogates have blanketed the state. Both Harris and Trump and their running mates have made multiple swings through the state in the contest’s final weeks.With the state on a razor’s edge, the search for votes has reached new heights – and descended to new depths. Kelly, the US senator, piloted his own plane to visit rural parts of the state, while Gallego hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon as part of his outreach to Native voters.Harris is courting traditionally Republican Mormon voters who believe Trump’s conduct and rhetoric are at odds with that church’s values. She has racked up a collection of endorsements from some high-profile members of the church, including Jeff Flake, the conservative Arizona senator who was driven from office over his criticism of Trump and recently served as Biden’s ambassador to Turkey.Trump, meanwhile, has sought to peel away support from Native voters, who have tended to favor Democrats in Arizona elections.View image in fullscreen“We’ve had historic Native vote turnout for the last two years, for the last four years, and the Native vote has been literally the margin in some of these past races,” Stephen Roe Lewis, governor of the Gila River Indian Community, said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionWhen asked about the outreach to Native voters, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, JD Vance, said at a rally in Peoria this month that many of these voters hadn’t ever voted Republican, but issues like border security and unaffordability hit Indigenous nations hard, too.Republicans have also made inroads with Latinos, who make up about one-quarter of the state’s electorate and were a critical part of Biden’s winning coalition in 2020.But since then, one in three voters who switched their party affiliation from Democratic to Republican were Hispanic, according to an Arizona Republic analysis of the state’s voter registration data. Only 40% of Arizona’s Hispanic voters are currently registered Democrats, compared with 47% four years ago.Lea Marquez Peterson, a Republican and member of the Arizona Corporation Commission, has been a part of that effort. Through the Hispanic Leadership Pac, which she launched to help elect more conservative Latino politicians to office, Marquez Peterson has been hosting cafecitos with voters across southern Arizona.They keep telling her the same thing: Arizonans are fed up with the high cost of housing and food.“You hear a lot about inflation numbers dropping and that things are easing, but I think among the community, among my own family, we still see the high price of grocery store items and, as a business person, certainly the high cost of steel and lumber,” she said. “I don’t think we’re feeling any change yet.”Harris trails Trump but Republicans see warning signsUnderlining the sometimes-conflicting impulses of the purple state, it appears likely that Arizonans will approve the measure to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution, overturning the current 15-week ban. But Arizonas are also predicted to vote for an anti-immigration ballot measure that would empower local and state officials to arrest and deport border-crossers.Republicans believe Harris is especially vulnerable on immigration in Arizona, a border state that has grappled with the impact of record migration.On a campaign swing in late September, Harris paced a scrubby stretch of border wall in an attempt to confront what Republicans believe is her biggest political vulnerability: immigration. At an event after the visit, in the border town of Douglas, she was introduced by a mother who lost her son to fentanyl and a Republican who touted her record of taking on transnational criminal gangs as the attorney general of California. When Harris spoke, she pledged to further restrict asylum and blamed Trump for derailing a bipartisan border deal earlier this year.“I reject the false choice that suggests we must choose either between securing our border and creating a system that is orderly, safe and humane,” Harris said. “We can and we must do both.”The border visit was aimed at winning the moderate-leaning Republicans who could defect from their party but rank immigration as a top consideration. It will only become clear next week whether Harris has managed to persuade them.View image in fullscreenMeanwhile, Democrats here hope a ballot initiative to protect abortion rights will help drive out the very voters who have powered their wins in this desert battleground – young people, suburban women and independents.Under pressure, and amid much drama, the Republican-controlled legislature voted earlier this year to repeal an 1864 ban on abortion that dated from before Arizona was even a state, opting for a prohibition on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy.Polls suggest it is entirely possible that voters here will act to protect abortion rights and also elect Trump, the man who claims credit for overturning Roe.The abortion rights initiative is “not a silver bullet for any one political party”, said Athena Salman, the director of Arizona campaigns for Reproductive Freedom for All and a former Democratic state legislator.If Harris wins Arizona’s 11 electoral votes, it could renew questions about whether the Republican party is on the right course in Arizona. Voters there seem to be more comfortable with traditional Republicanism over Maga Republicanism, though Trump is the exception.Trump seems to have some quality, some “rogue’s charm”, that those in his image can’t seem to replicate, said Kirk Adams, a Republican consultant for former Arizona House speaker who served as chief of staff to the last Republican governor.The firebrand Lake, who lost her run for Arizona governor in 2022, differs little on policy from the former president, but can’t capture his appeal with voters.“Sometimes I have actually questioned if winning is even their goal,” Adams said of candidates like Lake. “You can run a race and be successful, because now you become a social media star. You have lots of followers. You can monetize it. You don’t necessarily have to win elections to have a following.”Trump’s team, at least, is taking nothing for granted.“Here’s the scenario that I want you to consider, and I don’t mean to give you nightmare fuel here, but I’m going to do it,” Vance said at a recent rally in the state. “We wake up on November 6, and Kamala Harris is barely elected president of the United States by a 700-vote margin in the state of Arizona. Think about that. And ask yourself what you can do from now until then to make sure it doesn’t happen.” More

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      Supreme court rejects appeal to remove Robert F Kennedy Jr from swing state ballots – live

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      The highest court rejected an emergency appeal to remove Robert F Kennedy Jr, a third-party presidential candidate that has dropped out of the race and endorsed Donald Trump, from the ballots in Wisconsin and Michigan.Kennedy wanted to have himself remove from the ballots in these key swing states, arguing that keeping him on would violate his first amendment rights. But with early voting already under way, Wisconsin and Michigan said that removing him from the ballot now would be impossible.It is unclear how Kennedy’s presence on the ballot will affect the election, and whether it will rob votes from Trump.Politeness and convention dictate that European leaders try to sound noncommittal when asked whether a Donald Trump presidency would hurt Nato. But despite the rhetoric about “Trump-proofing”, Nato cohesion will be at risk from a hostile or isolationist Republican president, who has previously threatened to leave the alliance if European defence spending did not increase.“The truth is that the US is Nato and Nato is the US; the dependence on America is essentially as big as ever,” said Jamie Shea, a former Nato official who teaches at the University of Exeter. “Take the new Nato command centre to coordinate assistance for Ukraine in Wiesbaden, Germany. It is inside a US army barracks, relying on US logistics and software.”US defence spending will hit a record $968bn in 2024 (the proportion the US spends in Europe is not disclosed). The budgets of the 30 European allies plus Canada amount to $506bn, 34% of the overall total. It is true that 23 out of 32 members expect to spend more than 2% of GDP on defence this year, but in 2014, when the target was set, non-US defence spending in Nato was 24%. Lower than now but not dramatically so.There are more than 100,000 US personnel stationed in Europe, more than the British army, a figure increased by more than 20,000 by Joe Biden in June 2022 in response to Russia’s attack on Ukraine. US troops have long been based in Germany, but a 3,000-strong brigade was moved by Biden into Romania, a forward corps command post is based in Poland, and US troops contribute to defending the Baltic states, while fighter and bomber squadrons are based in the UK and five naval destroyers in Spain.Boris Pistorius, Germany’s defence minister, was recently asked whether Nato was ready for Trump. “Elections will have a result whatever,” he began, before acknowledging that much of Europe had been slow to increase defence budgets, missing the warning of Russia’s capture of Crimea in Ukraine in 2014 and only reacting substantively in 2022 after Russia’s full invasion. “What we did was push the snooze button and turn around,” Pistorius said.Read the full analysis here:In Wisconsin’s case, Kennedy had asked the supreme court to remove him from the ballot by covering his name with stickers, which officials said would be a herculean task.The state’s law prohibits the removal of a nominee’s name from the ballot, stating that “any person who files nomination papers and qualifies to appear on the ballot may not decline nomination”, with the only exception being in the case of that candidate’s death.Similarly, in Michigan, officials said that Kennedy’s request would be impossible to fulfill, requiring counties reprint and distribute new ballots, which would cause delays.Kennedy’s arguments to have his named removed from swing state ballots run contrary to his assertions in a New York case, where he fought to remain on the ballot after he was disqualified for listing a friend’s address as his residence.The highest court rejected an emergency appeal to remove Robert F Kennedy Jr, a third-party presidential candidate that has dropped out of the race and endorsed Donald Trump, from the ballots in Wisconsin and Michigan.Kennedy wanted to have himself remove from the ballots in these key swing states, arguing that keeping him on would violate his first amendment rights. But with early voting already under way, Wisconsin and Michigan said that removing him from the ballot now would be impossible.It is unclear how Kennedy’s presence on the ballot will affect the election, and whether it will rob votes from Trump.At the business roundtable in Pennsylvania, a woman from Puerto Rico who worked as a Medicare provider asked Trump about his plans for the health program.The campaign’s emphasis on the questioner’s Puerto Rican heritage was, no doubt, a way to manage the fallout from a comedian’s racist comments about the island during Trump’s rally this weekend. She told the former president that Puerto Ricans stand behind him.“I think no president said more for Puerto Rico than I have,” Trump responded, noting that the administration had approved aid for the island after Hurricane Maria. (It’s worth noting that his administration “unnecessarily” delayed $20bn in aid to Puerto Rico due to bureaucratic obstacles, according to an internal review)The roundtable is being hosted by Building America’s Future, an Elon Musk-funded Super Pac that has been putting out misleading campaign ads about Harris.At a business roundtable in Pennsylvania, where he was billed to discuss issues impacting senior citizens, Donald Trump is repeating a stump speech about migrants at the US border.He told the crowd of supporters that he doesn’t believe polls showing that the economy and inflation are the top issues for voters. “I think this is the biggest senior issue,” Trump said about migration. “They’re destroying our country, they’re ruining our country,” he said of migrants.As his campaign seeks to manage the fallout from this Madison Square rally, where a comedian’s racist joke about Puerto Rico has unleashed angry backlash, Trump has not scaled back any of the anger, vitriol or racist rhetoric that has been at the core of his message to voters.In his rambling comments, Trump also touched on transgender rights, lying that Democrats “want transgender operations for almost everybody in the world”.Deterioration of the Washington Post’s subscriber base continued on Tuesday, hours after its proprietor, Jeff Bezos, defended the decision to forgo formally endorsing a presidential candidate as part of an effort to restore trust in the media.The publication has now shed 250,000 subscribers, or 10% of the 2.5 million customers it had before the decision was made public on Friday, according to the NPR reporter David Folkenflik.A day earlier, 200,000 had left according to the same outlet.The numbers are based on the number of cancellation emails that have been sent out, according to a source at the paper, though the subscriber dashboard is no longer viewable to employees.The Washington Post has not commented on the reported numbers.The famed Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward said on Tuesday he disagreed with the paper’s decision, adding that the outlet was “an institution reporting about Donald Trump and what he’s done and supported by the editorial page”.Bezos framed the decision as an effort to support journalists and journalism, noting that in “surveys about trust and reputation, journalists and the media have regularly fallen near the very bottom, often just above Congress”.But in this election year, he noted, the press had fallen below Congress, according to a Gallup poll.“We have managed to fall below Congress. Our profession is now the least trusted of all. Something we are doing is clearly not working,” he wrote.In her remarks this evening, Kamala Harris is also expected to say that returning Trump to power will bring “more chaos” and “more division”.“I offer a different path,” she will say, in a speech dedicated to the still-undecided slice of US voters. “And I ask for your vote.”Harris will pledge to “seek common ground and commonsense solutions”.“Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe people who disagree with me are the enemy. He wants to put them in jail. I’ll give them a seat at my table,” Harris is expected to say.The Democrat has built a broad coalition that includes conservative anti-Trump Republicans such as Liz Cheney, the former Wyoming congresswoman and her father, the former vice-president Dick Cheney.“I pledge to be a President for all Americans,” Harris will say, “to always put country above party and above self.”Kamala Harris will warn that Donald Trump is “unstable”, “obsessed with revenge” “consumed with grievance” and “out for unchecked power” during her speech at the Ellipse on Tuesday night, according to excerpts of her remarks released by the campaign. “Donald Trump has spent a decade trying to keep the American people divided and afraid of each other. That’s who he is,” she will say. “But America, I am here tonight to say: that’s not who we are.”Harris is attempting to cast herself as a unifying figure who will work for “all Americans” as president, regardless of who they voted for in the November election, drawing a sharp contrast with Trump who has threatened a campaign of retribution against his political enemies. It’s a similar approach Biden took in the waning days of the 2020 election, but healing the tribalism and polarization proved elusive.Harris suggests that her election would “turn the page” on the Trump era entirely, though there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical that Trump would accept his defeat and retreat from the national stage.At his press conference, Steve Bannon also flirted with the idea that Democrats would try to steal the 2024 election from Trump.He also continued to deny the results of the 2020 election, though there is no credible evidence of misconduct that undermines the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s 2020 victory.“Were going to have a reprise of 2020 where they’re going to do everything humanly possible to nullify” Trump’s victory and “delegitimize his second term”.“The working-class people in this country that support Donald John Trump are not going to let that happen.”“The 2020 election was stolen,” Bannon said later.During a question-and-answer session, some sort of apparent interloper – it was unclear whether this was a comedian or performance artist or someone else entirely – asked Bannon: “When’s the next insurrection, and can we storm the Burger King after this?”This person appears to have been escorted out of the press conference.At a press conference Tuesday afternoon, about 12 hours after his release from prison, Steve Bannon railed against Democrat Nancy Pelosi, attorney general Merrick Garland and Harris, again claiming that he was a “political prisoner”.“The system is broken,” he said, claiming the justice department was “weaponized” to punish Trump supporters and gut his popular podcast, in an effort to thwart Maga’s influence.Bannon also claimed that he met a lot of “working class minorities” behind bars, saying he listened to, and learned from, them. They disliked Harris, he claimed, referring to the former prosecutor as the “queen of mass incarcerations”.Doubling down on his War Room statements this morning, where Bannon insisted that prison had empowered him, he also said: “Nancy Pelosi, suck on that.”Bannon also thanked the prison for giving him the opportunity to teach civics to about 100 students, noting that he had Puerto Rican and Dominican students. Bannon discussed his encounters with people of color at several points today, in an apparent effort to deflect anti-Latino commentary from Trump supporters.Nearly 3.2 million voters have cast ballots in the 2024 general election in North Carolina as of Tuesday at noon.The North Carolina state board of elections made the announcement on Tuesday, adding that 3.2 million voters represents a turnout of 40.7% of registered voters in the state.Just over 3m of the votes were cast in-person, and about 170,000 were cast via mail in ballot.Through the end of the day on Monday, more than 2.9 million voters had cast ballots in person during the first 12 days of the early voting period, which the elections officials said was an increase of 11.9% compared with 2020.Interestingly, turnout in the 25 western North Carolina counties affected by Hurricane Helene continue to outpace statewide turnout, the election board added.Jennifer Lopez will join Kamala Harris at a rally in Las Vegas on Thursday, the Harris campaign has announced.Lopez will speak on the importance of voting, what’s at stake for the country with this election, and why she is endorsing Harris and Tim Walz, the Harris campaign said.Mexican pop band Maná, will also perform at that rally.Grammy-winning Puerto Rican artist, Bad Bunny, posted a video on his Instagram on Tuesday in celebration of Puerto Rican culture.The post comes in response to the insulting remarks made at Donald Trump’s rally on Sunday against the island, where a comedian called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage”.Bad Bunny’s eight-minute long video, posted to his more than 45 million followers on Tuesday, is captioned “garbage” and highlights Puerto Rican culture, history and people over inspirational music.On Sunday, Bad Bunny, whose official name is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, signalled his support for Kamala Harris, sharing a video of the vice-president on his Instagram just moments after the comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made the remarks about Puerto Rico at the Trump rally.Vanessa Cárdenas, the executive director of the pro-immigration group America’s Voice, said the speakers at Trump’s rally on Sunday makes clear that his nativist movement will never see “Latinos or immigrants are real Americans.”Cárdenas pointed to comments made by Stephen Miller, an influential immigration adviser to Trump. Speaking at the same Sunday rally, Cardenas pointed to Miller’s declaration: “America is for Americans and Americans only.”“These words reveal their thinking. In their eyes we are not real Americans, and as far as Trump and his team are concerned, we will never be,” she said. “It foreshadows the sort of administration they would run.”Puerto Ricans are heavily concentrated in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Georgia but they have a presence in all 50 states Hispanic leaders and Activists said on a call on Tuesday responding to the racist remark about Puerto Rico made at Trump’s rally on Sunday. Alex Gomez, executive director of LUCHA based in Arizona, said there were approximately 64,000 Puerto Ricans living in the state, which was decided by 10,000 votes in 2020.“Trump is showing us who he is,” Gomez said. “This is our warning signal of the types of policies and what he and the people that follow him believe and so our communities are not going to stand for that.”She said her organization has a goal of knocking on 500,000 doors before election day, next Tuesday.“We will make sure that our communities know what he has said,” she said.A racist remark about Puerto Rico made at Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday was the “October surprise for the Latino community”, said Gustavo Torres, head of CASA in Action, a Latino and immigrant organization.Torres said his organization would work to inform Latino voters every day for the next week until election day. Trump, he said, “humiliate[s] and … underestimate[s] the Puerto Rican Community and the Latino community.”Polls suggest Trump has made notable inroads with Latino voters, particularly men and young people, despite his persistent attacks on immigrant communities and his pledge of mass deportations. The Hispanic leaders and activists on Tuesday’s call predicted a backlash that could cost Trump not only his support among Latinos but possibly the election.“We are going to see what is going to happen on November 5,” Torres told reporters on Tuesday.“Until he apologises and directly disavows those comments, it will leave a stain of racism and bigotry on him and his campaign for the Latino community,” said Janet Murguia, President, UnidosUS Action Fund. “If he understands the importance of Puerto Rican voters in Pennsylvania and Georgia in particular, it would be in his interest to at least make that effort.”Puerto Rico’s Largest Newspaper, El Nuevo Día, has endorsed Kamala Harris for President as of Tuesday morning.“On Sunday, continuing a pattern of contempt and misinformation that Donald Trump has maintained for years against the eight million of us American citizens who are Puerto Ricans, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe insulted us during a Republican Party event by referring to Puerto Rico as ‘an island of garbage in the ocean’” the statement from the newspaper reads.It continues, “Is that what Trump and the Republican Party think about Puerto Ricans? Politics is not a joke and hiding behind a comedian is cowardly.”The newspaper said that Trump “has for years maintained a discourse of contempt and misinformation against the island” pointing out the time Trump, as president, threw paper towels into a crowd after Hurricane Maria, “while we suffered without electricity for months.”Later in the lengthy piece, the newspaper asks readers, “Is this the great America we want?”.“On Sunday, as insults rained down on Puerto Rico, the Democratic candidate offered a message of hope, promising to maintain the interagency group dedicated exclusively to strengthening and creating new opportunities” the piece states.In its conclusion, the newspaper writes: “today we urge all those who love our beautiful island, the land of the sea and the sun, not to lend their vote to Donald Trump. To all Puerto Ricans who can vote in this upcoming United States election and represent those of us who cannot: Vote for Kamala Harris.”Former Michigan GOP Chair Rusty Hills has spoken out against Trump in a new opinion piece in the Detroit Free Press published on Tuesday.In the article, titled ‘Trump’s no Gerald Ford. He’s not even George W Bush’ Hills outlines the ways in which Trump is different from former Republican candidates for president.Hills pointed to Trump’s character, rhetoric, offensive insults toward political opponents, praise of Russia, and language regarding immigrants, among other differences he sees between Trump and former GOP candidates.He then asks the readers:
      Why would any Republican in Michigan who voted for Gerald Ford – or Ronald Reagan, George HW Bush or George W Bush, Sens. John McCain or Mitt Romney – ever cast a ballot for someone like Donald Trump?
      Hills, who teaches at the Gerald R Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, then writes:
      The answer is clear – they shouldn’t.
      New polls show Kamala Harris leading Donald Trump by one percentage point in Arizona, and Trump leading Harris in Nevada by the same margin.In the polls, published by CNN and conducted by SSRS polling between 21 October and 26 October, Harris received 48% support in Arizona among likely voters, while Trump received 47%.In Nevada, Trump received 48% support among likely voters, and Harris received 47%.It is important to point out that these numbers are within the margins of error for these polls. More

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      JD Vance hits out at critics over Trump ‘fascist’ claim

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      JD Vance hit back at those who say Donald Trump is a fascist, accusing Kamala Harris and her allies of disrespecting second world war veterans as he campaigned on Tuesday in one of the most hotly contested regions of battleground Michigan.A week before the election that will decide the next occupant of the White House and control of Congress and state legislatures nationwide, Democrats have increasingly argued that Trump – who has baselessly insisted that his 2020 election loss was fraudulent and recently proposed unleashing the military against his political opponents – is a follower of the far-right philosophy associated with Adolf Hitler.They have been aided in making their case by Trump’s former White House chief of staff John Kelly, who last week said his former boss fitted the definition of a fascist, and by Trump’s Sunday evening rally in New York’s Madison Square Garden, where Trump spent considerable time unleashing vitriol against immigrants and “the enemy from within”, as he describes his political opponents.Speaking at a recreational center in Saginaw, the seat of a central Michigan county of the same name that narrowly voted for Trump when he won the state in 2016, and then broke for Biden when he reclaimed it four years later, Vance sought to turn the tables on Democrats.“Look, politics is politics. I volunteered for this job – criticize me, attack me, insult me, it’s what I signed up for. But don’t you dare insult the brave Americans who are fighting for this movement. Don’t attack the voters of the United States of America. That’s what Kamala Harris is doing,” he said.

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      Vance turned to the Madison Square Garden rally, avoiding mention of warm-up act Tony Hinchcliffe describing Puerto Rico as an “island of garbage”, comments that have sparked fury among Latinos, a key voter group. Instead, he called the event “an incredible thing”, then decried how Democrats have compared it to a gathering of Nazis, such as the one held by American Hitler supporters in 1939.“I think it’s disgusting … and a person who would close out her campaign by running and attacking her fellow Americans has no business leading the greatest nation on Earth,” Vance said. Noting the presence of a war veteran who had led the pledge of allegiance at his event in Saginaw, Vance said: “It occurs to me that when they attack us as Nazis, it’s so disgraceful, because there are people in this room right now who have grandparents, who have parents, or who they themselves fought in world war two.”Last week, Harris said she agreed that Trump is a “fascist” and accused him of seeking “unchecked power”. The vice-president is searching for an edge in a race for president that, by all accounts, appears tied, with polls of Michigan and other swing states showing her neck-in-neck with the former president.Later on Tuesday, Harris is set to make what her campaign has billed as her closing argument to the American people from a park near the White House where Trump addressed his supporters before they attacked the US Capitol on January 6.Harris’s pitch to voters has centered on warnings that Trump is unfit for the presidency, and on promises to build an “opportunity economy” that would see the US government promote cutting-edge technologies and help Americans afford down-payments on their homes and care for their children and elders.Trump, by contrast, has described America as a country “destroyed” by foreign influence, from the undocumented migrants who have entered from Mexico to the manufacturers have have moved jobs overseas. Speaking in Saginaw, a medium-sized city that, like so many in Michigan and across the upper midwest, saw its manufacturing-centered economy collapse decades ago, Vance likened the struggles of American soldiers against Nazis to Trump’s own quest to win the presidency.“[Do] you think that the men who stormed the beaches at Normandy did it to give taxpayer-funded sex changes to illegal aliens? Do you think that the men who stormed the beaches at Normandy did it to ship all of our good manufacturing jobs off to China? Do you think the men who stormed the beaches at Normandy did it for a president who wants to open the American southern border?” Vance asked. “I don’t think so.” More

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      US election live: Harris says Puerto Ricans ‘deserve better’ as outcry grows over ‘hateful’ Trump rally remarks

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      The Congressional Hispanic Caucus has released a statement condemning the “shameful rhetoric” displayed at Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally on Monday, where speakers made racist remarks about immigrants, and one speaker described Puerto Rico as an “island of garbage”.In the statement, the caucus called the language and rhetoric at the rally as “not only divisive but dangerous”.
      Hateful rhetoric has real-world consequences. When political leaders, influencers, and those with a large social platform choose language that dehumanizes communities, families get hurt, and hate crimes rise.
      The statement continues:
      This type of language emboldens prejudice, encourages violence, and undermines the values of unity and respect that our country is built on. It’s deeply troubling to see Republican leaders celebrate this rhetoric instead of promoting unity and truth.
      Donald Trump faced mounting suspicion of hatching a plot to steal next week’s presidential election as Democrats and commentators focused on his references to a “little secret” at Sunday night’s tumultuous Madison Square Garden rally.The allusions initially attracted little notice amid the angry backlash provoked by racist jokes and incendiary rhetoric from a succession of warm-up speakers, including an offensive comment about Puerto Ricans that even Trump’s own campaign felt obliged to disavow.However, some observers and Democratic politicians believed the most telling remark of the night came from the Republican nominee himself after he introduced Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker, on stage and alluded to a shared secret.“We gotta get the congressmen elected and we gotta get the senators elected,” Trump told the crowd, referring to the congressional elections at stake next week.“We can take the Senate pretty easily, and I think with our little secret we are gonna do really well with the House. Our little secret is having a big impact. He and I have a little secret – we will tell you what it is when the race is over.”Read more:Kamala Harris’s campaign has seized on the racist remarks about Puerto Rico at Donald Trump’s New York rally on Sunday in a new campaign ad in which the vice-president argues “Puerto Ricans deserve better.”In the ad released on Monday, Harris also criticized Trump’s response to Hurricane Maria, which devastated the island and killed thousands of people in 2017. “He abandoned the island and offered nothing more than paper towels and insults,” she said.A report from 2021 found that the Trump administration delayed $20bn in aid to Puerto Rico after the hurricane.Donald Trump has pledged to gut the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), Biden’s signature climate law, even though some of his closest allies have benefitted from it.At least seven of Trump’s associates and fundraisers – or the companies they run – have obtained incentives thanks to the climate law, Reuters first reported.The IRA increased consumer interest in clean energy loans from California-based financial technology company Mosaic, which counts Trump’s son-in-law and former White House senior advisor Jared Kushner’s private equity fund Affinity Partners as an investor. Another IRA beneficiary was carbon capture and sequestration project Summit Carbon Solutions, in which Trump ally Harold Hamm’s fossil fuel company Continental Resources invested $250m in 2022.Though its founder Elon Musk has attacked the IRA, Tesla has also received gargantuan subsidies from the IRA. Musk is one of Trump’s most consequential boosters.Vicki Hollub, the Occidental Petroleum CEO and a major Trump donor and fundraiser, has also benefited from the IRA’s carbon capture tax credit and other subsidies. And pipeline company Energy Transfer – headed by longtime Trump supporter Kelcy Warren – participates in carbon capture and hydrogen projects boosted by IRA tax credits.The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act represented the biggest green downpayment in American history. Vice President Kamala Harris cast the tie-breaking vote for the law.Kamala Harris took another swipe at her Republican opponent, Donald Trump, during her visit to a semiconductor plant in Michigan.She attacked the former president again for the tone and content of his Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday, and defended the Chips and Science Act she said he wanted to abandon:
      We are eight days out from an election, so I’ve got to also talk about the contrast, because my opponent spends full time talking about, just kind of diminishing who we are as America, and talking down at people, talking about that we’re the garbage can of the world. We’re not.
      He just recently did a radio talk show and talked about how he’d get rid of the Chips act. That was billions of dollars investing in just the kind of work that’s happening here. And you know how we did it? We created tax credits to create the incentive for the private sector to do this work. That’s good work.
      When he was president, he sold advanced chips to China that helped them with their agenda to modernize their military. That’s not about what’s in the best interest of America’s security and prosperity, which should be two of the highest priorities for president of the US.
      There is a very serious choice presented in the next eight days. And as much as anything it is a question about what is the direction of the future that we want for our country.
      As Donald Trump’s campaign faces intense criticism over racist remarks from a speaker at the Republican candidate’s New York rally on Sunday, JD Vance has responded by saying that Americans need to “stop getting offended”.Tony Hinchcliffe, a podcaster and comedian who spoke ahead of Trump at Madison Square Garden, described Puerto Rico as “a floating island of garbage”. His comments have drawn widespread condemnation and outrage.Trump’s running mate said he had “heard about” the joke, and argued that Kamala Harris is painting the former president’s supporters as “Nazis”.“I think that it’s telling that Kamala Harris’s closing message is essentially that all of Donald Trump’s voters are Nazis and you should get really pissed off about a comedian telling a joke. That is not the message of a winning campaign.“I’m not going to comment on the specifics of the joke, but I think that we have to stop getting so offended at every little thing in the United States of America. I’m so over it.”The Puerto Rican singer Marc Anthony has just posted a stinging attack on Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally, reminding voters how the then president “blocked billions in relief while thousands died” on the island after 2017’s Hurricane Maria.“I’m here to tell you that even though some have forgotten … I remember. I remember what it was like when Trump was president. I remember what he did and said, about Puerto Rico … About our people,” he posted on X to his 11m followers:
      I remember after Hurricane Maria devastated our island… Trump blocked billions in relief … while thousands died. I remember that when our families lacked clean water and electricity, Trump threw paper towels and called Puerto Rico ‘dirty’ and ‘poor.’

      But I was not surprised … because I ALSO remember … he launched his campaign by calling Latinos criminals and rapists. He’s told us what he’ll do. He’ll separate children from their families and threatened to use the ARMY to do it.
      This election goes way beyond political parties. Now let’s remember what the United States represents and stands for. It’s our name – United. Regardless of where we’re from. I’m Marc Anthony … I remember.
      Police say they have identified “a suspect vehicle” connected to incendiary devices that set fire to separate ballot drop boxes in Oregon and Washington state early on Monday, the Associated Press reports.Surveillance images captured a Volvo stopping at a drop box in Portland, Oregon, just before security personnel nearby discovered a fire inside the box, officials said.That fire damaged three ballots inside. Around the same time, a fire was set at a drop box in nearby Vancouver, Washington, on early Monday, and hundreds of ballots were destroyed.Authorities said at a news conference in Portland that enough material from the incendiary devices was recovered to show that the two fires Monday were connected, and were also linked to an incident on 8 October when an incendiary device was placed at a different ballot drop box in Vancouver.Read more:The Nevada supreme court on Monday upheld the state’s post-election deadline for mail ballots lacking a postmark, CNN reported. The ruling is a rejection of a lawsuit brought by Republicans and the Trump campaign.The lawsuit challenged Nevada’s acceptance of mail ballots that are missing postmarks up to three days after an election. The supreme court, however, said the plaintiffs had failed to make a convincing case.“Notably, the RNC [Republican national committee] presented no evidence or allegations that counting mail ballots without postmarks … would be subject to voter fraud, or that the election security measures currently in place are inadequate to address its concerns regarding these ballots,” the ruling said.According to CNN, a similar case was filed by Republicans in federal court, but the US ninth circuit court of appeals is unlikely to resolve that case before next Tuesday’s election.Kamala Harris has been touring a semiconductor plant in Saginaw county, Michigan, on Monday afternoon, and talking up the Chips and Science Act.The Democratic presidential nominee said that if she wins next week’s election she will be reassessing “on day one” which federal jobs require a college degree and which ones do not.The comment, at the Hemlock Semiconductor facility in Hemlock, is both a policy proposal and a political bridge, the Associated Press news agency said, reporting her visit.One of the clearest political divides in the nation over the past few presidential cycles has been between college-educated and non-college-educated voters, with Democrats acknowledging they need to cut into Donald Trump’s support among the latter group, it said.“One of the things immediately is to reassess federal jobs, and I have already started looking at it, to look at which ones don’t require a college degree,” Harris said. “Because here is the thing: that’s not the only qualification for a qualified worker.”Earlier in her speech, Harris said: “We need to get in front of this idea that only high-skilled jobs require college degrees.”Moms for Liberty, a rightwing activist group focusing on education, launched a video ad in four battleground states on Monday targeting a Biden administration rule protecting LGBTQ+ students from gender bias.The ad, titled That’s Not Fair, features a father comforting his athlete daughter after she lost a race. “Dad, it’s not fair! I had to run against a boy! It’s not right,” the girl tells her father, who replies: “I know.”The ad will air in North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin.In June, a federal judge in Louisiana appointed by Donald Trump blocked the Biden administration from enforcing an education department rule extending sex discrimination protections under Title IX to LGBTQ+ students in Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana and Idaho. More

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      Chinese hackers collected audio from a Trump campaign adviser’s calls – report

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      Chinese state-affiliated hackers intercepted audio from the phone calls of US political figures, including an unnamed campaign adviser of Donald Trump, the Washington Post reported Sunday.Various media outlets reported on Friday that the Trump campaign was made aware last week that the Republican presidential candidate and his running mate JD Vance were among a number of people inside and outside of government whose phone numbers were targeted through the infiltration of Verizon phone systems.The FBI and the US cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency confirmed they were investigating unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by people associated with China, though they did not not name the Trump campaign in the statement.Reuters later reported that Chinese hackers also targeted phones used by people affiliated with the campaign of Kamala Harris.The Post now reports that the hackers were able to access audio from a phone call from a Trump campaign adviser, as well as unencrypted communications such as text messages of the individual.Trump’s campaign and the FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.The Trump campaign was hacked earlier this year. The US justice department charged three members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps with the hack, accusing them of trying to disrupt the 5 November election.Verizon said on Friday it was aware of a sophisticated attempt to target US telecoms and gather intelligence and is working with law enforcement.Congress is also investigating and earlier this month US lawmakers asked AT&T, Verizon and Lumen Technologies to answer questions about reports Chinese hackers accessed the networks of US broadband providers.The Chinese embassy in Washington DC said last week it was unaware of the specific situation but said China opposes and combats cyberattacks and cyber thefts in all forms. More

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      Michelle Obama introduces Harris at Michigan rally; across state, Trump joined by Arab and Muslim leaders

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      Senator Bob Casey attacked his Republican opponent, Dave McCormick, over allegations that he fostered a toxic work environment as CEO of the hedge fund Bridgewater, describing the claims as “disqualifying”.“I’ve always placed a priority on combating sexual harassment in the workplace, and apparently at Bridgewater, it was just a whole different story,” Casey told reporters this morning.“So he’s being held accountable for that, and he should be held accountable. I think that alone is disqualfiying. If you’ve engaged in that kind of activity in the private sector, you should not be a public official at any level.”The Casey campaign released an ad this week highlighting claims that McCormick attempted to silence or retaliate against female employees of Bridgewater who came forward with harassment claims.Casey’s campaign manager also penned a letter calling on McCormick to demand that Bridgewater release employees who reported harassment from their non-disclosure agreements.“It is your responsibility to ensure the voters of Pennsylvania have complete information about your record before casting their votes,” Tiernan Donohue, Casey’s campaign manager, wrote in the letter. “They deserve the full story.”Speaking to reporters after his event with the Carpenters Union, Senator Bob Casey said he believes the momentum and enthusiasm on the ground in Pennsylvania will lift Democrats to victory in 10 days.“I think it is close. There’s no question about that,” Casey said. “That energy and intensity on the ground is starting to uplift our side. I’ve never seen the number of volunteers that we’ve seen in this state. Every weekend they’re breaking another record.”Asked specifically about whether young voters will turn out to vote for him and Kamala Harris, Casey expressed confidence that they would.“I think the turnout is going to be high,” Casey said. “Young voters might engage a little late, but I think they’re ready to vote.”Kamala Harris is drawing out the personal and political differences between her and Donald Trump.“I grew up in a middle class neighborhood with a working mother who kept a strict budget and did everything she could to make sure my sister and I had all that we needed. I come from the middle class, and I will never forget where I come from,” Harris said.Trump’s “agenda is all laid out in Project 2025, which I still must say, I cannot believe they put that in writing,” she added, before going on to talk about her plan for a child tax credit and to lower housing and healthcare costs.Senator Bob Casey addressed members of the Carpenters Union in Philadelphia this morning, as the three-term Democrat enters the final 10 days of his race against Republican Dave McCormick.Casey, whose race has grown increasingly close in recent weeks, again critcized McCormick over his leadership of the hedge fund Bridgewater and his recent residency in Connecticut.“He was investing in Chinese oil companies, investing in Chinese steel companies and betting against US Steel — hurting our workers, hurting our companies. That is his record as a hedge fund CEO,” Casey said.“I’ll put my record — fighting for families in this state, investing in communities in this state and fighting for working men and women — I’ll put that record up against his record any day of the week.”Thanking the union for its support throughout his political career, Casey added, “I’m going to work night and day for the next 10 days, like I’ve been working my whole life, to earn your votes and to earn your trust.”Protesters demonstrating against the war in Gaza briefly interrupted Kamala Harris’ rally in Kalamazoo.The crowd chanted over the protesters before Harris continued, “And listen on the topic of Gaza, we must end that war, and we must end the war and bring the hostages home, but now I am speaking about 2024″.”Michelle Obama has welcomed Kamala Harris to the stage in Kalamazoo.“The stakes are high, because, as [Michelle Obama] reminds us, as my mother taught me, don’t just complain about injustice, do something,” Harris said.Michelle Obama says Kamala Harris will defend reproductive freedom “not because she’s a woman, but because she’s a decent human being.”“She will usher in a new generation of American leadership and send the ugliness of Donald Trump and his politics, back where it belongs. The past,” Obama said, before encouraging the crowd in Kalamazoo to “do something” and talk to their family and community about voting.Michelle Obama is painting a picture of what restricted reproductive health care could look like across the United States if Donald Trump is re-elected.“We will see more doctors hesitating or shying away from providing life saving treatments because they are worried about being arrested. More medical students reconsidering even pursuing women’s health at all. More OB-GYN clinics without enough doctors to meet demand, closing their doors, leaving untold numbers of women in communities throughout this country without a place to go for basic gynecological care, which in turn, will leave millions of us at risk of undiagnosed medical issues like cervical and uterine cancers,” Obama said.“To the men who love us, let me just try to paint a picture of what it will feel like if America, the wealthiest nation on Earth, keeps revoking the basic care from its women, and how it will affect every single woman in your life,” she continued.“I am asking y’all, from the core of my being, to take our lives seriously,” she said. “Do not put our lives in the hands of politicians, mostly men, who have no clue or do not care about what we as women are going through.”Michelle Obama is asking the crowd at Kamala Harris’s rally in Kalamazoo to consider which presidential candidate they think will look out for their civil and reproductive rights.“If you’ve ever been out there marching and weeping for justice, who do you think is going to have your back? Is it Donald Trump, who once took out a full-page ad to demonize innocent young Black teenagers in New York City, who has dreamed openly about his own version of a purge, where, in his words, he has said for one day, one real rough, nasty day, he says he will allow cops to use violence indiscriminately?” Obama said.“There’s more at stake than just protecting a woman’s choice to give birth, and sadly, we as women and girls have not been socialized to talk openly about our reproductive health. We’ve been taught instead to feel shame and to hide how our bodies work,” she added, describing the stigma many women feel discussing everything from menstruation to menopause.“And look, I don’t expect any man to fully grasp how vulnerable this makes us feel, to understand the complexities of our reproductive health experiences. In all honesty, most of us as women don’t fully understand the breadth and depth of our own reproductive lives,” she said. “There’s a huge disparity in research funding for women’s health, and if you happen to look like me and report pain, you’re more likely to be ignored even by your own doctors,” she added, to a chorus of agreement.“If we keep dismantling parts of our reproductive care system piece by piece, as Trump intends to do, I want folks to understand the chilling effect, not just on critical abortion care, but on the entirety of women’s health.”Still speaking in Kalamazoo, Michelle Obama has criticized Donald Trump’s handling of the pandemic and January 6 attack.“When the American people fired him from a job that was too big for him to begin with, he tried to steal it,” Obama said. Referencing the growing list of former Trump administration officials who have noted the ex-president’s authoritarian tendencies, Obama added, “These folks know that nothing this man says or does is funny in any way. So I hope you’ll forgive me if I’m a little frustrated that some of us are choosing to ignore Donald Trump’s gross incompetence while asking Kamala to dazzle us at every turn.”“I hope that you will forgive me if I am worried that we will blow this opportunity to finally turn the page on the ugliness once and for all, because, believe me, if Donald Trump is president again at some point or another, that ugliness will touch all of our lives.”In an interview with Meet the Press, JD Vance has tried to explain Donald Trump’s comments on “the enemy from within.Vance told moderator Kristen Welker: “I think what Donald Trump said is that those folks pose a greater threat to United States’ peace and security because America is strong enough to stand up to any foreign adversary.” The full interview will air tomorrow.Although she says she hates politics, Michelle Obama says the stakes of this election were too high for her to sit it out.“I wanted to do everything in my power to remind the country that I love that there’s too much we stand to lose if we get this one wrong,” the former first lady said.Obama also called out the higher standards that Black women are held to as some have criticized Harris. “They accuse her of not providing enough policy detail. Some wonder, do we really know her? Is she too aggressive? Is she not aggressive enough? There are folks sowing seeds of doubt about whether she’s who she appears to be,” Obama said. “Now, don’t get me wrong, voters have every right to ask hard questions of any candidate seeking office, but can someone tell me why we are once again holding Kamala to a higher standard than her opponent?”“For Trump, we expect nothing at all, no understanding of policy, no ability to put together a coherent argument, no honesty, no decency, no morals.”Speaking at the Harris campaign’s rally in Kalamazoo, Michelle Obama seeks to draw a stark comparison between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Kamala Harris is “showing us what a sane, stable leader looks like,” the former first lady said. “That’s because Kamala Harris is a grown-up. And Lord knows we need a grown-up in the White House.”“This is someone who understands you, all of you, someone from a middle class family raised mostly by her mom, like so many of us, leaning on her neighbors, like we all do, that’s what you want in a president,” Obama said.“With all that being said, I got to ask myself, well, why on earth is this race even close?” she added “It’s clear to me that the question isn’t whether Kamala is ready for this moment, because by every measure, she has demonstrated that she’s ready. The real question is, as a country, are we ready for this moment.”Michelle Obama is speaking now at Kamala Harris’ rally in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The former first lady, who was welcomed onstage to uproarious applause, called the city “Kamala-zoo”. More