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    None of Trump’s Economic ‘Solutions’ Hold Any Water

    Ask Donald Trump what he’ll do about any of the nation’s economic problems and he’ll give you one of three answers. He’ll either promise to cut taxes, raise tariffs or deport millions of people. When asked about child care, for example, Trump told the Economic Club of New York that he would raise “trillions” of dollars from new tariffs on virtually every good imported into the United States.This, of course, shows a fundamental ignorance of how tariffs work as well as the probable impact of a high-tariff regime on most American consumers. (The short story is that, if passed into law, Trump’s tariffs would amount to a large tax hike on most working Americans.) It’s also just not an answer. But that’s normal for the former president.On Friday, toward the end of a news conference where he attacked E. Jean Carroll — the former journalist who sued Trump, successfully, for damages relating to sexual abuse — Trump told his audience that he would discuss the latest jobs numbers. What followed was a brief rant about “foreigners coming in illegally” who “took the jobs of native-born Americans.”“And I’ve been telling you that’s what’s going to happen,” said Trump, “because we have millions and millions of people pouring into our country, many from prisons and jails and mental institutions and insane asylums. Traffickers, human traffickers, women traffickers, sex traffickers, which, by the way, that’s the kind of thing that people should be looking at, because it’s horrible.”Here, I’ll note that it is unclear whether Trump understands that “asylum” in immigration refers to seeking refuge or sanctuary and not, as he seems to think, to the kind of institution that you might find in a Batman movie.To the extent that Trump had a solution to this imagined problem, it was mass deportation. In fact, mass deportation is his — and his campaign’s — answer to a whole set of policy questions. What, for example, will Trump do about housing costs? Well, his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, says that they’ll deport 20 million people and that this, somehow, will bring prices down.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Hillary Clinton Debated Trump. Here’s Her Advice for Kamala Harris.

    The 2016 Democratic nominee fell short to Donald Trump, but she had strong debate moments against him. In an interview, she offered some thoughts for Kamala Harris.Hillary Clinton has as much experience as any Democrat in debating Donald J. Trump.The 2016 presidential campaign, when she was her party’s nominee, included three of the six general-election debates Mr. Trump has participated in. Those faceoffs went a long way toward shaping the country’s vision of his candidacy and what he would be like as president.Mr. Trump, of course, went on to win the 2016 election — an outcome that still haunts Democrats.When Mrs. Clinton called this week to discuss her old debate coach, Karen Dunn, who is helping out Vice President Kamala Harris this time around, I took the opportunity to ask about her experience on the debate stage with Mr. Trump.“The consensus was that I won all three debates and that I was well prepared,” Mrs. Clinton said.Here are excerpts from our conversation, which have been lightly edited and condensed.What do you remember about your own preparations to debate Donald Trump?It was the first debate when Trump literally ridiculed me for preparing. This was not something we had thought about beforehand, because who thought we could be ridiculed for preparing for a presidential debate in front of 85 or 90 million people?So basically I said, yeah, I did prepare. And I’ll tell you something else I prepared for: I prepared to be president. Because I had the confidence. I knew the material. I felt comfortable. I also knew I had to brush Trump back and not let him be the center of attention all the time.What advice do you have for Kamala Harris as she prepares to debate Trump?She’s proven to be a good debater, both in her races in California and in her debate with Mike Pence. So I think she needs to be prepared enough that she feels really comfortable going on both offense and defense against Trump, because there’s a lot to cover with him.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    During NYFW, Jill Biden, Anna Wintour and More March for Voting Awareness

    Jill Biden, Anna Wintour and top American designers participated in a voting awareness march at the onset of New York Fashion Week.Morning rush hour in Midtown Manhattan slowed to a halt on Friday as nearly 1,000 fashion-industry professionals walked up Broadway in a march meant to urge people to vote on Election Day in November.The march, held at the onset of New York Fashion Week, was organized by a group that included the Council of Fashion Designers of America; I Am a Voter, an organization that promotes civic engagement; and Vogue. The event was billed as bipartisan, but an appearance by Jill Biden, the first lady, and a Harris-Walz campaign scarf worn discreetly by Anna Wintour, the editor of Vogue, were among the signs of an underlying Democratic tilt.The march started outside the Macy’s store in Herald Square, where designers, including Tory Burch, Brandon Blackwood, Joseph Altuzarra and Proenza Schouler’s Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hr4ernandez gathered with fashion editors and garment industry workers before the crowd walked roughly six blocks to Bryant Park, chanting “V-O-T-E, vote, vote, vote” along the way.Anna Wintour of Vogue with the designer Thom Browne. On Ms. Wintour’s bag is a scarf Mr. Browne designed in partnership with the Harris-Walz campaign.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesMost marchers wore Old Navy T-shirts that said “Fashion for our future” and were designed by Zac Posen, right, the brand’s chief creative officer.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesThe designer Prabal Gurung marched with the group from Herald Square to Bryant Park.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesMost participants were uniformly dressed in Old Navy T-shirts designed by Zac Posen, the brand’s recently appointed chief creative officer, which were emblazoned with the slogan “Fashion for our future.” In a manner particular to fashion activism, the T-shirts were styled in myriad ways: tucked into pleated slacks, layered over slip dresses, knotted into crop tops.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Urges Police Officers to Watch for Voter Fraud

    Former President Donald J. Trump urged the board of the nation’s largest police union on Friday to “watch for voter fraud” across the country, an appeal that, if followed through on, could run afoul of multiple state laws and raise accusations of voter intimidation.Invoking his widely debunked claims of voter fraud in 2020, Mr. Trump suggested that the only way he could lose in November was if Democrats cheated. “Watch for the voter fraud, because we win without voter fraud,” Mr. Trump said at a meeting of the national board of the Fraternal Order of Police in Charlotte, N.C. “We win so easily.”Mr. Trump added that he believed the police could effectively scare some voters. “You can keep it down just by watching, because, believe it or not, they’re afraid of that badge,” Mr. Trump said. “They’re afraid of you people. They’re afraid of that more than anything else.”Mr. Trump’s comments follow his repeated statements raising doubts about the integrity of the upcoming election before a vote has been cast. But though Mr. Trump has previously urged his supporters to monitor voting activity — particularly in Democratic cities in battleground states — his entreaty to the police union heightens concerns that he is encouraging voter intimidation at the polls.Katie Reisner, a senior counsel at States United Democracy Center, a nonpartisan organization focused on elections, said that election officials and the police had been working for years to strengthen community relations around policing and elections, and that such encouragement from Mr. Trump could disrupt years of work and planning.“The idea of Trump telling the Fraternal Order of Police to take matters into their own hands and kind of go rogue, it’s certainly not a positive from a healthy elections standpoint,” Ms. Reisner said. “But it’s also really counter to a lot of work that’s happening in a lot of jurisdictions to make sure that law enforcement are both adhering to the law and not surprising their communities on Election Day or during voting.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    In His Last Months as President, Biden Is Both Liberated and Resigned

    President Biden spent decades seeking the highest office, only to drop his bid for re-election under pressure. These final months before the November election are bittersweet, his allies say.President Biden began the final stretch of his political career this week freed from the rigors of running for re-election, appearing by turns nostalgic, liberated and — in some cases — resigned to finding himself once again in a supporting role.After a two-week summer vacation, Mr. Biden has been campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris, now at the top of the Democratic ticket, and traveling the country to promote his administration’s accomplishments.But for a man who has spent decades seeking the highest office, only to drop his bid for re-election under pressure from his own party, these final months before the November election are bittersweet, his allies say.“For my whole career I’ve either been too young or too old, never in between,” Mr. Biden told a crowd of union workers on Friday in Ann Arbor, Mich. The president, who was not yet 30 when he first won a Senate seat in 1972, cracked that he went on to serve for “374 years.”Earlier in the week, Mr. Biden appeared unbothered about alienating conservatives when he attacked Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin — in the Republican’s home state — for not voting for the Inflation Reduction Act, the president’s signature legislation.And on Monday in Pittsburgh, during an event with Ms. Harris, Mr. Biden did not seem particularly keen to cede the spotlight. He spoke eight minutes longer than the vice president, even as he said he would be “on the sidelines” going forward.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Harris’s Debate Tutor: a Lawyer Unafraid of Telling Politicians Hard Truths

    Karen Dunn, who is preparing the vice president for next week’s clash, has trained Democrats for debates in every election since 2008. Her approach, as Hillary Clinton put it, is “tough love.”Vice President Kamala Harris has never met or spoken with former President Donald J. Trump, but the woman running her debate preparations has spent a lot of time thinking about how to respond to what Republican nominees say during an onstage clash.That outside Harris adviser, Karen L. Dunn, a high-powered Washington lawyer, has trained Democratic presidential and vice-presidential candidates for debates in every election since 2008.She is described by candidates she has coached and other people who have worked with her as a skilled handler of high-ego politicians. By all accounts, she possesses the rare ability to tell them what they are doing wrong and how to fix it — and how to inject humor and humanity to sell themselves to voters watching the debate.“It’s a combination of tough love,” Hillary Clinton, whom Ms. Dunn helped prepare for presidential debates in 2008 and 2016, said in an interview on Thursday. “She’s unafraid to say, ‘That’s not going to work’ or ‘That doesn’t make sense’ or ‘You can do better.’ But she also offers encouragement, like, ‘Look, I think you’re on the right track here’ and ‘You just need to do more of that.’”The emergence of Ms. Dunn as the leader of Ms. Harris’s debate team comes at a critical moment in both the presidential race and Ms. Dunn’s professional life.When she is not preparing top Democrats for debates — in addition to her four previous cycles of involvement at the presidential and vice-presidential level, she has worked with Senators Mark Warner of Virginia and Cory Booker of New Jersey — Ms. Dunn is a top lawyer for some of America’s leading technology firms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Walz’s Pennsylvania Campaign Swing Underscores Challenges in the Battleground

    Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota on Thursday capped two days of crisscrossing Pennsylvania, talking up Vice President Kamala Harris’s experience, taking shots at former President Donald J. Trump and making his now familiar pleas to voters that they fight for freedom with optimism.“Look, it would be easier if we didn’t have to do this. It would be easier if these guys wouldn’t undermine our system, if they wouldn’t lie about elections, if they wouldn’t put women’s health at risk. But they are, so it’s a privilege for us to do the fight,” he said in Erie, Pa., where he stumped from a stage at the edge of Presque Isle Bay before hundreds of cheering supporters waving “Coach” and “Kamala” signs.The appearance was one of several events that Mr. Walz used to blitz the local media airwaves and fire up Democratic volunteers with the Midwestern dad charm that his party is banking on to help draw white working-class voters. Mr. Walz, and his daughter, Hope, hit several cities in counties that went for Mr. Trump in 2016 — stung by fading American manufacturing and a difficult economy.The shooting this week at Apalachee High School in Winder, Ga., added urgency to his message at the Erie rally and at local Democratic offices, where he stressed it was in voters’ power to elect leaders willing to pass gun-safety laws, tackle climate change and ensure freedom in health decisions.“I say it as a gun owner; I say it as a veteran; I say it as a hunter: none of the things we’re proposing infringes on your Second Amendment right. But what does infringe upon this is our children going to school and being killed,” he said at a Harris-Walz field office in Erie. “It is unacceptable, and it doesn’t have to be this way. So we end that with our votes. We end it with a vision of a better America.”Onstage later, he recalled sitting with the parents of children killed in the Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut when he was still a member of Congress and a cardholder of the National Rifle Association. “I think about it — today, my son, this week, started his senior year of high school,” Mr. Walz said. “And it’s bittersweet for me because those killed at Sandy Hook would have been entering their senior year, too.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Swing State Politics Are Sinking a Global Steel Deal

    As the Biden administration nears a decision to block the proposed acquisition of U.S. Steel, the debate over national and economic security is being dwarfed by presidential politics.The Biden administration has spent the past three years promoting a policy of “friend-shoring,” which aims to contain China and Russia by forging closer ties with U.S. allies like Europe and Japan.That policy appears to stop at the state lines of Pennsylvania.As the administration nears a decision to block the proposed acquisition of the Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel by Japan’s Nippon Steel, the traditional debate over national security and economic security is being dwarfed by a more powerful force: presidential politics.Legal experts, Wall Street analysts and economists expressed concern about the precedent that would be set if President Biden uses executive power to block a company from an allied nation from buying an American business. They warn that scuttling the $15 billion transaction would be an extraordinary departure from the nation’s culture of open investment — one that could lead international corporations to reconsider their U.S. investments.“This was a purely political decision, and one that stomps on the Biden administration’s stated focus on building alliances among like-minded countries to advance the economic competition with China,” said Christopher B. Johnstone, a senior adviser and the Japan chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “At the end of the day, it represents pure protectionism that draws no apparent distinction between our friends and our adversaries.”Administration officials such as Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen, who leads a government panel that is reviewing the steel deal, have espoused the benefits of deepening economic ties with U.S. allies to make supply chains more resilient. Those sentiments are being disregarded in the heat of an election year, where domestic political dynamics take priority.The Biden administration has been under pressure to find a way to justify blocking the Nippon acquisition amid backlash against the deal from the powerful steelworkers’ union. The labor organization believes that Nippon, which has pledged to invest in Pennsylvania factories and preserve jobs, could jeopardize pension agreements and lay off employees.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More