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      Could rejected mail-in ballots cost Joe Biden the election? | Nathan Robinson

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      Donald Trump is the one who has complained most loudly about mail-in ballot problems. But problems with mailed ballots could in fact hurt BidenConservatives have spent the election cycle spreading fear and misinformation about mail-in ballots. Donald Trump has called mail-in voting a “scam” and suggested that millions of counterfeit foreign ballots will be submitted. PragerU has put out a video calling mail-in balloting a way to “steal an election”. Faced with the absurd conspiracies and criticisms, Democrats have rightly defended mail-in ballots as a crucial way to preserve democracy, especially during a pandemic.But the fact that expanded mail-in balloting is legitimate and necessary does not mean that Democrats have nothing to fear from it. In fact, as Thomas Edsall of the New York Times documented, because mailed ballots have a higher rate of rejection and are more easily subject to loss and error, Democrats may lose votes they critically need in close states – especially because Democrats are much more likely to vote by mail than Republicans. (According to one poll, 47% of Biden voters planned to vote by mail, compared with just 11% of Trump supporters.) Continue reading… More

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      Build your own US election result: plot a win for Biden or Trump

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      The electoral map has shifted in 2020, amid new challenges from misinformation to mail-in ballots. Previously reliable states on both sides are now looking more competitive.
      In the interactive graphic below, you decide which way these closer states will vote, and try to pave Joe Biden or Donald Trump’s path to victory.
      Some states remain very likely to go to Biden or Trump because they were won by large margins in 2016, or they have voted the same way in several recent elections. Such states – ranked either a “solid” or “likely” win for either party, according to the Cook Political Report – have already been coloured in for Biden and Trump in the graphic below.
      A majority of 270 electoral votes out of a total of 538 is needed to win, and the remaining states are up to you. Can you take Biden to victory? Or will Trump stay in the White House?

      Choose which way the key swing states will vote and trace Biden or Trump’s potential path to victory.

      JOE BIDEN
      BIDEN

      electoral college votes

      DONALD TRUMP
      TRUMP

      electoral college votes

      Under your scenario,
      would win the election!

      Under your scenario,
      Nobody would win the election. It’s a tie! More

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      Why Biden calls Trump a ‘climate arsonist’ – video explainer

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      Humanity is said to have just 10 years left to start seriously tackling the climate crisis before passing the ‘point of no return’ with multiple-degree temperature increases, rising sea levels and increasingly disastrous wildfires, hurricanes, floods and droughts predicted.Scientists say the US is far off the path of what is necessary for the nation and the world to avoid catastrophic global heating, particularly as in the past four years Donald Trump has shredded environmental protections for American lands, animals and people.As part of our climate countdown series, the Guardian’s Emily Holden looks at the issue and examines why the Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, calls his rival a ‘climate arsonist’ Revealed: the full extent of Trump’s ‘meat cleaver’ assault on US wildernessSign up for Fight to Vote – our weekly US election newsletterContinue reading… More

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      Democrats hold Senate floor overnight to protest Amy Coney Barrett confirmation – live

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      Key events

      Show

      5.52am EDT05:52
      Kremlin criticises Joe Biden over his Russia comments, saying they ‘encourage hatred of Russia’

      3.27am EDT03:27
      McConnell: ‘they won’t be able to do much about this for a long time’

      1.46am EDT01:46
      Democrats hold senate floor overnight in protest of Barrett

      Live feed

      Show

      5.52am EDT05:52

      Kremlin criticises Joe Biden over his Russia comments, saying they ‘encourage hatred of Russia’

      A quick bit of foreign policy news from Reuters here, firstly over nuclear weapons. The New Start treaty between Russia and the US expires shortly, it’s the last remaining nuclear agreement between the two nations, and there’s as yet no concrete signs of it being extended.
      Russia has today suggested that it would refrain from deploying thousands of missiles if Nato would agree to similar measures, and is proposing “mutual verification measures”.
      The Kremlin has also commented again on the US election, saying that a statement from Joe Biden that Russia is the main threat to the US is “not true”. A Kremlin spokesperson said such statements encourage hatred of Russia.

      5.47am EDT05:47

      We’ve got a live feed of Senate proceedings up above in the blog – you may need to refresh the page to get the play button to appear. Here’s a clip of Sen. Chris Murphy from earlier.

      Senate Democrats
      (@SenateDems)
      Senate Republicans are rushing through Judge Barrett’s nomination so they can finally do what they’ve been trying to do for years: repeal the ACA, end insurance for millions, and strip protections for pre-existing conditions.Sen. Murphy explains. pic.twitter.com/HBiWQUn70d

      October 26, 2020

      Sen. Tim Kaine followed him, and he finished his speech by saying that Republican leaders would not wear masks to cover their noses and mouths and protect themselves and others from the coronavirus, but that the “soulless process” of confirming Amy Coney Barrett to the supreme court showed they were willing to “cover their eyes and their ears”.

      5.43am EDT05:43

      Oliver Milman writes for us that the choice between Donald Trump and Joe Biden is pretty stark in terms of consequences for the global environment.

      The international effort to constrain dangerous global heating will hinge, in large part, on which of the dichotomous approaches of Donald Trump or Joe Biden prevails.
      On 4 November, the day after the election, the US will exit the Paris climate agreement, a global pact that has wobbled but not collapsed from nearly four years of disparagement and disengagement under Trump.
      Biden has vowed to immediately rejoin the Paris deal. The potential of a second Trump term, however, is foreboding for those whose anxiety has only escalated during the hottest summer ever recorded in the northern hemisphere, with huge wildfires scorching California and swaths of central South America, and extraordinary temperatures baking the Arctic.
      “It’s a decision of great consequence, to both the US and the world,” said Laurence Tubiana, a French diplomat and key architect of the Paris accords. “The rest of the world is moving to a low-carbon future, but we need to collectively start moving even faster, and the US still has a significant global role to play in marshaling this effort.”
      Few countries are on track to fulfill commitments made in Paris five years ago to slash their planet-heating emissions and keep the global temperature rise to “well below” 2C of warming beyond the pre-industrial era. The world has already warmed by about 1C since this time, helping set in motion a cascade of heatwaves, fierce storms and flooding around the planet.

      Read more here: Climate at a crossroads as Trump and Biden point in different directions

      5.31am EDT05:31

      The summer has been characterised by a series of extreme weather events on both coasts of the US, and that looks set to continue.
      Hundreds of thousands of Californians lost power as utilities sought to prevent the chance of their equipment sparking wildfires and the fire-weary state braced for a new bout of dry, windy weather.
      More than 1 million people were expected be in the dark Monday during what officials have said could be the strongest wind event in California this year, reports the Associate Press. More

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      'The system is broken': Americans cast their vote for better healthcare

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      Ramae Hamrin was a high school math teacher in rural northern Minnesota, in a small town with a Paul Bunyan statue and snow on the ground by October.
      Hamrin, 50, instructed low-income students in calculus. It was not an easy job, but it provided health insurance for her and her three children. When it came to voting, like many Americans, she was put off by the two-party system. She voted third-party and often libertarian.
      Then, Hamrin slipped, fell and broke her hip. She went to hospital, doctors discovered a 9-centimetre (3.5-inch) lesion on her femur, and within weeks was diagnosed with cancer: multiple myeloma. Within two years, she was unable to work, permanently disabled by the ravages of cancer treatment.
      “Before I got diagnosed, I would have never thought about healthcare or drug prices,” as a voting issue, said Hamrin. “Now, really that’s my only issue.”
      This year, she said, she is voting one way: “strictly Democratic”.
      With the US election just over a week away, Hamrin is one of millions of Americans who’s been heading to the polls this fall with healthcare and drug prices as their top voting issue.
      The United States’ massive, largely private and very expensive health industry has ranked as a top voter concern for years, and helped drive Democrats to victory in the midterm elections of 2018, when the party took control of the House of Representatives.
      But over the last six months of the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 220,000 Americans, Covid-19 eclipsed healthcare as the top issue of the election, though health voters like Hamrin argue the two are inseparable. Her daughter, an accomplished cross-country runner in college, was diagnosed with Covid-19 and now needs an inhaler.
      “I do trust the Democrats more than I trust the Republicans to get anything done on this issue,” said Hamrin. Although, she added: “It’s hard to know who to trust these days.”
      Although healthcare reform elicits concern across parties, it’s one in which Democrats hold a huge advantage. Biden has a 20-point lead over Trump on issues ranging from how to lower Americans’ health costs and to how to protect people from loathed insurance industry practices.
      “Covid has made us all healthcare voters,” said David Mitchell, founder of Patients for Affordable Drugs, one of a handful of advocacy groups which does not take money from pharmaceutical companies. More

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      Republicans closely resemble autocratic parties in Hungary and Turkey – study

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      The Republican party has become dramatically more illiberal in the past two decades and now more closely resembles ruling parties in autocratic societies than its former centre-right equivalents in Europe, according to a new international study.
      In a significant shift since 2000, the GOP has taken to demonising and encouraging violence against its opponents, adopting attitudes and tactics comparable to ruling nationalist parties in Hungary, India, Poland and Turkey.
      The shift has both led to and been driven by the rise of Donald Trump.
      By contrast the Democratic party has changed little in its attachment to democratic norms, and in that regard has remained similar to centre-right and centre-left parties in western Europe. Their principal difference is the approach to the economy.
      The new study, the largest ever of its kind, was carried out by the V-Dem Institute at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, using newly developed methods to measure and quantify the health of the world’s democracies at a time when authoritarianism is on the rise.
      Anna Lührmann, V-Dem’s deputy director, said the Republican transformation had been “certainly the most dramatic shift in an established democracy”.
      Graphic
      V-Dem’s “illiberalism index” gauges the extent of commitment to democratic norms a party exhibits before an election. The institute calls it “the first comparative measure of the ‘litmus test’ for the loyalty to democracy”.
      The study, published on Monday, shows the party has followed a similar trajectory to Fidesz, which under Viktor Orbán has evolved from a liberal youth movement into an authoritarian party that has made Hungary the first non-democracy in the European Union.
      India’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been transformed in similar ways under Narendra Modi, as has the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the Law and Justice party in Poland. Trump and his administration have sought to cultivate close ties to the leadership of those countries.
      The Republican party has remained relatively committed to pluralism, but it has gone a long way towards abandoning other democratic norms, becoming much more prone to disrespecting opponents and encouraging violence.
      “We’ve seen similar shifts in parties in other countries where the quality of democracy has declined in recent years, where democracy has been eroding,” Lührmann said. “It fits very well into the pattern of parties that erode democracy once they’re in power.”
      “The demonisation of opponents – that’s clearly a factor that has shifted a lot when it comes to the Republican party, as well as the encouragement of political violence,” she said, adding that the change has been driven in large part from the top.
      “We have several quotes from Trump, that show how he has encouraged supporters to use violence against either journalists or political opponents.”
      In western Europe, centre-right parties like Germany’s Christian Democratic Union and Spain’s People’s Party have stuck to their commitment to democratic norms. By the same measure, Britain’s Conservative party has moved some way along the liberal-illiberal spectrum but not to the Republicans’ extremes.
      “The data shows that the Republican party in 2018 was far more illiberal than almost all other governing parties in democracies,” the V-Dem study found. “Only very few governing parties in democracies in this millennium (15%) were considered more illiberal than the Republican party in the US.”
      The institute has found the decline in democratic traits has accelerated around the world and that for the first time this century, autocracies are in the majority – holding power in 92 countries, home to 54% of the global population.
      According to V-Dem’s benchmark, almost 35% of the world’s population, 2.6 billion people, live in nations that are becoming more autocratic. More

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      'This will make lib heads explode': Donald Trump Jr posts 2024 picture

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      Donald Trump Jr posed in front of a “Don Jr 2024” sign in Nevada on Saturday, posted the picture online and waited for “the lib heads to explode”.
      “Hahahahaha,” wrote the president’s oldest son, on Instagram. “Oh boy. This was a sign up at the Fallon Nevada Livestock Auction. This will make the lib heads explode.” (“Lib” being short for liberal.)
      “To whomever made that thanks for the compliment … but let’s get through 2020 with a big win first!!!!!”
      Though Nevada went for Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Joe Biden leads Donald Trump Sr there this year, it is considered a swing state. Democratic voters are concentrated in Las Vegas and its suburbs while Republicans can be found in more rural areas.
      Trump Jr, 42, is best known as an internet provocateur who shares both his father’s brashness and his inclination for sharing disinformation.
      Since his father won the White House he has not been involved in policy like his sister, Ivanka, and her husband, Jared Kushner, or as active in running the Trump Organization as his brother, Eric. He also has two half-siblings, Tiffany and Barron.
      But Don Jr does seem to be the Trump offspring most inclined to politics and he has turned into a valuable campaign surrogate with a knack for communicating with the president’s base.
      “Don Jr represents the emotional center of the MAGA universe,” Jason Miller, a senior advisor on Trump’s campaign, told the New York Times, using an acronym for “Make America Great Again”, a Trump slogan.
      Trump Jr has only joked about running for office but he – and his sister – have registered strongly in polls regarding notional Republican candidates for 2024, whether to succeed his father or to attempt to deny Joe Biden a second term.
      The president’s oldest son has also published two books with political themes, seeing the first top bestseller lists, if with help from the party, and suffering embarrassment over a mistake on the cover of the second.
      A Vice reporter recently suggested that Pennsylvania Republicans were floating the idea of Trump Jr replacing Pat Toomey, a Republican senator who has announced he will retire. Trump Jr himself has not spoken about the Pennsylvania seat.
      Speaking to the Guardian this week, Rick Wilson, a former Republican consultant and member of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, called Trump Jr “a post-Republican Republican … there only to engage in that performative dickery that is lib-owning in the Trump world. It is a political performance art to show your contempt for norms, institutions and education.”
      Wilson went on to explain why, should Trump Jr actually consider a run for office, that might be an asset.
      “It has become the ideological underpinning of the GOP. There’s no party of ideas any longer. There’s no there there except for sort of the screeching fury of Trumpism.” More

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      White House chief of staff says 'we're not going to control pandemic', after Pence staffers test positive – as it happened

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      Key events

      Show

      5.32pm EDT17:32
      Summary

      1.35pm EDT13:35
      Senate to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to Supreme Court tomorrow

      9.50am EDT09:50
      Meadows: ‘We’re not going to control the pandemic’

      9.06am EDT09:06
      Lincoln Project lawyer to Kushner and Ivanka: ‘Sue if you must’

      8.21am EDT08:21
      US just misses new Covid case record – a day after setting it

      8.02am EDT08:02
      Good morning…

      Live feed

      Show

      5.32pm EDT17:32

      Summary

      Here’s a quick overview of what happened today:
      The Senate, which is in the middle of a special weekend session, made its final step toward confirming Amy Coney Barrett to the US Supreme Court. Senate Republicans overrode a Democratic filibuster and are set to confirm Barrett tomorrow night.
      White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said in an interview with CNN that the president is “not going to control the pandemic”. The unusually candid statement gave insight into the mindset of a White House that has, from the beginning, played down the effect of the coronavirus.
      Meanwhile, the US merely set a new Covid case record on Saturday, coming close to the 83,757 cases that were reported on Friday – the highest number in a single day – at 83,718 new cases. US health officials have for weeks voiced concerns of a new surge as the weather gets colder, and people stay indoors where the virus is more likely to spread.
      We’ll be back tomorrow with more live updates. Thanks for reading.

      5.24pm EDT17:24

      A ballot drop box that held more than 120 ballots was set on fire in Boston earlier Sunday. The box was outside the Boston Public Library in downtown Boston. Police say that the fire appears to have been a “deliberate attack”.
      Officials said that of the 122 ballots that were inside the box when it was emptied, and 87 of the ballots were still legible and able to process. The Massachusetts secretary of state said that voters whose ballots were affected by the fire will be sent a new ballot and will also have the option of voting early in person, if they choose.
      Security cameras around the box showed footage of a person setting fire to the box. The Boston Police Department is asking the public to help identify the person who started the fire.

      Boston Police Dept.
      (@bostonpolice)
      BPD Investigating Ballot Box Fire in the area of 700 Boylston Street in Boston. https://t.co/8FYA34H815 pic.twitter.com/FNrO1PpEUg

      October 25, 2020

      In a joint statement, William Galvin, Massachusetts’ secretary of state, and Boston mayor Marty Walsh said: “We ask voters not to be intimidated by this bad act, and remain committed to making their voices heard in this and every election.”

      5.08pm EDT17:08

      Donald Trump Jr. posed in front of a “Don Jr. 2024” sign for a picture he posted on Instagram yesterday.
      “Hahahahaha. Oh boy. This was a sign up at the Fallon Nevada Livestock Auction,” he wrote on Instagram. “This will make the lib heads explode. To whomever made that thanks for the compliment… but let’s get through 2020 with a big win first!!!!!”

      Ben Riley-Smith
      (@benrileysmith)
      Hmm. Don Jr not going out of his way to play down the 2024 speculation. pic.twitter.com/G99NigQSpA

      October 24, 2020

      Though Nevada went blue for Hillary Clinton in 2016, the state is technically a swing state that leans slightly left. Joe Biden holds a lead over Trump in the state, where Democratic voters are concentrated in Las Vegas and its surrounding suburbs while Republicans can be found in more rural areas of the state.
      Donald Trump Jr, 42, is best known for being an internet provocateur, complementing his father’s brashness and inclination for sharing disinformation on Twitter. Trump hasn’t been as involved in White House policy as his sister, Ivanka, and her husband, Jared Kushner, nor has he been as active in running the Trump Organization as his brother, Eric, but Don Jr. has seemed to be the Trump offspring most inclined to politics and has turned into a valuable asset for his father’s campaign.
      “Don Jr. represents the emotional center of the MAGA universe,” Jason MIller, a senior advisor on Trump’s campaign, told the New York Times.
      While Trump has only joked about running for office, a Vice reporter suggested that Pennsylvania Republicans were floating the idea of Trump replacing a Republican Senator from the state who will be retiring. Trump himself has not spoken about the Pennsylvania Senate seat.

      4.34pm EDT16:34

      At least 58 million Americans have voted in the 2020 general election through early voting, according to Michael McDonald, a professor at the University of Florida who is running the US Election Project that’s keeping tabs on early voting count.
      Using individual state reports with ballot counts, the project estimates that 39.7 million Americans have voted by mail while 19 million have voted early in-person. Over 19 million of the total early votes come from California, Texas and Florida – the states with the highest population. Across 19 states that provide party registration with their reports, 13 million have been Democrat while 7 million are Republican. Another 6 million are registered independents.
      On Twitter, McDonald pointed out that Texas has hit nearly 80% of the total turnout in the state in 2016. McDonald has suggested that this election could have the highest voter turnout since 1908, with an estimated 65% of eligible voters participating in the election.

      Michael McDonald
      (@ElectProject)
      #earlyvote morning update 10/25At least 58 million people have voted in the 2020 general election 🥳https://t.co/s8K2xFDeSA pic.twitter.com/8NI64sWGRq

      October 25, 2020

      Joining the group of early voters is this interesting group of Joe Biden supporters in Nevada.

      Rex Chapman🏇🏼
      (@RexChapman)
      Nevada: Biden voters. Latinos. On horseback. In style.This is my America… pic.twitter.com/8ri9Ur7SyH

      October 25, 2020

      4.13pm EDT16:13

      From the Guardian’s Richard Luscombe in Miami:
      Born in Hawaii with deep roots in Chicago, Barack Obama is far removed from the traditional image of Florida Man. But with two appearances here in four days stumping for Joe Biden, the former president is relishing the atmosphere of the Sunshine State in the final days of the 2020 campaign.
      On Tuesday, Obama will follow up Saturday’s skewering of Donald Trump at a drive-in rally in North Miami with a similar gathering in Orlando, the exact details yet to be released by the Biden campaign.
      But the event means that, inside 96 hours, Obama will have made the same number of Florida appearances campaigning for his former vice-president that he did for Hillary Clinton in the last weeks of her run for the White House four years ago,
      “Oh, it’s good to be back in Florida,” Obama told the crowd in North Miami, shortly after paying a surprise visit to thank campaign workers in the nearby city of Miami Springs who helped him carry the state in 2008 and 2012.
      “You delivered twice for me, Florida. And now I’m asking you to deliver for Joe and deliver for Kamala.”
      Obama’s role in flipping Florida back blue after Trump seized the state by barely 1.2 percent in 2016 is more than just symbolic. Popular with Hispanic voters to a level that Biden has not been able to achieve, his messaging in a state where 2.5 million Latinos make up 17 percent of the electorate is crucial.
      On Saturday, he attacked Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, and noted it had “hit African Americans and Latinos harder than anybody in Florida.”
      It is a point he is certain to press again on Tuesday in Orlando, the heart of the I-4 corridor with a significant Hispanic population, including about 300,000 Puerto Ricans.
      The demographic also offers Obama another opportunity to slam Trump. Criticism of the president’s handling of 2017’s Hurricane Maria, which devastated the island, was loud among Central Florida’s Puerto Rican community, with images of Trump casually tossing rolls of paper towels to suffering residents still fresh.
      “When a hurricane devastates Puerto Rico, a president’s supposed to help it rebuild, not toss paper towels [or] withhold billions of dollars in aid until just before an election,” Obama told the crowd in Miami.
      Expect more of the same in Orlando on Tuesday as Trump, the ultimate Florida Man, gets roasted by his nemesis once again.

      3.53pm EDT15:53

      Joe Biden released a statement in response to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ interview with CNN today where he said that the White House is not going to control the pandemic.
      “We’re not going to control the pandemic. We’re going to control the fact that we get a vaccine, therapeutics and other mitigation,” Meadows told CNN’s Jake Tapper.
      Biden said that the interview wasn’t a slip-up, but “a candid acknowledgement of what President Trump’s strategy has clearly been from the beginning of this crisis: to wave the white flag of defeat and hope that by ignoring it, the virus would simply go away. It hasn’t, and it won’t.”

      Scott Wong
      (@scottwongDC)
      BIDEN: “This wasn’t a slip by Meadows, it was a candid acknowledgement of what President Trump’s strategy has clearly been from the beginning of this crisis: to wave the white flag of defeat and hope that by ignoring it, the virus would simply go away. It hasn’t, and it won’t.” pic.twitter.com/BTizJZMQdf

      October 25, 2020

      3.30pm EDT15:30

      Vladimir Putin has made it clear that he’s happy with Donald Trump’s coziness with Russia, but the Kremlin today contradicted Trump and said that he doesn’t believe Joe Biden’s ties with Ukraine are criminal.
      Trump used Thursday’s debate with Biden as an opportunity to accuse Biden’s son of having unethical ties to Ukraine, accusations that have not been verified and that Biden has denied.
      According to Reuters, Putin said today that he is willing to work with any US leader, but noted that Biden has “sharp anti-Russian rhetoric”. Here’s more from the Reuters report:

      Putin appeared less friendly towards Trump in remarks broadcast by Russian state TV on Sunday. In what may be seen by some analysts as an attempt to try to curry favour with the Biden camp, the Russian presdient took the time to knock down what he made clear he regarded as false allegations from Trump about the Bidens.
      “Yes, in Ukraine he [Hunter Biden] had or maybe still has a business, I don’t know. It doesn’t concern us. It concerns the Americans and the Ukrainians,” said Putin.
      “But well yes he had at least one company, which he practically headed up, and judging from everything he made good money. I don’t see anything criminal about this, at least we don’t know anything about this [being criminal]”.

      3.00pm EDT15:00

      Mike Pence, who as vice president is technically the president of the Senate, is coming under criticism from Democrats for planning to come into the chamber to preside over the vote for Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation to the Supreme Court.
      At a rally in Florida yesterday, Pence said “I wouldn’t miss that vote for the world”. Pence’s appearance would be symbolic as he does not need to be physically present in the Senate for the confirmation to go through.
      Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer denounced Pence’s plan to attend the vote tomorrow, saying it sets “a terrible, terrible example for the American public”.
      “It is clear to me that their closing message is that they’re going to personally deliver Covid to as many people as possible,” Brian Schatz, a Democratic senator for Hawaii, told a reporter.

      Igor Bobic
      (@igorbobic)
      “It is clear to me that their closing message is that they’re going to personally deliver COVID to as many people as possible,” Schatz adds

      October 25, 2020

      At least five people close to Pence, including his chief of staff, have tested positive for Covid-19. A White House official said Sunday that Pence and his wife have tested negative for the virus. His office said that the vice president does not plan to quarantine. Guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say a person should quarantine for 14 days if they were in close contact with a person who tested positive, even if they themselves do not have symptoms or tested negative.
      Pence, who is head of the White House’s coronavirus task force, has said that he can bypass CDC guidelines because he is an essential worker – a claim that has been questioned by health experts.

      2.27pm EDT14:27

      Ed Pilkington

      Andrew Cuomo, the governor of New York state, is having a field day over the comments of the White House chief of staff Mark Meadows this morning. In a rare moment of transparency, Meadows admitted to a Sunday political talk show that the Trump administration had no intention of containing coronavirus, saying: “We’re not going to control the pandemic”.
      Cuomo said that thinking was tantamount to giving in to the virus. “They surrendered without firing a shot. It was the great American surrender,” he said on Sunday, as reported by the Daily News.
      The New York governor said that the Trump administration’s approach to Covid was summed up from the start by such capitulation. “They have believed from the beginning that they can’t control the virus,” he said.
      By contrast, Cuomo prides himself on having wrestled coronavirus to the ground. After a bad start to the pandemic, which saw New York City become the world’s top hotspot, the rate of infection has been reduced to one of the lowest in the country through an aggressive program of testing and contact tracing.
      There have been a total of almost 500,000 confirmed cases in the state, and 25,730 deaths. About 120,000 New Yorkers are being tested every day.
      “What we learned in New York was, if you put up a fight you will have won. Because New York won,” Cuomo said.

      2.10pm EDT14:10

      After the Senate voted to move forward with the final vote to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, Mitch McConnell spoke on the Senate floor, celebrating the lasting influence of the vote for posterity.
      “By tomorrow night, we’ll have a new member of the United States Supreme Court,” he told the chamber.
      McConnell acknowledged that this election could change the tide in Washington but said that not much could be done to change the nature of the court “for a long time to come”.

      Nicholas Fandos
      (@npfandos)
      McConnell, just after the Senate votes to limit debate on Amy Coney Barrett: “A lot of what we’ve done over the last four years will be undone sooner or later by the next election. They won’t be able to do much about this for a long time to come.”

      October 25, 2020

      One Capitol Hill reporter noted that it appears the bruising on McConnell’s face and hands that were seen on Friday appeared to have gotten better. Apparently, getting three judges onto the Supreme Court in four years can do wonders to one’s health.

      Seung Min Kim
      (@seungminkim)
      Also, McConnell’s right hand, which was deeply bruised earlier this week and prompted several Qs about his health, appears much better. Most of the bruising is gone https://t.co/WPFJcqsog2

      October 25, 2020

      Updated
      at 2.19pm EDT

      1.35pm EDT13:35

      Senate to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to Supreme Court tomorrow

      The Senate just made a 51-48 vote to move forward with the final vote for Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court. Republicans overrode a Democratic filibuster with today’s vote, and the final vote for her confirmation will take place tomorrow night.
      With the Republican majority in the Senate, Barrett’s nomination is pretty much a guarantee, despite weeks of criticism from Democrats about a Supreme Court nomination weeks before the presidential election.

      Manu Raju
      (@mkraju)
      #Breaking: Amy Coney Barrett on track for confirmation tomorrow evening after Senate Republicans defeat a Democratic filibuster, 51-48, during a rare Sunday session just nine days before the election

      October 25, 2020

      Updated
      at 4.31pm EDT

      1.10pm EDT13:10

      The NFL has fined the Tennessee Titans $350,000 for violating protocols leading to the league’s first Covid-19 outbreak during the season, multiple outlets are reporting.
      The Titans had 24 people, including 13 players, test positive for the coronavirus between 24 September and 11 October. The outbreak led the NFL to postpone two Tennessee games and the rescheduling of a game against Pittsburgh from 4 October to today and the second against Buffalo from 11 October to 13 October.
      The league and its players association sent officials, including infectious disease experts, to Nashville where they reviewed video and interviewed players, coaches and other personnel.
      ESPN reports the NFL informed the Titans last week that their review had concluded and the organization would face a potential fine. Individuals would not be disciplined and there was no discussion of forfeiture of draft picks.

      12.35pm EDT12:35

      Archie Bland

      One of the more surprising headlines of the day comes from the Wall Street Journal in: Health Agency Halts Coronavirus Ad Campaign, Leaving Santa Claus in the Cold.
      The WSJ reports that the Trump administration offered Santa Claus performers a deal: if they agreed to promote a Covid-19 vaccine, they would get early access to it. The story says that performers playing Mrs Claus or elves would also have been included. But the plan has now been called off.
      The article continues:

      Ric Erwin, chairman of the Fraternal Order of Real Bearded Santas, called the news “extremely disappointing”, adding: “this was our greatest hope for Christmas 2020, and now it looks like it won’t happen.”

      You can read more of this belter at the Wall Street Journal (although it’s behind a paywall).

      12.08pm EDT12:08

      The US Senate has started day two of a rare weekend session to continue debate over the confirmation of federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett to the supreme court.
      Democrats have expressed outrage at the vacancy being filled so close to the election – in fact boycotting Thursday’s vote to advance her nomination to the full Senate – but the Republicans’ 53-37 majority in the upper chamber ensures they have the votes they need to approve her nomination and cement a 6-3 conservative majority on the high court for years to come.
      No supreme court nominee has ever been installed so close to a presidential election and, just four years ago, the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, and senator Lindsey Graham, who now chairs the judiciary committee, said that installing a nominee in an election year would be a shameful defiance of the will of voters.
      Barrett, 48, is expected to be confirmed Monday and quickly join the court.

      12.04pm EDT12:04

      More from Richard Luscombe…
      Joe Biden’s deputy campaign manager, Kate Bedingfield, was grilled on NBC’s Meet the Press about the Democrat nominee’s “light physical footprint”.
      To the backdrop of a graphic comparing Biden’s appearances since September in four key battleground states – North Carolina, Arizona, Florida and Pennsylvania – to Trump’s (the president leads 19-14), host Chuck Todd wanted to know why Biden was concentrating heavily on Georgia instead of more northerly swing states.
      The answer: Biden is “focused on maintaining as many paths to 270 electoral votes as we possibly can.” Bedingfield also pointed out that at a scheduled appearance in Warm Springs, Georgia, on Tuesday, Biden would deliver his closing arguments at a place “which obviously has historical significance in this country”.
      Warm Springs is the resort town where the 32nd president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, built his Little White House, a cottage he used while suffering from polio in the 1930s.
      “Vice-President Biden has visited all of these battleground states multiple times,” Bedingfield said. “He was in Pennsylvania yesterday, doing two events, along with Dr [Jill] Biden. So no, we have been very aggressively campaigning.
      “Here’s the difference between what we’re doing and what Donald Trump is doing, we’re doing it safely.”
      Bedingfield noted that the president’s rallies feature large, mostly maskless crowds with no social distancing.
      A new CBS poll, meanwhile, showed Biden tied with Trump in Georgia and holding narrow leads in other southern battlegrounds, including Florida and North Carolina.
      Todd also pressed Bedingfield on Biden’s comments at last week’s final debate about the oil industry. Why, he wondered, would oil workers in Texas or elsewhere support a candidate who supports a transition away from the industry at a risk to their jobs?
      “There is only one person in this country who Joe Biden thinks should lose his job and it’s Donald Trump,” she said.
      “Joe Biden … is not going to end the fossil fuel industry, he’s going to end subsidies for the oil industry. He believes your taxpayer dollars should go to education. Donald Trump believes they should go to Exxon. That’s a conversation we’re willing to have any day.”

      11.26am EDT11:26

      A CBS News/YouGov poll of three southern battleground states finds Joe Biden in a dead heat with Donald Trump in Georgia with slight edges in Florida (by two points) and North Carolina (by four).
      Some other key findings from CBS News:

      • Early voters in each told us they favored Joe Biden, but those who have not yet voted favor Donald Trump, setting up a key turnout test running now through Election Day for both parties.
      • Very different views on the coronavirus outbreak still shape the race in all these states. In all, most Biden voters are very concerned about getting it, and Trump’s voters, by comparison, are far less concerned. Biden also gets better marks overall on how he would handle the outbreak.
      • Biden voters are more likely to say the outbreak and a candidate’s personal character are major factors in their vote. For Trump voters, the economy and immigration are the biggest factors.
      • In splits among key demographic groups, Biden currently leads among White women with college degrees in Florida and North Carolina; and across all three states it’s shifts from 2016 that are helping Biden. In Georgia, White voters without college degrees – both men and women – tend to like how Trump handles himself personally and dislike Biden’s approach. Biden is cutting into Trump’s 2016 margins with seniors in Florida and Georgia, cutting Trump’s 2016 advantage in half. In North Carolina Biden has a two-point edge with seniors.

      Last week Trump was forced to play defense when he staged a prime-time rally in Georgia, which no Republican presidential candidate has lost since George HW Bush in 1992 – a far cry from his original designs on expanding the map into Democratic-leaning states. More