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      Could this anti-Trump Republican group take down the president?

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      Amid all the noise of an election involving Donald Trump – all the inflammatory tweets and shadowy Facebook posts – one set of ads has somehow managed to break through.There’s the one of the US president shuffling down a ramp that declares that the president “is not well”. There’s the whispering one about Trump’s “loyalty problem” inside his White House, campaign and family.There’s the epic Mourning in America that remakes Reagan’s election-defining 1984 ad, turning the sun-bathed suburbs into a dark national portrait of pandemic and recession. On Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, those three ads alone have racked up more than 35m views.The Lincoln Project, run by a group of renegade Republican political consultants, has crystallized one of the core narratives of the 2020 campaign in ways that few other political commercials have in past cycles.Its work on brutal attack ads sits alongside the swift boat veterans against John Kerry in 2004, the Willie Horton ad against Michael Dukakis in 1988, and the daisy ad against Barry Goldwater in 1964.Their reward? Disdain from independent media, distrust across the political spectrum and a recent series of harshly negative coverage from pro-Trump media outlets.Disdain appears to be the consensus view from the pundits. Atlantic magazine called their ads “personally abusive, overwrought, pointlessly salacious, and trip-wired with non sequiturs”. The New Republic examined what it called “the viral impotency” of the Lincoln Project, suggesting they couldn’t “persuade voters of anything”. Even the Washington Post declared most of their ads were “aimed not at persuading disaffected Republicans but simply at needling the president”.But that’s not how the project’s leaders see their work or purpose. In their launch manifesto, published as a column in the New York Times, the founders said their goal was “defeating President Trump and Trumpism at the ballot box”, including his Republican supporters in Congress.To that end, they said their efforts were about “persuading enough disaffected conservatives, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents in swing states and districts” to defeat Trump and elect congressional majorities opposed to Trumpism.In practice, that means organizing anti-Trump Republicans in eight swing states – including Florida, Ohio, Arizona and North Carolina – to hold virtual town halls and write postcards to Republican neighbors and friends. It also means organizing surrogates to speak to those voters in their home states and towns.“These are Republicans they are familiar with – former representatives and mayors,” said Sarah Lenti, executive director of the Lincoln Project. “People like Rick Snyder in Michigan who will come out and say, ‘We’re supporting the Lincoln Project and supporting Joe Biden this cycle.’ It gives people the cover to say, ‘Our leadership is doing this, so it’s OK for us too.’”Alongside the top-tier surrogates and ads, there is a grassroots effort to organize women, veterans and evangelicals to reach out to persuade Republicans to abandon the president who dominates their party.“There are certain voters we’re not going to move – the one-issue voters on the right to life – and that’s OK,” says Lenti.“We’re looking at 3-5% of Republicans in certain states. They tend to be more educated than not. Over 40 years old, and the demographic split is about 50/50, maybe a little towards men. We’re also seeing traction with some evangelicals, and those are typically older and less educated.”That sliver of disaffected Republicans is the target for ads like Mourning in America: people who are old enough to remember the original from three decades ago are also old enough to be at the highest risk of the coronavirus. “Under the leadership of Donald Trump,” the narrator says, “our country is weaker, and sicker, and poorer.”That was the first ad that triggered Trump enough to tweet-storm about the group two months ago: a presidential outburst that transformed the Lincoln Project’s profile and resources.“A group of RINO Republicans who failed badly 12 years ago, then again 8 years ago, and then got BADLY beaten by me, a political first timer, 4 years ago, have copied (no imagination) the concept of an ad from Ronald Reagan, “Morning in America”, doing everything possible to get even for all of their many failures,” Trump tweeted.If Trump was truly tormented by the Reagan reference, the irony is striking. Trump himself stole, without attribution, Reagan’s 1980 slogan: Make America Great Again.For the most part Trump’s tweets focused on the individual founders of the project that troubles him so deeply. Given their track record in GOP politics, his dismissal of them as Rinos – Republicans In Name Only – means there are very few Republicans who can pass the Trump test.The Lincoln Project founders include John Weaver, who was a political strategist for George HW Bush in 1988 and 1992, as well as John McCain’s strategist for a decade; Reed Galen, who worked on both Bush campaigns in 2000 and 2004; Steve Schmidt, who ran the McCain campaign in 2008 and worked in the Bush White House and campaigns before that; and George Conway, a conservative lawyer whose wife Kellyanne just happens to work as Trump’s counselor in the West Wing.The pushback did not stop there. The conservative Club for Growth took the extraordinary step of creating and airing its own ad attacking the Lincoln Project. It depicted the group as a bunch of failed strategists trying to make a quick buck by hating not just Trump but the American people.This month they have been joined by two hit stories in the Murdoch-owned New York Post, accusing the founders of “ties to Russia and tax troubles” as well as secretly wanting to work for Trump. These may be confusing lines of attack for Trump supporters who have grown numb to ties to Russia, tax troubles and think highly of those who want to work for Trump.For Democratic ad-makers, the work of the Lincoln Project has earned their respect, even if questions remain about its impact. “The ads have struck a chord with progressives and activists who see the Project as validating everything we’ve been saying about Trump, but now being voiced by the people we usually campaign against,” said Jim Margolis, a veteran Democratic strategist and ad-maker for the Obama and Clinton campaigns. “The question is whether independent voters, moderate Republicans and white suburban voters will respond as well.“If the objective is modest – moving a point or two in the right states with the right people – I think they can help win the election. Remember: Hillary Clinton lost the presidency in 2016 by less than one point in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. So even small gains can mean the difference between a Trump second term and a new day in America.”But for some of the ads it is clear they are engaged in a battle for the attention of a singular target.“Some of these ads have an audience of one,” says Lenti. “That’s always been part of the strategy. Because every time he gets off message, spewing grievances, he’s not campaigning. The idea is to get him off message again and again and again. It bothers him. We hear from people inside the White House that he wants them to make us go away. But we’re not going away.”Trump’s concern about the Lincoln Project has only helped to fill its coffers. After seeing Mourning In America, Trump stepped off Marine One and talked to reporters before boarding Air Force One.“They should not call it the Lincoln Project,” he complained, after taking more potshots at its founders. “It’s not fair to Abraham Lincoln, a great president. They should call it the Losers Project.”Instead of turning them into losers, Trump helped raise $2m for his sworn enemies. The group raked in more than $20m by the end of June, far ahead of its target of raising $30m by the end of the election cycle. Most of those funds came after Trump’s attacks in May, with small donors making up the bulk of its supporters: the average donation is around $50.Now the group has enough funds to go after Trump’s supporters in tight Senate races. This week it placed its biggest ad buy – $4m in Alaska, Maine and Montana – as the expanded battlefield underscores its bigger goal.“I don’t think this wing of the party is going away,” says Lenti. “Our job isn’t to reform the Republican party. Our job is to end Trump and Trumpism.” More

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      The US election is entering its final stretch – here are the key areas to watch

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      Election day in the US is officially 3 November, but amid the coronavirus pandemic, Americans are being encouraged to take advantage of early voting initiatives that open as soon as September to decrease the risks to themselves and others.From voter suppression to polling and debates, here are some of the key areas and figures the Guardian’s politics team will be watching as the race enters its final stretch.Donald TrumpThe Trump campaign has less than 100 days to change the dominant narratives of the year: that the president failed the leadership test during the coronavirus pandemic and missed the profound shift in public mood following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May.With his attempts to distract having largely failed, Trump has finally worn a face mask and promised a coronavirus “strategy” but provided few details so far. He may be pinning his hopes on an “October surprise”, such as the discovery of a vaccine, and a better than expected economic recovery, which has experienced the sharpest contraction since the second world war according to data released this week.He has shown even less willingness to engage with the cause of Black Lives Matter, inverting it to a racist campaign theme, stoking fear of violence in cities and portraying it as an existential threat to suburbs. “Law and order” may resonate with parts of his base but, polls suggest, it may be too little too late to rescue Trump from a one-term presidency. David SmithJoe BidenLess than 100 days out, the Biden campaign is currently well positioned to defeat Trump in November. The former vice-president leads Trump by double digits in a slate of new national polls, as the president’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic weighs on his approval rating.Biden has narrower but consistent margins in several battleground states as his campaign eyes an expansion in traditionally Republican states such as Arizona and Georgia, which could pave the way for Democrats to take back the Senate. And with the party largely united behind him, Biden has started to lay out an ambitious recovery plan as Trump’s edge on the economy slips.But there are risks, too. Though Biden is less unpopular than Hillary Clinton was in 2016, Democrats worry about his favorability ratings, which have slipped amid an advertising assault by the Trump campaign.Biden’s supporters are far less enthusiastic about his candidacy than Trump’s supporters are about his re-election. And polling suggests Biden has more work to do to mobilize young and minority voters, who were a key part of the coalition that twice elected Barack Obama. Lauren GambinoBiden’s pick for vice-presidentA presidential candidate’s running mate is usually one of the bigger lodestars in any campaign cycle. But Biden’s pick is particularly momentous, and he has said it will be announced in the first week of August. He has vowed to choose a woman, and if he wins, would usher into the White House the first female vice-president in American history.He has also said four of the candidate he is considering are African American. There has never been an African American female nominee on either the Republican or Democratic presidential tickets. More

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      The Guardian view on delaying elections: it’s what autocrats do | Editorial

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      Donald Trump’s suggestion that the 2020 US election could be crooked is a challenge to democracy itself Postponing elections is what autocracies do. On Friday, Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, announced a delay to September’s planned legislative council (LegCo) elections. Ms Lam cited the coronavirus public health emergency as her justification. Yet the real reason is Hong Kong’s political emergency. Hong Kong’s elections have been postponed because even with its very limited democracy, Ms Lam and the Chinese government are afraid the voters will choose a LegCo with greater sympathy for the protests.In spite of their very different systems, Donald Trump’s reasons for proposing the postponement of November’s US presidential election are essentially the same. Mr Trump also cites the pandemic. But his real motives are also political. He thinks he is losing the campaign. He thinks Joe Biden will be elected in November. He wants to stop him if he can, by fair means or foul. And he wants to discredit his own defeat. Continue reading… More

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      Will Trump actually pull federal agents from Portland? – video explainer

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      4:54

      Federal agents accused of behaving like an ‘occupying army’ are said to be pulling out of Portland, Oregon, in an embarrassing climbdown by the White House, but many protesters are sceptical over whether the agents will actually withdraw from the city.
      The force, which have been dubbed by some as ‘Donald Trump’s troops’, were sent in by the president a month ago to end what he called ‘anarchy’ during Black Lives Matter protests sparked after the police killing of George Floyd.
      The Guardian’s Chris McGreal looks at what Trump was hoping to gain by sending paramilitaries into the city, if and how they will leave, and how their presence has fuelled anger among most residents
      Federal agents show stronger force at Portland protests despite order to withdraw

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      Portland

      Protest

      Donald Trump

      Race

      Black Lives Matter movement

      US elections 2020

      Trump administration More

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      Coronavirus US: Fauci appears at house hearing on virus 'raging out of control' – live

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      Hearing chairman: Trump has no strategy to protect people
      Fauci: multiple candidate vaccines rapidly under development in US
      Plan to slash $600 lifeline threatens misery for millions
      Join us for a live digital event with Eric Holder to discuss voter suppression in the 2020 election, next Thursday at 5pm ET. Register now
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      Fauci testifies before congressional panel on ‘national plan’ for coronavirus – watch live

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      11.04am EDT11:04
      Crunch day for federal $600 weekly supplements for the unemployed in the coronavirus crisis

      10.33am EDT10:33
      Coronavirus vaccine: ‘Any American that needs it will get it,’ Fauci says

      9.45am EDT09:45
      Multiple candidate vaccines rapidly under development in US – Fauci

      9.30am EDT09:30
      Clyburn: coronavirus is ‘raging out of control’

      9.22am EDT09:22
      Clyburn: ‘Our nation is in the midst of a public health catastrophe’

      9.17am EDT09:17
      Coronavirus hearing on Capitol Hill gets underway

      8.59am EDT08:59
      Key coronavirus hearing on Capitol Hill

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      11.04am EDT11:04

      Crunch day for federal $600 weekly supplements for the unemployed in the coronavirus crisis

      A White House press briefing is now belatedly underway. Donald Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows is saying, in summary, no agreement yet in Washington about extending the $600 a week federal enhanced unemployment payments that are helping to keep at least 30 million Americans afloat right now.
      The payments technically expire today. Talks late last night between leading Republicans and Democrats did not result in a deal. It’s crunch day.
      My New York colleague Amanda Holpuch writes today:
      For millions of unemployed Americans dealing with the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression a $600 payment each week from the government has been a vital lifeline, allowing them to keep their homes and put food on the table despite losing their jobs.
      But now many of those hit hard by the economic disaster caused by the coronavirus pandemic are bracing for a steep drop in income this week as Republican party infighting delays a replacement for an expansion to weekly unemployment benefits, meaning many could have that vital lifeline cut or taken away.

      Updated
      at 11.05am EDT

      10.59am EDT10:59

      Anthony Fauci sets out his “five basics” for curbing the spread of coronavirus.
      Masks (yes), Crowds (no), Distancing (yes), bars (cheers, but nope), washing hands (yes).
      He said that congregating in any crowds can increase the risk of catching Covid-19.
      New York Democrat Nydia Velázquez pointed out that “it does not matter what you say if it’s undermined by the President of the United States.” More

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      Trump badly miscalculated in Portland – and even he knows it | Cas Mudde

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      Trump overestimated how much voters fear ‘antifa’ – and underestimated how terrible his ham-fisted authoritarianism would lookOpponents of Donald Trump often describe him as a “political genius” who has a cunning understanding of the anxieties and fears of American society, and is able to create and use crises to his favor. The current standoff in Portland shows, yet again, that this is not the case. While his alleged fight against antifa will satisfy some of his far-right supporters, it increasingly risks further alienating the so-called “moderate” Republicans – which seems mostly used to describe better-off pocketbook Republican voters – who are already feeling uneasy over his Covid-19 handling and the economic fallout of the pandemic.An almost ignored aspect of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic is that Trump failed to use it to push through his authoritarian agenda by increasing executive powers, weakening the powers of other institutions, like Congress, and marginalizing dissent, for instance by banning demonstrations. Almost all other countries implemented a more repressive approach to Covid-19, including those governed by progressive parties (like Spain), while most far-right governments used it to push through draconian repressive measures (such as Hungary and India). Continue reading… More

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      Why Trump cannot delay the election – plus the truth about mail-in voting

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      Donald Trump suggested on Thursday that the November election should be delayed. Can he do that?No. The president cannot act on his own to move the date of the election. The constitution gives state legislatures and Congress the ability to set the dates of elections. It does not give the president any power to do so.Article 2 of the US constitution, which outlines the powers of the executive branch, specifically gives Congress the power to set the “time” when states choose their presidential electors. In 1845, Congress set the day for choosing presidential electors as Tuesday following the first Monday in November in a presidential election year. Congress could move the date of the election by changing the law, but the president could not unilaterally do so.There will be no delay in the #2020Election. Congress sets the election date, and it should not be changed. It will be held on November 3rd, as planned and required by law.— US Rep Rodney Davis (@RodneyDavis) July 30, 2020
      The 20th amendment also says that the four-year term of the president and vice-president ends on 20 January. It also calls for the terms of members of Congress to begin on 3 January.“If there is no new president-elect (or V-P-elect), then the Twentieth Amendment calls for an Acting President on noon on January 20, with Congress having written a statute that would put the Speaker next in line,” Ned Foley, a professor at the Ohio State University, wrote in an email. The speaker is currently Nancy Pelosi.If Trump can’t move the election, why is he tweeting about it?For months, Trump has been laying the groundwork to contest the legitimacy of the 2020 election. He has falsely claimed that mail-in ballots, expected in record numbers this year because of Covid-19, will lead to votes being stolen and the election being “rigged”.There’s no evidence to support Trump’s claims. But it’s likely the president is creating a narrative that there could be something fishy about the election in November to argue the election isn’t legitimate if he loses. There is deep concern about how Trump will deploy this rhetoric in November, especially because there’s likely to be a long wait to get election results. Many experts are worried Trump could use the delay to claim victory before ballots are being counted.Trump’s tweets have also long been considered a distraction tactic from other national news cycles – most recently, the economic downturn.Does Trump have a point that vote by mail will lead to fraud?Trump and other Republicans argue that voting by mail is dangerous because, unlike in-person, a person other than the voter takes custody of the ballot. But several studies have shown that mail-in voting does not lead to more fraud. A Washington Post analysis of 14.6m votes cast in three states that automatically mail a ballot to all voters found just 372 cases of double voting or voting on behalf of a dead person. A different study of voter fraud cases maintained by the conservative Heritage Foundation found just 143 cases of criminal convictions involving absentee ballots over the last 20 years. That amounts to 0.00006% of total votes cast during that period.States have a number of measures in place to prevent fraud. Many states allow voters to track their mail-in ballots, giving them confidence that it was received in the mail. Many states compare the signature on the ballot to the one on file with election officials, a practice, if done carefully, that can prevent fraud. Some states restrict who can collect a mail-in ballot or even require ballots to be signed by a witness or notary (Democrats and voting rights groups are challenging these kinds of restrictions in many states, saying they are needlessly restrictive during Covid-19).Trump and conservative groups argue that even a small number of fraudulent votes can tip an election and have pointed to a recent case of suspected fraud involving mail-in ballots in Paterson, New Jersey, to support that idea. But local officials there told the Washington Post that they don’t believe the problem there is symptomatic of widespread fraud and that it was uncovered by election officials.Will mail-in voting hurt Trump and other Republicans?There’s no evidence that mail-in voting will hurt Trump. A study from Stanford researchers earlier this year showed that mail-in voting on the whole does not benefit Democrats or Republicans. In some states, such as Florida, Republicans have long relied on mail-in voting as a reliable way to get out the vote among supporters.There is some concern that Trump’s rhetoric around mail-in voting could actually put Republicans at a disadvantage this fall. Even as Trump has railed against mail-in voting Republicans have urged their supporters to request mail-in ballots. In Florida and North Carolina, local Republican parties have sent mailers to their supporters with images of selectively edited Trump tweets urging them to request mail-in ballots, according to the Associated Press.Trump keeps highlighting problems with vote by mail, like ballots getting delayed in the mail and rejected for various issues. Is he right?There are legitimate worries about the capacity of states and the United States Postal Service (USPS) to manage elections this fall. Many states are not used to seeing a large volume of mail-in votes and local election officials have been overwhelmed by the flood of absentee ballot requests and the ballots themselves. There is also concern that USPS, which is reportedly considering slowing down mail delivery because of a budget shortfall, will be unable to deliver ballots in a timely manner.States also can reject absentee ballots for a number of reasons – they might arrive late, the signature on the ballot might not match the one on file, or they might not be properly sealed. There’s concern that as more people vote by mail this year, more people are going to have their ballots rejected.These are all valid concerns – but neither Trump nor Republicans in Congress have done much to fix them. States need an estimated $4bn to adequately prepare for vote by mail, but Congress has allocated just $400m so far. The most recent Republican Covid-19 relief proposal in the Senate contained no additional funding to states to help them run elections. Advocates also say USPS desperately needs an injection of federal funding, but that also has stalled in Congress.States can reduce the number of ballot rejections by requiring election officials to notify voters before they reject their ballot, a requirement in place in fewer than 20 states. Many states also require election officials to reject ballots that arrive after election day, regardless of when they were placed in the mail. Democrats have filed a slew of lawsuits across the country seeking to require states to count ballots as long as they are postmarked by election day and arrive in the days after. The Trump campaign has not supported those efforts. More

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      in Elections

      Trump calls for delay to election, falsely claiming mail-in voting will lead to fraud – live

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      Trump calls election ‘inaccurate’ amid news of GDP plummet
      Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19
      Economy suffers worst quarter since second world war as GDP shrinks by 32.9%
      US passes 150,000 deaths
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      Mourners arrive for John Lewis memorial service – watch live

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      11.16am EDT11:16
      Funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis begins in Atlanta

      10.39am EDT10:39
      Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19

      9.01am EDT09:01
      Nasa successfully launches Perseverance mission to Mars

      8.56am EDT08:56
      Trump appears to call for delay to November election over his mail-in voting fears

      8.41am EDT08:41
      Mike Pompeo appears before the Senate foreign relations committee

      8.34am EDT08:34
      Grim GDP and jobless figures reveal extent of Covid-19 damage to economy

      8.18am EDT08:18
      Biden posts video with Obama criticising administration over approach to schools during Covid-19 crisis

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      11.16am EDT11:16

      Funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis begins in Atlanta

      The funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis has just begun at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia.
      The church’s senior pastor, reverend Raphael Warnock, is leading the service, which has dozens of attendees who are keeping social distance and wearing masks.
      “Here lies a true American patriot,” Warnock said.
      This morning, the New York Times published a powerful essay Lewis submitted two days before he died from pancreatic cancer at age 80.
      The Guardian’s Ed Pilkington writes:

      The essay rehearses several of the key moments that for Lewis shaped his life in non-violent protest and what he called “good trouble”. He said he was inspired into the movement against America’s brutal history of race discrimination by the lynching in Mississippi of Emmett Till, aged 15, in 1955 – when Lewis was himself just 14.
      “Emmett Till was my George Floyd. He was my Rayshard Brooks, Sandra Bland and Breonna Taylor,” he writes.
      He recalls how in his childhood in Alabama, the white supremacist threat was a fact of everyday life. “Unchecked, unrestrained violence and government-sanctioned terror had the power to turn a simple stroll to the store for some Skittles or an innocent morning jog down a lonesome country road into a nightmare.

      Updated
      at 11.22am EDT

      11.00am EDT11:00

      Julian Borger

      The Guardian’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger, is watching secretary of state Mike Pompeo testify before the Republican-led Senate Foreign Relations committee.
      Mike Pompeo has been questioned on the decision announced yesterday to pull nearly 12,000 US troops out of Germany, bringing 6,400 of them back to the US, and how that squared with Pompeo’s claims to be leading a tough policy towards Russia. He confirmed the state department was “very involved at the strategic level” but argued that bringing the troops home did not mean they were “off the field”
      “These units will participate in rotational activity. They’ll be forward deployed. They won’t be stationed or garrisoned. But make no mistake about it they will be fully available to ensure that we can properly prosecute the challenges we have from the global powers.”Senator Jeanne Shaheen asked him whether the impact on relations with Germany had been taken into account, to which Pompeo replied: “This is personal for me I fought on the border of East Germany when I was a young soldier I was stationed there.”
      Pompeo was stationed in West Germany as an army lieutenant in the late eighties. There was no fighting there.
      Mitt Romney, who continues to be the only Republican senator to seriously challenge the administration, picked up the issue in his own remarks, saying: “I have heard from the highest levels of the German government that this is seen by them as an insult to Germany, and I can’t imagine, at a time when we need to be drawing in our friends and allies so that we can collectively confront China, we want to insult them.”
      Pompeo was also questioned about Donald Trump’s suggestion that the election might be delayed.
      Senator Tom Udall asked the secretary of state: “Will you respect the results of the certified election as the State Department typically does throughout the world?”
      Pompeo replied: “Senator I’m not going to speculate. You had about 15 ‘ifs’ in there.. I’ve said repeatedly to this committee I will follow the rule of law, follow the Constitution. I’ve endeavored to do that in everything I’ve done and I’ll continue to do that every day.”

      10.39am EDT10:39

      Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19

      Former presidential candidate Herman Cain, 74, has died from Covid-19 after contracting the illness nearly one month ago.
      His official Twitter account, which had been providing updates on Cain’s hospitalization due to Covid-19, posted an announcement of his death on Thursday morning.

      Herman Cain
      (@THEHermanCain)
      You’re never ready for the kind of news we are grappling with this morning. But we have no choice but to seek and find God’s strength and comfort to deal… #HermanCain https://t.co/BtOgoLVqKz

      July 30, 2020

      Cain, the co-chair of Black Voices for Trump, had attended Donald Trump’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma in June, where he did not wear a mask.
      “We’re heartbroken, and the world is poorer,” said a post on Cain’s website, which provided insight into his Covid-19 infection.
      “There were hopeful indicators, including a mere five days ago when doctors told us they thought he would eventually recover, although it wouldn’t be quick,” the post said. “We were relieved to be told that, and passed on the news via Herman’s social media. And yet we also felt real concern about the fact that he never quite seemed to get to the point where the doctors could advance him to the recovery phase.”

      Updated
      at 10.49am EDT

      10.10am EDT10:10

      Dominic Rushe

      More on the staggering drop in GDP figures from the Guardian US’s business editor, Dominic Rushe:
      The fall came as large parts of the US economy shutdown in March in an attempt to halt the spread of the coronavirus across the US. The closures led to a historic number of layoffs and sent unemployment soaring to levels unseen since the 1930s Great Depression.
      Lexie Testa, 26, from Lansing, Michigan lost her hotel job at the end of May and waited two months to receive her first unemployment payment. While her husband has retained his job, she said it had been a struggle since her layoff and that she was wary about finding new work as the virus continues to spread.
      Testa said it was too early to cut benefits given how hard it remains to find work and the fact that the virus is still spreading. “I know a lot of people who aren’t really comfortable returning to work with children in their home and actually I have a few friends that cannot because they have no child care,” she said.
      “I am lucky enough that I have a grandmother who usually babysits for me but I just am not really comfortable yet as I have always worked in the food service industry and I see places in my city of Lansing shut down and reopen due to Covid cases often.”

      9.47am EDT09:47

      The Guardian’s voting rights report, Sam Levine, notes that the president can’t unilaterally change the election date.

      Sam Levine
      (@srl)
      The president cannot unilaterally move the election. The date of the election is set by Congress. The constitution says the President and Vice President’s term ends on January 20 https://t.co/LMVTeCOgRs https://t.co/LOz4qLjDBH

      July 30, 2020

      This is why people are speculating one of the reasons Trump asked whether the election should be delayed this morning is to distract from the very bad economic news this morning.
      Government figures revealed Thursday morning that the US economy shrank by an annualized rate of 32.9% between April and June, its sharpest contraction since the second world war.

      9.35am EDT09:35

      Julian Borger

      Secretary of state Mike Pompeo is appearing before the Senate foreign relations committee for the first time in more than a year, in what is already a particularly contentious hearing.
      The ranking Democrat, Bob Menendez said the Trump administration had “at worst simply abetted Putin’s efforts” to undermine the US, and said the state department was “at risk of catastrophic failure.”
      Menendez started his questioning on Trump’s admission on Wednesday that he had not confronted Vladimir Putin with intelligence reports that Russia was paying bounties to Taliban fighters for killing US soldiers in Afghanistan and asked Pompeo whether he had raised the issue with his counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.
      Pompeo’s reply avoided confirming the reports, which Trump called “fake news”, but claimed that if it was true, he raised it.
      “Anytime there was a tactical threat on the lives for the health of the safety and security or our assets in place, we have raised this with our Russian counterparts not only at my level but Ambassador Sullivan [US ambassador to Moscow], and every one of our team that interacts with the Russians we’ve made very clear our expectations.”

      9.18am EDT09:18

      One thing undermining Donald Trump’s ongoing quest against mail-in voting is that he and his officials have used it in the past.
      Mother Jones reporter Ari Berman notes that at least 16 Trump officials have either voted by mail or requested absentee ballots, including the president himself. Others include attorney general William Barr, adviser and president’s daughter Ivanka Trump and White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany.
      McEnany has voted by mail in every Florida election she has participated in since 2010, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
      When asked about this in late May, McEnany said: “Absentee voting has the word absent in it for a reason. It means you’re absent from the jurisdiction or unable to vote in person. President Trump is against the Democrat plan to politicize the coronavirus and expand mass mail-in voting without a reason, which has a high propensity for voter fraud. This is a simple distinction that the media fails to grasp.”

      Ari Berman
      (@AriBerman)
      16 top Trump officials have voted by mail or requested absentee ballots:TrumpPence Barr McEnanyConway IvankaMelaniaAzarRossDeVosMcDanielKushner GlassnerStepienAyersParscaleGOP only opposes mail voting when Dems use itpic.twitter.com/rBOKnJUoNe

      July 30, 2020

      9.01am EDT09:01

      Nasa successfully launches Perseverance mission to Mars

      On a brighter note, and sticking to their timetable, Nasa appears to have successfully launched the Perseverance mission, the third and final Mars launch from Earth this summer. China and the United Arab Emirates got a head start last week, but all three missions should reach their destination in February.
      Nasa’s science mission chief, Thomas Zurbuchen, pronounced the launch the start of “humanity’s first round trip to another planet.”
      “Oh, I loved it, punching a hole in the sky, right? Getting off the cosmic shore of our Earth, wading out there in the cosmic ocean,” he said. “Every time, it gets me.” More