October 28, 2024, presidential campaign news

Former President Donald Trump participates in a Q&A at the National Faith Advisory Summit in Georgia on Monday.

Former President Donald Trump said at a faith event in Georgia on Monday he would have a faith office connected “directly into the Oval Office and me” if reelected and said, “We have to save religion in this country.”

Trump again falsely claimed “they are persecuting Catholics” in the US and again said, “How could a Catholic possibly vote for Kamala?” referencing his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.

At one point, religious leaders on stage prayed over Trump.

Veteran Democratic Pennsylvania Rep. Matt Cartwright launched a new campaign ad Monday touting his support for a southern border wall, illustrating how vulnerable Democrats are courting crossover voters as they fight for reelection in the most competitive races

Cartwright — who has represented Pennsylvania’s 8th district since 2013 and won reelection by just over 2 points in 2022 — has a history of bucking his party, and his latest ad is aimed at promoting his independence and appealing to conservatives.

Cartwright’s attention to conservative priorities has been a feature of his campaign – in addition to his new ad about immigration, Cartwright has spent tens of thousands of dollars airing ads touting his support for law enforcement. Both issues have been key points of attack from Republicans in congressional races.

And in recent years Cartwright has had a few notable breaks with his party, as the lone Democratic representative from Pennsylvania to attend Trump’s 2017 inauguration, a critic of Biden’s record on immigration, and a vocal supporter of Israel.

Second gentleman Doug Emhoff sharply criticized former President Donald Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden Sunday, during which speakers spewed racist and vulgar attacks.

“We heard the antisemitic and racist speeches at Trump’s Madison Square rally yesterday. It’s appalling to hear these slurs, especially in the closing days of a presidential campaign, and even more painful to hear them on the anniversary of the massacre at Tree of Life,” Emhoff said while speaking at the University Pittsburgh one day after the anniversary of the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre.

Emhoff also delivered a detailed rebuke of the former president, attacking his alleged comments about Hitler and arguing that Trump would turn against Jewish Americans “on a dime.”

“He demeans immigrants with the same hateful slurs hurled at our ancestors: ‘vermin, animals who poison the blood of our country.’ He scapegoats Jewish voters right to our faces, saying that if he loses, it will be the fault of Jews. He looks at Adolf Hitler’s generals and sees something to admire. Just let that sink in. You do not reward someone like that with a platform, or with power,” Emhoff said.

He added: “Donald Trump demands loyalty, but he is loyal to nothing or no one but himself. If it suited his selfish interests, Trump would turn his back on Israel and the Jewish people on a dime, he would do it.”

During the majority of his speech, Emhoff reflected on the dangers of antisemitism, the importance of tackling it head on, and how Harris has encouraged him to take up the cause of fighting against it.

Michigan election officials and Dominion Voting Systems issued guidance about an issue affecting a small number of voters with disabilities in the state.

In a news release Friday, the day before early in-person voting began in Michigan, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson’s office highlighted “an issue” with Dominion Voting Assistance Terminals (VAT) that might make the process less convenient. These types of machines are used by voters with disabilities who need special assistance marking their ballots.

The guidance explains that voters using these machines won’t be able to select a straight-party option at the beginning of the process, and then select individual candidates from another party for specific races. Instead, voters looking to split their ticket will need to select candidates for each race individually from the outset.

Importantly, the release emphasized that the issue will not change anyone’s votes, nor will it prevent people from voting or making their preferred selections. Rather, it will only “make the process more inconvenient for some voters” using the VATs, according to Benson’s office.

In a separate statement the same day, Dominion issued a “reminder” for Michigan election officials and voters using the device to “carefully follow instructions on how to successfully complete and verify their ballot selections prior to casting their vote.”

Benson said that election officials are working to ensure that voters are aware of the programming issue and are voting on every section of the ballot.

Vice President Kamala Harris visits the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades District Council 1M in Warren, Michigan, on Monday.

Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday visited a union training facility in battleground Michigan, hoping to galvanize union workers to vote for her just over a week until Election Day.

Harris stopped by the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades training facility, joined by guests, including Sen. Gary Peters and other state and local leaders.

Harris shook hands and spoke with several instructors and apprentices inside the facility. Following the tour, she walked into another rooms filled with union workers to applause.

Harris told the workers: “This is highly skilled work. You do it with a sense of pride. You do it with a sense of commitment. You are making our country stronger and better by the work that you do.”

She later added: “You know, my opponent, he doesn’t understand the importance of unions at all. He gives a lot of mouth - he gives a lot of talk about what he cares about, but on the issue specifically of what is good for unions and union labor, he’s been awful.”

According to AdImpact data, Democrats have outspent Republicans in Michigan by a total of more than $50 million, $184 million to $130 million, during the three months since Harris became the nominee, and including bookings through Election Day.

A breakdown of each side’s reservations within the state – which has seen the second most presidential advertising overall, behind only Pennsylvania – shows Democrats concentrating their resources on urban areas that represent strongholds of votes, and Republicans spreading their money across the state, aiming to reach their voters in more rural areas.

According to data from the ad tracking firm AdImpact, the Detroit media market dominates the state, accounting for about 54% of all the presidential ad spending in Michigan media markets since July 22.

Democrats have outspent Republicans in the Detroit market by about $6.2 million, where each side has spent more than $50 million, reflecting Harris and her allies’ overall advertising lead in the state. They’ve also led Republicans by about $2.4 million in the Lansing media market, abutting Detroit.

In a pair of media markets covering key counties in Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo, Democrats have also outspent Republicans, though by smaller margins, about $400,000 to $600,00. And Democrats have also outspent Republicans by about $854,000 in a market covering another key portion of the state, Traverse County.

Republicans have outspent Democrats significantly on satellite TV in Michigan by about $1.9 million, a pattern reflected across other battleground states, indicating a strategic preference among pro-Trump advertisers; Republicans have also invested an unmatched $120,000 in regional sports networks, and outspent Democrats in the Marquette market by about $280,000.

Michigan Democrat Rep. Debbie Dingell said no presidential candidate has won over her state – and the race remains contingent on voter turnout.

Dingell highlighted that Vice President Kamala Harris needs to gain more ground among certain demographics like union workers and African American male voters in the state.

However, Harris is doing better than Hillary Clinton was doing in the state in 2016, Dingell said. The Michigan lawmaker was one of the Democrats to sound the alarm about Clinton’s chances in 2016 in her state, which eventually voted for Trump.

Dingell acknowledged that the Middle East conflict is heavily influencing politics in Michigan.

“In many ways, the Mideast war has come to the ground on Michigan,” she said, noting that some voters may choose Trump, Harris, a third party candidate or sit out the election.

“They’re not monolithic, like no group is. But they’re hurting. We need to understand the Jewish community, the Arab American community, they’re all hurting,” she said. “But everybody’s votes matter right now.”

Donald Trump’s Sunday rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City featured numerous instances of speakers making racist or bigoted remarks. Perhaps none more notoriously so than comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s offensive comments about Puerto Rico.

What makes those remarks – which the former president’s campaign has sought to distance itself from – so noteworthy is they come at a time when Trump seems to be making inroads with Hispanic voters. In fact, he seems to be on his way to doing better with this group than any GOP presidential nominee since George W. Bush in 2004.

Consider an average of recent polling data on Hispanic voters: Kamala Harris is ahead of Trump by just 13 points. That’s well off an average of post-election and exit poll data from 2020, when Joe Biden carried Hispanic voters by 26 points.

What’s remarkable is that this 26-point deficit, itself, was an improvement for Trump from 2016. Trump lost Hispanic voters by 39 points to Hillary Clinton, according to an average of exit poll and post-election data.

The polling data and 2020 outcome represent a big reason why the Trump campaign has made a concerted effort to win over more Hispanic voters.

Read more of the analysis of Trump’s standing with Hispanic voters

Former President Donald Trump participates in a moderated conversation with Pastor Paula White at the National Faith Summit in Powder Springs, Georgia, on October 28.

Former President Donald Trump had a surprise interaction with Alice Johnson, whom he pardoned when in office, while speaking at a faith event in Georgia on Monday.

Florida televangelist Paula White, who was moderating a conversation with Trump on stage at the Inaugural National Faith Summit in Powder Springs, Georgia, mentioned that Johnson was in the audience.

“Is Alice Johnson here?” Trump said.

“She’s here. Alice where are you?” White said.

Johnson, who was sitting a few rows back from the stage, stood up in her seat and waved.

“Alice! I love Alice. Oh wow, hi. Is it going well?” Trump asked.

“It’s going great,” Johnson said.

“She’s a great woman. You know, she, should I tell just a second of your story?” Trump said.

Trump said, “She had already served — is it 22 or 23 years, Alice? Or something, right? 23, I mean think of it. She had like 28 years left and first I gave her a commute and then I gave her a full pardon.”

More context: In 2018, Trump granted Johnson, a first-time nonviolent drug offender, a commutation, a week after Kim Kardashian pleaded her case for Johnson’s release during an Oval Office meeting with Trump. Johnson had already served 21 years of a life sentence after she was convicted on charges of conspiracy to possess cocaine and attempted possession of cocaine. In 2020, Trump granted Johnson a full pardon.

A Democratic lawmaker has requested that police to patrol all ballot drop boxes in Clark County, Washington, following two fires damaging ballots in the Portland area.

“I am requesting an overnight law enforcement presence be posted at all ballot drop boxes in Clark County through Election Day. Southwest Washington cannot risk a single vote being lost to arson and political violence,” Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez said Monday.

Authorities said one of the fires happened at a drop box in Vancouver, Washington. Gluesenkamp Perez said hundreds of ballots were destroyed.

The other fire was at a drop box in Portland, Oregon, which is located about 10 miles from Vancouver. Nearly all the ballots were protected by fire suppressant inside the box, but three were damaged, Multnomah County Elections Director Tim Scott said earlier.

“There is absolutely zero place in our democracy for political violence or interference against our fellow citizens, election workers, or voting infrastructure,” Gluesenkamp Perez said.

She represents Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, where one of the most competitive House races in the country is taking place.

Some more background: Federal officials have joined the investigation with the help of state and local law enforcement agencies, said Steve Bernd, a spokesperson for the FBI’s Seattle office. Police have tied the two fires to a similar incident last month, according to reporting from The Associated Press.

Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance speaks at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden on October 27 in New York.

Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance said people have to “stop getting offended at every little thing,” when asked about the comment made by Tony Hinchcliffe, a comedian and podcast host, equating Puerto Rico to a “floating island of garbage.”

Vance said he recently rejected someone’s attempts to encourage him to use a joke from comedian George Lopez against Harris.

The remark in question: At the rally Sunday in New York City’s Madison Square Garden, where Vance also spoke, Hinchcliffe said, “There’s a lot going on, like, I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”

Republicans asked the US Supreme Court on Monday to step into a fight over provisional ballots in the presidential battleground state of Pennsylvania, bringing a second potentially significant voting case to the high court within days of the election.

The Republican National Committee urged the justices to block a state court ruling that allows people to vote provisionally when election officials identify problems with their mail ballots — specifically, when they fail to put them into a “secrecy” envelope before sending them off in the mail.

Those ballots, because they are missing the secrecy sleeve, are referred to as “naked ballots.”

The case arrived hours after Virginia asked the Supreme Court to allow the state to continue a program to remove suspected noncitizens from the voter rolls. Both cases are likely to be handled with remarkable speed — by Supreme Court standards — and could yield orders within days.

The RNC asked the Supreme Court to decide the Pennsylvania case by Friday.

Background on the case: The initial lawsuit was filed by two voters in Butler County, north of Pittsburgh, who initially submitted mail-in ballots. But they didn’t enclose their ballots in the secrecy sleeve before placing them in an outer mailing envelope. A machine scanner identified that problem and the voters received an automated message alerting them that their vote would not be counted.

The voters then showed up at their precincts during the state’s primary election and attempted to cast provisional ballots but learned those votes wouldn’t be counted, either. County election officials said that state law barred them from voting because they had already submitted a mail-in ballot, even though that first ballot was deemed defective.

This post was updated with background on the case in Pennsylvania.

Attendees wait in line ahead of former President Donald Trump's rally in Atlanta on Monday.

Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp will not be at former President Donald Trump’s rally in the state today, according to a person familiar with his plans.

Some context: Kemp said in June that he did not vote for Trump in the primary, but he has maintained that he’ll “support the ticket” in November. Kemp clashed with the former president after he refused to call a special legislative session to help Trump as he sought overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia.

Trump was so furious with Kemp, he pledged to end his political career and backed a primary challenger in the 2022 Republican gubernatorial primary. The move failed spectacularly and Kemp beat David Perdue by over 50 points.

CNN’s Rashard Rose contributed reporting to this post.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz continued the Harris campaign’s outreach to Republican voters on Monday at an event in Waukesha, Wisconsin, where he spoke alongside the city’s Republican mayor who has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president.

Speaking to dozens of supporters at a coffee shop in the Milwaukee suburbs, Walz thanked Mayor Shawn Reilly for his endorsement, part of a slate Republicans who have backed Harris on the grounds that former President Donald Trump poses a threat to democracy.

Walz acknowledged differences between himself and the Republicans who have endorsed Harris but praised Reilly and other Republicans for their commitment to Constitutional values.

The Democratic vice presidential nominee’s remarks, which focused heavily on the danger Trump represents to America’s values and institutions, comes after Future Forward PAC, the main super PAC supporting Harris, warned against making attacks on Trump’s anti-democratic remarks and behaviors a focal point of the campaign’s closing message.

Vice President Kamala Harris tours the Hemlock Semiconductor Next-Generation facility in Michigan on Monday.

Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday toured Corning’s Hemlock Semiconductor Next Gen Facility in Michigan as part of her pitch to invest in American manufacturing jobs.

Last week, Hemlock Semiconductor received a $325 million preliminary investment under the CHIPS and Science Act, a bipartisan bill passed in 2022 under the Biden administration.

During her visit, the vice president toured the assembly line and greeted workers. At the beginning of her tour, the vice president briefly reached over wanting to touch some bagged material that was presented in front of her, but was quickly warned to not do so by her tour host, who explained much of the material in front of her was very sharp.

The vice president responded with a laugh: “OK, I won’t touch that.”

She then spoke with three workers wearing hard hats who explained how polysilicon, which is used in the manufacturing of solar panels, is made from quartz, before speaking with other workers at the facility.

In brief remarks after her tour, Harris said the country must not “rest on tradition” and must continue to innovate.

Noting the election is eight days away, Harris sought to contrast her approach with former President Donald Trump’s, saying “My opponent spends full time talking about — just kind of diminishing who we are as America, and talking down at people. Talking about, that we’re the garbage can of the world. We’re not.”

Harris continues Monday with more campaign stops through Michigan.

The Nevada Supreme Court upheld the state’s post-election deadline for mail ballots that are lacking a postmark, rejecting a lawsuit brought by Republicans and the Trump campaign.

A similar case was filed by Republicans in federal court, but the US 9th Circuit Court of Appeals is not currently on track to resolve that case before the election.

The state court case specifically challenged Nevada’s acceptance of mail ballots that are missing postmarks up to three days after an election.

“Notably, the RNC presented no evidence or allegations that counting mail ballots without postmarks … would be subject to voter fraud, or that the election security measures currently in place are inadequate to address its concerns regarding these ballots,” the Nevada Supreme Court wrote.

While their arguments in Nevada were rejected, Republicans did convince a conservative appeals court that Mississippi’s policy – to count mail ballots five days after the election as long as those ballots are postmarked – violated federal law. In that case, the appeals court declined to block the policy for this election, and has sent the case down to a lower court for more proceedings.

Democratic New York Rep. Nydia Velázquez speaks during a press conference in New York on Monday.

Lawmakers and other leaders are speaking out against comments made about Puerto Rico and Latinos at former President Donald Trump’s rally in New York over the weekend.

The rally began with Tony Hinchcliffe, a comedian and podcast host, assailing Puerto Rico: “There’s a lot going on, like, I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now,” he said. “I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”

“These Latinos, they love making babies, too. Just know that they do,” Hinchcliffe continued in another joke.

Democratic New York Rep. Nydia Velázquez, the first Puerto Rican woman elected to the House, said at a news conference on Monday that the comments were “racist, vile and reprehensible.”

Democratic New York Rep. Dan Goldman, who represents a large community of Puerto Ricans in Manhattan, also put the blame directly on Trump, arguing that it was his rally where the comments were made. He said it is an example that “you know where they stand. You know where Donald Trump stands.”

Jorge Figueroa, the president of Puerto Rican Chamber of Commerce of Central Florida, said that comments like those at the rally about Puerto Ricans were “very disrespectful” and do “not have any place in politics.”

Marcos Vilar, the executive director of Alianza for Progress, an organization focused on supporting Puerto Rican and Latinx communities in Florida, said that this is nothing new for Trump and said the former president has been playing “this game of bullying” for years.

Elon Musk’s pro-Trump super PAC cast Vice President Kamala Harris as the “C-word America simply can’t afford,” in a provocative video that alludes to the vulgar and derogatory term used to refer to a woman even as the video’s narrator later reveals the “C-word” that is being referenced is “communist.”

The video, posted on X Friday by America PAC, begins with a warning that the video “contains multiple instances of the C-word.” America PAC appears to have since deleted the video. CNN has reached out to representatives for America PAC for comment.

According to its latest disclosures with the Federal Election Commission, America PAC has spent more than $120 million on the presidential race including more than $70 million on canvassing and field operations, and more than $10 million on digital advertising. The most recent disclosures from the group also show that Musk himself has given nearly $120 million to the super PAC.

The Harris campaign declined to comment on the video.

With time ticking down until Election Day, public impressions of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have not fully coalesced around any singular enduring news story or political issue, according to The Breakthrough, a CNN polling project that tracks what average Americans are actually hearing, reading and seeing about the presidential nominees.

The most persistent theme of the 2024 election may be mentions of words such as “lie” and “liar” in conjunction with Trump, who has made numerous false claims over the course of the presidential campaign, including onstage during his debate with Harris and in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, found the poll, conducted by SSRS and Verasight on behalf of a research team from CNN, Georgetown University and the University of Michigan and fielded from October 18-21.

Those references have ranked among the top two words mentioned about him for four consecutive weeks. The relative consistency around Trump is a departure from 2016, when the news recalled about him ricocheted among a series of different topics, while the single word “emails” dominated much of the conversation about Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton throughout the majority of the election season.

“Donald Trump lies about almost everything,” one respondent wrote in the latest survey.

Overall, the sentiment behind the words Americans used in describing what they’d heard around each candidate remained more negative than positive – although the sentiment used in describing the news surrounding both Kamala Harris and Trump remains considerably less negative than the tone used to describe the final weeks of Biden’s campaign.

Read the full findings of CNN’s polling project here.

Democrats are poised to outspend Republicans on advertising across all seven key swing states in the condensed general election matchup between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

But in the final full month of the race, GOP advertisers have cut into the deficit and are even leading Democrats in the premier battleground: Pennsylvania.

Across the seven top battlegrounds – Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, North Carolina and Nevada – between July 22 (the day after President Joe Biden withdrew) and including bookings through Election Day, Democrats are set to outspend Republicans on ads by about $928 million to about $748 million.

Democrats have established their largest advertising lead in Michigan, where Harris and her allies are poised to outspend Trump and his supporters by more than $50 million over the condensed general election campaign. Democrats also lead over that span by nearly $25 million in Pennsylvania and nearly $20 million in Wisconsin, the two other midwestern battlegrounds that together comprise the so-called “Blue Wall.”

Looking only at bookings for October, Democrats still lead advertising across most of the swing states – but Republicans are outspending Harris and her supporters in Pennsylvania, the top target for both sides, by about $9 million, a significant reversal from earlier in the campaign.

After being dramatically outspent by Democrats across all seven battlegrounds, Trump and his allies’ ability to cut into or in some cases exceed the other side’s ad spending represents a significant shift in the balance from earlier in the campaign.

In his latest targeted tax relief promise, former President Donald Trump said that he’d push for a tax credit for family caregivers.

With just days left in this year’s election season, the former president did not provide any details about the credit — including who would be eligible, how large it would be and whether the cost would be covered. His campaign did not immediately respond to a request for additional information.

Trump’s proposal, which targets an often financially stressed segment of Americans who are typically juggling careers, children and aging parents, comes a few weeks after Vice President Kamala Harris unveiled a measure to have Medicare cover home health care for the first time to provide relief for the so-called sandwich generation.

The caregiving tax credit is the latest in a series of targeted tax relief measures Trump has unveiled during the campaign. He has also promised to eliminate taxes on tips, Social Security benefits and overtime pay, as well as to make interest on car loans fully tax deductible.

You can read more about what Trump and Harris are proposing on the economy here.

This image released by the Portland Police Bureau shows a ballot box in Portland, Oregon on October 28.

Authorities said they have identified a “suspect vehicle” tied to a pair of fires in ballot drop boxes in the Portland, Oregon, area on Monday.

Police responded to a call about a fire in Portland about 3:30 a.m. (6:30 a.m. ET) Monday, the Portland Police Bureau said in a statement. An “incendiary device” was placed inside the box and security personnel extinguished the fire, officials said.

Nearly all the ballots were protected by fire suppressant inside the box in Portland, but three were damaged, Multnomah County Elections Director Tim Scott said in a statement.

A second ballot box was set on fire early Monday morning at a bus station in Vancouver, Washington, according to the Vancouver Police Department. The city is along the Columbia River, which marks the border between Oregon and Washington states, and is about 10 miles from Portland.

When officers arrived, they found a “suspicious device” next to the box, which was smoking and on fire, police said.

The Clark County Elections Office said hundreds of ballots were damaged at the box in the C-TRAN Park and Ride at Fisher’s Landing Transit Center, CNN affiliate KPTV reported.

Laura Shepard, a spokesperson for the city of Vancouver, said elections officials are asking anyone who may have placed a ballot in the box after 11 a.m. on Saturday to contact them to check on the status of their ballot.

Meanwhile, federal officials have joined the investigation with the help of state and local law enforcement agencies, said Steve Bernd, a spokesperson for the FBI’s Seattle office. Police have tied the two fires to a similar incident last month, according to reporting from The Associated Press.

Vancouver Police work to put out a fire at a ballot box in Vancouver, Washington, on Monday.

The boxes are located about 15 miles apart. The one in Vancouver is in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, where one of the most competitive races in the country is taking place.

Other fires affecting ballots have been recently reported across the country. Last week, a mailbox outside a Phoenix post office was set on fire, damaging an unknown number of ballots. A 35-year-old man was charged with arson in connection with the incident. The Phoenix Police Department said he told them it was not politically motivated.

This post has been updated with additional information from officials. CNN’s Derrick Hinds contributed reporting.

President Joe Biden on Monday called Elon Musk’s $1 million giveaways to registered voters in swing states “totally inappropriate,” but didn’t weigh in on whether or not they were illegal.

“Tell him I’m registered! A million dollars,” Biden joked when he heard the question from reporters in Delaware.

He became more serious when asked if he thought it was legal conduct or election interference and responded: “I think it’s totally inappropriate.”

The Justice Department warned Elon Musk’s America PAC in recent days that his $1 million sweepstakes to registered voters in swing states may violate federal law, people briefed on the matter told CNN last week.

Musk, who has thrown his support behind former President Donald Trump and is spending millions of dollars supporting his candidacy, has publicized the $1 million prize by his political action committee aiming to increase voter registrations in hotly contested states.

President Joe Biden speaks with reporters after casting his early-voting ballot for the 2024 general elections on October 28 in New Castle, Delaware.

President Joe Biden slammed former President Donald Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday, while emphasizing the importance of the election.

He said that in his discussions with presidential scholars, they’ve said the “single most consequential thing about a president is character.”

“Character,” Biden says, “and he puts that in question every time he opens his mouth.”

The comments came moments after Vice President Kamala Harris said Trump’s event was “intended to divide our country.”

More than 250,000 voters cast their ballot over the course of the first two statewide early voting days in Michigan, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson told reporters Monday, adding that the figure “far exceeded the expectations of state and local election officials.”

In addition to the early in-person voting, more than 1.5 million voters in Michigan as of Monday morning have now submitted absentee ballots, Benson said.

This is the first general election that Michigan voters have the option to vote at an in-person early voting site, after a law was passed in 2022 enabling the early voting, so there is no historical comparison for the early-voting figure.

The party lean of those who have voted early is also unknown because Michigan does not register voters by party.

The early voting process “ran smoothly,” Benson said, adding that she had seen reports of long lines but did not know of voters leaving the polls due to those long lines.

In Michigan, every county that qualifies will be tabulating and processing votes early, there is only one city where the clerk had decided not to do that: Warren. Benson also said that she has been in touch with the clerk in Warren about this decision.

President Joe Biden exits the voting booth after casting his early-voting ballot for the 2024 general elections on October 28, in New Castle, Delaware.

President Joe Biden cast his ballot Monday in New Castle, Delaware.

The president arrived to the polling station near his home with a full entourage of aides, members of the US Secret Service and the traveling press. But as he stood in line with other voters for nearly 40 minutes before walking inside the polling place to cast his ballot, he was just another citizen.

The president smiled for photos with fellow citizens and stood in line near someone wearing a red hat in apparent support for former President Donald Trump. A stray heckler shouted “Let’s Go Brandon!” while others in line cheered Biden’s presence.

Asked after he voted whether the moment was bittersweet for him — it was supposed to be Biden’s name on that ballot only a few months ago — the president responded it was “just sweet.”

He reiterated his belief that Vice President Kamala Harris would win the election.

This post has been updated with more reporting on Biden’s vote.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz drew a sharp contrast between Vice President Kamala Harris’ plan to invest in American manufacturing and former president Donald Trump’s record on China during remarks to union workers in Wisconsin on Monday.

Walz told employees at the Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry Co. in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, that Harris is committed to protecting workers’ benefits and investing in the creation of manufacturing jobs while arguing Trump only knows how to “manufacture bullshit” and has made an “endless string of broken promises” to working-class voters and union members.

He leaned into Trump’s past praise of Chinese president Xi Jinping to label Trump a “unpatriotic scab,” while taking shots at Trump’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and the fact that the Bibles he’s selling were manufactured in China.

In contrast, Walz said a potential Harris administration would combat China’s growing influence in American manufacturing in part by directing federal contracts to companies that use American labor.

“We’ll never let other countries like China undermine these investments with unfair trade practices across the globe. This includes supporting American made products and steering federal contracts to firms that produce things here at home,” he said.

Vice President Kamala Harris described former President Donald Trump’s event in New York on Sunday as “absolutely something that is intended to, and is, fanning the fuel of trying to divide our country,” speaking to the press before heading to Michigan to campaign in the last full week before election day.

Asked if she saw comparisons to a 1939 pro-Nazi rally that was also held in Madison Square Garden, Harris didn’t directly answer, but said it was “not new.”

Harris also seized on controversial comments from a comedian at the rally who called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage,” saying she would make the US territory a priority.

“I have announced also my plan that is about my opportunity economy writ large, but a specific target that will include a task force focused on the needs of Puerto Rico,” she said.

Harris said she was “very proud” celebrities like Puerto Rican rapper and singer Bad Bunny signaled his support after the comments, saying he and Jennifer Lopez were “supporting me before that nonsense last night at Madison Square Garden, and are supporting me because they understand that they want a president United States was about uplifting the people and not berating, not calling America a garbage can.”

President Joe Biden and US senate candidate Lisa Blunt Rochester on Monday in Delaware.

President Joe Biden emerged from The Legend Restaurant in Delaware, saying that he is “going to go vote” as he boarded his motorcade.

Biden was having breakfast Monday morning with Democratic Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware, who began running for Senate after Sen. Tom Carper announced his retirement.

It is not a competitive race, and Biden, who has largely been on the sidelines in the final weeks of the election, offered his endorsement in a video message released by Rochester’s campaign on Sunday.

“I’ve known Lisa for years – I’ve known her family, I’ve worked alongside her,” he said in the direct to camera video.

“Time to vote,” said Rochester, as they headed out of the restaurant.

This post has been updated with more reporting on Biden voting early.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump enter the final full week of the 2024 campaign locked in one of the closest races in recent history as the two nominees, their running mates and top surrogates all fan out across the battleground states that are poised to determine which candidate will win the election.

Battleground blitz: The closing flurry of events by Harris and running mate Tim Walz include plans to visit all seven battleground states this week. On Monday, the vice president will campaign in Saginaw and Macomb — two of the state’s most closely-watched counties — holding a pair of events aimed at drawing a contrast on plans to spur American manufacturing. Harris and Walz will then attend a rally in Ann Arbor featuring singer Maggie Rogers. Before the rally, Walz will campaign in Wisconsin with stops in Manitowoc and Waukesha.

The marquee event for Harris is expected to be an address Tuesday evening in Washington at the Ellipse, the site of Trump’s rally on January 6, 2021, prior to the violent attack on the US Capitol, as she makes the case that the former president is unfit to lead the country. Her closing argument address comes as a top super PAC supporting her candidacy warns about the Harris campaign focusing its message too narrowly on Trump attacks. The vice president will campaign in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin on Wednesday, followed by rallies in Nevada and Arizona on Thursday.

Following his insult-laden Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday, the former president heads to Georgia today — a crucial state in his pathway to victory — for remarks at a faith summit followed by an evening rally in Atlanta. Trump is set to campaign in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in the coming days, which will include an event in Green Bay where he will be joined by former Packers quarterback Brett Favre. Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, starts the week targeting Blue Wall states with stops Monday in Wisconsin and Tuesday in Michigan.

Mixed messaging: Trump’s hometown rally Sunday represented the latest example of the dueling messages being put forward by the former president’s campaign. While the GOP nominee and his allies offered a steady stream of grievances and vulgar attacks, his campaign was running ads during Sunday football broadcasts touting his economic record and contrasting that with the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of inflation and immigration.

Yet that message was overshadowed by the remarks of Trump loyalists — including comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who referred to Puerto Rico as “a floating island of garbage.” The comments sparked immediate backlash, with Puerto Ricans a key group of voters, particularly in Pennsylvania, where the former president is set to campaign Tuesday. The Trump campaign said the remarks do “not reflect the views” of Trump or the campaign.

The comments drew a sharp response from Walz and Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, with the vice presidential nominee seizing the opportunity to slam Trump’s handling of the response to Hurricane Maria in 2017. The Harris campaign also saw Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny signal support for Harris by sharing a clip of social media of her plans for the island to his 45 million followers on Instagram. The controversy sparked by the Trump rally coincided with a visit by Harris to a Puerto Rican restaurant in Philadelphia on Sunday, where she pitched her policy agenda for the island.

Tony Hinchcliffe arrives on stage to speak during a Trump campaign rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday.

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, blasting the Trump campaign after a comedian called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” during a Trump rally, urged Latino voters on Monday morning to realize that the ex-president sees them as “an unimportant, unvalued and unnecessary part of the United States of America.”

She continued, “He believes that Latinos, as we’ve seen, are an unimportant, unvalued and unnecessary part of the United States of America.”

On Sunday, Hinchcliffe made an offensive joke assailing Puerto Rico – in New York, the city that’s home to the largest Puerto Rican population on the US mainland.

“There’s a lot going on, like, I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now,” Hinchliffe said. “I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s family is from Puerto Rico, and she told CNN that the comments were an “authentic depiction” about what Trump believes and thinks about the country.

The congresswoman said ex-President Donald Trump’s policies following Hurricane Maria in 2017 left the island devastated and struggling to rebuild, contrasting Vice President Kamala Harris’ recent campaign promises to focus on economic development in the region.

After Bolduan pointed out that Harris has been moving to the center on issues such as fracking, a border wall and Medicare for All, she asked the congresswoman, “Do you like that she is doing that? Do you like that shift?”

Ocasio-Cortez did not answer Bolduan’s question directly, instead reiterating her support of progressive policies, stating that said that there should be an expansion of Medicare and lowering the age of eligibility, as well as a plan to provide a path to citizenship and documenting people to handle illegal immigration.

However, she added, “I know what candidate the progressive flank has a fighting chance with, and it’s not Donald Trump, it’s Kamala Harris.”

Elon Musk speaks at a town hall at the Roxain Theater on October 20, in Pittsburgh. Musk also awarded an attendee $1 million dollars during the event.

Philadelphia’s district attorney asked a judge Monday to shut down tech billionaire Elon Musk’s controversial $1 million giveaway to registered voters.

Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, a Democrat and self-described progressive prosecutor, filed the civil lawsuit against Musk and his pro-Trump group, America PAC.

Musk’s super PAC awarded two $1 million prizes to registered voters in Michigan and Wisconsin last week, after being warned by the Justice Department that the payments might be illegal.

The Justice Department had previously sent a letter to the group, warning that its “daily” sweepstakes might violate federal election laws against paying for voter registrations.

CNN has reached out to a spokesperson for Musk’s super PAC seeking comment.

Virginia Republican officials asked the US Supreme Court on Monday to allow the state to implement a program to remove suspected noncitizens from the voter rolls in one of the first major voting cases to reach the high court ahead of next week’s presidential election.

The appeal has political salience as former President Donald Trump and other Republicans have seized on the case as part of a false narrative of widespread voting by people in the country illegally. It is one of several election-related suits that have already landed at the Supreme Court or that are expected to arrive in the final days before the November 5 election.

Read more about this Supreme Court case appeal here.

Members of Democrats Abroad handed out "how to vote" cards at the Battersea Power Station in London on Saturday.

With just over a week until the election, Democrats Abroad, an overseas campaign group, is determined that no Americans miss out on casting their vote – especially those a long way from home.

Democrats Abroad is the official branch of the Democratic National Committee, supporting and engaging with Americans living overseas. Eight out of 447 DNC members represent Democrats Abroad, and their members are elected from different regions around the world.

About 4.4 million US citizens lived abroad in 2022, according to the Federal Voting Assistance Program, and about 2.8 million of them were eligible to vote.

But, as Sharon Manitta, the global press secretary for Democrats Abroad noted, there are many other groups, including students who are studying abroad and digital nomads, who will not be in the US for next week’s election.

In London, volunteers spent the weekend handing out cards and encouraging Americans to vote. They’ve spent time this year at farmers markets in areas with large populations of Americans and outside international NFL games, as well.

Despite being a Democratic-affiliated organization, Manitta said the group is “here to help anybody who is outside the US who is having trouble voting.”

“We will help anybody of any political persuasion vote. We feel really strongly about that,” Manitta said.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will campaign in North Carolina on Wednesday, making stops in Charlotte, Greensboro and Asheville.

It’s part of a push, alongside Vice President Kamala Harris to barnstorm seven battleground states — Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania — in a final push before Election Day,

Vice President Harris offered her clearest answer to date on what her top legislative priority would be should she win the presidency, saying in an interview aired Monday she’d work to pass “a package of legislation that is about lowering costs.”

“On the issue of housing, small businesses, child tax credit,” she told CBS News in an interviewed taped over the past few days. “Basically putting more money in the hands of American working people but also cutting middle class taxes.”

The answer was clearer than Harris’s previous responses to various questions on her immediate governing priorities — including at last week’s CNN town hall — though still didn’t include specific details of the legislation she would attempt to pass.

She also added two other items of legislation she would work to pass as president.

She told CBS “a priority in equal form is going to be what we need to do to deal with reproductive healthcare and reinstate the freedoms and the rights that all people should have, and women should have, over their own body.”

And she named a third priority: “Dealing with immigration, in particular border security, and bringing back up that bipartisan bill that Donald Trump killed, so we can get more resources down to the border,” she said.

At CNN’s town hall last week, when asked her number one policy goal requiring Congressional action, Harris offered only a vague response.

In response to that question, Harris said there was “not just one” goal and that she was willing to work across the aisle “to deal with a number of issues.”

Kamala Harris delivers a speech as she campaigns in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on Sunday.

Vice President Kamala Harris will be traveling for various campaign events in the critical days ahead, with just over a week until Election Day.

On Monday, Harris will campaign events in three counties across Michigan, before returning to Washington, DC.

On Tuesday, she will speak in DC.

On Wednesday, she will be campaigning in three states — first in North Carolina, then Pennsylvania, and finally in Wisconsin.

On Thursday, Harris goes west — holding a campaign event in Arizona, then two more in Nevada.

Sen. Deb Fisher and Independent Senate candidate Dan Osborn.

There’s an unexpectedly tight race for Senate in Nebraska between Independent Dan Osborn and Republican Sen. Deb Fischer, according to a new poll from the New York Times and Siena College.

Fischer holds 48% of likely voters there, while Osborn has 46%, a result suggesting no clear leader in the race as it lands within the poll’s margin of sampling error.

Osborn holds broad support from younger voters (62% of likely voters younger than 30 support him) and independents (63% back him).

He also peels off 16% of those who say they’re supporting former president Donald Trump in the presidential contest against Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump holds a wide lead in the state, according to the poll, while Harris continues to lead by a double-digit margin in the 2^nd Congressional District there.

The Cornhusker state’s Senate race could have significant implications for control of the US Senate. Republicans need to flip two Democratic-held seats and hold their current ones to get the 51 seats needed to control the chamber. The race for Fischer’s seat was not expected to be competitive. Osborn has not said if he will caucus with either Democrats or Republicans in the Senate should he win the race.

In Texas, a Times/Siena poll also released today finds Republican Sen. Ted Cruz narrowly ahead of Democratic Rep. Colin Allred in Cruz’s bid for another term, with 50% backing Cruz to 46% for Allred.

About the polls: The two polls were conducted by telephone among likely voters in each state Oct. 23-26. Results in Nebraska have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.2 points, it is plus or minus 3.3 points in Texas.

When President Joe Biden enters a voting booth in Delaware on Monday to cast his early ballot for Kamala Harris, the moment will be a bittersweet one.

Biden, of course, once hoped to vote for himself, one last opportunity to check the box next to his own name after half-a-century in the political arena.

Instead, he is voting for his chosen successor — a moment of pride, to be sure, that is still coming earlier than he wanted it to.

Instead of a big campaign event — as it would likely have been if he were still the candidate — his trip to a polling station in Delaware will be a low-key affair compared to the roiling presidential campaign that is unfolding without him.

With eight days until election day, the president’s schedule this week doesn’t reflect a surrogate in high demand. After suggesting in September he would be on the road regularly for Vice President Kamala Harris in the final months, Biden has been largely absent from the campaign trail in the closing stretch.

His union event in Pittsburgh over the weekend provided an outlet to attack Donald Trump and boost Harris — but the outing wasn’t heavily promoted by the Harris campaign, unlike higher-profile rallies with the Obamas.

Biden has a few “campaign calls” scheduled this week, where he hopes to rally various groups telephonically behind Harris. He’ll attend a union event in Philadelphia on Friday, but it’s considered an official event rather than a Harris campaign rally.

The rest of his week before the election, for now, is devoted to official tasks: receiving briefings on hurricane recovery, a Diwali reception in the East Room, remarks in Baltimore about infrastructure, trick-or-treating at the South Portico.

President Joe Biden talks briefly with reporters as he departs the White House on October 24.

President Joe Biden is casting his early-voting ballot today in Wilmington, Delaware, before heading back to Washington, DC, according to the White House.

He has a busy week ahead — with events in Pennsylvania and Maryland, as well as several campaign calls, after returning to the trail over the weekend.

Some context: As his Democratic predecessors former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton crisscross the campaign trail, Biden has largely stuck to official White House events in battleground states during the final weeks before the election, touting the administration’s accomplishments.

Biden has emerged as a partial liability for the Harris campaign as Trump has sought to cast Biden’s onetime running mate as an incumbent and continuation of an unpopular presidency. His approval rating currently stands at 38%, according to CNN’s poll of polls.

But Biden has said he wants to be as helpful as possible to Harris, including in areas where he still enjoys support, like blue-collar voters and voters in battleground Pennsylvania.

A significant new security perimeter was erected around the Ellipse early Monday ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris’s closing argument speech at the site this week.

The Ellipse is the southern part of the President’s Park in Washington, DC.

Tall black temporary fencing was being installed by workers along Constitution Avenue at the south end of the park and along its east and west sides, all the way to the White House complex, entirely enclosing the space.

The heavy, 10-ft fence going up Monday is the same model that entirely surrounded the White House during protests in the summer of 2020. It returned around Election Day in 2020. Unlike bike racks, the fence is meant to be non-scalable.

The north side of the White House complex has also been enclosed in fencing this year as workers construct the Inaugural viewing platform and media riser.

A permit for the event showed as many as 20,000 people were expected to attend the event, with spillover onto the National Mall. Most of Harris’s large rallies this year have been indoors or inside arenas, rather than out in the open.

Remember: The Ellipse is where then-President Donald Trump rallied his supporters ahead of the January 6 Capitol riot. The House Select Committee that investigated the event put the crowd number at Trump’s speech at 53,000.

Trump Media & Technology Group is losing money, generating very little revenue and its main product Truth Social remains a relatively small player in social media.

And yet Wall Street is valuing former President Donald Trump’s social media company at nearly $8 billion, a price tag that has tripled in the span of just five weeks.

Since plunging to record lows on September 23, Trump Media’s share price has skyrocketed. Market veterans say this monster comeback is being almost entirely driven by bets that Trump will win the White House.

Trump Media is not a normal stock. It’s basically a meme stock, meaning that it trades not on fundamentals but on hype and momentum linked to the Republican nominee’s political fortunes. The stock is essentially a proxy for how traders think the election will turn out.

Munster said there is “nothing” about Trump Media’s fundamentals that can justify its nearly $8 billion market value.

The company’s second-quarter revenue amounted to just $837,000, a tiny amount normally associated with a company valued in the millions, not billions, of dollars.

And yet Trump Media’s share price has surged more than 200% since September 23.

Read more about how a potential Trump win at next week’s election could impact the share price here.

Voters make selections at their voting booths inside an early voting site on October 17, in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Most voters think Donald Trump would not concede if he lost the presidential election, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.

A sizable minority of his backers say losing candidates have no obligation to do so. And should legal challenges related to the election find their way to the Supreme Court, a majority of all voters has little or no confidence in the high court to make the right decisions.

Just 30% of registered voters think Trump would accept the results of the election and concede if he lost, while 73% say that Vice President Kamala Harris would accept an election loss.

Most registered voters (54%) believe that Harris would concede if she lost and that Trump would not, while 18% say that both candidates would do so, 15% that neither of them would, and only 11% that Harris would not concede but Trump would.

Homing in on each candidate’s supporters, 97% of Harris supporters expected her to concede if she lost, while a much smaller 57% majority of Trump’s supporters believe he would acknowledge a loss.

That 57% represents an uptick from July, when just half of Trump’s supporters thought he would concede a loss — a shift that comes even as his campaign has laid the groundwork to weaken confidence in America’s election system and claim victory regardless of the results in November.

Harris supporters are broadly unified in their perceptions of what the candidates would do: More than 9 in 10 Harris supporters say that she would concede, but that Trump would not (92%).

Read more about how voters feel the candidates will respond to election results.

Vice President Kamala Harris will campaign in Michigan today, where she will focus on the manufacturing industry as she seeks to draw a contrast with former President Donald Trump, according to a campaign official.

Harris will first visit Hemlock Semiconductor in Saginaw. She will tour the assembly line and greet workers while highlighting the importance of investing in US manufacturing jobs.

Last week, Hemlock Semiconductor received a $325 million preliminary investment under the CHIPS and Science Act, a bipartisan bill passed in 2022 under the Biden administration that will invest more than $200 billion over five years to help the US regain a leading position in chip manufacturing.

The vice president is expected to make the case that her agenda will allow for the creation of thousands of US manufacturing jobs, while arguing a second Trump term would eliminate opportunities. She’s called for a number of proposals to help boost the industry, including a new tax credit for American manufacturers.

Among other proposals to help boost the industry, Harris also has plans to expand apprenticeship programs to help workers get jobs without having to get a four-year degree. She also said she backs eliminating degree requirements and increasing skills-based hiring.

The vice president will then travel to Macomb County, where she will tour a labor union training facility with instructors and apprentices.

According to the final nationwide CNN poll before votes are counted, conducted by SSRS, Trump maintains broad leads among likely voters as more trusted to handle the economy (50% say they trust Trump more, 37% Harris).

Harris will end her day in the Great Lake State with a rally in Ann Arbor.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

There are just eight days until Election Day, with Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump keeping their focus on key battleground states.

Here’s where the candidates and their surrogates will be today:

Harris: The vice president will speak at campaign events in Michigan’s Saginaw, Macomb County and Ann Arbor.

Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, will hold a joint rally in Michigan featuring singer Maggie Rogers, a Harris campaign official told CNN.

Trump: The former president will hold a rally in Atlanta, Georgia this evening.

Trump will also appear elsewhere in Georgia beforehand, delivering remarks before the rally at the National Faith Advisory Board’s inaugural “National Faith Summit” in the city of Powder Springs.

JD Vance: The Republican vice presidential nominee is expected to speak at campaign events in the cities of Wausau and Racine in Wisconsin.

Barack Obama: The former president will appear at a rally and concert with Bruce Springsteen in Philadelphia as part of a series of get-out-the-vote events featuring the singer in key battlegrounds.

Donald Trump Jr.: The former president’s son is scheduled to speak this evening at a Team Trump Tour event in Coplay, Pennsylvania.

The names of the candidates for the 2024 Presidential election are seen on a vote-by-mail ballot in Miami on October 2.

This election cycle — in which a former president who tried to overturn his 2020 loss is topping the Republican ticket — has featured an unprecedented amount of pre-election litigation, with the GOP touting that it’s been involved in 130 cases.

The GOP’s aggressive approach in court goes hand in hand with Donald Trump’s strategy of using the courts to preemptively cast doubt on the 2024 results. Republicans counter any criticism by saying that they’re focused on making sure the rules are clear and that election officials are on notice that they must follow the law.

Democrats have rushed to court as well — to defend the election policies under GOP attack and to fend off moves they say would kick eligible Americans off the voter rolls.

Yet legally, the onslaught of Republican-led lawsuits has done little to change the status quo around voting and election administration, according to Leah Tulin, an election law expert at the liberal-leaning Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s law school.

Read more about the cases being litigated in the week before Election Day.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

Both Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have spent considerable time in a handful of states during their presidential campaigns as they race to make their pitch to voters.

The campaigns have put their focus and efforts there as these battleground or swing states are likely to decide who wins the election.

Here’s what to know about those states:

Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz appear on stage together during a campaign event on August 6 in Philadelphia.

Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz will hold a joint rally in Michigan today featuring singer Maggie Rogers, a Harris campaign official told CNN.

The rally will take place in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the official said.

Kamala Harris speaks during a campaign event in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on October 27.

Vice President Kamala Harris criticized former President Donald Trump for his past comments that immigrants are taking Black jobs in a podcast released today, arguing that it’s another way he’s “trying to divide” and “scare” people.

“It’s just another example of him trying to divide, and him trying to scare people. It’s just another example of him doing that, of him trying to say it’s either you or them. Right?” Harris told former NFL player Shannon Sharpe on his “Club Shay Shay” podcast.

Remember: At CNN’s presidential debate in June, Trump blamed President Joe Biden for creating inflation and said his immigration policy has led to jobs losses for Black people.

In the podcast, Harris sought to speak to Black Americans considering support Trump for president. “Don’t think you’re in Donald Trump’s club. You’re not. He’s not going to be thinking about you,” she said.

Harris also said she would not consider raising the minimum age for eligibility for Social Security benefits. She said that she would work with Congress to revive the bipartisan border security bill. And she vowed to “keep fighting” for student loan debt relief.

It’s been called the “red mirage” or the “blue shift.”

It’s the recent phenomenon by which an apparent Republican lead early after polls close on election night is erased by the counting of mail-in ballots later in the evening or in the days after Election Day.

Former President Donald Trump has pointed to the red mirage to back up his baseless allegations of election fraud. In reality, it has been a function of the rise of mail-in voting and the often-peculiar rules about when those ballots can be counted.

What happened in 2020: When most Americans went to bed on election night in 2020, on November 3, the end result was far from clear.

The contest between then-President Trump and now-President Joe Biden was still too early to call in the key states of Arizona, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Maine, Georgia and Pennsylvania.

The following days would include dramatic hours spent watching the counting of votes in these states. The vote count didn’t reflect a Biden lead in Georgia until early in the morning of November 6, when, as CNN’s Phil Mattingly showed viewers on the Magic Wall, small batches of votes were being counted and affecting the very close election.

CNN was able to project that Biden would win the election four days after Election Day, on November 7, but counting would continue. An analysis by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that counties won by Biden counted slower, on average, than counties won by Trump.

In 2020, the slowest-counting states were places like California, which are heavily Democratic and where every registered voter is sent a mail-in ballot. That means a blue shift in the popular vote could still occur even if it does not delay figuring out the presidential election results.

Remember: While news networks like CNN might project a winner when it is clear who will win, the races are not officially certified until later. Certification deadlines vary from state to state, but they all have until December 11, 2024, to complete recounts, if needed, and settle disputes around presidential results.

Read more about the “red mirage.”

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

High prices are a top concern for many Americans who are struggling to afford the cost of living after a spell of steep inflation.

In CNN polling released in September of six swing states, economic issues remain the topic most often chosen by voters when asked what matters in their choice for president.

Below is a snapshot of what the candidates have proposed so far on the economy:

Kamala Harris’ economic promises:

Donald Trump’s economic promises:

Read more about Harris’ and Trump’s campaign promises on key issues.

If you are a US citizen overseas and have forgotten to request your ballot to vote in this year’s general election — or haven’t received it yet — here’s what to know to cast your vote:

Firstly, you need to visit the Federal Voting Assistance Program website and check the voter registration for your US home state or territory for an absentee ballot.

You need to print the voting form to request the absentee ballot, sign it and then send it back.

The FVAP asks you to request and register your ballot as soon as possible — by August 1 — but if you have forgotten to or haven’t received it in time, there is a backup.

You can use the federal write-in absentee ballot, which works like a backup ballot.

If you have requested but not received your ballot yet, you can contact your election office to ask about its status.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden on October 27 in New York City.

Donald Trump anchored his bid to win a second White House term next week on searing anti-migrant fear at a rally at Madison Square Garden, doubling down on his promise for a massive deportation program on Day 1 to reverse an “immigrant invasion.”

As the ex-president’s allies defend him against Democratic claims he is a “fascist” and an authoritarian in waiting, based in part on warnings by his ex-chief of staff John Kelly, Trump on Sunday delivered a screed that may augur the most extreme presidency in modern history if he beats Democratic nominee Kamala Harris on November 5.

The huge rally was billed as the launch of the final stage of Trump’s bid to pull off one of the greatest comebacks in American political history after trying to overturn the result of the last election. Before he spoke, some of the ex-president’s top supporters flung race-based and vulgar rhetoric. Former congressional candidate David Rem called Harris the “antichrist” and “the devil,” while others lashed out at Hillary Clinton, “illegals” and homeless people. Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.”

The Trump campaign later disavowed the line.

Much of Trump’s speech brimmed with falsehoods and exaggerations. It was the kind of rhetoric that the Harris campaign believes could prompt moderate voters and disaffected Republicans to choose the vice president. But it also represents a bet from the Republican nominee that he can drive out a huge base turnout and activate voters who don’t normally cast ballots but who agree with his hardline politics.

Read the full analysis.

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden, on October 27, in New York.

Former President Donald Trump said at a rally in New York City on Sunday he would let former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has been a leading purveyor of debunked vaccine conspiracy theories, “go wild on health,” “go wild on the food” and “go wild on medicines,” if reelected.

Trump previously told CNN’s Kristen Holmes he would consider appointing Kennedy to a role in his administration if he wins in November. Kennedy, who spoke at the rally, has a role on Trump’s transition team.

Kennedy previously served as senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, a climate advocacy group.

More context: As a candidate, Kennedy repeatedly made false claims about the safety and efficacy of vaccines. He regularly criticized Trump for approving public health restrictions during the pandemic and implementing a plan to accelerate the development of a Covid-19 vaccine. Kennedy often attempted to link Trump to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who helped lead the US Covid response during the Trump and Biden administrations and became a focal point of criticism from some on the right.

"I voted" stickers are seen in the Polk County Election Office during early voting, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024, in Des Moines, Iowa.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are racing for the White House, but as a voter, there is a lot of information to sift through while you decide how to cast your ballot.

Here are some resources to help you navigate the election:

If you are looking for even more in-depth analysis and coverage of the headlines of this election, here are some other resources to check out: