Key events
Ex-president Barack Obama will campaign in Detroit later this month for Kamala Harris. The Detroit News reports that Obama will visit the state on 22 October. The announcement of his visit comes just days after Donald Trump insulted the manufacturing hub while campaining there.
Obama has begun campaining for Harris in the final weeks before the 2024 election, hoping to drum up support in swing states. He made his first appearance on behalf of the nominee in Pittsburgh this week.
Trump courts Latino vote at Las Vegas roundtable
Donald Trump will appear at a roundtable with Latino voters in Las Vegas shortly. We’ll be following along and will share any major takeaways with you – according to his campaign, Trump is expected to focus on inflation and his ‘No tax on tips’ policy.
Meanwhile, Trump’s running mate JD Vance has been campaining in Pennsylvania, where he answered questions from reporters in front of a crowd of supporters.
The New York Times published an hour-long interview with JD Vance this morning, covering the vice-presidential nominee’s stance on abortion rights, immigration, the economy and the 2020 election. Vance spoke at length about his Catholic faith and views on reproductive rights, refused to say Joe Biden won the 2020 election, and committed to a peaceful transfer of power – were Donald Trump to win the 2024 election. He also walked back his criticism of “childless cat ladies” before saying he thought it was “bizarre” and “sociopathic” not to have children because of fears around climate change.
Harris and Trump neck-and-neck, according to latest polling
Our latest polling shows Harris and Trump are neck-and-neck, with Trump gaining ground on Harris in crucial swing states.
Robert Tait reports: “the Guardian’s 10-day polling average tracker showed the vice-president and Democratic nominee with a two-point nationwide lead, 48% to 46%, over her Republican opponent as of 10 October – tellingly, down from a 4% advantage she registered two weeks ago.”
Harris enjoys just three, fractional leads in Nevada and Michigan, and a slim one-point advantage in Pennsylvania. Trump has wafer-thin leads in the five remaining swing states – Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia and Arizona.
Government data shows immigrants are not taking jobs from Black or Hispanic people
Despite Donald Trump’s claims that immigrants are taking “Black jobs” and “Hispanic jobs”, government data shows that immigrant labor has grown the economy and promoted new opportunities for native-born workers, the Associated Press reports. Mass deportations like those Trump has advocated for could cost taxpayers up to a trillion dollars, economists say.
Giovanni Peri, a labor economist at the University of California, Davis, told the AP that, because native-born workers and non-citizens often have different language and skill sets, immigrant workers take jobs that citizens are often unwilling to fill, like agriculture and food-production roles. He also added that “we have many more vacancies than workers in this type of manual labor. In fact, we need many more of them to fill these roles.”
Ethan Lewis, an economist at Dartmouth College, added: “There is a vast amount of research on the labor market impact of immigration in the US, most of which concludes the impact on less-skilled workers is fairly small and, if anything, jobs for US-born workers might by created rather than ‘taken’ by immigrants.”
Since the non-citizen labor force makes up roughly 4% of US GDP annually, Peri estimates that mass deportation would result in a roughly $1tn loss.
At a private dinner with several billionaire donors in September, Donald Trump expressed frustration that Republicans had not raised more money for his campaign, the New York Times reports.
The likes of hedge fund manager Paul Singer, investment banker Warren Stephens, businessman Joe Ricketts and former education secretary Betsy DeVos were all in attendance at the Trump Tower soiree, where Trump conveyed his annoyance that his campaign had not drawn larger donations – despite tax policies he said were favorable to the wealthy.
In the less than three months that she’s been in the presidential race, Kamala Harris has raised $1bn. That’s allowed her to focus on campaigning in the final weeks of the race, while Trump continues attending fundraisers. In July, August and September, the vice-president raised twice as much as Trump.
Back in Washington, Christian nationalists are gathering on the National Mall today to fast and pray, and denounce gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth.
The Guardian’s Alice Herman has the story:
Less than a month before the presidential election, multilevel marketing professional-turned-Christian “apostle” Jenny Donnelly is summoning women to the National Mall to fast, pray and uphold “the Lord’s authority over the election process and our nation’s leadership”.
It’s the first of a series of Christian nationalist gatherings in DC to rally believers to the Capitol ahead of the 2024 election.
The pro-Trump influencer has billed the event as a rallying call for mothers concerned about changing gender norms in modern America, gathering women under pink and blue banners emblazoned with the anti-trans hashtag #DontMessWithOurKids. In her promotional materials, Donnelly casts the event at the Capitol as an opportunity for women to stand their ground and play a pivotal role in changing the cultural and political trajectory of the US.
In the wake of recent reporting that Donald Trump sent Covid-19 tests to Russia at the height of the pandemic – and Kamala Harris’s criticism of that move – the Kremlin said today that Harris’s description of Vladimir Putin as a “murderous dictator” shows how politicians in Washington are seeking to impose their views on the world, Reuters reports.
“The lofty political establishment of the United States of America, to all appearances, is infused with such a political culture,” Russian news agencies have quoted Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov telling a television interviewer.
“This is probably the quintessence of the very model of international relations that they are trying to foist on the entire world, a model that most in the world are beginning to like less and less.”
Tensions with Russia have been high in recent years, between the war in Ukraine and Russian election interference in 2016.
Kamala Harris will travel to North Carolina for campaign events in Raleigh and Greenville today and tomorrow, according to her campaign.
This evening, she will visit with local Black elected faith and community leaders in Raleigh, while also participating in a volunteer hurricane relief supply drive. Tomorrow, she’ll attend a church service in Greenville, just days after launching her campaign’s “Souls to the Polls” effort to turn out Black churchgoers.
Trump to stop in Coachella in southern California
After campaigning in Las Vegas this afternoon, Trump will make a stop in Coachella, California. An agricultural town in southern California, Coachella is best known for hosting an internationally acclaimed arts and music festival.
It’s not the first place many people expected Trump to campaign, but the Coachella Valley’s large community of migrant farm workers make it ripe for the former president to continue the anti-immigrant message he ramped up in Aurora, Colorado yesterday. Although Trump is unlikely to flip long-blue California, the rally will present an opportunity for him to rail against the state’s Democratic leadership – as he did in Aurora, Colorado, yesterday.
Tim Walz is trading the campaign trail for the prairies of Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, this morning as he kicks off pheasant-hunting season there.
@Tim_Walz is out hunting pheasants for the season opener in MN.
The Harris Walz campaign recently announced the hunters, gun owners & anglers coalition.
Walz often says he supports the 2nd Amndmt but advocates for “common sense” legislation.
& we know Harris owns a Glock. pic.twitter.com/cM4RN7VAYn
— Shawna Mizelle (@shawnamizelle) October 12, 2024
The vice-presidential nominee and Minnesota governor has dramatically shifted his stance on gun rights over the years – going from garnering an A rating from the NRA to straight F’s as his children asked him to back gun-violence protections in the wake of several campus mass shootings.
The Harris-Walz campaign has called for an assault weapons ban, while walking a fine line among gun owners in the United States. Both Harris and Walz have emphasized that they themselves are gun owners, with Harris saying on 60 Minutes this week that she owns a Glock.
Kamala Harris’s medical report declares her fit for the presidency
The biggest headline circulating this morning is Kamala Harris’s medical report, which declares her fit for the presidency. For a closer look, here’s the Guardian’s Ramon Antonio Vargas:
A senior aide to Harris, 59, said the vice-president’s advisers viewed the publication of the health report and medical history as an opportunity to call attention to questions about the Republican White House nominee Donald Trump’s physical fitness and mental acuity. The 78-year-old Trump has also not released any information about his health, though he would be the oldest president elected if Americans give him a second term in the Oval Office.
The report – in the form of a two-page letter from the vice-president’s physician, Joshua Simmons – described Harris as being in “excellent health” and asserted that her medical history was notable for seasonal allergies and hives. Harris manages those conditions with over-the-counter medications such as Allegra, Atrovent nasal spray and Pataday eye drops, and she has also been on allergen immunotherapy for three years, the letter said.
Otherwise, Harris is mildly nearsighted and wears corrective contact lenses as a result, had abdominal surgery when she was three years old and has a maternal history of colon cancer. “She has no personal history of diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, cardiac disease, pulmonary disease, neurological disorders, cancer or osteoporosis,” said the letter from Simmons, who added that the vice-president’s most recent physical examination in April was “unremarkable”.
The statement on Harris’s health came on Saturday as Trump has become increasingly incoherent at campaign rallies, something the Guardian US reported on earlier in October. He has been slurring, stumbling over his words, hurling expletives – and showing signs of cognitive decline consistent with someone approaching his 80s, according to medical experts.
Good morning and thanks for joining us this Saturday. With election day just over three weeks away, we’ll be covering the latest developments as they happen.
Here’s a quick summary of the latest news from yesterday and where things stand today:
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At a rally in Aurora, Colorado, yesterday, former president Donald Trump announced “Operation Aurora”, a plan to invoke the 1798 Alien Enemies Act if he is re-elected. The law allows the president to detain and deport non‑citizens in times of a declared war or presidentially proclaimed “invasion”.
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Meanwhile, speaking in Scottsdale, Arizona, Kamala Harris said she would create “a bipartisan council of advisers” if elected president. She’s drawn remarkable support over the past two and a half months from establishment Republicans, most notably Liz and Dick Cheney.
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Also yesterday, Vogue magazine released its newest issue, featuring Harris on the cover. The photograph of the vice-president stood in stark contrast to Harris’s first appearance on the magazine’s cover three years ago – an image that was widely criticized as unserious and disrespectful.
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This morning, Harris released a report on her medical history – in contrast to her opponent who has repeatedly promised and then refused to do the same. The report concludes that Harris “possesses the physical and mental resiliency required to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency”.
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And Trump is scheduled to speak this afternoon at a Hispanic roundtable in Las Vegas. He’s expected to return to the anti-immigrant message that has defined his campaign.
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In a change of scenery, Tim Walz is taking a break from the campaign trail today to kick of Minnesota’s pheasant hunting season. He’s spending the day at the Governor’s Pheasant Opener – reiterating the Minnesota governor’s reputation as a hunter despite his firm stance on gun violence regulations.
Let’s watch what happens.