Obama and Biden together in Flint. Obama said: ‘Joe Biden tries to live the values we cherish: honesty, hard work, kindness, humility, responsibility, helping someone out.’ Photograph: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images
Obama and Biden together in Flint. Obama said: ‘Joe Biden tries to live the values we cherish: honesty, hard work, kindness, humility, responsibility, helping someone out.’ Photograph: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images
Early voting surges in Texas. In a stunning display of enthusiasm, more than 9.6m Texans have voted ahead of election day, surpassing the total number of votes cast four years ago.
Texas Democrats cancel event after campaign bus followed. Texas Democrats said they cancelled a campaign event for “public safety and security reasons”, after a group of Trump supporters driving trucks followed a Biden-Harris campaign bus on a highway outside of Austin.
Thousands of Donald Trump supporters appear to have been left out in the cold following his rally outside Pittsburgh tonight, according to CNN.
CNN’s DJ Judd shared a photo from outside Trump’s rally in Butler showing hordes of rallygoers waiting in near-freezing temperatures for shuttles to take them back to the designated parking areas.
Trump has finished and left, but there’s thousands of supporters who have been let loose into the night with no sign of the shuttles they’ve been told will take them back to parking. People are filling the street, blocking the road for ambulances and police. pic.twitter.com/uMgfvUZ4Jg
Judd said the temperature outside the venue at the time of his photos was 41F (5C).
It’s the second time in four days that transportation snarls have left Trump rally attendees stranded after an event.
On Tuesday, seven people were hospitalized after supporters at a late-night Trump rally at an Omaha airport remained at the site waiting on buses hours after Trump’s plane had departed. The problem was blamed on limited traffic flow on the two-lane road that led to the site of the rally.
The Washington Post reported that Trump supporters were stuck after the president spoke at Omaha’s Eppley Airfield. It said many elderly supporters of Trump were among those stranded.
Omaha police said in a written statement that first responders dealt with 30 people for medical reasons throughout the day and seven were sent to hospital.
At the rally, Trump said he’s issued a memorandum that calls on government agencies to determine fracking’s impact on the economy and trade and the costs of banning the oil and gas extraction through fracking. The president has repeatedly charged that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris support restrictions on the industry.
“In other words, if one of these maniacs come along and they say we’re gonna end fracking we’re gonna destroy the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” Trump said in announcing his memorandum during his remarks. “You can say ‘sorry about that.”’
Barack Obama briefly showed off his silky left-handed shooting stroke at Flint Northwestern High School where he spoke at a drive-in rally with Joe Biden earlier today.
The clip of the impromptu three-pointer has gone viral in the hours since Saturday’s rally, garnering praise from no less than LeBron James.
“Now you just showing out now my friend!!” the recently minted NBA finals Most Valuable Player tweeted. “That’s what you do huh?? Ok ok I see. All cash!”
A federal judge has ordered the US Postal Service to take “extraordinary measures” to deliver ballots in time to be counted in Wisconsin and around Detroit, including using a priority mail service.
The Associated Press reports:
Chief US district judge Stanley Bastian in Yakima, Washington, issued the order on Friday after being presented with data showing on-time delivery of ballots sent by voters was too slow in Michigan and Wisconsin. They are both “battleground states” in the November election.
Delivery of ballots in the USPS’ Detroit district, for example, has dipped as low as 57% over the past week, Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s office said Saturday.
“Every vote must be counted,” Ferguson said. “Our democracy depends on it.”
National on-time delivery has been at 93% or higher, said the statement from Ferguson, who leads a coalition of 14 states that filed a lawsuit on 18 August over changes to the Postal Service.
Bastian, an appointee of former US president Barack Obama, said that starting Sunday and continuing through 10 November, the USPS must report to his court the prior day’s “all clear” status for each facility and processing center in the Detroit area and a district covering most of Wisconsin.
If the USPS identifies any incoming ballots in its “all clear” sweeps of these facilities, it must make every effort to deliver those ballots by 8pm local time on Election Day, including by using Priority Mail Express or other extraordinary measures, Bastian said.
Priority Mail Express is an overnight service that costs a minimum of $26.35 per envelope, according to the USPS.com website.
Asked for comment on the judge’s order, Postal Service spokesman Dave Partenheimer referred to a fact sheet posted Saturday that says as of Friday, Postal Service employees are authorized to use the Express Mail network to speed completed ballots to their intended destinations.
“We take our legal obligations very seriously and (are) complying with all court orders,” Partenheimer said. “The Postal Service continues to implement extraordinary measures across the country to advance and expedite the delivery of the nation’s ballots.”
They include extra pick-ups, extra deliveries, and collecting mail on Sunday, Partenheimer said.
US judge to hear Republican bid to void 100,000 votes in Texas
A federal judge in Texas scheduled an emergency hearing for Monday on whether Houston officials unlawfully allowed drive-through voting and should toss more than 100,000 votes in the Democratic-leaning area, Reuters reports.
US district judge Andrew Hanen in Houston on Friday agreed to hear arguments by a Republican state legislator and others that votes already cast at drive-through voting sites in the Houston area should be rejected.
More from Reuters:
The lawsuit was brought on Wednesday by plaintiffs including Steve Hotze, a conservative activist, and state representative Steve Toth. They accused Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins, a Democrat, of exceeding his constitutional authority by allowing drive-through voting as an alternative to walk-in voting during the coronavirus pandemic.
Harris County, home to about 4.7 million people, is the third most populous county in the United States. It currently has 10 drive-through polling sites, which are available to all voters.
The lawsuit came after the Texas Supreme Court, one of the most conservative state courts in the United States, rejected similar bids to halt drive-through voting in Harris County.
The plaintiffs ask the court to “reject any votes it finds were cast in violation of the Texas Election Code” and “requir all memory cards from the 10 drive-thru voting locations be secured and not entered or downloaded into the Tally machine until this Court issues an order on this Complaint.”
Hanen was appointed by President George W. Bush, a Republican.
The request is “wholly unreasonable,” Democratic groups, including the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said on Friday in a motion asking to intervene in the case.
“Plaintiffs ask this Court to throw Texas*s election into chaos by invalidating the votes of more than 100,000 eligible Texas voters who cast their ballots at drive-thru voting locations at the invitation of county officials and in reliance on the Texas Supreme Court’s decision to allow drive-thru voting to proceed,” the groups said.
An election worker accepts ballots from voters in cars at a drive-through mail ballot drop-off site at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas. Photograph: Go Nakamura/Getty Images
Donald Trump was greeted by former Notre Dame football coach Lou Holtz on the tarmac after Air Force One touched down at Pittsburgh International Airport, where he’s traveled for his third of four rallies today in the crucially important battleground state of Pennsylvania.
“Lou Holtz is a friend of mine and it’s so nice for him to be here,” Trump said during a brief gaggle with reporters. “He’s getting the presidential medal of freedom. He’s a very inspiring guy.”
He added: “I hear we’re doing great in Florida, great in Ohio. Doing really well in Florida, doing great in Texas. ... Iowa’s doing really great. We’re going tomorrow but we’re doing really good.”
Trump’s rally in Butler, about 35 miles north of Pittsburgh, is expected to begin shortly.
Donald Trump speaks with the press alongside former Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz upon arrival at Pittsburgh International Airport on Saturday. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
Stevie Wonder was back in his home state on Saturday performing at a get-out-the-vote event for Joe Biden in Detroit.
“The only way we’re gonna win this fight, a fight against injustice, is by voting,” the Saginaw native told a crowd at the drive-in rally. “We must vote justice in and injustice out.”
Wonder, who stumped for both Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 and Hillary Clinton in 2016, was warming up the crowd before scheduled remarks by Obama and Biden, their second joint campaign stop of the day in the battleground state oof Michigan.
At one point he admonished the crowd for not adhering to social distancing guidelines while taking a swipe at Donald Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.
“I know you’re having a good time but I want y’all to social distance,” he said. “I’ve seen y’all get to close, come on. Don’t do all that. We’ve got a situation going on cause somebody didn’t handle their business right.”
"I know you're having a good time but I want y'all to social distance. I've seen y'all get to close, come on. Don't do all that. We've got a situation going on cause somebody didn't handle their business right." pic.twitter.com/21fo8MyAsa
Amid rising partisan tension in the United States, at least 11 Americans have been killed while participating in political demonstrations since May this year, according to new data from a non-profit monitoring political unrest in the United States.
Nine of the people killed during protests were demonstrators taking part in Black Lives Matter protests. Two were conservatives killed after pro-Trump “patriot rallies”. All but one were killed by fellow citizens, and most of them were shot to death.
Another 14 Americans have died in other incidents linked to unrest this summer, including two law enforcement officers allegedly killed by an anti-government “Boogaloo” extremist, who deliberately targeted federal law enforcement during a protest against police violence.
A get-out-the vote rally in the battleground state of North Carolina on Saturday ended with police using pepper spray on some participants and making several arrests.
Multiple people were arrested outside Alamance county’s courthouse and police used pepper spray to disperse a crowd which including a five-year-old girl and other children, according to the Raleigh News & Observer:
A racially diverse group of about 200 people walked with a police escort from Wayman’s Chapel AME Church to Court Square, where they held a rally encouraging people to vote. The event was organized by Rev. Greg Drumwright, a Burlington native who leads the the Citadel Church in Greensboro, according to his website.
At least three politicians participated in some parts of the event: the current mayor of Burlington, Ian Baltutis; Democratic candidate for county commissioner Dreama Caldwell; and Democratic school board candidate Seneca Rodgers.
At one point, the marchers held a moment of silence in the street in honor of George Floyd, the Black man killed while in police custody in Minneapolis earlier this summer. After the moment of silence concluded, law enforcement told people to clear the road.
Then, deputies and police officers used pepper spray on the crowd and began arresting people. Several children in the crowd were affected by the pepper spray.
Melanie Mitchell said her 5-year-old and 11-year-old daughters were pepper-sprayed just after the moment of silence. She said Graham police approached the crowd assembled in the street and told them to move onto the sidewalk and soon began spraying pepper spray toward the ground. Mitchell’s 5-year-old took off running, she said. Both kids threw up.
“My 11-year-old was terrified,” Mitchell said. “She doesn’t want to come down to Graham anymore.”
Josh Stein, the attorney general of North Carolina, issued a statement on the conflagration, saying: “All eligible voters in North Carolina have a constitutional right to cast their vote safely and securely, without threats or intimidation. After today’s troubling events in Alamance county, I went to the courthouse in Graham and all is calm now.
“I reached out to the State Board of Elections and was informed that the events appear not to have impacted voting at the early voting location. The site there was calm, and the voters got in line and voted. I have also reached out to the Alamance county sheriff but have not yet connected. I will update when I learn more.”
The offspring of Donald Trump are out in force today. Eric Trump has been on Catholic radio complaining about Christmas trees, Donald Trump Jr is in Montana with erstwhile Guardian assaulterGreg Gianforte, and Ivanka Trump is here in Youngstown, Ohio, pumping up the masses ahead of Tuesday.
Ivanka is the latest surrogate to be dispatched to Ohio, a state that Trump won comfortably in 2016 after Barack Obama triumphed in 2008 and 2012.
Despite Trump’s 2016 win, Joe Biden is running neck-and-neck with the president this year, suggesting the disaffected voters who voted for Trump in 2016 might be having second thoughts.
In any case, the people here are having a good time, despite having to sit on increasingly muddy ground in front of Ivanka’s stage.
Judith Shortreed, 75, is here with her friend Mary Holland, 85. They are both members of the Trumbull county women for Trump group, a more than dozen-strong organization dedicated to re-electing the president.
Both Shortreed and Holland were wearing pink ‘Women for Trump’ hats, which had been signed by Donald Trump Jr. They were hoping to get Ivanka to sign them too.
“I’ve always admired Ivanka. She does so much for the children, she does so much for women, she’s a delightful speaker, I just love the enthusiasm of being involved,” Shortreed said.
Here’s some members of Trumbull County Women for Trump, waiting to hear Ivanka Trump speak in Youngstown OH. They want to get their hats signed. pic.twitter.com/895umgd7ya
Holland campaigned for Trump in 2016, and was even a guest of the campaign at the inauguration in DC. A camera crew filmed Holland getting her hair done before the inauguration, she told the Guardian. She added that she was wearing the same coat she wore that day.
A fervent supporter of Trump, Holland said: “I believe in everything he believes in.”
The pair wasn’t sure if Trump would win in 2016, but this year they are convinced of his victory.
“I think it’s going to be a landslide,” Shortreed said.
“Because – I don’t even know if this is any indication or not – but I think Trump has signs in people’s driveways 10 times more than [Biden has]. When you see the crowds that Trump is able to assemble – 20,000 compared to 20 for Biden – he just has the country all revved up.”
The Guardian suggested this could be because Biden is deliberately holding smaller rallies, in a stated effort to thwart the spread of coronavirus. Not so, said Shortreed.
“It’s the Pelosis and the Schumerss and the deep state that don’t want him out,” she said.
“Because number one, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and number two, he’s constantly making gaffes.”
Nina Lakhani reports from Pennsylvania, where she is speaking with Trump supporters outside his rally at Reading regional airport ...
Vincent Tusa, 56, who works in advertising and twice voted for Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, is a third-generation Italian American who supports Donald Trump’s hardline – some would say cruel and unjust – immigration policies. “I’m not a staunch Republican but we can’t be overrun by illegal immigrants. They need to come legally like my grandparents.”
Advocates have documented the dismantling of America’s immigration and asylum system over the past four years, as well as the separation of thousands of children from their parents at the southern border.
Tusa added: “Trump is a businessman and that gives me confidence. Biden doesn’t have the accomplishments, he’s cognitively challenged and he’s chosen an unqualified running mate based on identity politics.”
Vice-president candidate Kamala Harris’s experience includes being state attorney general and a US senator for California.
Tusa was wearing a mask but many people were not. However, volunteers were checking people’s temperatures as they entered the airport for the second of Trump’s four rallies on Saturday in the crucial swing state.
Nicolette Miller, 30, is here with her friend Megan Shaddick, 30. They grew up nearby but now live in Philadelphia.
Both will be voting for Trump for the second time and said the main reason for coming today was to be around like-minded people to express their support for the president without fear of being called racist.
“He stands behind small businesses, our law enforcement and hard-working people – that’s what this country was built on. And look at what he achieved in the Middle East: four major peace deals,” said Miller.
“He’s done more than any other president in the history of America. He’s trying to find the parents of those 500 children separated at the border but their parents are coming to claim them because they are illegal. The mainstream media spins and takes out of context everything he says,” added Shaddick.
Trump won the state’s precious 20 electoral votes by just over 44,000 votes in 2016 – or less than one percentage point – but the RealClearPolitics average of recent Pennsylvania polls, taken between 21 and 27 October, shows Biden with an 3.7-point advantage.
Donald Trump, who is currently at the podium at the second of four rallies today in Pennsylvania, has issued a statement on the rescue of an American citizen in Nigeria. US special forces rescued Philip Walton, 27, who was abducted on Tuesday from his home in neighboring southern Niger, two US officials said on condition of anonymity.
Last night, at my direction, the United States military conducted a successful operation to rescue an American hostage in Nigeria, kidnapped just 96 hours earlier. United States Special Forces executed a daring nighttime operation to rescue their fellow American with exceptional skill, precision, and bravery. No United States Service Members were harmed. The former hostage is currently in good health and has been reunited with his family.
Securing the freedom of Americans held in captivity abroad has been a top national security priority of my Administration. Since the beginning of my Administration, we have rescued over 55 hostages and detainees in more than 24 countries. Today’s operation should serve as a stark warning to terrorists and criminal thugs who mistakenly believe they can kidnap Americans with impunity.
Niger, like much of West Africa’s Sahel region, faces a deepening security crisis as groups with links to al-Qaida and the Islamic State carry out attacks on the army and civilians, despite help from French and US forces.
Four US soldiers were killed in an ambush in Niger in 2017, sparking debate about the US role in the sparsely populated West African desert that is home to some of the world’s poorest countries.
In a stunning display of enthusiasm, more than 9.6m Texans have voted ahead of election day, surpassing the total number of votes cast four years ago.
What that means for the races up and down the ballot is “the million dollar question”, says Emily M Farris, an associate professor of political science at Texas Christian University.
“We just don’t really know,” she says.
In what has been a reliably red state with low voter participation, 30.4% of this year’s ballots have been cast by voters who didn’t participate in 2016 at all, according to Tom Bonier, chief executive of political data firm TargetSmart. Turnout has surged especially among Asian, college-educated white and young Texans.
“You can definitively say now, more voters under the age of 30 have voted already in Texas than have ever voted in any election, and that’s remarkable,” Bonier says.
Nearly 4.2m Texans who voted early do not have a history of voting in either party’s primary election, Republican consultant Derek Ryan wrote in a report on Friday. Around 1.7m live in Republican-dominated precincts, while 1.2m are from areas that typically swing Democratic.
Ryan expects more than 12m Texans to vote when all is said and done, which would amount to a double-digit spike in turnout from 2016.
“Clearly people are interested, and they’re motivated with this election,” says Juan Carlos Huerta, a professor of political science at Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi.
“Texas is a tough state to vote in,” Huerta says. “And, you know, there’s plenty of folks who would say ‘Oh, that’s by design,’ because it’s designed to discourage participation.”
Donald Trump is still slightly favored to win Texas – a state he took by nine points in 2016 – though polls showing a close race have ignited a firestorm of speculation about whether this is the year the state actually turns blue.
“We feel good with where we’re at, but we need to keep on going, and you know, we’re not there yet,” says Abhi Rahman, communications director for the Texas Democratic party.
On top of the battle for the White House, Texas is home to a key Senate race, as air force veteran MJ Hegar tries to unseat Republican John Cornyn. But Cornyn is still favored to win re-election, and despite a more competitive race than many would have predicted back in March, “it would be a surprise” if Hegar prevailed, Farris says.
“Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat, you know, statewide in more than two decades now,” she says. “And so that kind of shift in Texas would be a pretty big change.”
Texas Democrats cancel event after campaign bus followed
Lois Beckett
Texas Democrats said they cancelled a campaign event on Friday for “public safety and security reasons”, after a group of Trump supporters driving trucks followed a Biden-Harris campaign bus on a highway outside of Austin.
While vice-presidential candidate Kamala Harris was campaigning in Texas that day, she was not on the bus, a spokesman for a state Democratic representative confirmed.
Multiple video clips posted on social media showed trucks flying Trump flags surrounding a Biden-Harris campaign bus on a highway.
“They’re like chasing him,” a man says, laughing as he narrates one clip shared by Trump supporters. “They’re literally escorting him out of town.”
A group of the same 12 cars has been following the Biden bus all over the country, CBS News Austin reported, citing Texas Democrats.
A Democratic campaign event scheduled for Friday evening in Pflugerville was cancelled due to security concerns related to the cars following the Biden bus, Sheryl Cole, a Democratic state representative, tweeted on Friday.
“Unfortunately, Pro-Trump Protesters have escalated well beyond safe limits,” she wrote.
This is a 1st for me - but we just cancelled a joint event in Pflugerville w/ @JoeBiden campaign, @AustinYoungDems, & more, due to security reasons. Unfortunately, Pro-Trump Protestors have escalated well beyond safe limits. Sorry to all who looked forward to this fun event. https://t.co/tSq4moqro0
The decision to cancel the Pflugerville event came after Democrats received reports in the late afternoon that there had been some kind of collision between a pro-Trump vehicle and another vehicle on I-35, André Treiber, a spokesperson for Cole, told the Guardian. The details of the incident on the highway are still not clear, Treiber said, including whether the collision turned out to be “an accident or an escalation”.
“When you have two hours to make the call, you make the safe call,” Treiber said. “We wanted to make sure everyone was safe.”
An event with Democratic politicians in Austin was also cancelled on Friday, but CBS News Austin reported that Democrats in Austin said the cancellation was not prompted by security concerns, but by the decision not to take focus from Kamala Harris, who was making appearances elsewhere in the state.
When the Biden-Harris bus stopped briefly in Austin earlier on Friday, Trump supporters heckled and faced off with Democrats, with Trump supporters calling Biden a “Chinese communist”, CBS Austin reported.
The cars following the bus include a pro-Trump hearse emblazoned with the slogan, “Vote like your life depends on it,” according to social media and news reports.
Republicans apologized after Trump supporters brought a casket to a Biden event outside Houston, with a dark-haired mannequin that some viewers saw as representing Kamala Harris, a local Fox News affiliate reported.
Axios reports that early voting in the 2020 election on Saturday afternoon had already reached 65.5% of 2016’s total turnout, citing state data compiled by the US Elections Project.
Michael McDonald, the University of Florida professor who administers the US Elections Project, said last week the high level of early voting augurs a record turnout of about 150 million, representing 65% of eligible voters, the highest rate since 1908.
People line up to cast their in-person absentee ballots at the Berkeley County Library on Friday in Hanahan, South Carolina. Voters waited about an hour and a half to cast their ballots. Photograph: Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images
Barack Obama vouched for Joe Biden’s “decency and kindness” while taking a swipe at Donald Trump’s idea of masculine strength in an appeal to Michigan voters in their first joint campaign appearance at Flint Northwestern High School.
An excerpt from the former US president’s remarks:
With Joe and Kamala at the helm … you’re not going to have to think about them every day. You’re not going to have to argue with your family about him every day. It won’t be so exhausting. You’ll be able to get on with your lives knowing that the president is not going to suggest we inject bleach as a possible cure of Covid. You won’t have to wake up in the morning, kind of open your phone and, hey, news flash: the president retweeted conspiracy theories that the Navy Seals didn’t actually kill Bin Laden. You’re not going to have a president who goes out of his way to insult people just because they don’t support them. This is not normal behavior, people. We would not tolerate it from a teacher or a coach or a co-worker or a family member. If a neighbor was acting like this, you would stay away from that neighbor. Why would we accept it from the president of the United States?
And you know what, there are consequences to his actions. There are consequences to his actions. This is not just a joke. It’s not funny. Those actions embolden other people to be mean, and divisive, and racist. And it frays at the fabric of all of our lives and it affects how our children see the world and how they treat each other. It affects the way our families get along. It affects the way the world sees America. That’s why Joe talks about the soul of America. That’s why he talks about decency, and kindness, and responsibility and hard work. That more than anything is what separates Joe Biden from his opponent: he actually cares about every American. He does not have a mean-spirited bone in his body. I have seen him spend time with people, strangers that he doesn’t know, when he hears they’re going through hardship, he talks about what he’s gone through. When he sees a kid, his eyes light up because because he thinks about his own kids and grandkids.
Joe Biden tries to live the values we cherish: honesty, hard work, kindness, humility, responsibility, helping somebody else out. That used to be the definition of manliness. Not strutting and showing off, acting important, bullying people. It used to be being a man meant taking care of other people. Not going around bragging, but just doing the work. Not looking for credit. Trying to live right. Passing on those values to your kids. Looking out for a community. Carrying your weight. Giving up a little bit of what you might have to help somebody who has a real need.
When you elect Joe, that’s what you’ll see reflected from the White House. And those shouldn’t be Republican or Democratic values – they didn’t used to be! They’re what we grew up learning for our parents and from our grandparents. And they’re the values we still try to teach our kids. And they’re not white or black or Hispanic or Asian or Native American values – they’re American values. And we’ve got to reclaim them right now. And to reclaim them, we’re going have to turn out like never before. And if we’re going to reclaim those values, we need to leave no doubt. We can’t afford to be complacent. Not this time. Not in this election.
Former president Barack Obama speaks at a rally for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. Photograph: Andrew Harnik/AP
