“Some of Joe Biden’s allies are waging a campaign behind the scenes to stop Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) from becoming his vice president,” CNBCreports.
“The concerns focus on her attacks on Biden during a primary debate last year, bringing into question her loyalty to the former vice president. Some also argue that she’s too ambitious and that she will be solely focused on eventually becoming president.”
The ferocity of this tells me that Kamala is probably the choice.
Walter Shapiro: “In recent years, the press has gotten a jump on many vice presidential picks by deciphering the flight path of a private plane departing from the V.P. nominee’s home airport. That tactic may not work during a pandemic—since everything from interviews with Biden to the vice presidential rollout may be done on Zoom.”
A new Monmouth poll in Georgia finds Joe Biden and Donald Trump tied in the presidential race at 47% each.
Said pollster Patrick Murray: “There is a lot of parity between the two candidates. Trump has a lock on his base but Biden is performing much better than Clinton did in key swing areas.”
In the regularly scheduled U.S. Senate race, Sen. David Perdue (R) leads challenger Jon Ossoff (D), 49% to 43%.
In the special U.S. Senate jungle primary, Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) leads the pack with 26% support, followed by Doug Collins (R) at 20%. Leading Democrats include Matt Lieberman at 14% and Raphael Warnock at 9%, but both could get shut out of the runoff if Loeffler and Collins take the top two spots.
A spokesman for President Trump’s reelection campaign clashed with Fox Business over the polls, arguing that public opinion surveys are “skewed to the left” and do not fully account for the president’s support ahead of the November election, The Hill reports.
Said press secretary Hogan Gidley: “A lot of those polls are junk.”
Rep. Denver Riggleman (R-VA) said he’s seriously considering running for Virginia governor, just weeks after his own party voted against giving him a second term in Congress, Bloomberg reports.
Said Riggleman: “The Virginia Republican Party is so broken. Maybe it is time for a third-party run.”
The Lincoln Project is out with an ad attacking Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME).
John Harris: “As it happens, the Trump Drops Out scenario is one I have trafficked to colleagues and sources for a couple years now, usually to dismissive grunts or quizzical stares. It is true that there is scant time left for the scenario to come to pass. It’s true also that, if I were a reliable predictor of Trump’s political fortunes, Hillary Clinton would now be running for re-election.”
“But even if one doesn’t really think Trump will drop out of the race—as a proselytizer of the theory I acknowledge it is a stretch—it is worth examining the reasons he just might, as a way of illuminating the bleakness of his situation with just over three months to go before the general election.”
Politico: “The [Tennessee Republican Primary for the U.S. Senate] was never supposed to be competitive: The Trump-backed candidate, Bill Hagerty — who served as the president’s ambassador to Japan — was on a glide path. … But as the contest has tightened in the run-up to the Aug. 6 election, Hagerty’s main opponent, Manny Sethi, has found traction by claiming to be the true, unapologetic Trumpian conservative in the race — while blasting Hagerty as a squishy, Mitt Romney-loving phony.”
“Hagerty largely ignored Sethi most of the race — seemingly confident of his lead which his internal polls had at 17 points — until earlier this month, when he abruptly went on the offensive… The battle is a window into the changing nature of the Republican Party, in which economic populism is in vogue, and race and identity have been thrust to the fore.”
“Joe Biden’s campaign is expanding its paid media effort into Ohio with a message focused on his new economic agenda, a sign of the campaign’s increasingly bullish view of the battleground map and a shot at President Trump on the issue he’s counted on to keep him in the White House,” NBC News reports.
“Until Thursday, the Democratic nominee’s campaign has focused most of its advertising on six states Trump carried in 2016 — Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.”
“President Trump’s campaign has quietly receded from the television airwaves in Michigan in recent weeks, shifting money elsewhere as one of the key Midwestern states that powered his surprise victory in 2016 threatens to move more firmly back into the Democratic column in 2020,” the New York Times reports.
Daily Beast: “Political donations by non-disclosing groups… have skyrocketed in recent years. During the 2018 election cycle, such groups provided roughly $178 million to federal political committees… In 2020, they’re on track to far surpass that total. By the end of June, non-disclosing groups had donated $177 million to federal political committees.”
“The result, experts say, has been an erosion of fundamental rules governing American elections and the growing amounts of money spent to affect their outcomes… The phenomenon is not confined to one political side or the other.”
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is moving to help two members of the so-called “Squad” who suddenly find themselves facing difficult primaries, the Washington Post reports.
“Pelosi endorsed freshman Rep. Rashida Tlaib, praising the Michigan Democrat after an outside group supporting her opponent, Brenda Jones, distributed a leaflet of Jones standing next to Pelosi, smiling.”
“The statement comes two weeks after Pelosi did something similar for Rep. Ilhan Omar, who also finds herself in a suddenly competitive primary.”
Nate Silver says national polling trends are more important than the lead itself.
“In other words, I don’t really care if Biden us up 8 nationally or whatever. I care about the numbers in Wisconsin, Florida, etc. But if Biden has gained 2 points in national polls, it’s likely that he’s also gained roughly 2 points in Wisconsin and Florida since they were last polled.”
“In theory, you can also impute these trends from state polls (i.e. if Biden is gaining in Michigan, he’s probably gaining in Wisconsin) and our model does do that too. But national polls give you a high volume of polls from a relatively constant set of pollsters—making trend detection easier.”
Washington Post: “While any transition of power can be jarring — particularly between two presidents of opposite parties — the shift from President Trump to Biden would be among the most head-snapping in American history. There is still a long campaign to run, with scaled-back party conventions next month and three debates expected in the fall, but Biden more and more lately has talked about, strategized over and begun planning for what he would do on Day 1, according to his aides and a review of his public statements.”
“Presidential candidates have long made ‘Day 1’ pledges that don’t actually occur during the first 24 hours — and often instead guide their first 100 days. But Biden is stretching even the usual limits, with his growing list of far-reaching and wide-ranging commitments.”
A new CNBC/Change Research poll finds most voters in six key swing states support an extension of the $600 per week unemployment benefit, along with another direct payment and state and local government relief.
In addition, a majority of respondents also opposes shielding corporations from coronavirus-related lawsuits.
“The ferocity of this tells me that Kamala is probably the choice.”
I agree. I think it’s been decided and some people are making a last-minute effort to change his mind. Why else would they be leaking to the press?
Agree. It’s obvious from the stories that the leaks are coming from “Biden allies” like Dodd who don’t like her for whatever reason. If Biden hadn’t picked her or isn’t leaning toward picking her, they’d be silent.
I think this may also explain why Biden had talking points on the Harris hit piece. He wouldn’t want his VP nom undermined in the media right before the big announcement.
This also sounds like Biden needs to purge his “allies”. This is a misogyny trigger — giving permission for all of that to be normalized against her.
Biden is 70-whoppsie Daisy. whoever he picks BETTER FRIGGIN be ready to be president on day 1.
also fuck Chris Dodd. Biden needed to be called out, Harris proved she isnt gonna be some party hack toadie who kisses the ass of whoever is in charge. That philosophy got us Clintonian neoliberalism.
“Some also argue that she’s too ambitious and that she will be solely focused on eventually becoming president.”
How dare she! VPs never consider being or running for President. Oh wait…
Statements like these infuriate me. They drip in misogyny.