A new Morning Consult poll in Texas finds Joe Biden edging Donald Trump in the presidential race, 47% to 46%. In the U.S. Senate race, Sen. John Cornyn (R) leads MJ Hegar, 44% to 38%.
New battleground polls from Hodas & Associates, a Republican polling firm:
- Michigan: Biden 53%, Trump 41%
- Pennsylvania: Biden 51%, Trump 45%
- Wisconsin: Biden 52%, Trump 38%
A new Gallup poll finds just 13% of U.S. adults are satisfied with the state of the nation, down seven percentage points in the past month and 32 points since reaching a 15-year high in February.
Key finding: “The plunge in the U.S. mood, both in the past month and since February, is mostly occurring among Republicans. Republicans’ satisfaction today (20%) is about half what it was a month ago (39%) and down 60 points since February, after the Senate acquitted President Donald Trump in his impeachment trial.”
A new Morning Consult poll in Kentucky finds Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is crushing challenger Amy McGrath by 17 points, 53% to 36%.
A new Morning Consult poll in South Carolina finds Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) barely ahead of challenger Jaime Harrison (D), 44% to 43%.
A new UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies poll in California shows Joe Biden leads Donald Trump in California by a whopping 39 percentage points, 67% to 28%.
While that’s not a surprise for a heavily Democratic state. What is notable, however, is the size of the gap and the degree to which approval of Trump’s work as president has declined among groups that until now have supported him.
Roger Marshall (R) has won the Kansas Senate Republican primary by defeating Kris Kobach (R), according to Decision Desk. Marshall will face Barbara Bollier (D) in the general election.
Damn. I was hoping for a Kobach win in the primary so that Bollier could win the seat. It is more of a struggle now.
Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-MO) lost the Democratic primary in Missouri on Tuesday night, falling to Cori Bush (D), an activist who entered politics after the Ferguson protests in 2014 and tapped into the recent energy of the Black Lives Matter movement to upset the 10-term congressman, the Washington Post reports.
Good. It is time for the old guard to retire, voluntarily or otherwise.
Politico calls it “a huge win for the left and a seismic loss for the Congressional Black Caucus, which has tried to snuff out challenges from younger candidates.”
Rep. Steve Watkins (R-KS), who was just indicted for voter fraud, has been defeated in a Republican primary challenge by Jake LaTurner (R), according to Decision Desk.
Six incumbent congressmen have now lost renomination this cycle.
“Kanye West has officially submitted signatures to appear on the ballot in Wisconsin, arguably the most important state on the presidential map — and those signatures were dropped off by an experienced GOP operative,” Vice News reports.
“Lane Ruhland, who a local reporter recorded as she headed in to drop off the signatures that would qualify West for his presidential bid in Wisconsin on Tuesday, is one of a handful of GOP election lawyers in the state — and a former legal counsel for the state Republican Party.”
New York Times: Republicans aid Kanye West’s bid to get on 2020 ballot.
“A St. Louis-based Republican consultant with ties to Missouri Gov. Mike Parson and U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley was listed as the point of contact for Kanye West’s campaign when it submitted signatures Monday to appear on the Arkansas ballot in November,” McClatchy reports.
“At least two people with links to Kanye West’s nascent presidential campaign are also active in Republican Party politics,” New York Magazine reports.
“Missouri voters on Tuesday approved Medicaid expansion to many of the state’s poorest adults, making their conservative state the second to join the Obamacare program through the ballot during the pandemic,” Politico reports.
The Trump campaign sued the state of Nevada claiming its plan to conduct the November election almost entirely by mail-in ballot is unconstitutional, NBC News reports.
Las Vegas Review Journal: “In Nevada and beyond, there has been virtually no credible evidence to support claims of increased fraud through voting by mail. Several attempts by conservative groups to block Nevada’s vote-by-mail primary due to fraud concerns have already been dismissed by the court.”
President Trump elaborated on his sudden support for mail-in voting in the state of Florida by noting the state is run by a Republican governor, The Hill reports.
Said Trump: “Florida’s got a great Republican governor. And it had a great Republican governor. Two great governors. And over a long period of time they’ve been able to get the absentee ballots done extremely professionally.”
He added: “They’re so well run. Florida’s a very well run state. Low taxes, low everything. They’ve done a great job. Really a great job. And the two governors, between the both of them, they’ve really got a great system of absentee ballots and even in the case of mail-in ballots.”
Politico: “New private polling shared first with Politico showed that Republicans have become overwhelmingly concerned about mail balloting, which Trump has claimed, without evidence, will lead to widespread voter fraud. A potentially decisive slice of Trump’s battleground-state base — 15% of Trump voters in Florida, 12% in Pennsylvania and 10% in Michigan — said that getting a ballot in the mail would make them less likely to vote in November.”
“Trump won each of those states by a thin margin in 2016, and less than 1% of Joe Biden voters said getting a ballot mailed to them would make them less likely to vote. Overall, 53% of voters in Florida and about half in Michigan and Pennsylvania expressed health concerns about casting their ballots in person and prefer voting by mail in November.”
President Trump told Fox & Friends that he’s likely to deliver his Republican convention speech from the White House.
Richard Stengel: “Trump giving his convention speech on the South Lawn is the clearest conceivable violation of the Hatch Act. Hundreds of White House staffers would be violating it, not to mention charges of criminal appropriation of Congressional funds for political purposes.”
The Washington Post reports that “the decision to stage the most high-profile political event of Trump’s reelection campaign at the national seat of presidential power would be just the latest break by Trump in presidential norms, which have historically drawn clear lines between official business of the president and campaign events.”
“A presidential address in front of the Gettysburg battlefield, or at the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. A speech from the first lady, Melania Trump, at Seneca Falls, N.Y., the cradle of the national movement for women’s rights. Perhaps a stage for the warm-up acts built at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.,” the New York Times reports.
“These are some of the scenarios that have been under discussion among President Trump and his top aides as they hold out hope for an ambitious, Trumpian display over four nights of Republican National Convention programming…”
“But his advisers have been thinking bigger, looking for ways to re-create what they view as the president’s most successful speech since the virus halted regular events: his address in front of Mount Rushmore over the July 4 weekend, when Mr. Trump described his effort to win a second term as a battle against a ‘new far-left fascism’ seeking to wipe out the nation’s values and history.”
A new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows 58% of respondents say the U.S. “should allow all voters to vote by mail in elections this year” to help slow the spread of the highly contagious disease.
There is a substantial partisan split within those results, driven by President Trump’s frequent attacks on mail voting. Among Democrats, 81% favored allowing everyone to vote by mail, and 57% of independents did too. Just 33% of Republicans agreed.
“Confidants of Joe Biden believe his choices for vice president have narrowed to Sen. Kamala Harris and Susan Rice — and would be surprised if he picks anyone else,” Axios reports.
“This is a snapshot of the nearly unanimous read that we get from more than a dozen people close to him. Of course, it comes with a giant asterisk: Only Biden knows for sure, and the more insiders know, the less they say to reporters.”
“The running mate, whoever she may be, first and foremost has to be acting in support of the candidate and governing as a partner should he win. So I absolutely think that’s the vitally important role. It’s not about one’s own profile.”
— Susan Rice, in an interview with CBS News.
When Rep. Karen Bass’ “friend and mentor” died three years ago, she eulogized the community organizer’s passing in remarks she inserted into the Congressional Record, Politico reports. Left out of the 406-word eulogy for Oneil Marion Cannon: He was a top member of the Communist Party USA for decades.
“I’m not a socialist. I’m not a communist. I’ve belonged to one party my entire life and that’s the Democratic Party and I’m a Christian.” — Rep. Karen Bass (D-CA), in an interview with NBC News.
Fox News host Tucker Carlson claimed it was “probably illegal” for Joe Biden to prioritize Black women in his running mate search while calling those candidates unqualified, the Daily Beast reports. LOL.
“A Trump campaign spokeswoman said Tuesday that the president has agreed to participate in three scheduled debates against Joe Biden organized by an independent commission,” Politico reports.
“Joe Biden still may be undecided about who to pick for a running mate, but Donald Trump’s team knows exactly who they want: Susan Rice,” Politico reports.
“Trump’s aides and allies accuse Rice — without delving too deeply into the evidence — of helping cover up crimes for two of the president’s favorite foils, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, making her just the kind of deep-state villain who could fire up his MAGA base.”
Said one Trump campaign official: “She is absolutely our No. 1 draft pick.”
“Donald Trump’s campaign says it knocked on over 1 million doors in the past week alone. Joe Biden’s campaign says it knocked on zero,” Politico reports.
“The Republican and Democratic parties — from the presidential candidates on down — are taking polar opposite approaches to door-to-door canvassing this fall. The competing bets on the value of face-to-face campaigning during a pandemic has no modern precedent, making it a potential wild card in November, especially in close races.”
Ryan Lizza: “Trump, according to 15 Republicans interviewed over the past week, is troubled that his usual arsenal seems to be having no effect. A president who thrives on polarizing conflict and identifying unpopular enemies has been thwarted, and Trump’s untamed political instincts, once treated by so many fellow Republicans with an almost mystical revery, appear increasingly unlikely to stave off defeat in November.”
Said a former White House official: “The enemy here isn’t something that punches back via Twitter. You need an enemy and Covid’s not cooperating, Biden’s not cooperating.”
Slate: “It is the late evening of Nov. 3, 2020—Election Day. The race is tight. It’s come down to the three states that President Donald Trump barely won in 2016: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Most in-person votes have been counted, and Trump holds a small lead in each state. But there are millions of mail-in ballots that election officials have not yet processed. Hundreds of thousands of voters dropped their ballots in the mail days ago, but they haven’t been received. Meanwhile, thousands of ballots that were mailed in time have been rejected due to alleged technical defects.”
“The outcome of the election turns on all these outstanding votes. But Trump, on the basis of the results so far, declares victory and dismisses the remaining mail-in ballots as fraudulent and illegitimate. The Republican-controlled legislatures of all three states agree, assigning their electoral votes to the president. Trump has secured a second term in the White House.”
“This scenario is not paranoid or outlandish. It is now chillingly plausible. Trump has spent several months laying the groundwork to steal the 2020 election this way.”
0 comments on “The Campaign Report – Biden leads in TX, MI, PA, WI”