thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--GOP Tries To Save Its Senate Majority, With Or Without Trump

ASSOCIATED PRESS Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell , R-Ky. , speaks to supporters during a rally in Lawrenceburg , Ky. , Wednesday , Oct. 28 , 2020 .
( AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley ) Control of the Senate can make or break a presidency .
With it , a reelected Trump could confirm his nominees and ensure a backstop against legislation from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif .
Without it , Joe Biden would face a potential wall of opposition to his agenda if the Democratic nominee won the White House .
Republican incumbents are straining for survival from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the heartland and the West and even Alaska .
Overpowered in fundraising and stuck in Washington until just last week to confirm Trump ’ s Supreme Court nominee , they are fanning out some alongside Trump for last-ditch , home-state tours to shore up votes .
Younger voters and more minorities are pushing some states toward Democrats , including in Colorado , where the parties have essentially stopped spending money for or against GOP Sen. Cory Gardner because it seems he is heading toward defeat by Democrat John Hickenlooper , a former @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Iowa , a state Trump won in 2016 but is now a toss-up as Sen. Joni Ernst struggles to fend off Democrat newcomer Theresa Greenfield .
Ernst wowed Republicans with a 2014 debut ad about castrating hogs but she faced criticism after last month ’ s debate when she stumbled over the break-even price for soybeans .
In Georgia , Trump calls David Perdue his favorite senator among the many who have jockeyed to join his golf outings and receive his private phone calls .
But the first-term senator faces a surge of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jon Ossoff is playing hardball .
Graham ’ s challenger in South Carolina , Jamie Harrison , has raised so much money — some $ 100 million — that it sent the top Trump ally scrambling to take the race seriously .
Graham swiftly raked in his own record haul as he led the Senate confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court .
The COVID crisis has shadowed the Senate races as Democrats linked Trump ’ s handling of the pandemic to the GOP ’ s repeated attempts to undo the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ insurance protections for those with preexisting medical conditions .
Republicans fired back that Democrats want to keep the economy closed , hurting jobs .

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans are fighting to save their majority, a final election push against the onslaught of challengers in states once off limits to Democrats but now hotbeds of a potential backlash to President Donald Trump and his allies on Capitol Hill.
Fueling the campaigns are the Trump administration’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis, shifting regional demographics and, in some areas, simply the chance to turn the page on the divisive political climate.
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Control of the Senate can make or break a presidency. With it, a reelected Trump could confirm his nominees and ensure a backstop against legislation from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. Without it, Joe Biden would face a potential wall of opposition to his agenda if the Democratic nominee won the White House.
In North Carolina, for example, the match-up between GOP Sen. Thom Tillis and Democratic challenger Cal Cunningham, among the most expensive in the nation, is close.
“At some point, you put it in the hands of voters,” said Dallas Woodhouse, a former executive director of the state’s Republican Party.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., speaks to supporters during a rally in Lawrenceburg, Ky., Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley) ASSOCIATED PRESS
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Republican incumbents are straining for survival from New England to the Deep South, in the heartland and the West and even Alaska. Overpowered in fundraising and stuck in Washington until just last week to confirm Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, they are fanning out some alongside Trump for last-ditch, home-state tours to shore up votes.
With the chamber now split, 53-47, three or four seats will determine Senate control, depending on which party wins the White House. The vice president breaks a tie in Senate votes.
What started as a lopsided election cycle with Republicans defending 23 seats, compared with 12 for Democrats, quickly became a more stark referendum on the president as Democrats reached deeper into Trump country and put the GOP on defense.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins arrives at a campaign stop Thursday, Oct. 29, 2020, in Limington, Maine. Collins is seeking reelection against Democratic challenger Sara Gideon, the speaker of the Maine House. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty) ASSOCIATED PRESS
Suddenly some of the nation’s better-known senators — Lindsey Graham in South Carolina, Susan Collins in Maine — faced strong reelection threats. Only two Democratic seats are being seriously contested, while at least 10 GOP-held seats are at risk.
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“I don’t see how we hold it,” said Chip Felkel, a Republican strategist in South Carolina who opposes the president.
Felkel added: “You’d be hard pressed to admit we don’t have a Trump problem.”
The political landscape is quickly changing from six years ago when most of these senators last faced voters. It’s a reminder of how sharp the national mood has shifted in the Trump era.
Younger voters and more minorities are pushing some states toward Democrats, including in Colorado, where the parties have essentially stopped spending money for or against GOP Sen. Cory Gardner because it seems he is heading toward defeat by Democrat John Hickenlooper, a former governor.
Republican U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner speaks during a debate with Democratic former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, Friday, Oct. 9, 2020 in Denver. (Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post via AP, Pool) ASSOCIATED PRESS
In more Republican-friendly terrain, the GOP senators must balance an appeal to Trump’s most ardent supporters with outreach to voters largely in suburbs who are drifting away from the president and his tone .
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Tillis is struggling to gain ground in North Carolina, a presidential battleground, even after Cunningham’s sex-texting scandal with an aide.
Arizona could see two Democratic senators for the first time since last century if former astronaut Mark Kelly maintains his advantage over GOP Sen. Martha McSally for the seat held by the late Republican John McCain.
A vivid dynamic is in Iowa, a state Trump won in 2016 but is now a toss-up as Sen. Joni Ernst struggles to fend off Democrat newcomer Theresa Greenfield. Ernst wowed Republicans with a 2014 debut ad about castrating hogs but she faced criticism after last month’s debate when she stumbled over the break-even price for soybeans.
Democratic candidate for Senate Jon Ossoff, right, and Democratic candidate for Senate Raphael G Warnock, left, arrive before they speak to a crowd during a "Get Out the Early Vote" event at the SluttyVegan ATL restaurant on Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2020, in Jonesboro, Ga. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson) ASSOCIATED PRESS
In Georgia, Trump calls David Perdue his favorite senator among the many who have jockeyed to join his golf outings and receive his private phone calls. But the first-term senator faces a surge of new voters in the state and Democrat Jon Ossoff is playing hardball.
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Ossoff called Pedue a “crook” over the senator’s stock trades during the pandemic. Perdue shot back that the Ossoff would do anything to mislead Georgians about Democrats’ “radical and socialist” agenda.
Democrats have tapped into what some are calling a “green wave” — a new era of fundraising — as small-dollar donations pour in from across the country from Americans expressing their political activism with their pocketbooks.
Graham’s challenger in South Carolina, Jamie Harrison, has raised so much money — some $100 million — that it sent the top Trump ally scrambling to take the race seriously. Graham swiftly raked in his own record haul as he led the Senate confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court.
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks at a campaign rally on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2020, in Conway, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard) ASSOCIATED PRESS
Competitive races are underway in Republican strongholds of Texas, Kansas and Alaska where little known Al Gross broke state records, Democrats said, in part with viral ads introducing voters to the military-veteran-turned-doctor who once fought off a grizzly bear.
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Swooping in to fill the gap for Republicans is the Senate Leadership Fund, tapping deep-pocketed donors. Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson has funneled more than $60 million to help Republicans hold the Senate.
Over the weekend, the fund was pouring $4.6 million to one of the rare Republican bright spots — in Michigan, where John James, a Black Republican businessman is gaining on Democratic Sen. Gary Peters.
“We see a potential opportunity,” said Senate Leadership Fund president Steven Law.
The only other state where Republicans are playing offense is Alabama, where Democratic Sen. Doug Jones pulled off a rare special election win the Trump stronghold but now wages a longshot campaign against Republican Tommy Tuberville, a former Auburn football coach.
“We are confident heading into the home stretch because we remain on offense is so many seats across the country,” said Stewart Boss, a spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
The COVID crisis has shadowed the Senate races as Democrats linked Trump’s handling of the pandemic to the GOP’s repeated attempts to undo the Obama-era Affordable Care Act, particularly its insurance protections for those with preexisting medical conditions. Republicans fired back that Democrats want to keep the economy closed, hurting jobs.
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David Flaherty, a Colorado-based Republican pollster, said his surveys are showing that COVID will be “the most likely issue many voters will make their decisions on.”
“In more places in the country than not, the president is not getting good marks” on that, Flaherty said, and it’s damaging Senate GOP candidates, “especially those in lockstep with the president.”
Several races may drag well past election night including if no candidate secures a majority, including in Georgia or Maine, where Collins was once considered among the most independent senators, is now confronting critics from the right and left.
Jesse Hunt, spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee said the races are tightening in the final days.
“We always knew this was going to be a competitive election cycle,” he said.
___
Associated Press writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--These Evangelicals Voted For Trump In 2016. They Refuse To Do It Again.

The emotional heavy lifting white evangelical voters need to do to move away from the Republican Party is no easy feat , according to John Fea , a history professor at Messiah College and the author of “ Believe Me : The Evangelical Road to Donald Trump.
” And it would be even harder for them to vote for Biden , instead of a third-party candidate .
The Christian right has convinced evangelical voters that abortion and religious liberty are the most important issues facing believers , Fea said .
Ahead of the 2020 election , pro-Trump evangelicals have been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ anyone who votes for Biden is not a real Christian or will be held responsible for the killing of millions of babies in the womb , he said .
The voters , who range in age from 31 to 77 , spoke of praying for weeks about their choice .
They peppered their conversations with references to Bible verses and stories , trying to demonstrate how their faith has shaped their views .
Some talked about being misunderstood by their family members , being politely forced out of church ministries or having to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most , this year will mark the first time they have ever voted to put a Democrat in the White House — not because they agree with everything Biden and the Democratic Party stand for , but because this is where their faith has led them .
The Fruits Of His Spirit A Different View Of Christianity And Power

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Becky Madigan carried around her copy of Virginia’s sample election ballot for days. After a while, the edges of the pale yellow form began creasing. She highly suspects she spilled coffee on it at one point.
Still, the 54-year-old from Leesburg read the ballot again and again, praying daily for clarity.
Madigan is an evangelical Christian. For most of her life, she believed that meant she had to be a Republican. It’s why she voted for Donald Trump in 2016.
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“It was this very deep programming,” she told HuffPost. “It wasn’t even necessarily a conscious thought. I can remember as a very young woman thinking that you can’t be a Christian and a Democrat.”
But now, her heart is in a different place. She has been appalled by the president’s character and the way he treats people, and she doesn’t think she can stomach four more years. She spent months thinking through her decision to vote for Democratic candidate Joe Biden, reading the Gospels and asking Jesus to speak to her and allay her fears.
“I am jumping way out of the box here, I’m jumping into the deep end,” she told HuffPost in early October. “Hopefully, someone throws me a life preserver.”
One day, as she was reading through her Bible, clarity came in the form of a verse ― Luke 11:42. The verse decries people who tithe according to the letter of the law, while neglecting “justice and the love of God.”
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This is what the Republican Party has been doing, Madigan thought ― it has been ignoring justice and love. She underlined the verse in her Bible and wrote it down on her sample ballot.
On Oct. 23, when she walked into the voting booth at Loudoun County’s General Registrar’s office to vote for a Democrat for the first time in her life, she was overcome by tears.
“It just feels like a big moment in our history, but not only collectively as a nation, but it just really felt like a big moment for me because I did it differently this time. I didn’t toe the party line or do what I was supposed to do,” Madigan told HuffPost after voting. “Here I am, at 54, and for the first time, I feel like I’ve really voted and studied and made my own decision, fear or no fear.”
Becky Madigan is an evangelical Christian voter from Virginia. A Bible verse that helped her find clarity about her decision to vote for Joe Biden is written on her sample ballot, on the left. Courtesy of Becky Madigan
For months now, there have been rumblings of discontent about Trump in certain pockets of American evangelicalism. These dissenters have become increasingly vocal over the past year, publishing opinion pieces and books challenging fellow evangelicals to reconsider their loyalty to the Republican Party. Vote Common Good, a faith-based, anti-Trump group led by evangelical pastor Doug Pagitt, spent much of the year reaching out to evangelicals on a nationwide bus tour. Some leaders have even publicly endorsed Biden.
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Despite this movement, Madigan’s decision to vote for the former vice president still makes her an anomaly in her religious group. White evangelicals have long been a reliable base for the Republican Party and there’s no indication that will change substantially this year. About 78% of white evangelicals told the Pew Research Center this fall they were leaning toward voting for Trump. Many of the evangelical leaders speaking up against the president these days have either expressed their displeasure with Trump before or hail from the progressive wing of American evangelicalism.
Nevertheless, since white evangelicals are a key part of the electorate ― making up over a quarter of voters during the 2016 election ― the slightest dip in support in a few crucial swing states could spell trouble for Trump.
The emotional heavy lifting white evangelical voters need to do to move away from the Republican Party is no easy feat, according to John Fea, a history professor at Messiah College and the author of “Believe Me: The Evangelical Road to Donald Trump.” And it would be even harder for them to vote for Biden, instead of a third-party candidate. The Christian right has convinced evangelical voters that abortion and religious liberty are the most important issues facing believers, Fea said. Ahead of the 2020 election, pro-Trump evangelicals have been making the case on social media that anyone who votes for Biden is not a real Christian or will be held responsible for the killing of millions of babies in the womb, he said.
Because of these fear-based tactics, many first-time Democratic voters will have moments in which they will second-guess their decision to vote for Biden, Fea said. To break away from their loyalty to the Republican Party, these Christians need to believe that Trump and some of his policies are so deeply immoral that they have no other choice but to vote a different way, he said.
“Such a move is not for the faint of heart. It requires courage,” Fea said.
To get a snapshot of the reasons voters like Madigan have chosen to go against the grain, HuffPost spoke to nine white evangelical voters from across the country who cast their ballots for Trump in 2016 but have decided not to do so again this year.
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The voters, who range in age from 31 to 77, spoke of praying for weeks about their choice. They peppered their conversations with references to Bible verses and stories, trying to demonstrate how their faith has shaped their views. Some talked about being misunderstood by their family members, being politely forced out of church ministries or having to find a new church altogether. For most, this year will mark the first time they have ever voted to put a Democrat in the White House — not because they agree with everything Biden and the Democratic Party stand for, but because this is where their faith has led them.
“The fact that Trump has fulfilled his promise by appointing three conservative Supreme Court justices might make a vote for Biden a bit easier,” Fea said. “Whatever the case, some conservative evangelicals are looking for reasons ― any ― to feel better about voting for Biden.”
Here are just a few of the issues that came up repeatedly in HuffPost’s conversations with those nine voters.
The Fruits Of His Spirit
Bill Werts, a 46-year-old veteran from Greensburg, Pennsylvania, grew up deeply immersed in white evangelical culture. He listened to conservative talk radio for years and looked up to Vice President Mike Pence as a role model.
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Werts told HuffPost the prospect of breaking away from the Republican Party in a presidential election for the first time breaks his heart. But ultimately, he said, Trump did not pass his litmus test for character and integrity.
He referred to Bible passages about the “fruits” of a good Christian life ― characteristics like love, kindness, gentleness and self-control.
“Christ said by their fruits you will know them, and that a good tree can’t bear bad fruit,” Werts said. “I was looking for those fruits of the spirit and Trump had none. Zero.”
“Character and integrity come before policy,” he added. “If I agree with everything you agree with, but you have no character and integrity, I’m not voting for you.”
All nine voters HuffPost spoke with brought up Trump’s character as a key reason for their loss of faith in him.
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Sandy Orth, a 77-year-old from Des Moines, Iowa, has been a registered Republican her entire adult life. Orth had reservations about Trump in 2016, but she was hoping he would be humbled by the presidency once he arrived in Washington. Instead, Orth said, the opposite has occurred ― Trump has changed the office of the presidency to suit his own goals.
Orth said she’s heard other Christians defend Trump because of his appointment of conservative judges. But Orth said she refuses to give the president a pass for his behavior.
“What good are these Christian judges when we live in a country where we hate each other so much?” she asked. “I have always felt that the person at the head of a family, team, or company sets the tone that trickles down. And I feel very strongly about the fact that having Donald Trump as our president is setting the tone that we see in our country today ― divisiveness, hatred, lying. People are not truthful about things, they don’t show concern for their fellow human beings.”
“I think we need a president who is truthful and transparent and who can bring peace to our country and bring people back together again,” she added. “I think somebody of better character can do that job a lot better than our current president.”
Catherine Prichard, an evangelical voter from Ohio, is pictured here voting with her daughter. Courtesy of Catherine Prichard
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Welcoming The Stranger
Catherine Prichard, a 48-year-old from New Paris, Ohio, told HuffPost that from childhood, she had always equated being Christian with being a Republican.
Prichard started to question her decision to vote for Trump in 2016 days after his inauguration, when he signed an executive order halting the U.S. refugee resettlement program and blocking immigration from several predominantly Muslim countries. Prichard’s concerns escalated the next year, when the Trump administration implemented a “zero tolerance” policy at the U.S.-Mexico border that resulted in over 2,500 minors being separated from their parents or caregivers. This 2018 policy proved to be deeply unpopular ― even among typically loyal evangelical voices, such as Franklin Graham.
Prichard said she’s upset that, years later, hundreds of kids still haven’t been reunited with their parents.
“It broke my heart and it still breaks my heart, as a mom, as a grandmother. No mother or father should be without their child,” she said.
The migrants at the border have a right to seek asylum, Prichard told HuffPost ― and Christians have a responsibility toward them. She pointed to a Bible passage from the Gospel of Matthew ― one that has been quoted often by critics of Trump’s immigration agenda ― that calls on Christians to care for the “least of these.”
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“Trump just doesn’t get it and neither does his administration,” she said about the verse.
Although Trump later rescinded the zero-tolerance policy, Adam Hardy, a 39-year-old from Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, hasn’t forgotten what happened that spring. He said Trump’s approach to that crisis planted the first seeds of doubt in his heart. The Bible calls on Christians to welcome marginalized people ― not to treat immigrants as the enemy, he said.
“If we as evangelicals want to claim that we’re pro-life, then we should be pro every life,” Hardy said.
Joy Kinser, a 31-year-old from Oklahoma City, also referred to Trump’s response to migrants at the border in 2018 as the period when her politics started shifting. Kinser said she was grieved to see people in her faith community claiming on social media that God was on Trump’s side of this debate, because he was a God of law and order.
“Something in me broke. I thought, ‘If this is who we think God is, that he wants to traumatize children to get his way, I don’t think we know the true nature of God,’” she said. “We are aligning this president with God’s nature and I don’t think this is right.”
Joy Kinser of Oklahoma City is pictured here after dropping off her absentee ballot. Courtesy of Joy Kinser
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‘Pro-Life’ From ‘Womb To Tomb’
Nearly all of the voters HuffPost interviewed said abortion was the toughest issue they had to navigate this year. Their belief that life begins at conception is what pushed many to ignore their misgivings and vote for Trump in 2016.
But over the past four years, these voters’ ideas about what “pro-life” means have expanded.
Kelly Dingess, a 35-year-old evangelical Christian from San Diego, said she believes being “pro-life” shouldn’t just mean being “pro-birth.” It’s also about preventing unplanned pregnancies by increasing young people’s access to sex education, she said, and about making sure mothers are financially supported.
“It’s beyond just getting the child born,” she said.
Kinser said she has been passionate about the “pro-life” movement for years. But under the Trump presidency, Kinser has started questioning how she defined that term.
Being “pro-life” should mean protecting every life, including those of immigrants and minorities, from “womb to tomb,” she said. That means thinking about how to decrease the need for abortion by supporting paid family leave and health care coverage for women and children, Kinser added. These policies tend to be Democratic causes, she said.
In addition, Kinser has been disturbed by how white supremacists seem to have been empowered during the Trump presidency, while minorities feel unsafe, she said. The lives of Black Americans, Native Americans and other marginalized communities matter to God, she said. When the Trump administration forcefully dispersed a crowd of Black Lives Matter protesters before the president’s photo shoot in front of a church near the White House, Kinser remembers thinking, “This is not how I want my Christianity to be manifested in politics.”
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“I feel like it’s a really ugly false dichotomy we’ve been given where we have to support everything Trump stands for, which includes harm to minorities and harm to immigrants, and support the unborn, or we have to support Biden and support minorities and be a baby killer,” she said. “If I have one, myopic view of abortion that allows me to support harm in countless other ways, that is really damaging.”
Ronald Hawthorne and his wife are pictured here voting early at a drop-off ballot box in Warren, Michigan. Ronald Hawthorne
Damage To Christian Witness
When Ronald Hawthorne, a 51-year-old from Warren, Michigan, accepted Jesus into his heart in the summer of 2016, it turned his life around. Hawthorne told HuffPost that it helped him step away from drugs and alcohol, introduced him to a supportive spiritual community ― an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Church ― and, eventually, led him to his wife.
It also changed the way he voted. Hawthorne said he had serious trepidations about Trump before the 2016 election. But with the encouragement of his new pastor, he cast his ballot for Trump ― before tucking the memory of that decision deep into his brain and deciding to focus less on politics and more on his spiritual journey.
Three years later, Hawthorne’s faith felt stronger than it had ever been and he was eager to tell others about the way Jesus had changed his life. He was talking to a co-worker about the Gospel one day, when the man asked a question that caught him off guard.
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“He looked right at me and said, ‘Why would I want to be a Christian when you support such a horrible human being?’”
Hawthorne said the question left him dumbfounded ― and cut the conversation short.
“It just reminded me of how I felt that day in that voting booth,” Hawthorne said. “I didn’t have an answer.”
That conversation with his co-worker was the beginning of a long journey. He started paying more attention to politics and eventually came to the conclusion that the Jesus he had come to know was not reflected in Trump’s words and policies.
That’s why this year, Hawthorne said, Trump will not have his vote.
“When the world looks at the church, we’re supposed to look different. Purer, a higher moral standard. That’s gone with Donald Trump,” he said.
Dingess, the San Diego resident, told HuffPost she believes that Trump has damaged evangelicals’ public witness. She said she sees evidence of that in her interactions with an online debate group. The private Facebook group, where people post opinions about news articles and invite others to offer alternate perspectives, is largely made up of people who Dingess says don’t have any specific religious affiliation.
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When a story about evangelicals is posted on that group, Dingess said, other members react by pointing out the religious group’s hypocrisy.
“They say things like, ‘I thought we were supposed to love people,’ and ‘What would your savior say about this?’” she said. “And I can’t even tell them they’re wrong, because they’re right.”
The members of her debate group have a deep distrust of religion, she said. Dingess worries that, because of evangelicals’ indefatigable support for Trump, they have “completely lost their ability to win people for Jesus.”
Faith leaders pray with President Donald Trump during a rally for evangelical supporters at the King Jesus International Ministry church in Miami in January 2020. Lynne Sladky/AP
A Different View Of Christianity And Power
Over the past four years, Dingess has also become increasingly disenchanted with the Republican Party. Its leaders have failed to keep Trump in check in an effort to hold onto political power, she said.
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As a result of that disappointment, Dingess said, she recently changed her party affiliation.
“I always held these people on this moral pedestal,” Dingess said about Republican leadership. “But they’re there for the power and they don’t care who they hurt.”
Kinser said she believes some evangelicals have fallen prey to Christian nationalism, fusing Christianity with a desire for political power. Evangelicals feel that their religious rights are being taken away and that traditional family values are being attacked, she said.
“We become so fearful of being oppressed that we become the oppressor, we pass laws that restrict people’s freedom when God actually gives us the dignity of choice,” she said. “We’re convinced that we need temporary power for the church to be what it’s supposed to be. But there is no threat to the true church of Jesus Christ when we are persecuted.”
She pointed to the story of Palm Sunday, which is about Jesus arriving in Jerusalem. People expected him to ride in triumphantly, in a show of defiance of the Roman empire, Kinser said. But instead, Jesus rode into the city on a donkey and days later, died on a cross.
“We feel that it’s going to hinder us if we don’t have power. But I think our quest for power is hindering our witness,” she said.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Texas Supreme Court Denies Republican Effort To Toss Nearly 127,000 Ballots

The state ’ s all-Republican high court rejected the request from a state representative and two GOP candidates without explaining its decision .
Their effort to have the Harris County ballots thrown out is still set to be taken up during an emergency hearing in federal court on Monday .
Conservative Texas activists have railed against expanded voting access in Harris County , where a record 1.4 million early votes have already been cast .
The county is the nation ’ s third largest and a crucial battleground in Texas , where President Donald Trump and Republicans are bracing for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen is expected to rule on the same issue on Monday .
Hanen ’ s decision to hear arguments on the brink of Election Day drew attention from voting rights activists .
The Texas Supreme Court also rejected a nearly identical challenge last month .
Conservative GOP activists have filed a battery of court challenges over moves to expand voting options during the COVID-19 pandemic .
The challenges have not involved President Donald Trump ’ s campaign .
Trump won Texas by nine points in 2016 but polls @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reach in America ’ s biggest red state .
Democrats also need to flip only nine seats to reclaim a majority in the Texas House for the first time in 20 years , and have aggressively targeted several races in Harris County .
Harris County has offered 10 drive-thru locations where its nearly 5 million residents can cast ballots in their cars instead of going inside polling centers .
The accommodation aims to prevent transmission of the coronavirus .
Jared Woodfill , a former chairman of the Harris County GOP , argued that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for drive-thru voting and that only voters who need assistance are eligible to cast a ballot curbside .
Woodfill ’ s lawsuit also noted that all but one of the drive-thru centers were set up “ in Democrat areas of the county.
” More than 40 % of Harris County residents are Latino , and about one in five residents are Black .
The Texas Supreme Court , which is controlled entirely by Republicans , rejected an identical lawsuit last month .
Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins , who runs the county ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Greg Abbott to affirm that the drive-thru locations are legal but received no response .
Texas is one of just five states that did not allow for widespread mail-in voting this year during the coronavirus pandemic , which has killed nearly 18,000 people statewide .
Abbott instead expanded early voting by one week , and that extra time helped Texas already surpass 2016′s total votes even before Tuesday ’ s election .
More than 9.7 million people have cast early ballots in Texas , where turnout typically ranks among the lowest in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that total turnout in Texas could surpass 12 million , and Harris County officials have taken more steps than most to expand voting access .
The county tripled the number of polling places and last week had eight locations that stayed open for 24 hours .

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DALLAS (AP) — The Texas Supreme Court on Sunday denied a Republican-led petition to toss nearly 127,000 ballots cast at drive-thru voting places in the Houston area.
The state’s all-Republican high court rejected the request from a state representative and two GOP candidates without explaining its decision. Their effort to have the Harris County ballots thrown out is still set to be taken up during an emergency hearing in federal court on Monday.
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Conservative Texas activists have railed against expanded voting access in Harris County, where a record 1.4 million early votes have already been cast. The county is the nation’s third largest and a crucial battleground in Texas, where President Donald Trump and Republicans are bracing for the closest election in decades on Tuesday.
U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen is expected to rule on the same issue on Monday. Hanen’s decision to hear arguments on the brink of Election Day drew attention from voting rights activists. The Texas Supreme Court also rejected a nearly identical challenge last month.
Conservative GOP activists have filed a battery of court challenges over moves to expand voting options during the COVID-19 pandemic. The challenges have not involved President Donald Trump’s campaign.
Trump won Texas by nine points in 2016 but polls have shown Democrat Joe Biden still within reach in America’s biggest red state. Democrats also need to flip only nine seats to reclaim a majority in the Texas House for the first time in 20 years, and have aggressively targeted several races in Harris County.
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Harris County has offered 10 drive-thru locations where its nearly 5 million residents can cast ballots in their cars instead of going inside polling centers. The accommodation aims to prevent transmission of the coronavirus. Jared Woodfill, a former chairman of the Harris County GOP, argued that Texas election law makes no explicit allowances for drive-thru voting and that only voters who need assistance are eligible to cast a ballot curbside.
Woodfill’s lawsuit also noted that all but one of the drive-thru centers were set up “in Democrat areas of the county.” More than 40% of Harris County residents are Latino, and about one in five residents are Black.
Counting the drive-thru votes, Woodfill argued, would “call into question the integrity and legality of a federal election.”
The Texas Supreme Court, which is controlled entirely by Republicans, rejected an identical lawsuit last month. Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins, who runs the county’s elections, had asked Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to affirm that the drive-thru locations are legal but received no response.
Texas is one of just five states that did not allow for widespread mail-in voting this year during the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed nearly 18,000 people statewide. Abbott instead expanded early voting by one week, and that extra time helped Texas already surpass 2016′s total votes even before Tuesday’s election.
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More than 9.7 million people have cast early ballots in Texas, where turnout typically ranks among the lowest in the country. Some elections experts predict that total turnout in Texas could surpass 12 million, and Harris County officials have taken more steps than most to expand voting access.
The county tripled the number of polling places and last week had eight locations that stayed open for 24 hours.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Trump Adviser Baselessly Claims Democrats Will Try To 'Steal' Election

A senior adviser to President Donald Trump ’ s reelection campaign said he expects Trump will secure far more electoral votes on Election Day but that Democrats will try to “ steal ” his reelection in the days after .
His comments come as Trump tries to prevent mail-in ballots received after Tuesday from being counted .
“ If you speak with many smart Democrats , they believe that President Trump will be ahead on election night , probably getting 280 electoral [ votes ] , somewhere in that range , ” adviser Jason Miller told ABC News ’ George @ @ @ @ @ @ @ electoral votes are needed to win the election .
“ And then they ’ re going to try to steal it back after the election , ” he continued .
“ We believe that we will be over 290 electoral votes on election night .
So no matter what they try to do , what kind of hijinx or lawsuits or whatever kind of nonsense they try to pull off , we ’ re still going to have enough electoral votes to get President Trump reelected.
” Trump has repeatedly insisted that a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , even though several states allow mail-in votes to be counted after Nov. 3 , as long as they are postmarked by that date .
“ Hopefully , the few states remaining that want to take a lot of time after Nov. 3 to count ballots , that won ’ t be allowed by the various courts , ” Trump said Wednesday .
Trump has also contested the overall legitimacy of mail-in voting , which more voters are using this year amid the coronavirus pandemic .
The U.S. Supreme Court last week ruled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ballots received in Pennsylvania and North Carolina from being counted several days after Tuesday ’ s election .
Trump on Friday called the court ’ s decision “ crazy.
” Anita Dunn , a senior adviser to Democratic nominee Joe Biden , also said Sunday that a winner may not be declared on election night because of uncounted mail-in ballots .
“ Obviously three big battleground states may be slower to count their votes .
Pennsylvania in particular , which both campaigns are very focused on right now , ” Dunn told Stephanopoulos @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , at least seven counties have said they will not start counting mail-in ballots until the day after the election due to staffing concerns .
“ But , Georgia and North Carolina and Florida are all states that I think we can reasonably assume we ’ re going to hear results from either election night or early the next morning , ” Dunn added .
We want to know what you ’ re hearing on the ground from the candidates .
If you get any interesting ― or suspicious !
― campaign mailers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think we should know about , email us at scoops @ huffpost.com .

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A senior adviser to President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign said he expects Trump will secure far more electoral votes on Election Day but that Democrats will try to “steal” his reelection in the days after. His comments come as Trump tries to prevent mail-in ballots received after Tuesday from being counted.
“If you speak with many smart Democrats, they believe that President Trump will be ahead on election night, probably getting 280 electoral [votes], somewhere in that range,” adviser Jason Miller told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos on Sunday. At least 270 electoral votes are needed to win the election.
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“And then they’re going to try to steal it back after the election,” he continued. “We believe that we will be over 290 electoral votes on election night. So no matter what they try to do, what kind of high jinks or lawsuits or whatever kind of nonsense they try to pull off, we’re still going to have enough electoral votes to get President Trump reelected.”
Trump has repeatedly insisted that a winner should be declared on Election Day, even though several states allow mail-in votes to be counted after Nov. 3, as long as they are postmarked by that date.
“Hopefully, the few states remaining that want to take a lot of time after Nov. 3 to count ballots, that won’t be allowed by the various courts,” Trump said Wednesday. Trump has also contested the overall legitimacy of mail-in voting, which more voters are using this year amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The U.S. Supreme Court last week ruled against Republicans’ efforts to prevent absentee ballots received in Pennsylvania and North Carolina from being counted several days after Tuesday’s election. Trump on Friday called the court’s decision “crazy.”
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This decision is CRAZY and so bad for our Country. Can you imagine what will happen during that nine day period. The Election should END on November 3rd. https://t.co/Hkftv9Jp56 — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 30, 2020
Anita Dunn, a senior adviser to Democratic nominee Joe Biden, also said Sunday that a winner may not be declared on election night because of uncounted mail-in ballots.
“Obviously three big battleground states may be slower to count their votes. Pennsylvania in particular, which both campaigns are very focused on right now,” Dunn told Stephanopoulos in a separate interview.
In Pennsylvania, at least seven counties have said they will not start counting mail-in ballots until the day after the election due to staffing concerns.
“But, Georgia and North Carolina and Florida are all states that I think we can reasonably assume we’re going to hear results from either election night or early the next morning,” Dunn added.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Trump Jokes His Supporters Were 'Protecting' Biden's Bus On Highway

President Donald Trump on Sunday mockingly claimed that his supporters were “ protecting ” a campaign bus belonging to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden when a caravan of vehicles dangerously surrounded it on a Texas highway , leading to a vehicular collision .
“ They were protecting their bus yesterday because they ’ re nice , ” Trump said at a rally in Michigan to cheers , laughter and applause .
Video that captured the situation in Hays County on Friday showed the tour bus being surrounded by vehicles with Trump flags .
The person recording it jokes that they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Texas .
As the camera pans to the surrounding drivers , two vehicles directly behind the bus ram into one another .
One of the vehicles was reportedly being driven by a volunteer with Biden ’ s campaign .
A Biden campaign official , speaking with CNN , said the drivers cut off the bus and forced it to drop its speed to 25 mph .
Staffers on the bus reportedly called 911 amid the chaos .
President Trump on Biden bus incident in Texas : `` You see the way our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ yesterday because they 're nice . ''
RELATED : Biden campaign cancels event in Texas after pro-Trump cars surrounded its bus https : //t.co/8wFMinbLjC pic.twitter.com/a3mMr8RmQ8 — The Hill ( @ thehill ) November 1 , 2020 Biden ’ s campaign and state Democrats canceled multiple events in Texas following the incident .
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel , when asked about the video on Sunday , said that Trump wouldn ’ t endorse “ hurting other people.
” On Saturday , Trump tweeted a video of the vehicles with the caption : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Certainly you don ’ t want harm , and we shouldn ’ t be hurting other people so the president would not endorse that , ” McDaniel said on CBS ’ s “ Face the Nation.
” We want to know what you ’ re hearing on the ground from the candidates .
If you get any interesting ― or suspicious !
― campaign mailers , robocalls or hear anything else you think we should know about , email us at scoops @ huffpost.com .

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President Donald Trump on Sunday mockingly claimed that his supporters were “protecting” a campaign bus belonging to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden when a caravan of vehicles dangerously surrounded it on a Texas highway, leading to a vehicular collision.
“They were protecting their bus yesterday because they’re nice,” Trump said at a rally in Michigan to cheers, laughter and applause.
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Video that captured the situation in Hays County on Friday showed the tour bus being surrounded by vehicles with Trump flags.
This is a traffic violation and attempted homicide. Why hasn’t anyone been arrested? pic.twitter.com/QnfF4vXMQn — melissa “cancel student debt” byrne (@mcbyrne) October 31, 2020
The person recording it jokes that they’re trying to run Biden out of Texas. As the camera pans to the surrounding drivers, two vehicles directly behind the bus ram into one another. One of the vehicles was reportedly being driven by a volunteer with Biden’s campaign.
A Biden campaign official, speaking with CNN, said the drivers cut off the bus and forced it to drop its speed to 25 mph. Staffers on the bus reportedly called 911 amid the chaos.
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President Trump on Biden bus incident in Texas: "You see the way our people -- they were protecting his bus yesterday because they're nice."
RELATED: Biden campaign cancels event in Texas after pro-Trump cars surrounded its bus https://t.co/8wFMinbLjC pic.twitter.com/a3mMr8RmQ8 — The Hill (@thehill) November 1, 2020
Biden’s campaign and state Democrats canceled multiple events in Texas following the incident.
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, when asked about the video on Sunday, said that Trump wouldn’t endorse “hurting other people.” On Saturday, Trump tweeted a video of the vehicles with the caption: “I LOVE TEXAS!”
“Certainly you don’t want harm, and we shouldn’t be hurting other people so the president would not endorse that,” McDaniel said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
We want to know what you’re hearing on the ground from the candidates. If you get any interesting ― or suspicious! ― campaign mailers, robocalls or hear anything else you think we should know about, email us at scoops@huffpost.com.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Chris Wallace: What Got Him 'Pissed Off' About The First Debate

Fox News anchor Chris Wallace said he was “ pissed off ” that President Donald Trump ’ s family declined to wear face masks during the first presidential debate , which he said put him in a uniquely vulnerable position as moderator .
In an Instagram Live interview with Washington Post reporter Geoff Edgers last month , Wallace was asked about the Sept. 29 event , in which Trump ’ s guests were seen without their masks when seated , despite requirements that everyone wear them for the duration of the event .
“ I was not fully conscious of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wearing masks until after the debate .
I was really focused on preparing for the debate .
But after I had the luxury to think about it , I was pissed off .
That ’ s a technical phrase , ” Wallace said , according to excerpts from the interview published on Sunday .
“ I mean , did they think that the rules that applied to everybody else didn ’ t apply to them ?
I was upset when it turned out I ’ d been on the stage in a uniquely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 48 hours after the fact that the president had tested positive for the coronavirus .
Everybody , except for the three of us on the stage , was supposed to wear a mask , and the first family came in wearing masks , took them off and sat there.
” Trump announced in the early hours of Oct. 2 that he and his wife , Melania Trump , tested positive for COVID-19 .
When he first began to experience symptoms is unclear .
It ’ s also unclear if he tested negative before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at his NBC News town hall weeks later , Trump said , “ Possibly I did , possibly I didn ’ t. ” Wallace was also asked what his late father , legendary broadcast journalist Mike Wallace , would have thought of the exceedingly polarized times we live in .
He then referred to Trump ’ s penchant for comparing him to his father .
Trump has called Chris Wallace a “ Mike Wallace wannabe ” and accused him of trying to be like his father but failing due to “ lack of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Wallace has been far more critical of the president than most of his Fox News colleagues and hasn ’ t shied away from asking Trump tough questions .
“ For some reason , the president thinks it ’ s going to get under my skin when he says , ‘ Chris Wallace is no Mike Wallace , ’ to which my response is , ‘ One of us has a daddy issue , and it ’ s not me , ’ ” Wallace said .
“ I think it ’ s revealing that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ line .
I think my father would be shocked at how much things have changed and how degraded our political discourse is .
”

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Fox News anchor Chris Wallace said he was “pissed off” that President Donald Trump’s family declined to wear face masks during the first presidential debate, which he said put him in a uniquely vulnerable position as moderator.
In an Instagram Live interview with Washington Post reporter Geoff Edgers last month, Wallace was asked about the Sept. 29 event, in which Trump’s guests were seen without their masks when seated, despite requirements that everyone wear them for the duration of the event.
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“I was not fully conscious of the fact that they weren’t wearing masks until after the debate. I was really focused on preparing for the debate. But after I had the luxury to think about it, I was pissed off. That’s a technical phrase,” Wallace said, according to excerpts from the interview published on Sunday.
“I mean, did they think that the rules that applied to everybody else didn’t apply to them? I was upset when it turned out I’d been on the stage in a uniquely vulnerable position, and we found out 48 hours after the fact that the president had tested positive for the coronavirus. Everybody, except for the three of us on the stage, was supposed to wear a mask, and the first family came in wearing masks, took them off and sat there.”
Trump announced in the early hours of Oct. 2 that he and his wife, Melania Trump, tested positive for COVID-19. When he first began to experience symptoms is unclear. It’s also unclear if he tested negative before the debate. When asked about it at his NBC News town hall weeks later, Trump said, “Possibly I did, possibly I didn’t.”
Wallace was also asked what his late father, legendary broadcast journalist Mike Wallace, would have thought of the exceedingly polarized times we live in.
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The Fox News host said his father wouldn’t have believed it.
He then referred to Trump’s penchant for comparing him to his father. Trump has called Chris Wallace a “Mike Wallace wannabe” and accused him of trying to be like his father but failing due to “lack of talent,” among other slights. Wallace has been far more critical of the president than most of his Fox News colleagues and hasn’t shied away from asking Trump tough questions.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Trump Stumps In Midwest, Biden In Pennsylvania 2 Days Before Election

DUBUQUE , Iowa/PHILADELPHIA ( Reuters ) - Two days before Election Day , President Donald Trump on Sunday sprinted across U.S. battleground states with appearances in Iowa and Michigan as he seeks to rally past Democratic challenger Joe Biden , who in pivotal Pennsylvania implored his supporters to turn out to vote .
Biden leads in national opinion polls though the race is seen as close in enough battleground states that Trump could achieve the 270 votes needed to win in the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the overall victor .
“ We have to earn our democracy .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Biden said at a drive-in rally in a parking lot outside a Philadelphia church , with supporters honking their car horns .
“ We ’ re at an inflection point .
So we have to vote like we never did before .
Every day - every day - is a new reminder of how high the stakes are , of how far the other side will go to try to suppress the turnout , especially here in Philadelphia , ” Biden added .
Buffeted by snow flurries in Washington , a town @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appearance of the day Trump wore his trademark red cap emblazoned with the words “ Make America Great Again ” and was bundled up in an overcoat as he addressed a boisterous crowd on a cold and blustery morning .
Trump then addressed another spirited rally in windy Dubuque , where he made his pitch to Iowa farmers in the important corn-growing state and predicted he would win there as he did four years ago .
In his 2016 victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton , the real estate developer and reality TV personality-turned-politician @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Michigan , states that for decades had gone in the Democratic column .
“ President Trump is terrified what will happen in Pennsylvania .
He knows that if you get to have your say , he doesn ’ t stand a chance , ” Biden told the Philadelphia event .
“ There ’ s too much on the line to sit it out , ” Biden added .
“ We only have two more days .
In two more days , we can put an end to this presidency that has from the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to tear us apart.
” Hitting on familiar themes , Trump portrayed himself as running against “ a corrupt politician ” and “ a dummy and a half ” in Biden as well as a “ left-wing mob ” and Democratic “ maniacs.
” Both men have previously mused about physically striking one another .
Trump , 78 , brought it up again on Sunday , saying of his 77-year-old rival , “ He thinks he ’ s a tough guy .
... You know what , boom ... ding , he ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a Republican state legislator and a conservative activist are seeking a court ruling that drive-through voting is illegal and that about 120,000 votes already cast should be thrown out .
The Texas Supreme Court on Sunday declined to hear their claims .
A federal judge is due to hold an emergency hearing on their request on Monday .

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DUBUQUE, Iowa/PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Two days before Election Day, President Donald Trump on Sunday sprinted across U.S. battleground states with appearances in Iowa and Michigan as he seeks to rally past Democratic challenger Joe Biden, who in pivotal Pennsylvania implored his supporters to turn out to vote.
Trump, aiming to avoid becoming the first incumbent president to lose a re-election bid since fellow Republican George H.W. Bush in 1992, has a frenetic schedule for Sunday, with stops also planned in North Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
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Biden leads in national opinion polls though the race is seen as close in enough battleground states that Trump could achieve the 270 votes needed to win in the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the overall victor.
The former vice president made the latest in a series of appearances in closely contested Pennsylvania, the state where he was born.
“We have to earn our democracy. We have to get out and vote,” Biden said at a drive-in rally in a parking lot outside a Philadelphia church, with supporters honking their car horns.
“We’re at an inflection point. So we have to vote like we never did before. Every day - every day - is a new reminder of how high the stakes are, of how far the other side will go to try to suppress the turnout, especially here in Philadelphia,” Biden added.
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Buffeted by snow flurries in Washington, a town north of Detroit, in his first appearance of the day Trump wore his trademark red cap emblazoned with the words “Make America Great Again” and was bundled up in an overcoat as he addressed a boisterous crowd on a cold and blustery morning.
After the crowd loudly chanted “We love you” Trump responded, “I love you, too. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be standing here because it’s freezing out here.”
“You better get out there and vote,” Trump told the crowd.
Trump predicted he would repeat his 2016 victory in Michigan and touted his efforts to create auto jobs, a key issue for the auto manufacturing state.
“We brought back your car industry. Your car industry was finished. You would have had nothing left,” Trump said.
Motor vehicle manufacturing employment in Michigan has fallen by about 5,000 jobs since Trump took office, and there are about 13,000 fewer jobs making vehicle parts.
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Trump then addressed another spirited rally in windy Dubuque, where he made his pitch to Iowa farmers in the important corn-growing state and predicted he would win there as he did four years ago.
Biden was ahead 51% to 43% nationally in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll, taken Oct. 27-29. A coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 230,000 Americans and battered the economy has weighed on Trump’s campaign.
The race remains a toss-up in Florida, North Carolina and Arizona, Reuters/Ipsos polls showed, while Trump trails by 7 percentage points in Pennsylvania and 10 percentage points in Michigan and Wisconsin.
In his 2016 victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, the real estate developer and reality TV personality-turned-politician took Pennsylvania and Wisconsin as well as Michigan, states that for decades had gone in the Democratic column.
Polls show a tight race in Iowa.
Biden underscored the importance of Pennsylvania in Tuesday’s election.
“President Trump is terrified what will happen in Pennsylvania. He knows that if you get to have your say, he doesn’t stand a chance,” Biden told the Philadelphia event.
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“There’s too much on the line to sit it out,” Biden added. “We only have two more days. In two more days, we can put an end to this presidency that has from the very beginning sought to divide us, to tear us apart.”
The Democratic governors of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin all said they were upbeat about Biden’s chances in their states. Ohio’s Republican governor predicted Trump would win the state by a couple of percentage points.
Biden is scheduled to appear again on Monday in Pennsylvania and added a stop in Ohio on Monday, indicating his campaign views that Midwestern state as winnable.
A record-setting 93 million early votes have cast either in-person or by mail, according to the U.S. Elections Project, a phenomenon expected to boost Biden’s chances.
Trump is due to stage 10 rallies - five a day - on Sunday and Monday, the campaign’s busiest stretch, with Monday appearances planned in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and back in Michigan.
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Hitting on familiar themes, Trump portrayed himself as running against “a corrupt politician” and “a dummy and a half” in Biden as well as a “left-wing mob” and Democratic “maniacs.” Both men have previously mused about physically striking one another. Trump, 78, brought it up again on Sunday, saying of his 77-year-old rival, “He thinks he’s a tough guy. ... You know what, boom ... ding, he’s gone.”
Trump also again criticized the U.S. Justice Department for not investigating prominent Democratic adversaries.
The contest has proven unexpectedly close in Texas, typically a reliable Republican state.
In Democratic-leaning Houston, a Republican state legislator and a conservative activist are seeking a court ruling that drive-through voting is illegal and that about 120,000 votes already cast should be thrown out. The Texas Supreme Court on Sunday declined to hear their claims. A federal judge is due to hold an emergency hearing on their request on Monday.
Reporting by Steve Holland; Additional reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt, Jan Wolfe, Doina Chiacu, Susan Cornwell and David Shepardson; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Frances Kerry and Daniel Wallis


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Trump Bashed For Falsely Claiming Biden Called Black Kids ‘Super Predators’

“ Joe Biden called Black Youth SUPER PREDATORS , ” Trump tweeted .
“ They will NEVER like him , or vote for him .
They are voting for ‘ TRUMP ’ .
” But there ’ s no evidence Biden ever used the term “ superpredators.
” It ’ s likely Trump confused Biden with Hillary Clinton , the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee , who used the term to refer to young people in gangs while discussing a controversial 1994 crime bill .
Though Clinton did not directly refer to race when she described “ superpredators , ” her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and many anti-racism activists and Democrats accused her of referring to young Black people .
Biden referred to “ predators ” while discussing at-risk youth in the 1990s but did not directly refer to Black people at the time , and he has not publicly used the term “ superpredators.
” “ That was Hillary , dum-dum , not Joe , ” tweeted attorney George Conway , who is married to former Trump aide Kellyanne Conway .
“ On the other hand , it was you who said two Black members of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the ‘ crime infested places from which they came , ’ said that ‘ laziness is a trait in Blacks , ’ and said you ‘ hate ’ having ‘ Black guys counting my money.
’ ” Following a wave of fact-checking on Twitter , Trump tweeted ― without evidence ― that Biden “ constantly used the term ‘ Super Predator ’ when referring to young Black Men , according to my sources.
” Trump , who has repeatedly railed against journalists who cite anonymous sources , did not reveal his supposed sources @ @ @ @ @ @ @ respond to a request for comment .
“ This is simply not true , ” journalist Eric Michael Garcia tweeted .
“ Biden DID write the crime bill but Hillary Clinton said superpredators .
Trump REALLY wishes he were running against Clinton.
” CNN reported that Trump supported “ tough on crime ” bills of the 1990s and wrote in his 2000 book , “ The America We Deserve , ” that “ wolf packs ” of children roamed the streets and “ terrorized urban America.
” “ The problem isn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up , ” Trump wrote .
“ It ’ s that we don ’ t have enough criminals locked up .
”

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Twitter users mercilessly mocked President Donald Trump on Sunday after he falsely claimed Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden referred to Black adolescents as “superpredators.”
“Joe Biden called Black Youth SUPER PREDATORS,” Trump tweeted. “They will NEVER like him, or vote for him. They are voting for ‘TRUMP’.”
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But there’s no evidence Biden ever used the term “superpredators.” It’s likely Trump confused Biden with Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, who used the term to refer to young people in gangs while discussing a controversial 1994 crime bill.
Though Clinton did not directly refer to race when she described “superpredators,” her use of the term was widely scrutinized, and many anti-racism activists and Democrats accused her of referring to young Black people.
Biden referred to “predators” while discussing at-risk youth in the 1990s but did not directly refer to Black people at the time, and he has not publicly used the term “superpredators.”
“That was Hillary, dum-dum, not Joe,” tweeted attorney George Conway, who is married to former Trump aide Kellyanne Conway. “On the other hand, it was you who said two Black members of Congress should ‘go back’ to the ‘crime infested places from which they came,’ said that ‘laziness is a trait in Blacks,’ and said you ‘hate’ having ‘Black guys counting my money.’”
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Following a wave of fact-checking on Twitter, Trump tweeted ― without evidence ― that Biden “constantly used the term ‘Super Predator’ when referring to young Black Men, according to my sources.”
Trump, who has repeatedly railed against journalists who cite anonymous sources, did not reveal his supposed sources. The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“This is simply not true,” journalist Eric Michael Garcia tweeted. “Biden DID write the crime bill but Hillary Clinton said superpredators. Trump REALLY wishes he were running against Clinton.”
CNN reported that Trump supported “tough on crime” bills of the 1990s and wrote in his 2000 book, “The America We Deserve,” that “wolf packs” of children roamed the streets and “terrorized urban America.”
“The problem isn’t that we have too many people locked up,” Trump wrote. “It’s that we don’t have enough criminals locked up.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--When Will We Know The 2020 Election Results? Here Are The States To Watch.

This nonsense is particularly dangerous in the 2020 election because of how the coronavirus pandemic has altered voting .
Far more people will cast mail-in and absentee ballots than in any previous election due to the pandemic .
Some states will not be able to open , process or count those ballots until dawn on Election Day , or even until after the polls close .
Results in some key swing states , including Michigan , Pennsylvania and Wisconsin , will not and can not be projected by the end of Election Day .
So , what time can we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ projected a winner in Florida as early as 10:50 p.m. in 2016 , when Trump won by 1.2 percentage points , and as late as 12:27 a.m. in 2004 , when George W. Bush won by 5 percentage points .
Barack Obama ’ s 2008 victory was called at 11:16 p.m .
Results were delayed for four days in 2012 , when Obama won the state again , but this time by less than 1 point .
And , of course , there were the botched calls for both Al Gore and Bush @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to reform how they project election winners .
The Trump campaign , however , has indicated it will seek to stop Pennsylvania from counting ballots after Election Day .
At least three conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court appear to be open to tossing ballots in Pennsylvania that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive up to three days afterward .
Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro ( D ) says that he is concerned that the Trump campaign would seek to suspend the counting of all absentee ballots while the court hears @ @ @ @ @ @ @ If it comes down to Pennsylvania deciding the election , be prepared for a long winter .
The four major swing states fall into three buckets : Arizona and Texas will likely have close to full results on election night , as they can process and count mailed ballots before Election Day .
Ballots can be processed in Michigan beginning the day before the election , which leaves some but not much time to count them before the end of election night .
Wisconsin is not going to be able to report anything @ @ @ @ @ @ @ clerks must wait until Election Day to process and count ballots .
At The End Of The Night

Every four years, Americans gather in front of their TVs or computers to watch the results of the presidential election come in. Overcaffeinated cable news hosts zoom in and out of battleground state maps projected from towers of screens to fill time before any real news is reported. The polls close in state after state as the Western Hemisphere rotates away from the sun. Eventually, your preferred TV personality yells “Breaking news” and announces the projected winner of individual states.
Election night 2020, as everyone should know by now, will be different. And watching election results will be different, too.
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The biggest reason: It is entirely possible that a winner will not be known on election night.
Stressful as it is ― and as much as President Donald Trump hates it ― that’s actually normal. Officially, the election results are never finalized on election night. When cable news hosts project that Trump won Alabama or that Democratic nominee Joe Biden won Massachusetts, for example, they do so based on unofficial results. Not a single state reports its final, official results on election night. Every state certifies its official results days after Election Day.
This happens every single election, but Trump has falsely claimed that it is illegal to count valid votes once the scheduled programming block called “election night” is over. It isn’t. Regardless of what Trump says, the final result and the winner of the presidential election will be decided when all of the validly cast votes are counted ― whether that takes hours, days or weeks.
This nonsense is particularly dangerous in the 2020 election because of how the coronavirus pandemic has altered voting. Far more people will cast mail-in and absentee ballots than in any previous election due to the pandemic. Some states will not be able to open, process or count those ballots until dawn on Election Day, or even until after the polls close. Results in some key swing states, including Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, will not and cannot be projected by the end of Election Day.
But there are a handful of critical battleground states that do allow election officials to process and count mail-in ballots prior to Election Day. These ballots will be reported when the polls close. That leaves just in-person votes and ballots returned on Election Day to be counted. If these states are not too close, the winner could be called early. And if the right swing states are called early, it may be possible to project that Biden or Trump will have won the presidency.
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Those are the key states to follow. Below is a guide on what to watch on election night, and how to know whether there will be a winner Tuesday night or early Wednesday, or whether you’ll have to stay glued to your screen for for days to come. (For simplicity, all times are EST.)
7 p.m.: Florida, Georgia
Polls close at 7 p.m. in Georgia and Florida. Isabella Carapella
The first poll closures that will really matter are in Florida and Georgia at 7 p.m. Florida allows election officials to process and count absentee ballots prior to Election Day, while Georgia can process ballots before the election, but not count them until Election Day.
Both states provide a significant early in-person voting period. More than half of registered voters will have voted by Election Day in these states. This means the results in both states could be known on election night if they are not terribly close.
Florida is the most important state to watch if you hope to see an election winner called early on election night. It is the swing state with the largest number of electoral votes (29) most likely to complete its vote tally on election night.
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Florida’s election results are typically very close, and polls show Biden with a narrow lead in this year’s race. The difference in the total number of votes cast for Democratic and Republican presidential candidates from 1992 through 2016 is less than 20,000 votes. In four elections, the winner won by less than 2 percentage points. The closest victory was George W. Bush’s win by 0.009 point in 2000. Bill Clinton claimed the biggest margin ― 6 points ― in 1996. Recent statewide elections have been no different, with the past three gubernatorial winners finishing with about a 1-point margin of victory. The 2018 Senate race was decided by a mere 0.13 percentage point.
Polling averages show the race in Florida is closer than in other swing states like Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Voters line up to cast their ballots during early voting in Celebration, Florida, Oct. 25. Gregg Newton / Reuters
If news networks are able to project a winner in Florida, it could foreshadow how the rest of the election will play out. If Florida goes for Biden early, he is almost certain to be the next president. On the other hand, if Florida is called for Trump, or is too close to call, the election drama will drag into states less likely to complete their counts on election night.
So, what time can we hope to know? The press has projected a winner in Florida as early as 10:50 p.m. in 2016, when Trump won by 1.2 percentage points, and as late as 12:27 a.m. in 2004, when George W. Bush won by 5 percentage points. Barack Obama’s 2008 victory was called at 11:16 p.m. Results were delayed for four days in 2012, when Obama won the state again, but this time by less than 1 point. And, of course, there were the botched calls for both Al Gore and Bush in 2000 that led television news channels to reform how they project election winners.
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Like Florida, Georgia is a state with a big electoral vote count ― 16 ― and if called for Biden would signal his impending victory. Since absentee ballots can be processed ahead of time in Georgia, something close to an unofficial vote result is possible on election night if the margin of the winner’s victory is above 1 percentage point.
Georgia has not featured a close presidential race since the 1990s. The state’s 2018 gubernatorial race between Republican Brian Kemp and Democrat Stacey Abrams was decided by less than 2 points. Kemp declared victory on election night, but Abrams did not admit defeat for nine more days as she sought a recount that could have pushed Kemp below the 50% threshold to avoid a runoff election. Presidential elections, however, are not subject to Georgia’s runoff rules.
7:30 p.m.: North Carolina, Ohio
Polls close in North Carolina and Ohio at 7:30 p.m. Isabella Carapella
North Carolina, like Florida, allows election officials to process and count absentee ballots ahead of time. This means that a winner could be projected on election night. With 15 electoral votes, it is a big Electoral College prize that, if won by Biden, will herald his victory.
In 2012 and 2016, the North Carolina winner was projected around 11 p.m. In both of those years, the winner won by 2 points to 3 points. When Obama won the state by 0.5 points in 2008, however, the result was not reported until two days after Election Day.
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Ohio and its 18 electoral votes swung hard for Trump in 2016, when he won the state by 8 points. But 2020 polls there show the race is close, and most election ranking sites put it in the toss-up category. A Trump win in Ohio does not mean much, in terms of determining if he’s going to win or lose, but a Biden win would strongly signal that he will be the next president.
It’s helpful that Ohio election officials have been processing mailed ballots as they began arriving on Oct. 6. The ballots will be counted on Election Day. Ohio normally reports tabulated absentee ballots on election night soon after the polls close. Since there will be far more than usual this year, the reporting could be slowed, but not by as much as in other Rust Belt swing states.
8 p.m.: Pennsylvania
Polls close in Pennsylvania at 8 p.m. Isabella Carapella
After falling into the Democratic Party column from 1992 through 2012, Pennsylvania voted for Trump in 2016 by a slim 43,000-vote margin. Biden only needs to win back the three “blue wall” states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin that had all gone for Democrats over the same period to claim victory. But there is little chance that Pennsylvania will report anything close to final results on election night.
Pennsylvania, which boasts 20 electoral votes, does not allow election officials to process or count absentee ballots in advance of Election Day. The Republican-led state legislature refused to adjust the rules for the pandemic. Most county election officials will begin processing and counting ballots at the beginning of Election Day, but some are not planning to do so until the polls close.
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“[T]he overwhelming majority of ballots will be counted by the weekend, honestly, and maybe even significantly sooner,” Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar (D) said in September.
The one thing to pay attention to here is that results reported on Election Day will likely show an early Trump lead. Republicans report that they are far more likely to vote in-person on Election Day, while Democrats say they are more likely to vote by mail. This means Trump will jump to an early lead based on in-person ballots. This is being referred to as a “red mirage.”
The big swath of Biden votes are expected to create a “blue shift” as the mail-in ballots are counted. This may be so dramatic as to show a 15-point Trump lead on Tuesday night erased after mail-in ballots, which tilt to Biden by 21 points, are finally counted, according to FiveThirtyEight.
For that reason, don’t fret if there’s no Pennsylvania result called on Tuesday. All of this is totally normal, based on state laws for processing and counting mail-in ballots.
Voters wait to vote early in the 2020 election at a satellite voting location at City Hall in Philadelphia on Sept. 29. Rachel Wisniewski / Reuters
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The Trump campaign, however, has indicated it will seek to stop Pennsylvania from counting ballots after Election Day. At least three conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court appear to be open to tossing ballots in Pennsylvania that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive up to three days afterward. Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D) says that he is concerned that the Trump campaign would seek to suspend the counting of all absentee ballots while the court hears a challenge to these late-arriving ballots. If it comes down to Pennsylvania deciding the election, be prepared for a long winter.
9 p.m.: Arizona, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin
Polls close in Arizona, Michigan, Texas and Wisconsin at 9 p.m. Isabella Carapella
The four major swing states fall into three buckets: Arizona and Texas will likely have close to full results on election night, as they can process and count mailed ballots before Election Day. Ballots can be processed in Michigan beginning the day before the election, which leaves some but not much time to count them before the end of election night. (Polls close in eastern Michigan at 8 p.m., while final polls in the western part of the state close at 9 p.m.) Wisconsin is not going to be able to report anything close to full results, as election clerks must wait until Election Day to process and count ballots.
Since Arizona and Texas are the most likely to report something close to full results on election night, these are the two states to watch in this poll closing block. Texas is the most likely of these two to reach something approaching a full total, as there will be far fewer mail-in ballots cast as a percentage of the total vote because the Republican-run state government refused to allow no-excuse absentee voting during the pandemic.
If Biden wins Texas and its 38 electoral votes, which no Democrat has done since Jimmy Carter in 1976, he will have won the election.
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Fast-food and nursing home workers gather during a "My Vote is Essential" rally before casting their early ballots at Wayne County Community College in Detroit on Oct. 24. Emily Elconin / Reuters
What may keep a winner from being projected in Arizona on election night is that the state normally sees a very high number of absentee ballots dropped off in-person on Election Day. In 2016, even though Trump won by 4 percentage points, the state’s results could not be called for two days as these ballots were counted. And in 2018, late-returned votes counted the day after the election fueled Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s (D) win.
Michigan, with 16 electoral votes, and Wisconsin, with 10, will look a lot like Pennsylvania, with a large in-person Trump vote appearing on election night that will be whittled away by a large mail-in Biden vote. In Wisconsin, election workers plan to count ballots through the night and into the next day. Like Pennsylvania, do not expect results to be projected in either Michigan or Wisconsin on election night.
10 p.m.: Iowa, Nevada
Polls close in Iowa and Nevada at 10 p.m. Isabella Carapella
Nevada and Iowa, with six electoral votes each, are the only two swing states with poll closings at 10 p.m. or later. The outcome in Nevada is more consequential for the presidential election than Iowa, which, if Biden were to win, would likely just be icing on the cake. Nevada, on the other hand, provided the final electoral votes putting Bush over the top at 11 a.m. on the day after the 2004 election.
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Due to the pandemic, Nevada moved to conduct an all-mail election this year and mailed ballots to all active registered voters. Election officials are allowed to process and count ballots before Election Day. While this normally would mean there is a higher likelihood of the state reaching some kind of unofficial result with a projected winner on election night, Nevada also requires all ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted. This means there could be a significant number of ballots outstanding that cannot be counted immediately.
Iowa allows officials to process ballots ahead of time, but not to count them. This should still speed up the reporting schedule on election night, but may not mean there is a projection.
At The End Of The Night
If Biden is winning on election night, you will be able to tell because a state like Florida is called either before midnight or in the early hours of Wednesday. There are few scenarios in which a Trump victory could be called on election night, but they rely on him winning the Upper Midwest states that won’t process and count absentee ballots until Election Day or the day before.
On the other hand, if the Sun Belt states that Trump won in 2016, like Arizona, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina, are called for him on election night, prepare to stay glued to the screen for the remainder of the week, month and year.
If the election comes down to which ballots will count in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the election will be drawn out into a repeat of the 2000 Bush v. Gore debacle.
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Just remember, the only thing that matters is who wins after all the votes are counted, whether Trump angrily tweets about it or not.
CORRECTION: An earlier version misstated the time North Carolina’s polls close. They close at 7:30 p.m.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-01--Donald Trump Is A Down-Ballot Burden — Even In Districts He Won

MANDEL NGAN/Getty Images President Donald Trump arrives for a rally in Montoursville , Pennsylvania , on Saturday .
In other @ @ @ @ @ some Republican candidates are keeping their distance from the president .
A Pro-Labor Republican Who @ @ @ @ @ s Name In the interim , Fitzpatrick has doubled down on his “ independent ” @ @ @ @ @ a challenge from his right during the primary , Fitzpatrick refuses to say for which @ @ @ @ @ vote on Election Day .
He told The Philadelphia Inquirer , whose editorial board has @ @ @ @ @ he plans to make a decision in the voting booth on Election Day .
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SCRANTON, Pa. ― Two House races in Pennsylvania show the diminished value of Donald Trump’s brand as the president pins his hopes of reelection on another Keystone State upset.
A Republican up for reelection in a district Trump lost in 2016 is struggling to distinguish himself from the embattled president. And a Democrat up for reelection in a district that Trump won finds no political risk in publicly criticizing the president.
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Rep. Matt Cartwright, 59, a Democrat up for reelection in a blue-collar swath of northeastern Pennsylvania where Trump won, is heavily favored in his race, despite a relatively liberal record that includes a vote to impeach Trump. While Cartwright has eschewed the rhetorical bomb-throwing of his colleagues in more solidly Democratic seats, he does not shy away from criticizing Trump on the campaign trail.
Meanwhile, in Philadelphia’s northern suburbs, Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, 46, won’t so much as say for whom he plans to vote in the presidential election. Unlike other Republicans in the Philadelphia area, Fitzpatrick survived Democrats’ 2018 midterm election wave thanks to some moderate policy stances and a broad coalition. But even with a cash advantage over his latest Democratic challenger and a family name that makes him political nobility in Bucks County, Fitzpatrick is locked in a tight race.
The two incumbents ― one a Democrat, the other a Republican ― have taken great pains to cultivate independent images that resonate with their constituents regardless of national trends.
But in the end, neither of them can escape Trump’s impact, according to Mark Nevins, a Democratic campaign consultant based in Philadelphia.
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“There almost isn’t a single race you can run this year where Trump isn’t a significant factor,” Nevins said.
Rep. Matt Cartwright, a northeast Pennsylvania Democrat, won reelection in a district that went for Trump in 2016. He's poised to do it again on Tuesday, even as he criticizes the president. Tom Williams/Getty Images
‘A Great Disappointment In The Current Administration’
Trump beat Hillary Clinton by almost 10 percentage points in Pennsylvania’s 8th Congressional District in 2016. The victory in the historically Democratic region in northeast Pennsylvania, which includes the former industrial cities of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, was emblematic of the inroads Trump had made with white working-class voters, including many rank-and-file members of labor unions that had endorsed Clinton.
But Cartwright, a Democrat, has managed to survive the formerly coal-rich region’s shifting political tides with relative ease. He was reelected in the 8th by 7 points in 2016, and 9 points in 2018. Cartwright estimates that 33,000 of his constituents voted for both Trump and him in 2016, and he welcomes them to split their tickets again.
When HuffPost asked Cartwright why his constituents had opted for Trump, he had a simple explanation: The decadeslong decline of the coal mining and manufacturing economy has kept the region’s unemployment rate higher than that of the state as a whole ― and people are hungry to change that, he said.
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“The pain level is higher around here. And when you’re hurting, you vote for the candidate of change. That’s why President Obama did well. He was the change candidate,” Cartwright said. “And in 2016, there was no way on God’s green Earth that Secretary Hillary Clinton could make herself the change candidate.”
Asked what he made of a suggestion by some Democrats ― including top Clinton campaign aides ― that Trump won because of his appeals to people’s white supremacy, Cartwright paused before mustering a polite objection.
“Anybody who calls my constituents white supremacists ― I beg to differ,” he said.
“He said that. He promised that. It didn’t happen.” - Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.)
Cartwright, a mild-mannered trial attorney, has blazed an unusual path to four consecutive victories in a House seat with a demographic makeup that has made it an attractive target for Republicans.
He originally won his seat in 2012 when redistricting forced centrist Democratic Rep. Tim Holden into a more liberal district. Running as a progressive from “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party,” Cartwright defeated Holden in the primary and went on to win the general election handily.
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Cartwright is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and has been a co-sponsor of single-payer health care legislation since 2014. Having won his primary as an advocate for closing the “Halliburton loophole” that exempts natural gas fracking from federal regulation, he remains a champion of legislation that would subject the practice to official national scrutiny.
But Cartwright, who has a seat on the powerful House Appropriations Committee, tends to emphasize bipartisan compromise and securing federal support for local causes, like funding for abandoned mine cleanups and protecting jobs at an Army logistical depot, rather than partisan or ideological pronouncements.
Critically, Cartwright joins former Vice President Joe Biden in opposing a federal ban on fracking, which is a source of jobs, many of them union, in his district.
Fracking will eventually end, but “it’s going to be the free-market economy that makes the choice,” Cartwright said.
What’s more, Cartwright’s ads feature a promise to “bring jobs back from China” and a local former police chief praising Cartwright for securing additional funding for law enforcement. He doesn’t mention Trump in any of them.
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It’s a marked contrast with other Democrats running for reelection in districts Trump won, like Staten Island Rep. Max Rose. In one of Rose’s TV ads, he touts his agreement with Trump’s decision to kill Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
Instead, Cartwright tends to speak about Trump with the frustration of a prospective friend who has been let down.
The absence of an infrastructure bill has “been a great disappointment in the current administration,” Cartwright told over a dozen members of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters Local 445, who were phone-banking in mid-October for Biden, Cartwright and a Democratic state senator at their union hall in Scranton.
.@RepCartwright addresses a room of @EASCarpenters about to phone bank: “This is serious competition we’re up against and we’re going to have to grease the skids in this country to make sure our businesses can compete with Chinese businesses.” pic.twitter.com/J7vVm7053v — Daniel Marans (@danielmarans) October 20, 2020
“He was in charge of all the levers of power ― the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives ― his first two years,” Cartwright added. “Infrastructure? Nothing. Why? I don’t understand why.”
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The Carpenters union, which counts 1,000 members in Local 445 and about 20,000 in Pennsylvania, is among the more moderate labor unions in the country.
Many of the union’s members voted for Trump in 2016. And this cycle, the union believes that its members’ views track closely with polls of the national electorate as a whole, among whom Biden’s lead is substantial but not enormous.
In his remarks at the union hall, Cartwright expressed empathy for those union members who had cast a ballot for the current president.
“A lot of your guys voted for Donald Trump. And I don’t blame them one bit. Because Trump was going to be the candidate of change ― he was going to be the builder, he was the developer, he knew how to build smarter than anybody,” Cartwright said. “He said that. He promised that. It didn’t happen.”
Of course, House Democrats still expect Cartwright to outperform Biden in the district. So steering clear of criticizing Trump, even in front of a friendly audience, might have been an easier path.
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Jim Bognet, a veteran Republican political operative and former Trump administration official who is challenging Cartwright, has tried to make an issue out of Cartwright’s vote for impeachment. He pronounced Cartwright “toast” after the pivotal vote and has highlighted the decision in a TV ad. Bognet’s campaign did not respond to HuffPost’s requests for comment about the race.
But Cartwright’s confidence that he won’t pay a price for spurning the president speaks to just how far the president has fallen in the predominantly white, working-class districts that carried him to victory in 2016. In an internal polling memo that the Bognet campaign released in mid-October to show his chances improving, the campaign nonetheless had Trump trailing Biden by 2 percentage points in the district.
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), seen here speaking at a press conference for ending the use of "forever chemicals," is locked in a tough reelection fight despite some moderate votes. Paul Morigi/Getty Images
A Pro-Labor Republican Who Dares Not Speak Trump’s Name
In Pennsylvania’s 1st Congressional District, some 100 miles south of Pennsylvania’s 8th, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick managed to pull off the inverse feat from Cartwright.
Although Trump lost to Clinton in Pennsylvania’s 1st in 2016 by 2 percentage points, Fitzpatrick won his first election in the suburban Philadelphia seat by nearly 9 percentage points.
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Fitzpatrick, a former FBI agent, had the advantage of running to succeed his brother, Mike, who had represented the area from 2005 to 2007 and again from 2011 to 2017.
But aware that he represented a purple district, which encompasses all of Bucks County and a small sliver of Montgomery County, at a time when the suburbs were growing more liberal, Fitzpatrick found ways to buck his party on several key votes and policy stances. He voted against the House’s bill repealing the Affordable Care Act, embraced moderate gun safety regulations, cozied up to organized labor, vowed to protect Social Security, and became involved in the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus.
Fitzpatrick’s efforts to triangulate paid off in 2018, which was otherwise a Democratic wave year. In Pennsylvania alone, Democrats picked up four House seats.
In the interim, Fitzpatrick has doubled down on his “independent” brand. After fending off a challenge from his right during the primary, Fitzpatrick refuses to say for which presidential candidate he plans to vote on Election Day. He told The Philadelphia Inquirer, whose editorial board has endorsed his reelection, that he plans to make a decision in the voting booth on Election Day. (Fitzpatrick, whose campaign declined to make him or an aide available on the record, claims to have written in Mike Pence for president in 2016.)
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Going a step further than opposing repeal of the ACA, Fitzpatrick now calls himself an outright supporter of the law. In a TV ad, Fitzpatrick’s mother, a breast cancer survivor, vouches for her son’s commitment to the law’s protections for people with preexisting conditions, noting that Fitzpatrick “stood up to his own party” on the matter. She also promises that Fitzpatrick will protect Social Security and Medicare because he knows how important those programs are to seniors like her.
Fitzpatrick’s support for tougher regulations of industrial chemicals that end up in water sources has even won him some environmental support. This cycle, the League of Conservation Voters Action Fund has endorsed him.
In addition, Fitzpatrick is one of just five House Republicans to vote in favor of the PRO Act, a bill that would dramatically increase federal penalties for company interference in unionization and prohibit right-to-work laws that bar unions from compelling dues payment from workers they are obligated to represent. The vote has won him the endorsement, once again, of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO.
“We were proud to endorse Brian Fitzpatrick for re-election to Congress. He shows a willingness to put partisan politics aside and support working families. That support of workers led to the endorsement." @PaAFL_CIO pic.twitter.com/p977G6B7P5 — Brian Fitzpatrick (@BrianFitzUSA) September 8, 2020
Even as the Carpenters union was mobilizing its members to phone-bank for Biden and Cartwright in northeast Pennsylvania, in Bucks County, members of Local 167 were making calls for Biden and Fitzpatrick. The union cites Fitzpatrick’s vote for the PRO Act as evidence that they can rely on him.
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Bob Simons, a staunch Democrat from Bensalem and politically active member of Local 167, plans to vote for Fitzpatrick.
“Some people ― they tell me that my view is too simplistic about who I vote for,” Simons said. “But I have always just voted in the union’s best interests because, in turn, it’s my best interest.”
It’s something of a surprise then that Fitzpatrick is again in a tight matchup ― this time against Democrat Christina Finello, a lawyer who works for Bucks County.
Recent public polls in the district show a neck-and-neck race, though the firms that conducted the surveys lean Democratic.
Still, Republican spending in the district suggests that the GOP sees it as a close contest as well.
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“It’s strictly the Trump effect that’s keeping these races competitive.” - Mark Nevins, Democratic campaign consultant
Although Fitzpatrick had spent nearly $2 million more than Finello as of mid-October, the national party, big business groups and at least one moderate union have flooded the race with additional money. The National Republican Congressional Committee, House Republicans’ campaign arm, has spent more than $1 million to reelect Fitzpatrick. The Congressional Leadership Fund, House Republicans’ main super PAC, has spent nearly $3 million. In all, outside groups have spent $6.2 million on support for Fitzpatrick, compared with $2.9 million for Finello.
The reason for Republicans’ alarm comes down to Trump’s poor standing in the district, where Democrats expect to improve on their 2016 margin. High Democratic turnout, particularly among infrequent voters showing up to vote Trump out, could lead to an uptick in single-party voting up and down the ballot.
“He could end up losing and it’s not because he should have done something different,” he said. “It’s strictly the Trump effect that’s keeping these races competitive.”
Finello, who has the backing of pro-choice groups and more progressive labor unions like the Service Employees International Union, is doing her best to chip away at Fitzpatrick’s moderate branding.
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The campaign notes that Fitzpatrick has taken plenty of anti-union votes, earning him a lifetime score of just 58% from the national AFL-CIO. And his vote in favor of the Trump tax cuts repealed the ACA’s individual insurance mandate. In a bid to overturn the entire ACA, the Trump administration is now arguing to the Supreme Court that Congress’ elimination of the individual mandate effectively invalidated the rest of the health care law as well.
Finally, in a suburban district where many voters remain supportive of abortion rights, Finello is hammering Fitzpatrick as an opponent of women’s rights. Fitzpatrick’s anti-abortion record includes a vote for a 2017 bill to criminalize abortion 20 weeks into a pregnancy without exceptions for rape, incest or the health of the mother.
“Brian Fitzpatrick has been a reliable vote for the Trump agenda when Republicans need him most,” Finello campaign manager Alli Anderson said in a statement. “Fitzpatrick sided with Trump against reproductive freedom, sided with Trump in downplaying the pandemic, and sided with Trump on the disastrous tax bill that could strip healthcare from people with pre-existing conditions.”
We want to know what you’re hearing on the ground from the candidates. If you get any interesting ― or suspicious! ― campaign mailers, robocalls or hear anything else you think we should know about, email us at scoops@huffpost.com.