St. Louis — Voters in Missouri, Nebraska and Alaska will soon decide whether workers there should be entitled to paid sick leave.
If approved, the ballot measures would allow many workers to accrue paid time off, a benefit supporters say means workers — especially those with low-paying jobs — would no longer have to fear losing wages or possibly the jobs themselves for getting sick. Proponents say such policies benefit the broader public, too, allowing workers to stay home when sick or to care for ill family members to stem the spread of infectious diseases.
But opponents say the measures force new burdens on employers, who should be the ones deciding which benefits are best.
Fifteen states and the District of Columbia now have laws requiring at least some employers to provide paid sick time, according to the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank based in Washington, D.C. They are largely Democratic-controlled places.
The three sick leave ballot measures up for vote are in Republican-led states. Ballot measures, which are allowed in 24 states, let voters amend state constitutions or enact laws by voting directly on an issue, allowing them to bypass state legislatures. For example, voters ushered in Medicaid expansion in Missouri and Nebraska in 2020 and 2018, respectively, after their legislatures wouldn’t pass it.
Still, as Election Day quickly approaches, the three sick leave ballot initiatives have flown under the radar, unlike higher-profile ballot measures — say, on abortion, which is on the ballot in 10 states, including Missouri and Nebraska.
Campaigns supporting the sick leave initiatives in Alaska, Missouri and Nebraska raked in less than $9 million combined in cash contributions, according to a KFF Health News analysis of state campaign filings as of Oct. 28.
That’s significantly less than Missouri’s ballot measures on abortion and sports betting, which have amassed more than $55 million combined in cash contributions, according to state records. TV ads flood the airwaves on those two measures and yard signs on abortion saturate the region.
Most of the money for the sick leave measures has come from backers outside those three states, the filings show, with the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a D.C.-based advocacy group, being the top contributor to each of the three campaigns. “No one should have to choose between their health and a paycheck,” the group said in a statement.
The group, which funds progressive causes nationwide, does not disclose its donors, but in recent years nonprofits tied to George Soros and Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss have reportedly given to it.
For Alana Ashmore, 18, paid sick leave would be welcome. The St. Louis woman works two jobs: one as a restaurant server and another at a gym. When she’s too sick to work, she said, she immediately worries about being able to afford her $800 monthly rent and starts thinking: “I better find a way to get money.” She said she plans to vote for the measure.
More than 930,000 Missourians lack paid sick time, like Ashmore, and the measure is expected to benefit 728,000 private-sector workers in the state, according to the Missouri Budget Project, a nonprofit focused on analyzing public policy. Some state or local government workers would not be eligible.
If the measures pass, many workers in these three states could accrue paid time off as they work, earning about a week of paid leave per year. In Missouri and Nebraska, workers for large organizations could earn one hour of paid sick time for every 30 hours worked. To earn one day of paid sick time, they would need to work 40 hours per week for six weeks. In Alaska, eligible workers could accrue a maximum of 56 hours of paid time each year.
In Missouri and Alaska, the measures also seek to raise the minimum wage.
In all three states, the measures have received broad support including from major unions. Jodi Lepaopao, the campaign manager for Paid Sick Leave for Nebraskans, said her campaign has received support from at least 200 businesses, though not from the meatpacking plants whose workers she said stand to gain the most as they often lack paid sick leave.
During the pandemic, meatpacking plants were heavily hit by COVID-19. Nearly 1 in 5 meatpacking plant workers were infected from March to July 2020, “a profound burden of cases unparalleled in any other worker population,” researchers found.
“This is going to be a big win for them, if we can win,” Lepaopao said.
St. Louis-based Generate Health, a nonprofit that supports healthy outcomes for Black moms and their babies, has backed the paid leave proposition in Missouri for both its employees and its clients.
“To have a healthy baby, you have to have a healthy family and, ultimately, a healthy community,” said Lora Gulley, director of advocacy for Generate Health.
But not every employer has thrown support behind the push for paid sick leave.
The National Federation of Independent Business has also opposed paid sick leave requirements, and specifically has come out against the Alaska measure as a threat to small businesses.
Separately, ballot measures can boost voter turnout, said Adam Snipes, director of strategic partnerships at the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, which works to pass progressive ballot measures around the country. Voters are often galvanized to head to the polls by the issues, causing ripple effects across all races.
“While they might be skeptical of politicians, they are highly participatory when it comes to ballot measures,” Snipes said.
KFF Health News Midwest correspondent Bram Sable-Smith contributed to this article.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling and journalism.
CHANHASSEN, Minn. — Before there were trick-or-treaters in Chanhassen and Chaska Thursday, there were two other people knocking on doors asking not for candy, but for votes.
DFL Rep. Lucy Rehm and GOP challenger Caleb Steffenhagen are in the final sprint to the finish trying to shore up as much support as possible in this sliver of the state. Rehm is seeking her second term, and Steffenhagen — a political newcomer — is looking to unseat her and help Republicans win back a majority in the state House.
All 134 seats in the chamber are on the ballot this fall. But only about a dozen — like District 48B covering all of Chanhassen and parts of Chaska — are competitive. Roughly half of those are in the Twin Cities metro.
Local races like this one don’t grab headlines, but the outcome impacts school funding, taxes, health and human services and much more. Control of the state legislature is at stake and voters in these battlegrounds will decide if total DFL control of state government should stay or go.
“It’s a really important race, I think, in our area because they know that the person that you send to the state capitol really affects your community and how the schools are run and how you live your life,” Rehm said.
The first-term Democrat highlights investing in education, making health care affordable and fighting climate change as her top three issues, as well as protecting abortion rights, which Democrats were quick to do when they took power of the House, Senate and governor’s office in 2022. Rehm also said she meets Republicans unsatisfied with the party under former President Donald Trump who are willing to vote for her and other Democrats.
Democrats have 70 seats and Republicans hold 64. The GOP only needs to flip four to take back the speaker’s gavel. Leaders in both caucuses projected confidence in a recent WCCO interview.
“I hear it at the doors every day. People want divided government. They want someone who is going to not just vote down party lines,” he said. “And that’s what was promised in 2022 and then instead it was one party, one control, one voting style.”
Both the House Republican and Democrats’ campaign committees boast fundraising records this cycle, but the DFL has a significant financial edge.
A September Minnesota Star Tribune poll found voters are almost evenly split in their opinions with 49% saying they approve of how Gov. Tim Walz and the Democrats in the legislature have governed since winning back the state Senate in 2022. And 47% say they disapprove.
Lawmakers in the state Senate are not up for re-election this fall; they serve four-year terms. There is one special election for the seat left vacant by DFL Sen. Kelly Morrison, who stepped down to run for Congress.
If Republicans triumph in that race, it would tip power in their favor. Democrats had just a one-seat majority before Morrison resigned.
Caroline Cummings is an Emmy-winning reporter with a passion for covering politics, public policy and government. She is thrilled to join the WCCO team.
Howard University is where Vice President Kamala Harris spent some of the most formative years of her life, and it will now serve as the location where she spends what could arguably be the most important night of her life: election night.
Her campaign announced this week that Harris will spend election night at her Washington, D.C., alma mater.
“I am proud to be the first HBCU vice president of the United States. I intend to be the first HBCU president of the United States,” Harris said in an interview with Charlamagne tha God just two weeks ago.
The Democratic presidential candidate graduated from Howard University with her bachelor’s degree in 1986. On the campus, nestled on a hill in Washington, D.C., she also pledged the first Black sorority in the U.S., Alpha Kappa Alpha. The Historically Black College and University was founded in 1869 and is often referred to as “The Mecca” for its storied legacy of producing Black community leaders like Stokely Carmichael and Thurgood Marshall.
If elected, Harris would be the first Black woman to win the presidency, and she has already made history as the first Black woman to secure a major party nomination. But her identity is something she seldom brings up on the campaign trail despite the historic nature.
Although Harris may not talk about her race on the trail often, she has highlighted Howard University’s role in her life throughout her political career; most recently it served as one of the locations she did preparations for her debate against former President Donald Trump. It is also where she launched her failed 2020 presidential bid.
Harris’ campaign has recently leaned into HBCUs and attempted to appeal to young voters and alumni by visiting homecomings on the campuses of schools for what it dubbed the “HBCU Homecoming Tour.”
Trey Baker, a senior advisor to Harris, said the homecoming tour is about meeting voters where they are. There are nearly 290,000 students enrolled at HBCUs across the country, according to the Pew Research Center. Each fall, students and alumni gather on the campuses for homecomings that are reminiscent of a family reunion.
Many of the campaign’s homecoming tour stops have been in battleground states, but the campaign was also intent on visiting Howard’s homecoming, which took place in late October.
With a rally held just blocks away from Howard’s campus, the Harris campaign provided free food and drinks, with merch and yard signs being given out to those who filled out to commit to vote cards.
Harris skipped out on Howard homecoming this year to campaign in battleground states, but in a letter penned to her alma mater, she said, “At Howard, we learn that we have the capacity to be great and also that we have the responsibility to work hard to live up to that potential each day.”
Cameron Trimble, who organized the HBCU tour and is a Howard graduate as well, told CBS News it fills him with “immense pride” to be able to cast his vote for a fellow Bison.
“This is a chance for America to really make good on the promise of the founding of this country, that all people are truly created equal and that any American, can break through any glass ceiling that exists,” Trimble said.
Mississippi state Rep. Justis Gibbs graduated from Howard in 2018 but returned for homecoming and spoke about how Harris has inspired him to get involved politically.
“I think sometimes we think about how long it takes for things to change, and then change is happening right in front of us,” Gibbs said. “I remember being in third grade. I didn’t think that I would have an African-American president in my lifetime. And now we have President Barack Obama. We’re about to have President Kamala Harris.”
Despite the support some have for Harris, there is still a sense of anxiety. A recent CBS News poll found an even split in support for Harris and Trump across battleground states, underscoring just how close the election will be.
“There’s a lot on the line in this election,” said Virgil Parker, another Howard graduate. “I am very anxious about former President Trump winning because he has already shown us the divisiveness he is capable of.”
Regardless of whether Harris wins the election, Parker says that “her access shows us that anyone can ascend to any level of success no matter who they are and what they look like. As a person of color and HBCU graduate, I see myself in VP Harris.”
In an effort to understand the political divide in the U.S., Trump and Harris supporters in New Jersey were invited to watch the other side’s favorite cable news channels. Tony Dokoupil reports on how it went.
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Pennsylvania was a pivotal state in the 2020 presidential election, sealing Joe Biden’s victory over Donald Trump after four days of vote counting. So it’s no surprise the Keystone State is again front and center this election cycle, with both Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump investing time and resources there ahead of Election Day.
In the past few weeks, the presidential candidates have been regulars in Pennsylvania, often joined on the campaign trail by celebrities and fellow politicians. They’ve made some memorable pit stops — from Harris snapping selfies at Famous 4th Street Deli to Trump donning an apron during a campaign event at a McDonald’s in Bucks County, which Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro calls the “swingiest of all swing counties in the swingiest of all swing states.” Trump also returned to Butler for a rally at the same fairgrounds where he survived an assassination attempt in July.
CBS News’ Battleground Tracker shows an effectively tied race in Pennsylvania a week before Election Day. The state is part of the Democrats’ “blue wall” along with Michigan and Wisconsin, considered crucial for the party’s path to the White House.
Here’s what you need to know ahead of Election Day:
Pennsylvania Election Day fast facts
Polls open: 7 a.m. ET
Polls close: 8 p.m. ET
Mail-in ballot deadline: 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024
Every state has its own rules when it comes to vote counting. In Pennsylvania, state law requires county election workers to wait until polls open on Election Day (7 a.m. ET) to start processing — removing ballots from envelopes — and counting mail-in ballots.
Pennsylvania counties also can’t begin to record or release mail-in ballot results until after the polls close at 8 p.m. ET. That means there will be a lag in announcing the final tallies and, in turn, projecting the state’s winner. How long of a delay, however, is unclear.
Pennsylvania’s Electoral College votes
Pennsylvania has 19 electoral votes, making it an important prize in the presidential race. The state had 20 electoral votes in the 2020 race but lost one in the congressional redistricting that followed the 2020 Census.
When will we know who won Pennsylvania?
In 2020, Mr. Biden was named the projected winner of Pennsylvania late morning on Saturday, Nov. 7 — the fourth day of vote counting — after taking an insurmountable lead in the state. Winning the state’s then-20 electoral votes helped him top the 270 needed to win the presidency.
But it’s hard to draw any conclusions from 2020 when more voters opted for mail-in voting for the first time due to the ongoing spread of COVID-19. It was the first year Pennsylvania allowed no-excuse mail-in voting, leading to a record 2.6 million mail-in ballots. In 2020, 38% of Pennsylvanians voted either early or by mail, compared to 4% in 2016, according to CBS News’ records.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court also ruled in 2020 that mail-in ballots couldn’t be rejected over signature mismatches.
Kathy Boockvar, former Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, told CBS News that 2024 will likely look different since election officials have had four more years of practice, bought new equipment and have a better idea of how much staffing they’ll need.
“Nobody knows on election night who wins or loses. What we hope to do is count the ballots securely, accurately, and then after that as quickly as humanly possible,” Boockvar said.
In 2020, about 54% of total votes cast were reported by 12 a.m. ET after Election Day, according to the Associated Press. The “overwhelming majority of ballots” were counted by Thursday night into Friday morning in 2020, according to Boockvar.
Boockvar estimates this year, given all of the lessons learned from 2020 and improvements made to the counting system, that the majority of ballots will be counted by the end of Wednesday instead of Thursday, which may help speed up the process of projecting a winner.
However, if the race is close, then that may delay things further. Pennsylvania has an automatic recount if the margin in any statewide race is 0.5% votes or less. The state also allows losing candidates to file a request for a machine recount if they pay for it. A refund may be available depending on the findings.
Could Latino voters in Pennsylvania decide the election?
In order to secure a Pennsylvania victory, both Harris and Trump may need to win over Latino voters. There are nearly 580,000 eligible Latino voters in Pennsylvania, according to the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute’s latest data. Pennsylvania’s share of eligible Latino voters has more than doubled since 2000, the data shows.
Roughly about half of the Latino population lives in the center part of the state called the “222 Corridor” — a stretch of small cities including Reading, Allentown, Lancaster and Bethlehem, where the presidential candidates and their running mates have visited frequently.
Who won Pennsylvania in past presidential elections?
Pennsylvania has voted for the presidential winner dating back to 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president. Here’s a look at who has claimed the state over the years:
2020: Democrat Joe Biden defeats Donald Trump
2016: Republican Donald Trump defeats Hillary Clinton
Jennifer Earl is the Vice President of Growth & Engagement at CBS News and Stations. Jennifer has previously written for outlets including The Daily Herald, The Gazette, NBC News, Newsday, Fox News and more.
Washington — Among the topics voters may consider in the 2024 presidential election are LGBTQ rights — and it’s an issue where former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have starkly different messages and backgrounds.
A large majority of Americans support legal protections for LGBTQ people, according to a survey from the Public Religion Research Institute. But support is stronger in blue states than red states, and has declined overall in recent years — especially among Republicans. And support for same-sex marriage has also seen a slight decline.
Meanwhile, 38% of Americans said LGBTQ rights are a factor in their voting decisions, and 30% say they will vote only for a candidate who aligns with them on the issue.
Here’s what to know about the candidates’ views and records on the issue:
Donald Trump on LGBTQ issues
The former president has been inconsistent on the issue during his time in the public eye, and his administration rolled back protections for LGBTQ people — especially transgender individuals.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, before he entered politics, Trump expressed support for domestic partnership laws that granted couples the same benefits of married couples — a position that the GOP widely opposed at the time — and often showed personal tolerance for LGBTQ issues more broadly. In a 1999 interview, where he also said he was “very pro-choice” Trump said that “it would not disturb me” for gay people to serve in the military.
Years later, Trump said in 2011, amid speculation about a possible presidential bid, that he was “opposed to gay marriage.” In 2015, he said he supports “traditional marriage.”
Trump became the first GOP presidential nominee to mention LGBTQ issues in his 2016 RNC speech, pledging to protect the community in the aftermath of the Pulse nightclub shooting.
Trump chose a conservative running mate in 2016, Mike Pence, who had staunchly opposed same-sex marriage, but Trump’s own comments on the topic varied.
Trump said during his 2016 campaign that he would “strongly consider” appointing Supreme Court justices who would overturn the 2015 ruling that legalized same-sex marriages. Then, days after he was elected, he said he was “fine” with same-sex marriage and suggested he wouldn’t appoint justices to the high court with the goal of overturning the ruling. His wife, Melania Trump, called him “the first president to enter the White House supporting gay marriage” as he sought reelection in 2020.
On transgender issues, Trump said in 2016, amid a controversy over a North Carolina bathroom ban, thattransgender people should “use the bathroom they feel is appropriate.” But his administration went on toreverse a policy that required schools to allow transgender students to use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity, and his administration banned some transgender people from serving in the military while Trump was in office — a policy that President Biden reversed. Trump’s administration also tried to repeal health protections for transgender people and sought to end protections for transgender individuals in federal prison, among other policies.
Anti-trans sentiments would go on to become a prominent talking point for Republicans on the campaign trail in the 2022 midterm elections. In early 2023, Trump said he would use his powers, should he return to the White House, to punish doctorswho provide gender affirming care for minors and impose consequences for teachers who discuss it with students.
In the final months of the 2024 campaign, Trump and his allies leaned into anti-trans rhetoric, spending millions on advertisements focusing on the issue in battleground states.
Meanwhile, Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance, sponsored legislation in 2023 that would ban access to gender-affirming care for minors, along with a bill to bar the State Department from allowing the gender marker “X” on passports. The Ohio Republican also said he would vote no on the Respect for Marriage Act, which provided federal protections for same-sex and interracial marriages, while campaigning for Senate in 2022, citing religious liberty concerns.
Kamala Harris on LGBTQ issues
Harris has generally been an early adopter of pro-LGBTQ policies and stances, doing so before other prominent members of her party.
The former San Francisco district attorney officiated some of the nation’s first same-sex marriages in 2004, after then-mayor Gavin Newsom directed the county clerk to approve the marriages although the law didn’t yet recognize them. The marriages were invalidated months later. Then, when she was elected as California’s attorney general in 2010, Harris said she would not defend in court a voter-approved measure known as Proposition 8, which outlawed same-sex marriage.
As district attorney, Harris had prosecuted violence against LGBTQ people, establishing a hate crime unit to look into crimes against LGBTQ youth. As attorney general, she sought to end the “panic defense” that allowed homicide defendants to seek lesser sentences if they attested to being panicked by the victim’s sexual orientation.
Harris has been criticized by LGBTQ advocates for denying gender-affirming surgeries for transgender inmates when she served as attorney general; she said she was bound by the Department of Corrections policy in place at the time. She later expressed support for providing such care to inmates during her 2020 presidential bid. During that campaign, where she ran on a more progressive platform, Harris also said she supports decriminalizing sex work, though she noted that it’s not a simple issue.
As a senator, Harris sponsored a handful of bills aimed at addressing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, along with other LGBTQ issues. Harris’ record has also been tied to the Biden administration, which expanded Title IX protections for LGBTQ students, although they were blocked by the Supreme Court. In 2022, Mr. Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law, enshrining federal protections for same-sex and interracial marriages.
Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, has a reputation as an advocate for LGBTQ rights. When Walz was a high school teacher, he served as the faculty adviser who helped form his school’s first gay-straight alliance in the ’90s.
Americans went to the polls under very different circumstances in 2020. CBS News chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett takes a look back ahead of Election Day on Nov. 5.
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With just a week remaining until Election Day, CBS News polling shows Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump virtually tied nationwide and in key battleground states. Republican strategists Leslie Sanchez and Terry Sullivan along with Democratic strategist Joel Payne, break down what’s at stake.
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Vice President Kamala Harris rallied in Michigan Monday, but as she spoke she was again interrupted by a group protesting the war in Gaza. Michigan has the largest percentage of Arab Americans voters, and some Democrats fear support from those voters has slipped away.
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At first glance, an initiative called “Progress 2028” appears to be a progressive version of “Project 2025,” the conservative blueprint spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation that includes policy proposals for the next president.
However, Progress 2028 is not linked to Vice President Kamala Harris or any progressive group, according to an analysis by CBS News; rather, it is a campaign funded by conservatives with the goal of linking Harris to policy ideas she has not supported in her presidential campaign.
According to Virginia State Corporation Commission records shared by OpenSecrets, a conservative nonprofit called Building America’s Future registered Progress 2028 on Sept. 23. The website progress2028.com was then registered three days later.
Building America’s Future has received millions from conservative supporters, including billionaire Elon Musk, according to The Wall Street Journal, and has promoted Trump campaign material while running ads critical of the Biden administration.
What does Progress 2028 claim?
The website makes a number of false claims about Harris’ positions. It says she would prioritize a nationwide gun buyback program and is committed to banning fracking, which she says she will not do. Its Facebook ads also incorrectly state she “WILL FIGHT TO EXPAND MEDICARE FOR UNDOCUMENTED IMMIGRANTS” as well as give them drivers licenses and housing subsidies.
These claims do not reflect Harris’ policy positions or campaign platform. In fact, undocumented immigrants remain ineligible for Social Security benefits and Medicare, according to the Social Security Administration, and there is no evidence Harris is attempting to change these policies.
During the Democratic primaries in 2019, Harris previously expressed support for banning fracking and buyback programs for assault weapons alone, but during her 2024 presidential run she said she no longer supports either proposal and would not ban fracking.
A Harris-Walz campaign spokesman told CBS News that Progress 2028 is a “lie to deceive voters.”
The group behind Progress 2028 spent more than $265,000 on such ads in the week between Oct. 15 and Oct. 21, according to Facebook’s Ad Library.
Progress 2028 has spent thousands on online ads.
Progress 2028 launched new ads as recently as Saturday, Oct. 26.
Progress 2028’s Facebook ads have received millions of impressions, though their own social media accounts have had limited engagement so far. A Facebook page for Progress 2028 has less than 100 followers.
“This type of political advertising isn’t new and has been found across the media landscape for decades,” said Meta spokesperson Ryan Daniels in a statement. Meta also noted it requires a disclaimer for political ads and will block new political ads during the final week of the campaign, a practice they introduced in 2020.
Project 2025 remains a talking point of campaign
Democrats, including President Biden and Vice President Harris, have repeatedly claimed that former President Donald Trump is involved in or will follow Project 2025.
Trump has not adopted the blueprint as his campaign platform and has attempted to distance himself from it. However, dozens of former Trump administration officials contributed to Project 2025, and CBS News identified at least 270 proposals out of 700 in their published blueprint that match Trump’s past policies and current campaign promises.
A number of polls in recent months suggest that a majority of Americans view Project 2025 unfavorably.
CBS News has reached out to Progress 2028 for comment.
Alex Clark is a producer for CBS News Confirmed, covering AI, misinformation and their real-world impact. Previously, he produced and edited Emmy and Peabody-nominated digital series and documentaries for Vox, PBS and NowThis. Contact Alex at alex.clark@cbsnews.com
CBS News chief election and campaign correspondent Robert Costa breaks down the final week before the 2024 presidential election and what to expect from the campaigns.
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MINNEAPOLIS — It’s a sea of blue in southwest Minneapolis as Harris-Walz signs dominate the landscape.
However, people like Tess Olson know their Tangletown neighborhood is uniquely aligned.
“I think it gives me a little bit of a false sense of hope, if anything,” said Olson. “Initially, I was totally sure I’d be like, ‘Kamala will have this in the bag, no problem.’ As we’ve crept closer, my anxiety levels are definitely also creeping.”
The stakes are high this election, and for many, so is the anxiety.
One way to reduce election stress, according to experts, is to stay off social media. Avoid the so-called “doomscroll,” spending excessive time reading news that upsets you, and set time limits each day.
“Being exposed to so many news that are not always positive or happy or encouraging leads to more sense of distress,” said Dr. Emanuel Maidenberg, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA.
Experts also said exercise and doing things you enjoy, while avoiding stressful political topics with friends, will also help.
“Typical self-care routines that we all have that include the physical activation, engaging in activities that are pleasurable, making sure that discussions that we have with friends or family members are not necessarily around the topics that are currently stressful,” said Maidenberg.
Down the road from Olson, roommates Gavin Owens and Bryce Bohn have placed a Trump sign outside their Armatage duplex.
The two said they’re not letting election stress keep them up at night.
“I wouldn’t say I’m worried,” said Bohn. “I don’t think it would be anything that is going to shatter the country or anything. It’s just kind of the election happens, move forward and we just keep going.”
MINNEAPOLIS — Leading cyber security experts will meet for a three-day summit in the Twin Cities this week— just days ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
For the 14th year, the Cyber Security Summit will highlight research, achievement and innovation in the area of online protection.
The event draws in experts from both the private and public sector.
“Cyber security affects everybody,” said Elizabeth Stevens, the event’s communication’s director. “This is something that is going to be just essential.”
1,000+ participants will take place in workshops over the course of the week. For board member Mark Ritchie, the event couldn’t be coming at a better time.
“These cyber questions are serious,” he said.
Ritchie, Minnesota’s former Secretary of State, said the office has and continues to do everything possible to keep elections safe and secure.
“It’s how we keep the trust – and I’m hopeful that Minnesota always puts those two things together,” he said. “We have the most effective, professional, skilled, trained and skilled people on our team protecting our elections. We’re not going to allow someone next door, or someone around the world to manipulate or change or in any way impact our elections.”
Las Vegas — For nearly a year now, 32-year-old renter Mason Cunha and his realtor have been struggling to find the right home in Las Vegas at the right price.
“It just doesn’t really make sense right now to buy a home with the interest rates where they are, and with the inventory what it is,” Cunha said.
Vice President Kamala Harris has said that if she wins the general election in November, she plans to work with the private sector to build three million new homes and rental units.
Cunha, a Harris supporter, is in favor of the proposal.
“I think it’s going to definitely help, if you were to double or triple or quadruple the inventory,” Cunha said.
Harris is also proposing outlawing price fixing by corporate landlords and giving first-time homebuyers who have paid their rent on time for two years with up to $25,000 in down payment assistance.
“I would want to review what the qualifications are for that,” said 32-year-old Andrew Lum of Las Vegas, a wedding DJ and married father. “Where is that $25,000 coming from?”
Lum sold his home when his family expanded. He now rents a bigger house but he can’t afford to buy. Lum says his life was better when former President Donald Trump was in office.
“In 2020 we were able to buy a home,” Lum said. “We were able to buy it at an interest rate that was possible. We were able to buy it with, you know, minimal down payments.”
Trump’s plan involves reducing mortgage rates by slashing inflation. Trump has also said he would open limited portions of federal lands to allow for new home construction, a plan the Biden administration is already enacting. As an example, one such 20-acre plot in Las Vegas was recently transferred from the federal government to Clark County, and now it has been designated for affordable housing.
According to the Congressional Research Service, 80.1% of the land in Nevada is owned by the federal government.
Trump has also said that that his promised mass deportations will make more housing available. It is an argument that both Lum and Cunha don’t seem to agree with.
“It just seems a little farfetched to me that all the houses are being purchased by immigrants,” Lum said.
“I think everything that Trump says has to be taken with a really aggressive grain of salt because he is known to inflate the truth,” Cunha said.
Carter Evans has served as a Los Angeles-based correspondent for CBS News since February 2013, reporting across all of the network’s platforms. He joined CBS News with nearly 20 years of journalism experience, covering major national and international stories.
Tom Zawierucha, 58, a building services worker in New Jersey, wishes candidates would talk more about protecting older Americans from big medical bills.
Teresa Morton, 43, a freight dispatcher in Memphis, Tennessee, with two teenagers, wants to hear more about how elected officials would help working Americans saddled with unaffordable deductibles.
Yessica Gray, 28, a customer support representative in Wisconsin, craves relief from high drug prices and medical bills that have driven her and her husband deep into debt. “How much are we going to pay?” she said. “It’s just something that’s always on my mind.”
Health care hasn’t figured prominently in this increasingly acrimonious presidential campaign. And the economy has generally topped the list of voters’ concerns.
But Americans remain intensely worried about paying for medical care, national surveys show.
Two in 3 U.S. adults in a recent nationwide poll by West Health and Gallup said they’re concerned a major health event would land them in debt. A similar share said health care isn’t getting enough attention in the campaign.
To better understand voters’ health care concerns as the 2024 campaign nears an end, KFF Health News worked with research firm PerryUndem to convene a pair of focus groups last week with 16 people from across the country. PerryUndem is a nonpartisan firm based in Washington, D.C., that studies public views on health care and other issues.
The focus group participants represented a broad swath of the electorate, with some favoring Republican candidates, and others Democrats. But nearly all shared a common complaint: Neither presidential candidate has talked enough about how they’d help people struggling to pay for medical care.
“You don’t really hear anything much about health care costs,” said Bob Groegler, 46, who works in residential financing in eastern Pennsylvania. Groegler said he’s worried he may never be able to retire because he won’t have enough money to pay his medical bills.
Former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, hasn’t offered a detailed health care agenda, though he criticizes current laws and said he has “concepts of a plan” to improve the 2010 Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare.
Vice President Kamala Harris, a Democrat, has laid out more detailed health care proposals, including building on legislation signed by President Joe Biden to lower patients’ bills.
In 2022, Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, which limits how much Medicare enrollees must pay out-of-pocket for prescription drugs, including a $35 monthly cap on insulin. The legislation also provides additional federal aid to help Americans buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, though this aid will expire unless Congress and the president renew it next year.
But most of the focus group participants said they knew little about these proposals, complaining that hot-button issues like abortion have dominated the campaign.
Many also expressed deep skepticism that either Harris or Trump would do much to lighten the burden of medical bills.
“I believe they’re out of touch with our reality,” said Renata Bobakova, 46, a teacher and mother outside Cleveland. “We never know when we’ll get sick. We never know when we’ll fall down or sprain an ankle. And prices really can be astronomical. … I’m constantly worried about that.”
Bobakova, who is from Slovakia, said she went back to Europe to give birth to her daughter 10 years ago to avoid crippling medical debt she knew she’d incur in this country. Parents with private health coverage face on average more than $3,000 in medical bills related to a pregnancy and childbirth that aren’t covered by insurance.
Other focus group participants said they or people they knew had left the country to get cheaper prescription drugs. The U.S. has the highest medical prices in the world, research shows.
Several focus group participants, such as Kevin Gaudette, 64, a retired semiconductor engineer in North Carolina, blamed large hospitals, drug companies, and insurers for blocking efforts to lower patients’ costs to protect their profits. “I think everybody has their finger in the pie,” Gaudette said.
Martha Chapman, 64, who is also retired and lives in Philadelphia, pointed to what she called “corporate greed.” “I just don’t think it’s going to change,” she said.
In the closing days of the campaign, that cynicism represents a particular problem for Harris, said PerryUndem co-founder Michael Perry, who led the two focus groups.
Harris has tried to distinguish herself as the candidate who is more serious about policy and more sympathetic to voters’ economic struggles, Perry said. And in recent weeks, she’s begun airing new ads highlighting health care issues.
But even focus group participants who said they lean Democratic seemed to blame both candidates for not addressing Americans’ health care concerns. “They’re not feeling listened to,” Perry said.
Many of the participants nevertheless continued to express hope that an issue as important as health care would someday get the attention of elected officials, regardless of political party.
“We’re all human beings here. We’re all people just trying to make it,” said Zawierucha, the building services worker in New Jersey. “If we get sick or have to go in and get something done, we should have that peace of mind that we can go in there and not have to worry about paying it off for the next 20 years.”
“Just give us some peace of mind,” he said.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling and journalism.
Georgia’s Supreme Court rejected a Republican-led effort to implement more than half a dozen controversial new election rules before Election Day.
In a brief order issued Tuesday, the court declined to reinstate the seven new rules implemented by the State Election Board, and declined to consider an expedited appeal — effectively ending the effort to get the new rules in place in time for the upcoming election.
A lower level Georgia judge on Oct. 16 declared the rules “illegal, unconstitutional and void.” The rules, which include one that requires ballots to be hand-counted and two related to certification of results, were supported by three of the State Election Board’s five members, all of whom were endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
President Biden defeated Trump in the state in 2020, and Trump has since repeated disproven claims that fraud cost him the election.
The new rules were opposed by not just Democrats, but also state Republican officials who cast doubt on whether they were legal. They said a hand count could delay election results, and argued in court that it was too late to properly train election workers on the new responsibilities.
Other rules passed by the board — include one that would have required county officials “to examine all election related documentation created during the conduct of elections,” a potentially laborious process — and another that would have required them to conduct a “reasonable inquiry” before certifying results. That rule did not explain what a “reasonable inquiry” entails.
The Georgia Supreme Court didn’t outright reject the appeal. In the order Tuesday, the court said it is declining to fast forward proceedings.
“When the appeal is docketed in this court, it will proceed in the ordinary course,” the justices wrote.
Graham Kates is an investigative reporter covering criminal justice, privacy issues and information security for CBS News Digital. Contact Graham at KatesG@cbsnews.com or grahamkates@protonmail.com
Elon Musk has used the social media platform he owns to amass nearly 3.3 billion views on X by fueling doubts about election security issues since January this year — making the tech mogul one of the most viral voices on elections during the 2024 campaign, a CBS News investigation has found.
Musk has frequently shared conspiratorial narratives that have been vexing to public officials who are trying to maintain Americans’ confidence in the election in the face of a barrage of misinformation and disinformation.
At his first solo appearance at a pro-Trump rally in Philadelphia last week, Musk claimed, “Statistically there are some very strange things that happen that are statistically incredibly unlikely.” He then repeated debunked claims about the validity of vote tallies produced by Dominion voting machines. But even before he took the stage, Musk had already emerged as a prolific conduit for election misinformation on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“The goal all along has been to import as many illegal voters as possible,” Musk posted in July, echoing the conspiracy that Democrats are purposefully letting immigrants enter the country illegally to vote in the upcoming presidential election. The post gained 45.8 million views.
The CBS News Confirmed team fact-checked Musk’s posts on election security and found that 55% contain misleading or false statements, or amplify posts that do. Further analysis of these posts showed that 40 of the accounts Musk replied to or reposted were accounts researchers have identified as promoters of voter fraud claims.
Musk did not respond to CBS News’ request for comment.
CBS News collected more than 48,000 of Musk’s posts over the past four years, with support from the International Center for Journalists Disarming Disinformation program and the research group Convocation Research+Design. The analysis focused on X posts on the topic of election administration, security and operation.
An analysis of nearly 17,000 of Musk’s posts from this year, as well as thousands more he replied to or reposted, found 361 posts specifically on the topic of potential election fraud in U.S. elections. Although these election posts represent a small fraction of the dozens of posts Musk publishes each day, each one had an average of 9.3 million views as Musk continues to be the most followed profile on X.
Experts are concerned that such high audience engagement on posts amplifying election fraud conspiracies could set the stage for possible post-election chaos.
“On election night, if Trump believes he’s losing, he is likely to spread massive amounts of disinformation about the existence of fraud,” said David Becker, executive director of the Center of Election Innovation and Research.
“I think we can say with near certainty, Elon Musk is going to take those comments and spread them out to hundreds of millions of people to be consumed immediately, while election officials are busy counting ballots,” Becker said.
Mekela Panditharatne, senior counsel for the Brennan Center for Justice’s Elections & Government Program, agreed. “I think that this is galvanizing unfounded fears and concerns about the election process, and preparing for the possibility of unfounded challenges to election results in the aftermath,” she said.
Musk’s increased engagement with election conspiracies has mirrored his embrace of the establishment political right.
The tech entrepreneur said that he voted Republican for the first time in a Texas congressional race in June 2022. A month later, he wrote that he thought it was time “for Trump to hang up his hat.” Over the next two years, posts criticizing President Biden and the prosecution of Trump became more frequent.
On July 13, 2024, the day of the first attempted assassination of Trump, Musk announced his formal endorsement of the Republican candidate for a second term. Since then, his posts have shown full-throated support for Trump.
“I have never been materially active in politics before, but this time I think civilization as we know it is on the line,” Musk posted last month. “If we want to preserve freedom and a meritocracy in America, then Trump must win.”
Since then he has campaigned with the former president in Arizona and contributed more than $74.95 million to the America PAC, a super PAC that supports Trump’s reelection.
SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks on stage at a rally for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 5, 2024.
JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images
Musk has also used his platform to go head-to-head with election officials who try to refute his conspiracies. This weekend he posted on X claiming that Michigan has more registered voters than eligible citizens. Michigan Secretary of State Joceyln Benson responded with a correction, saying that there are not more voters than citizens in the state. “There are 7.2 million active registered voters and 7.9 million citizens of voting age in our state,” her post said. “@elonmusk is spreading dangerous disinformation.”
“Jocelyn Michelle Benson, shame on you for blatantly lying to the public!” Musk responded. The post amassed 24.2 million views and 39,000 retweets in less than three days.
The skepticism online directed towards election officials like Benson can have real-world impacts. The secretary said that she and her team received an uptick in threats and harassing messages directed to her office after Musk’s post. She ended up asking her security team to focus on protecting her children and her executive assistant after messages started coming in using extreme language and echoing the concerns about voter registration numbers, citing two incidents of swatting earlier this year.
“It’s unnerving because his actions lead to a direct uptick in threats to me and other election officials around Michigan,” she told CBS News. “This is all happening when early voting is unfolding in Michigan, and while my team needs to be focused fully on making voting work properly, they are having to deal with this instead.”
Benson’s experience is not unique. “We have seen a number of election officials who have expressed the view that Musk’s posts coincide with a surge in questions from constituents about the integrity of the process,” said Panditharatne. “Musk’s posts have encouraged vitriol directed at election officials.”
Musk focuses on non-citizens, machines and mail voting
More than half of Musk’s posts on election security this year relate to non-citizen voting or representation in Congress, with many repeating the conspiracy that Democrats under the Biden administration are intentionally allowing an increase in immigration to boost their political power.
Some posts even extend beyond the upcoming presidential election to a future political landscape.
“My prediction is that if Kamala wins, the Dems will import and legalize enough migrants to ensure a permanent one-party rule that is increasingly socialist (to a confiscatory level) and repressive,” wrote Musk in a September post.
The idea that Democrats are “importing voters” echoes the “great replacement theory,” a conspiracy, widely decried as racist, that White voters are being replaced by non-White voters entering the country.
“These kinds of lies make the assumption that the ‘real’ voters are White voters,” said Gilda Daniels, author and professor at the University of Baltimore Law School. “That other-ism, that idea that immigration is out of control, and so we have all these people who are not White [voting].”
Non-citizen voting is not widespread, and it is already illegal for non-citizens to vote in national elections. Non-citizens who vote can face fines, prison time, or even deportation. A Washington Post analysis of the conservative Heritage Foundation’s data found that of 2 billion votes cast since 1979, there were only 85 cases involving allegations of non-citizen voting.
Other posts that Musk frequently engages with discuss potential tampering with voting machines, vulnerabilities of absentee voting, and the need for stricter photo ID laws. His posts on mail-in ballots have a combined 344 million views, and posts about voter ID have a combined 524 million views. He also advocates for hand-counting paper ballots without machines, which experts say makes it difficult to audit ballots for accuracy.
“They’re throwing everything against the wall and seeing what sticks,” said Becker. “As with all disinformation, it is not based at all on truth or actual policies that need to be improved upon or changed. It is based solely upon outcome, because [Musk] is highly invested in seeing a Donald Trump presidency.”
Amplification of the extreme
An analysis by Convocation Research + Design, or CoRD, a research lab that focuses on disinformation and the far-right, has found that the accounts he replies to reposts the most on this topic primarily post far-right ideas, including the great replacement theory.
“More and more often these accounts Musk is engaging with are far right, and become further right,” said Sam Smith, co-founder of CoRD.
“We have witnessed Musk become more right-wing in his posting, as well as more political.”
Within his most amplified accounts are several profiles known to engage in far right ideology. On the topic of election security, he engages the most with “EndWokeness,” an account known for spreading conspiracies about immigration and posting racist memes. Earlier this year, Musk reposted an EndWokeness post falsely claiming that the number of people registering to vote without a photo ID in three states was “skyrocketing.”
“Extremely concerning,” Musk wrote in a post that gained 65.7 million views. State election officials confirmed that the numbers in the post represented the number of requests from the states to the Social Security Administration to verify voter identities, not new voter registrations.
Researchers are concerned with the way that Musk’s engagement with right-wing accounts may alter the posts other X users see on their profiles.
“If Musk frequently engages with or amplifies far-right content, the platform’s algorithm may prioritize similar content for his followers. This can lead to an unintended exposure to extreme viewpoints, misinformation, or harmful ideologies,” said Smith.
Republican lawmakers and conservative activists are also among the top ten accounts Musk interacts with on the topic of election integrity: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, Sen. Mike Lee’s alt account “BasedMikeLee,” and Steven Miller, former senior adviser to President Trump, who now runs America First legal.
In response to a thread from Johnson on the SAVE Act, a bill that would have required proof of citizenship to vote, Musk wrote “Those who oppose this are traitors. All Caps: TRAITORS. What is the penalty for traitors again?” The repost had 56.8 million views.
For election night, and the days after, experts like Becker are concerned about the reach of Musk’s posts and the impact they may have on trust in the process.
“When we see attacks on the judiciary, when we see attacks on law enforcement, when we see attacks on election officials, when we see attacks on voters themselves, those will probably be amplified by Musk on his platform that he owns,” he said.
“So, the ability of the truth to reach citizens is going to be extremely limited while the ability of liars to defraud citizens is going to be maximized,” Becker said.
Facts about voting
Non-citizen voting refers to voting by unauthorized immigrants, green-card holders, or immigrants on temporary visas. Voting by these groups is not widespread. Federal law requires citizenship to vote in national elections, and voters attest under penalty of perjury that they are citizens when they register. Non-citizens who vote can face fines, prison time or even deportation. A Washington Post analysis of the conservative Heritage Foundation’s data found that of 2 billion votes cast since 1979, there were only 85 cases involving allegations of non-citizen voting. A study of Arizona voter rolls found 1,934 voters in Arizona were non-citizens — 0.04% of the state’s registered voters. After the 2016 election, analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice found 30 cases of suspected non-citizens voting reported by election officials out of 23.5 million votes cast in 42 jurisdictions that were reviewed.
Non-citizen representation: The Constitution states that all people should be counted in the apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives, which is used to calculate the number of electoral votes each state receives. Even if the census includes a citizenship question, according to the Constitution, non-citizens would be counted in the population totals used for determining congressional and electoral representation. Analyses by the Pew Research Center and Center for Immigration Studies found that not counting non-citizens in apportionment of House seats would have minimal impact on the additional seats that historically lean toward Democrats.
Voting machines must pass federal and state certification standards to be deployed and are tested before voters cast their ballots to make sure they are working properly. Additionally, while voting machines are highly accurate in counting votes, widely used paper ballots allow those machine counts to be checked and audited by people. Forty-nine states performed a post-election audit of some kind, including Pennsylvania, which found just 24 discrepancies among the 201,715 total votes officials reviewed in 2023. That’s about 1/100 of 1% of all ballots audited. According to the Election Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council and others, “All of the states with close results in the 2020 presidential race” had paper records of each vote.
Mail-in voting: Historically, mail ballot systems have had bipartisan trust. Security measures protect against vulnerabilities such as tampering, impersonation and ballot stuffing. Mail-in ballots are enclosed in sealed envelopes that are confirmed for eligibility. The voter’s identity is verified by signature and other identifying information to ensure it matches details on file. Multiple election staff members or bipartisan teams are present when ballots are retrieved and handled throughout the process. Election officials track issued ballots to prevent duplicate voting with serial numbers or barcodes, and the number of ballots received is compared to the number of voters who applied for a ballot. Suspicious ballots are investigated and relayed to law enforcement as needed.
Mishael White, a first-time candidate for Georgia House District 81, discussed his campaign focused on unifying diverse residents in Henry County. He emphasized addressing common issues transcending party and race. White highlighted his commitment to public service and the positive community response to his blue-collar background.
House District 81 contains portions of Locust Grove and McDonough.
“It’s a diverse area. You have a mix of Democrat, Republican, white, and Black. “But the things that I’ve been focused on in the campaign are the issues that we that we share in common. These are issues that transcend party and they transcend race. And so the type of campaign that I’ve been running is one that is looking to unify us.”
White also stresses the importance of reducing Georgia’s high maternal mortality rate. Plus, White speaks about the rumored disconnect between Black men and the Democratic Party. He stresses the importance of framing the rise of a black woman as a positive development that does not come at the expense of Black men and encourages a focus on qualifications and policy impact. White also emphasizes the need for better messaging and outreach to highlight policies that benefit Black men, such as criminal justice reform and education investment.
White also talks about Georgia’s heartbeat law which bans abortions at six weeks of pregnancy. Georgia’s abortion bans occur before an embryo is fully formed. Georgia is one of fourteen states where such abortion bans are on the books. White commits to representing the voices of his constituents and voting based on their needs and concerns.
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In the frantic last weeks of the campaign, both Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are doing everything they can to get an edge.
One development that has Democrats concerned and Republicans thrilled is Trump’s relative strength with minority voters.
In 2020, President Biden got 90% of the Black vote while Trump received only 9%.
But in 2024, polls show Harris is not doing as well and Trump has made gains. Harris has 78% of the Black vote while Trump has 15% — an advantage of 63%.
The bottom line is that Harris still has a huge edge among Black voters, but in an election that is expected to be razor close, the difference is significant.
If you break it down by gender, you can see a big source of the divide — 70% of Black men support Harris while 83% of Black women do. The numbers have both sides scrambling.
“As a person who the polls don’t always capture well, I can tell you that I am not sure those numbers are right, but let’s just act like they are,” Ellison said. “It means we have a lot of work to do. It means we have to help voters understand that Donald Trump has been frankly hostile to Black people for a long time.”
On the Republican side, Minnesota Republican National Committee Member AK Kamara says Trump is gaining momentum.
“From my perspective, this is a trend that is continuing nationally,” Kamara said. “I think there are a lot of Black men who see a hero in Donald Trump, a guy that is going to stand up for what he actually believes in.”
Last week, Harris countered by offering up what she calls her “Opportunity Agenda for Black Men.” The policies include a plan to provide as many as 1 million fully forgivable loans of up to $20,000 for Black entrepreneurs.
In these final weeks, Trump is focusing especially hard on younger Black men who polls show are especially receptive to him.
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Esme Murphy, a reporter and Sunday morning anchor for WCCO-TV, has been a member of the WCCO-TV staff since December 1990. She is also a weekend talk show host on WCCO Radio. Born and raised in New York City, Esme ventured into reporting after graduating from Harvard University.
Former President Donald Trump delivered unusual and vulgar remarks Saturday about the late golf legend Arnold Palmer while campaigning in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, as the campaign enters the final stretch to Election Day.
The former president spoke for more than 10 minutes about Palmer, who was born in Latrobe, at a rally at the local airport named in Palmer’s honor.
“He was an incredible man, he was an incredible champion, and he came from Latrobe,” Trump said.
Then his comments appeared to go off script.
“This is a guy that was all man,” the former president said. “This man was strong and tough, and I refuse to say it, but when he took showers with the other pros, they came out of there, they said, ‘Oh my God, that’s unbelievable.’”
To laughter, Trump added, “I had to say it.”
Republican presidential nominee and former President Donald Trump gestures at a campaign rally on Oct. 19, 2024, in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.
Win McNamee/Getty Images
Trump noted that he’s been to Latrobe and told the story before, but “not in this kind of detail.”
Palmer’s daughter Peg Palmer Wears said in 2018 that her father, a political conservative who died in 2016 shortly before Trump was elected, was “appalled” by Trump.
“What would my dad think of Donald Trump today? I think he’d cringe,” she told author Thomas Hauser then.
On Sunday, she told The Associated Press that she is “not really upset” about Trump’s remark, saying “there’s nothing much to say.”
“I think it was a poor choice of approaches to remembering my father, but what are you going to do?” Palmer Wears said.
Later in his remarks, Trump led the crowd in a call-and-response about the Biden-Harris administration’s economic and foreign policy record, saying “everything they touch turns to…” as the crowd chimed in with the expletive.
“You have to tell Kamala Harris that you’ve had enough, that you just can’t take it anymore. We can’t stand you. You’re a s-– vice president. The worst,” Trump said to the crowd about his Democratic rival. “You’re the worst vice president. Kamala, you’re fired.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson was asked repeatedly about Trump’s Arnold Palmer comments on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday, but he pivoted to Harris’ record, saying, “put the rhetoric aside.”
“This shouldn’t be about personalities, it should be about policies,” Johnson said.
Meanwhile, Harris has been calling Trump’s mental state into question on the campaign trail in recent days, while sharpening her criticism of the former president. On Saturday, she told reporters that Trump is “becoming increasingly unstable and unhinged.”
“The American people are seeing it, witnessing it in real time,” she added.
