With polls showing increasing support for Kamala Harris, the Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports that Donald Trump’s campaign is betting on a strong debate performance to give him an edge over the vice-president:
Donald Trump’s campaign insists that they’re pursuing multiple strategies against Kamala Harris, but the true picture that is emerging is that the Trump senior advisers’ grand plan, for now, is to pray that the former US president has a good night at the presidential debate next month.
The game plan, in other words, has become one of hoping that Trump wins the debate so they can regain momentum – a stunning approach that shows the serious predicament for Trump and his campaign as he struggles to find ways to land effective attacks against the vice-president just months before the election.
What has happened internally in the Trump campaign in recent weeks is the realization that nothing they do in the period up to the debate is likely to cut through in a significant way that blunts Harris’s gains that have her level in key swing state polls, according to people close to the matter.
And because they don’t think the messaging will cut through, senior advisers are left hoping that Trump can energize voters with his performance on stage, the people said.
Trump is certain to continue his day-to-day campaign work until the debate on 10 September: he has a busy travel schedule that will see him do a town hall event in Wisconsin and a rally in Pennsylvania this week, after his visit to the Arlington national cemetery became mired in controversy.
Trump staffer 'pushed' Arlington cemetery official – report
MSNBC reports that a staffer from Donald Trump’s campaign pushed an employee of Arlington national cemetery out of the way so that he could take pictures and video during the former president’s visit to the Virginia burial grounds on Monday:
Breaking on @MSNBC: An employee at Arlington National Cemetery was pushed out of the way by a Trump official on Monday, according to two defense officials, so that the Trump official could take photos and video at Section 60 while Trump visited the cemetery.
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) August 29, 2024
Military police were…
Reports emerged earlier this week of an altercation during Trump’s visit to a section of the cemetery holding the bodies of those killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and where takings pictures is prohibited. The former president’s aides have said that they had permission to film and shoot photos there.
Here’s more on the brewing controversy:
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Later today, Kamala Harris will do the first sit-down interview of her campaign with CNN, and be joined by her running mate, Tim Walz.
Donald Trump’s allies in the GOP rarely pass up an opportunity to criticize Harris, and are trying to make a scandal out of the vice-president’s decision to take questions alongside Walz.
“It is absolutely unacceptable that the first and ONLY interview from Kamala Harris – the anointed Democrat nominee for President of the United States – is done jointly with Tim Walz. It is offensive to ALL women that Kamala has refused to sit for a solo interview when she is running to be Commander-in-chief,” the high-ranking House Republican Elise Stefanik said in a statement.
In response, Politico reports that Harris’s campaign has compiled a long list of joint interviews done by presidential contenders over the past 20 years, and adding that the vice-president plans to do solo interviews in the weeks to come.
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Another poll out today, this time from Emerson College, shows Democratic candidates leading in several swing state Senate races:
US Senate polls with @thehill:#AZSen: Gallego (D) 49%, Lake (R) 42%#MISen: Slotkin (D) 47%, Rogers (R) 41%#NVSen: Rosen (D) 50%, Brown (R) 40%#PASen: Casey (D) 48%, McCormick (R) 44%#WISen: Baldwin (D) 49%, Hovde (R) 48%https://t.co/6kUM620BMz
— Emerson College Polling (@EmersonPolling) August 29, 2024
The party is facing a tough road to maintain their 51-seat majority in the chamber, which almost certainly hinges on Kamala Harris winning the White House, in addition to the re-election of senators from red states Ohio and Montana – races that Emerson did not poll.
Harris and Trump neck and neck in Sun belt swing states – poll
In more poll news, a Fox News survey released late yesterday has found Kamala Harris and Donald Trump practically tied for voter support in North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona, the four swing states located in the Sun belt.
The poll was conducted after the conclusion of the Democratic national convention last week, and after independent candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr ended his campaign and endorsed Trump. Here’s what it found:
The surveys, released Wednesday, find a close, two-way Harris-Trump race: Harris is up by 1 percentage point in Arizona and by 2 points in Georgia and Nevada, while Trump is ahead by 1 point in North Carolina. All are within the margin of sampling error.
In past Fox News surveys, Biden trailed Trump in each state: by 5 points in both Arizona and Nevada (June), by 6 in Georgia (April) and by 5 points in North Carolina (February).
The new surveys find Trump achieves his 2020 vote percentage in the head-to-head race in every state except Georgia, while Harris meets or exceeds Biden’s 2020 vote share across the states.
In 2020, Trump won North Carolina by just over 1 point, while Biden narrowly won the other three states (Arizona and Georgia by less than 1 point and Nevada by over 2 points).
Overall, in an average of the four states, Harris is ahead of Trump by a single point in the two-way match-up, 50% to 49%. That 1-point Harris edge also holds among the seven in 10 voters who say they are extremely motivated to cast a ballot this year.
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Voter enthusiasm surges as Democrats cheer Harris’s entry into race, poll finds, ahead of vice-president's first interview
Good morning, US politics blog readers. There’s no doubt that Kamala Harris’s candidacy has transformed the presidential race, with poll after poll showing her drawing even or overtaking Donald Trump in the support of voters nationally, and in the swing states expected to decide the election. Gallup reported this morning that enthusiasm among all voters has jumped in recent weeks, after Harris ascended to the top of the Democratic ticket and chose the Minnesota governor, Tim Walz, as her running mate. Among her party’s voters, enthusiasm has jumped to 78% from 55% in March, Gallup finds. Among adults overall, it’s up to 69%, from 54% over the same period – which Gallup notes is the highest level it has measured during a presidential election campaign. That doesn’t necessarily mean that Harris is poised for victory, since Gallup says overall enthusiasm came close to that level in 2004, a year when Democrats failed to retake the White House.
Today is shaping up to be a big one for both Harris and Walz. They are sitting down with CNN in the afternoon for their first joint interview since launching their candidacy, and after weeks of mounting questions over why neither one has had an in-depth talk with reporters. Their conversation airs at 9pm ET, but we can expect to see excerpts released before then.
Here’s what else is happening today:
Harris is continuing her bus tour of south Georgia, and will hold a rally in Savannah at 5.30pm.
The controversy is building over reports of an altercation between Donald Trump’s staffers and an official at Arlington national cemetery during his visit there this week. The former president’s campaign hasn’t helped matters by sharing video of their trip on TikTok.
JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, will reportedly address a firefighters’s union convention today, after Walz spoke to them yesterday.
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