Supreme court rejects Republican argument on Pennsylvania ballot counting: AP
The supreme court on Friday rejected an emergency appeal from Republicans that could have led to thousands of provisional ballots not being counted in Pennsylvania, the Associated Press reports.
The justices left in place a state supreme court ruling that elections officials must count provisional ballots cast by voters whose mail-in ballots were rejected.
As of Thursday, about 9,000 ballots out of more than 1.6 million returned have arrived at elections offices around Pennsylvania lacking a secrecy envelope, a signature or a date, according to state records.
Pennsylvania is the biggest presidential election battleground this year, with 19 electoral votes. Donald Trump won the state in 2016, then lost it in 2020.
Key events
Summary
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris campaigned in midwest swing states today, ending with dueling rallies in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, seen as a crucial state to win. Here are some of today’s key updates from myself and my colleagues:
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Cardi B spoke at Harris’ Milwaukee rally, saying that she had not been planning to vote in this presidential election, but that Harris convinced her to do so. She called Harris an “underdog” whose accomplishments as a woman have been repeatedly demeaned and underestimated.
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Despite facing criticism over saying yesterday that his prominent Republican critic Liz Cheney should have rifles shooting at her, Trump revisited his remarks about Cheney and her father Dick Cheney, calling her a war hawk and a coward. Harris had called Trump’s rhetoric about Cheney “disqualifying”.
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The supreme court rejected an emergency appeal from Republicans that could have led to thousands of provisional ballots not being counted in Pennsylvania, and left in place a state supreme court ruling that election officials must count provisional ballots cast by voters whose mail-in ballots were rejected.
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Trump visited Dearborn, Michigan, to tout his support among Arab Americans and Muslim Americans who are angry with the Biden Harris administration over their support for Israel and the human death toll in Gaza and Lebanon. While key Arab American leaders chose not to meet with Trump, some called his in-person visit important, and criticized Harris and the Democratic party.
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Dearborn’s Democratic mayor, Abdullah Hammoud, posted on X, “The architect of the Muslim Ban is making a campaign stop in Dearborn…To the Dems – your unwillingness to stop funding & enabling a genocide created the space for Trump to infiltrate our communities. Remember that.”
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The prominent vaccine skeptic Robert F Kennedy Jr campaigned for Trump in Michigan and Wisconsin, earning big cheers from Trump supporters as the former third-party candidate reportedly is aiming for a major healthcare role in Trump’s White House.
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A federal judge on Friday denied an attempt by America Pac – the political action committee founded by Elon Musk to support Donald Trump’s campaign for a second presidency – to move to federal court a civil suit brought by the Philadelphia district attorney over a daily $1m prize draw for registered voters. A hearing was scheduled in Pennsylvania state court on Monday, the day before the election.
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Arizona’s attorney general has launched an investigation into whether Donald Trump violated state law through his violent rhetoric against Liz Cheney. In a statement to 12News on Friday, attorney general Kris Mayes said: “I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analyzing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws.”
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The justice department announced on Friday it is deploying election monitors in 86 jurisdictions in 27 states for the general election on 5 November. “The Justice Department enforces federal voting rights laws that protect the rights of all eligible citizens to access the ballot,” an official statement said. “The department regularly deploys its staff to monitor for compliance with federal civil rights laws in elections in communities all across the country.”
Trump has wrapped up his Milwaukee rally, not long before 11 pm local time.
Despite the late hour, the crowd in Milwaukee rose to its feet to give him a standing ovation as Donald Trump listed off the actions he would take against migrants who commit crimes, the Associated Press reports.
Trump has centered his campaign on hardline tactics to stop illegal immigration, including the death penalty for migrants who are in the country illegally and kill an American citizen.
We are counting down to just three days and a few hours before the 2024 election, and Donald Trump is still riffing to a crowd of supporters in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, as Kamala Harris has already arrived at her hotel for the night, according to the White House pool reporter.
Harris’ Milwaukee speech tonight was short, peppy, and relentlessly on message. Trump, as is his style, is rambling, hitting his attack lines on the economy and immigration, but also making extraneous attacks, such as criticizing the hair of ABC anchor David Muir, saying 60 Minutes should be shut down, and complaining that he is not allowed to call the Democratic governor of Illinois fat. (Again, he is in Wisconsin.)
“Is there a chance she would resign before the election? Three days?” Trump asks of his Democratic competitor, Kamala Harris. It’s not clear why Trump is airing this idea, other than as part of his claim that Harris looks “rattled”.
“I actually think they should have left Joe, he would have done just as well, maybe better,” Trump says.
Now Trump, speaking in Wisconsin, is attacking the Democratic governor of Illinois, JB Pritzker.
“I am not allowed to use the fat word. That’s the other word you cannot use,” Trump says, to some laughter from the crowd. “You are not allowed to use the fat word so I will not do it, but that guy is disgusting.”
“I took a lot of heat about two months ago because I said, ‘I think women like me, I do, I think the suburban housewives like me,” Trump said. There are high-pitched cheers from the audience.
“I think they like me because they know I’m going to protect them,” Trump says.
Talking about his plans for mass deportation of migrants, and expediting deportation of gang members, Trump says that he will invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, and said that it’s “incredible” that “we had to go back so far” to find the law he needed.
“That’s when we ran a tough country,” he says, of the year 1798.
It is past 10pm in Milwaukee and Donald Trump is still talking. He is riffing freely, criticizing journalist David Muir’s hair, and revisiting what he saw as the unfairness of his debate against Kamala Harris, which Muir moderated.
Then he spoke about his lawsuit against CBS News and 60 Minutes, saying it “should be forced to close”.
Trump sounds a bit tired, and he is delivering his attack lines in a gentler tone that he did earlier in the day in Michigan.
“You were a very difficult state,” Trump says of Wisconsin, talking about how hard the state was for him to win in 2016, and then falsely claiming that he actually won the state again in 2020. (He did not.)
The AP has a fact check of Trump’s comments just now on the economy, and what his comments leave out: two major hurricanes as well as big strikes.
Donald Trump is saying that the US jobs report today, which showed that employers added 12,000 jobs in October, showed that the Biden-Harris administration is failing on the economy. Last month’s hiring gain was down significantly from the 223,000 jobs that were added in September.
“This is like a depression,” Trump said of the numbers as he heaped insults on Harris.
Economists estimate that Hurricanes Helene and Milton, combined with strikes at Boeing and elsewhere, pushed down net job growth by tens of thousands of jobs in October.
Kamala Harris appears to be wrapping up her speech, urging her supporters to remind everyone they know to vote, and to reach out to people through text and conversation.
“Let’s please be intentional about building community,” she adds. “There’s something intentional about this whole Trump era. It’s been powered by this idea that Americans should be pointing fingers at each other, and to make people feel alone and to make people feel small, when we all know we have so much more in common than what separates us.”
“I love Gen Z. I really do,” Kamala Harris laughs, talking about “all the younger leaders I see who are voting for the very first time.”
“Here’s what I love about you guys. You are rightly impatient for change. I love that about you. You are determined to live free from gun violence. You are going to take on the climate crisis. You are going to shape the world you inherit. I know that. I know that.”
“And here’s the thing about our young leaders. None of this is theoretical for them. None of this is political for them. It’s their lived experience. It’s your lived experience, and I see your power, I see your power, and I am so proud of you.”
“I see her today … she’s exhausted. She looks like … she’s exhausted,” Trump says of Kamala Harris, at his Milwaukee rally.
Harris is simultaneously speaking very energetically to her cheering crowd a few miles away.
Both Trump and Harris are performing with a surprising deal of energy tonight after a long day of travel and multiple swing state events.
The crowd at Trump’s rally has been frustrated with the sound levels in the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, even chanting earlier, “Fix the mic!” the Associated Press reports.
Trump eventually got the message and ripped the microphone from the podium to hold it closer to his mouth. “I think this mic stinks,” Trump said.
Trump has been jumping from topic to topic, mentioning that this is his third campaign rally today, then referencing his rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden nearly a week ago, and then hurling insults at his Democratic rival.
In two different venues across Milwaukee and its suburbs, both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris’ Wisconsin crowds have been waiting hours to hear the candidates speak, and both crowds sound fired up and enthusiastic.
