Election 2020 live updates: Trump says debate mute button is 'unfair,' but 'that's my life'
Former President Barack Obama met Wednesday in Philadelphia with local officials and Black community leaders to discuss the importance of voting as a way to improve their lives.
Trump, who rallied in Erie on Tuesday and narrowly won the Keystone State in 2016, finds himself trailing there just 13 days before Election Day. A new USA TODAY/Suffolk poll released Wednesday found the former vice president leading Trump by 7 points.
Trump and Biden will meet for the final time before the election on Thursday during a debate in Nashville.
☕ The latest:
Congress and the White House have still not come to a deal on more COVID-19 relief. What that means for you.
19 women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct. Here's what their stories have in common.
There may be continuing delays with U.S. mail two weeks before an election where mail-in ballots are being used at unprecedented levels. Of 64 letters and packages sent short distances within battleground states since mid-September, 14 took longer than the U.S. Postal Service’s own three-day service standard for first-class local mail, a USA TODAY and University of Maryland tracking effort found.
📊 What the polls are saying: Democrat Joe Biden leads President Donald Trump among likely voters in Iowa, which Trump won in 2016.
📆 13 days until Election Day, one day until the final presidential debate, 91 days until Inauguration Day, 73 days left in 2020.
🗳️ Voting: See USA TODAY's Voter Guide for information on registering to vote, when your state begins voting and what the candidates think about the issues.
We will update this article throughout the day. You can follow all of USA TODAY's politics reporters on Twitter or subscribe to our daily On Politics newsletter.
Donald Trump: I'm not 'begging' suburban women to vote for me
President Donald Trump used a pre-debate rally Wednesday to detail one of his complaints with this week's "60 Minutes" interview, saying correspondent Lesley Stahl claimed he is "begging" for the votes of suburban women.
Maybe not begging – but definitely asking.
Speaking to supporters in Gastonia, N.C., near Charlotte, Trump talked about how he solicits votes: "I joke and I say, 'women of the suburbs, please, please love me! I've done so good!'"
According to Trump, Stahl said the request for "love" amounts to "begging;" the president said he explained he was being "sarcastic," and mocked the premise of the question.
Said Trump: "From now on, when I say, 'women of the suburbs. please love me,' I've got to say, 'I'm only kidding! I'm only kidding!'"
Trump spoke a day after abruptly ending the "60 Minutes" interview, claiming it was biased and unfair.
Trump has not released a video, as he said on Tuesday he might do, but teased the interview on Wednesday by tweeting images of Stahl interviewing him.
The CBS program doesn't plan to air the interview until Sunday as part of a special program devoted to the presidential election.
In the meantime, Trump engages in his second and final debate with Democratic opponent Joe Biden in Nashville on Thursday.
— David Jackson and Courtney Subramanian
Trump: Mute button and other debate details are 'unfair,' but 'that's my life'
President Donald Trump prepared Wednesday for the final debate of the election season by complaining about it.
"I think the mute is very unfair," Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a pre-debate campaign rally in Gastonia, N.C., which is near Charlotte.
Trump also complained, again, about moderator Kristen Welker and the fact that the topic of Thursday's debate in Nashville was changed from foreign affairs to a more general discussion of the issues.
"But," he added philosophically, "that’s my life. In the meantime, that’s the White House standing behind me, right?”
After Trump constantly interrupted opponent Joe Biden during their Sept. 29 showdown, the Commission on Presidential Debates said it will mute each candidate's microphone for two minutes as their rival answers questions.
While the mute option appears directed at him, Trump said he still plans to show up in Nashville on Thursday and hopes to get in more preparation time earlier in the day.
– David Jackson
Obama: ‘If you don’t vote, you’re not at the table’
Former President Barack Obama encouraged people to learn what interests their residents have and then to describe how those might be affected by the president, or state legislature or city officials. Obama acknowledged that young people face many distractions, but he suggested they will vote if they see others voting.
“The government is us: of, by and for the people,” Obama said at his first in-person campaign event of the 2020 election. “It wasn’t always for all of us. But the way it’s designed, it works based on who is at the table. If you do not vote, you’re not at the table.”
Obama was also scheduled to give a speech supporting his vice president, Joe Biden, against President Donald Trump.
The Biden campaign launched “Shop Talk” sessions for its surrogates to encourage voting after the Aug. 23 police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The shooting led to peaceful protests and violent rioting in the city, as part of a summer of racial justice protests about policing.
Policing has been a flashpoint between the two campaigns. Trump campaigns as the law-and-order president vowing to end urban violence. He noted that unemployment was low for Black and Hispanic communities before the pandemic shuttered the economy. Biden has proposed greater police training, to reduce tensions during confrontations between officers and residents, and economic changes to spur Black homeownership and businesses.
Other Biden surrogates who have held “Shop Talk” programs include one of his campaign’s co-chairmen, Rep. Cedric Richmond of Louisiana, Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes and former basketball star Earvin “Magic” Johnson.
Obama’s event was at the Hank Gathers Youth Access Center in North Philadelphia, a community suffering from discriminatory lending dating to the 1930s and from high rates of poverty, unemployment and gun violence.
Biden’s economic proposals aim to reduce discriminatory lending, offer $15,000 to first-time home buyers and reduce the costs of college. But he would need congressional legislation for many of his proposals, while Republicans have criticized Biden’s plan to overturn Trump’s tax cuts on businesses and on individuals earning more than $400,000 per year.
Tamir Harper, co-founder of UrbEd Inc., a non-profit that advocates for public schools, asked Obama how to design a curriculum to get young people involved in politics and voting.
Obama said demonstrating the power of voting – even if just on what flavor pizza to order or which book to read from a class syllabus – is a way to demonstrate results from voting.
“People are more likely to vote if they’ve participated in something like that when they were younger,” Obama said. “Giving kids a sense that they have a voice, that piques their interest.”
Isaiah Thomas, a Philadelphia City Council member, asked how to inspire voters who see problems magnified during the pandemic without any signs of change.
“All of our problems will not go away with one election,” Thomas said. “But at the same time, we have to recognize that this is a step in a direction of progress and change.”
Obama said listening to voters is a way to learn their priorities. Then, he said incremental change is possible – if people vote. He noted African American voter turnout set a record with his election in 2008 at 60%, but that the country hasn’t seen what would happen at 80%.
“What I say to young people is: give it a shot,” Obama said. “We can make things better. Better is good.”
— Bart Jansen
Biden holds massive cash advantage over Trump for final two weeks
Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden holds a massive cash-on-hand advantage over President Donald Trump for the final stretch before the Nov. 3 election.
The Biden campaign reported having more than $177 million on hand to spend, nearly three times the $63 million the Trump campaign reported, according to filings submitted to the Federal Election Commission on Tuesday. Figures, which do not include joint fundraising committees, were as of the end of September.
It comes as the former vice president has dominated Trump in fundraising the past two months, erasing a one-time fundraising advantage Trump enjoyed earlier in the campaign.
Biden last week announced raising 383 million in campaign funds in September, breaking the one-month record for a presidential candidate that he set the month before. The Trump campaign raised $247.8 million in September. In August, Biden raised $364.5 million, beating the $210 million raised by the Trump campaign. These figures include joint fundraising committees.
Biden has a significantly larger war chest despite outspending the Trump campaign significantly last month. The Biden campaign spent nearly $285 million in September, giving them a major edge in television advertising, compared to $139 million spent by the Trump campaign last month.
Trump said in August he would drop his own money into the race if he felt it was needed, but he has not done so.
— Joey Garrison
Mike Pence delivers speech to crowd in Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Vice President Mike Pence spoke to a crowd in Portsmouth, New Hampshire on Wednesday as polls show the president and Republican candidates for Congress polling behind Democrats in the Granite State.
While more traditional in tone than the blockbuster rallies of President Trump, Pence revisited familiar territory, touting the administration’s record on energy, trade, manufacturing, immigration, law enforcement and conservative appointments to the judiciary.
“I’ve got news for the Democrats: The dogma lives loudly in the Constitution of the United States of America,” Pence declared while criticizing opposition to the nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett.
The vice president also frequently criticized Joe Biden’s time as a senator and vice president, knocking the former vice president and Senator Kamala Harris’ policy agenda.
Pence also criticized Biden’s healthcare and economic policies. “We’re going to pass the best healthcare in the world and we will never be a socialist country,” Pence promised to a crowd cheering “USA!”
Pence, the chair of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, defended the administration’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, stating “While Joe Biden is talking about shutting down the economy, we’re opening up again.”
Pence listed a number of priorities for the administration’s potential second term, including turning the country into the “manufacturing superpower of the world” while banning “sanctuary cities and increasing support for the military and law enforcement.
“Some say the choice is not whether America becomes more Democrat or Republican, more liberal of conservative…New Hampshire, the choice in this election is whether America remains America,” he warned to chants of “Four more years!"
— Matt Brown
Romney didn't vote for Trump
Sen. Mitt Romney, one of the president’s harshest critics among Republicans in Congress, has already cast his ballot in the November election but did not vote for the leader of his party: President Donald Trump.
The Utah Republican told reporters at the Capitol on Wednesday he did not vote for Trump but wouldn’t elaborate on whether he’d voted for former Vice President Joe Biden or written in someone else. A group of former Romney staffers backed Biden earlier this year.
“I did not vote for President Trump,” Romney said.
Romney, the Republican party’s nominee for president in 2012, also did not vote for Trump in the 2016 cycle, choosing to instead write in the name of his wife, Ann Romney. He has had a contentious relationship with the president, calling Trump a “phony” and a “fraud” ahead of the 2016 election and continuing to rail against the president’s rhetoric and actions on a host of issues while serving in the U.S. Senate, including on foreign policy, mail-in voting, race and the administration’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Romney was the sole Republican to vote to convict Trump on one article of impeachment earlier this year. The criticisms have drawn Trump’s ire, calling Romney a host of names on Twitter, including a “loser” and a “grandstander.”
Most recently, Romney was critical of both the president and Democrats for the “hate-filled” rhetoric during this election cycle.
“I have stayed quiet with the approach of the election," Romney said in a statement. "But I'm troubled by our politics, as it has moved away from spirited debate to a vile, vituperative, hate-filled morass that is unbecoming of any free nation – let alone the birthplace of modern democracy."
—Christal Hayes
COVID stimulus update: Senate fails to pass Republicans' $500B relief plan
The Senate on Wednesday failed to pass a $500 billion COVID-19 stimulus package as relief negotiations drag on less than two weeks before Election Day.
The bill would have given a federal boost to weekly unemployment benefits, sent $100 billion to schools, and allocated funding for testing and vaccine development. It failed in a 51-44 vote, unable to reach the 60 votes required to allow the legislation to move forward as nearly all Democrats opposed it over concerns that more money was needed to combat the virus and help Americans.
– Christal Hayes
COVID stimulus update: Senate to take up $500 billion plan
The Republican-controlled Senate on Wednesday will take up a $500 billion COVID-19 stimulus package, a bill unlikely to make it out of the Senate as relief negotiations drag on less than two weeks before Election Day.
The bill would give a federal boost to weekly unemployment benefits, send over $100 billion to schools, and allocate funding for testing and vaccine development. Democrats are expected to block the legislation, arguing more money is needed to combat the virus and help Americans.
The bill's $500 billion price tag is far less than the roughly $1.8 trillion package the White House has offered and the $2.2 trillion package Democrats have backed. The two parties have spent months attempting to find a bipartisan agreement for one last batch of coronavirus stimulus relief before the election.
– Christal Hayes and Nicholas Wu
Stimulus update: Senate to take up $500 billion COVID-19 stimulus package as relief talks continue
Trump leaves '60 Minutes' interview with Lesley Stahl
President Donald Trump cut short an interview with "60 Minutes" on Tuesday, and threatened to protest by posting a tape of the session before the program's scheduled broadcast on Sunday.
"This will be done so that everybody can get a glimpse of what a FAKE and BIASED interview is all about," Trump said in a series of tweets that also attacked "60 Minutes" correspondent Lesley Stahl.
Trump, who has often criticized coverage of "60 Minutes," did not provide any examples of bias.
Trump abruptly ended the session – he didn't do the traditional "walk-and-talk" with Stahl, and said the "60 Minutes" crew had been given enough time – nor did he return for a joint interview with Vice President Mike Pence, said two people familiar with the incident.
– David Jackson
Trump's "60 Minutes" interview: Trump leaves contentious '60 Minutes' interview with Lesley Stahl, goes on Twitter attack
COVID stimulus update: McConnell urges White House against large stimulus deal
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, in a closed-door lunch Tuesday, told fellow Republicans he urged the White House not to strike a deal with Democrats on a COVID-19 relief package, according to a Senate source who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss closed-door discussions.
The Kentucky Republican, who has blasted Democrats in negotiations, voiced concerns there would not be enough GOP votes to back a package and worries that voting on such legislation could negatively affect the timing on Judge Amy Coney Barrett's confirmation vote to the Supreme Court, the source said.
Republicans disagree about the size and details of an aid bill. Some Republicans rejected Democratic offers they said are too costly and will add to the federal deficit, though President Donald Trump has pushed for Republicans to offer even more than Democrats.
– Nicholas Wu and Christal Hayes
Stimulus talks: McConnell urges White House against large stimulus deal as Pelosi and Mnuchin continue talks
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Election 2020 updates: Trump complains about debate mute button
