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Election 2024 live updates: Harris calls Trump a ‘fascist’ as new poll shows change in state of race

Kamala Harris in Georgia with Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen on Thursday while Donald Trump heads west to Arizona and Nevada

Kamala Harris responds to question on whether or Donald Trump is a 'fascist’

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Kamala Harris said she believes that Donald Trump is a “fascist” in a CNN town hall in Pennsylvania on Wednesday, again warning of the threat the Republican poses to the country’s future.

The former president is currently facing a fresh storm of criticism over a report alleging that he once said he needed “the kind of generals that Adolf Hitler had.”

John Kelly, his former chief of staff, has meanwhile told The New York Times that Trump praised Hitler on multiple occasions in his hearing.

Harris told compere Anderson Cooper that Kelly’s revelations were a “911 call to the American people”, having said earlier that Trump is “increasingly unhinged and unstable” and that, in a second Trump term, “people like John Kelly will no longer be there to rein him in”.

Trump has nevertheless taken a narrow lead over Harris in new Wall Street Journal poll with less than two weeks to go until Election Day.

The Republican is on 47 percent of the vote in the newspaper’s latest survey, with Harris two points behind on 45 percent.

Another poll from Marist places the candidates neck-and-neck in the swing states of Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina.

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Trump’s rambling answers at Bronx barbershop visit were edited down for broadcast

Donald Trump has furiously denounced CBS News for editing the 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris for clarity and brevity, as is the norm in a news magazine show. The former president even called for the network to lose its license, so incensed was he about the issue — having refused to be interviewed himself.

However, now a full unedited video has emerged from Trump’s visit to a barbershop in the Bronx in New York City, as part of Fox & Friends co-host Lawrence Jones’ ongoing barbershop interview series.

CNN compared the video — shot on the phone of someone in the store and posted to Instagram — with what was broadcast by Fox News, and would you believe it, the network “edited out many of Trump’s rambling comments and false claims” and “participants had to repeatedly follow up when Trump meandered away from the original point of their questions”, the network reports.

Trump complained that the Harris interview edits made by CBS were intended to “make her look better”, which is exactly what Fox News has done on this occasion and in other recent interviews with the president on the campaign trail.

The former president’s barbershop rants about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, and crime in Aurora, Colorado were omitted from broadcast.

Per CNN:

One of the most telling parts of the dialogue began when an audience member asked Trump about finding a way to eliminate federal taxes in the future. On Fox, Trump was shown immediately answering affirmatively: “There is a way.”

But that response from Trump actually came more than seven minutes later, after Trump (and Jones) brought up other topics, including inheritances, the Keystone Pipeline, Ronald Reagan, Russia, and transgender sports players. Trump had to be nudged back on track several times by the unnamed audience member, who kept circling back, apologetically, and said “I wasn’t able to finish my question.” After he repeated his tax inquiry yet again, Trump said “there is a way.”

A Fox News spokesperson confirmed to CNN that all of the barbershop segments are pretaped and edited and the Bronx edition ran for an hour and so was cut for time and clarity.

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The truth about whether ‘Nikki Haley Republicans’ can help Harris win

While the Vice President touts the support of disaffected Republicans like Liz Cheney and John McCain’s son, alumni of Haley’s campaign aren’t impressed, writes Eric Garcia.

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All-star line-up for Harris rally in Atlanta

Not only will Kamala Harris be joined by Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen at her rally in Atlanta tonight — her first campaign appearance with both the former president and the Boss — but she will also be backed up by Hollywood royalty.

NBC reports that joining the vice president tonight will also be director Spike Lee, actor Samuel L Jackson, filmmaker Tyler Perry, and Mix Master David.

This is the first in a series of “When We Vote We Win” concerts. Springsteen and Obama are also scheduled to appear in Philadelphia on Tuesday.

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Inside the grassroots campaigns already planning to overturn the 2024 election

Thousands of US citizens concerned about Trump-alleged election fraud have been trained by MAGA-aligned figures on how to spot and fight it ahead of the imminent presidential election, an investigation claims.

Dozens of far-right election advocacy groups have visited communities across the country to hold seminars and training sessions intended to motivate average voters to monitor their local election offices.

Ariana Baio has more.

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Justice Department announces four cases brought by Election Threats Task Force

The Justice Department’s Election Threats Task Force (ETTF) has announced four cases involving interstate transmissions of threats to election personnel and other victims.

  • Teak Brockbank, 45, of Cortez, Colorado, pleaded guilty today to threatening a Colorado election official and making other threats to an Arizona election official, a Colorado state judge, and federal law enforcement agents between September 2021 and July 2024.
  • Brian Jerry Ogstad, 60, of Cullman, Alabama, was sentenced on Monday to 30 months in prison for sending messages threatening violence to election workers with Maricopa County Elections in Phoenix from Aug. 2-4, 2022, during and immediately following the Arizona primary elections.
  • Richard Glenn Kantwill, 61, of Tampa, Florida, was charged on Monday for allegedly sending a threat on Feb. 9 to an election official in addition to already pending charges for threats made to three other victims based on their political commentary in 2019 and 2020.
  • John Pollard, 62, of Philadelphia, was charged on Monday for allegedly threatening on Sept. 6 to kill a representative of a Pennsylvania state political party who was recruiting official poll watchers.

“As we approach Election Day, the Justice Department’s warning remains clear: anyone who illegally threatens an election worker, official, or volunteer will face the consequences,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland.

“Over the past three and a half years, the Justice Department has been aggressively investigating and prosecuting those who threaten the public servants who administer our elections, and we will continue to do so in the weeks ahead. For our democracy to function, Americans who serve the public must be able to do their jobs without fearing for their lives.”

Read more about the cases here

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DOJ warns Elon Musk’s $1m sweepstakes could be illegal

The Department of Justice has warned Elon Musk’s Trump-supporting political action committee that its $1m sweepstakes could be illegal.

A letter from the department’s election crimes chief in its public integrity bureau reminded America PAC that offering anything of value to influence how someone casts their ballot would violate federal law.

The letter follows alarm from election law experts and civil rights groups alleging that Musk’s scheme is either an illegal vote-buying stunt or an ethically dubious infusion of the billionaire’s cash into a Trump-boosting campaign.

Alex Woodward has more.

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Ex-Republican congressman who voted to impeach Trump endorses Harris

“We don’t need this chaos,” says Fred Upton after he crosses the aisle having represented the GOP in Michigan for almost four decades.

“We need to move forward.”

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Trump calls Biden’s ‘lock him up’ comments ‘election interference’ – despite his own 2016 catchphrase

Donald Trump has branded President Joe Biden’s comments that the GOP candidate should be locked up “illegal” and “election interference” – seemingly forgetting his own 2016 catchphrase about his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

During a visit to the Democratic Party’s New Hampshire headquarters on Tuesday, the president told campaign workers that “we gotta lock him up” about Trump. He quickly backtracked, adding the caveat: “politically.”

Trump condemned Biden’s remarks during his campaign rally in Duluth, Georgia, last night, saying it “should cause cases.”

“He can’t say that,” the former president said.

“I’ve been telling you that it’s election interference. This is all it is. He said: ‘We got to lock him up.’ This is illegal and should cause cases.”

James Liddell has more.

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Nostradamus pollster reveals latest 2024 prediction – and how he’s never had ‘so much hate’ in an election

Historian Allan Lichtman has insisted that he stands by his prediction about who will win the 2024 presidential race despite recent polls – and revealed that he has “never experienced” so much “hate” in an election cycle.

Rhian Lubin reports.

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MAGA appropriates Vincent Price to warn against ‘Kamalaween’

I’ve seen a lot of pro-Trump garbage on social media in my time but I just can’t let this one go – the legendary horror actor and art collector, who passed away in 1993, would have been utterly mortified to be associated with anything as crass and divisive as Donald Trump.

It is actually quite nicely done, particularly the pumpkin-headed Trump “with his golden hair aflame like the autumn leaves”, but Vincent, who was “greylisted” by Joseph McCarthy’s goons as a suspected Communist in the 1950s, would unquestionably have been voting Harris-Walz and deserves so much better than to have his image travestied like this.

Here’s an actual political message from the great man, in which he appeals for tolerance, unity and social responsibility, values entirely alien to Trump.

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