New poll shows Harris leading Trump in three battleground states - The Boston Globe (2024)

Kamala Harris leads Donald Trump in three key states in NYT/Siena College poll — 10:51 a.m.

Bloomberg

Vice President Kamala Harris leads Republican Donald Trump by four percentage points in three crucial battleground states, according to surveys from the New York Times and Siena College.

The poll, which was conducted among 1,973 registered voters Aug. 5 through Aug. 9, shows Harris with 50% support among likely voters in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. Trump had 46% support in each of the states.

The margin of sampling error across the three states was plus or minus 2.5 percentage points for all registered voters, and plus or minus 2.6 percentage points for the likely electorate.

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Trump is putting mass deportations at the heart of his campaign. Some Republicans are worried. — 4:31 a.m.

By the Associated Press

“Mass Deportation Now!” declared the signs at the Republican National Convention, giving a full embrace to Donald Trump’s pledge to expel millions of migrants in the largest deportation program in American history.

Some Republicans aren’t quite ready for that.

Trump, when pressed for specifics on his plan in an interview with Time Magazine this year, suggested he would use the National Guard, and possibly even the military, to target between 15 million and 20 million people — though the government estimated in 2022 there were 11 million migrants living in the U.S. without permanent legal permission.

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Donald Trump headlines Montana rally after plane diverted — 2:11 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Donald Trump traveled to Montana for a Friday night rally intended to drum up support for ousting the state’s Democratic senator, but the former president’s plane first had to divert to an airport on the other side of the Rocky Mountains because of a mechanical issue, according to airport staff.

Trump’s plane was en route to Bozeman, Montana, when it was diverted Friday afternoon to Billings, 142 miles to the east, according to Jenny Mockel, administrative assistant at Billings Logan International Airport. Trump continued to Bozeman via private jet.

On Friday, Trump ripped into three-term Senator Jon Tester, mocking him for being overweight and for insinuating he sometimes sided with the former president.

“He voted to impeach me — that guy voted to impeach me,” Trump said of Tester, whom he called a “slob” with “the biggest stomach I’ve ever seen.”

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A financial tale of two potential vice presidents: JD Vance and Tim Walz — 8:07 p.m.

By The New York Times

After JD Vance was elected to the Senate from Ohio in 2022, he and his wife bought a five-bedroom house — their third home — for $1.6 million in Alexandria, Virginia, not far from the Capitol. Their real estate agent told a local magazine that the buyers paid in cash.

When Tim Walz was elected governor of Minnesota four years earlier, his family was living in a heavily mortgaged Cape Cod-style house, with one room rented out, about 90 miles from Minneapolis. After moving into the governor’s mansion, they sold the house for $304,000 — less than the asking price.

These real estate transactions are just one example of the vast gulf in wealth between the two vice presidential candidates.

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Biden promised peace, but will leave his successor a nation consumed by war — 7:45 p.m.

By The New York Times

While America is no longer waging a large-scale ground war like those in Iraq and Afghanistan, for much of his tenure, Biden has seemed like a wartime leader.

Since pulling the last US troops out of Afghanistan three years ago, Biden has spent much of his presidency mobilizing public opinion and military might against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and playing a deeply engaged role in supporting Israel in its war in the Gaza Strip, and against Iran and the groups it backs.

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Trump plane heading to Montana rally was diverted but landed safely nearby, airport staff says — 5:45 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump’s plane was diverted on its way to Bozeman, Montana, due to a mechanical issue but landed safely in nearby Billings, according to a staff member at the Billings airport.

The former president was heading to Bozeman for a Friday night rally in support of Republican Senate candidate Tim Sheehy, who is challenging Democratic Senator Jon Tester.

Trump’s campaign posted a video of him upon landing in which he said he was glad to be in Montana but did not mention anything about the landing.

Republicans ask Supreme Court to allow Arizona voter-registration restrictions to be enforced during legal fight — 5:38 p.m.

By the Associated Press

National and state Republicans are trying to get the Supreme Court involved in a fight over voter registration restrictions that Republicans enacted in Arizona in 2022 following Biden’s narrow 2020 victory in the battleground state. In an emergency appeal filed Thursday, the Republicans want the justices to allow provisions to take effect requiring the rejection of some voter registration forms that don’t have proof of citizenship, while a lawsuit plays out.

The move came after a lower court blocked a requirement that called for state voter registration forms to be rejected if they are not accompanied by documents proving US citizenship. A second measure, also not in effect, would prohibit voting in presidential elections or by mail if registrants don’t prove they are US citizens. Federal law does not require proof of citizenship either to vote in federal elections or cast ballots by mail, though voters have to attest that they are US citizens.

The high court is not expected to act before late August.

A confident Mitch McConnell says Republicans have avoided bad Senate nominees this cycle — 4:43 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell is expressing confidence that the GOP will be able to win a majority in the November elections because the party has avoided nominating the kinds of weak candidates that have lost tough races in the past.

“What is the key in winning a Senate election in a competitive state? Candidate quality,” McConnell told conservative voters at “The Gathering,” an annual convocation hosted by influential radio host Erick Erickson. “I’m not going to mention names,” McConnell said, “but over the course of 10 or 15 years, in four or five instances, we have not had candidates that appeal to a competitive state.”

The Kentucky Republican was alluding to candidates like Herschel Walker, the controversial 2022 nominee who lost to Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock in a year where Republicans swept all other statewide elections in the state.

Republicans need to net just two additional seats to command a majority in January, and it’s widely presumed that they already will pick up West Virginia, where Democratic-turned-independent Joe Manchin is retiring. Democratic Senators Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Jon Tester of Montana are running in states former President Trump won twice and is expected to win again.

“We need to take the Senate as an insurance policy against what these people will do to the country,” McConnell said. The longest-serving Senate leader in history, McConnell is stepping down from his leadership post in the new Congress that will convene in January.

White Dudes for Harris have assembled. What comes next? — 4:21 p.m.

By the Washington Post

Vic Meyers is the kind of White Dude you wouldn’t expect to find going viral with the libs. He lives on 100 acres of ranch in “the sticks,” out by Trinidad, Colo., near the border with New Mexico. He goes into town to work as an armed security guard, hauls his water back home because the wells aren’t any good, used to own horses but it got too expensive between the drought and the cost of hay. He doesn’t really talk to his neighbors. But he has been posting TikToks this year.

“I’m a 56-year-old rural, gun-owning White guy,” he said in a video posted a few days ago that has been viewed more than a million times, cowboy hat on his head, tractor in the background. “Kamala Harris favors an assault weapons ban and background checks and red-flag laws and thinks I’d vote for her.”

“And she’d be right.”

He’s grown disenchanted with how Democrats talk to people like him. Or the fact that they don’t really. Donald Trump won his county by double digits in 2016 and 2020. He left the Democratic Party about six or eight years ago, after an ill-fated run for Congress, and switched his registration to unaffiliated.

“I didn’t feel like I fit. I think that’s why so many people in the rural areas are gravitating towards Trump, it’s because the Democratic Party has left them. They don’t bother to go out there and meet them,” Meyers says.

Fact check: A look at claims made by Trump at news conference — 3:54 p.m.

By the Associated Press

In his first news conference since Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee for president, former president Donald Trump said he would debate her on Sept. 10 and pushed for two more debates. The Republican presidential nominee spoke for more than an hour, discussing a number of issues facing the country and then taking questions from reporters. He made a number of false and misleading claims. Many of them have been made before.

Here’s a look at some of those claims.

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Trump’s tax plan could add trillions in debt. Harris’s is a mystery. — 2:35 p.m.

By The New York Times

Trump keeps adding new tax cuts to his list of campaign promises, and their projected costs keep piling up.

Independent analyses suggest Trump’s plans could add close to $4 trillion over the next decade to America’s already fast-growing national debt, even after factoring in additional revenues from new taxes he wants to impose on imports.

It is impossible to make a similar estimate for Harris, Trump’s Democratic opponent this fall. She has not laid out any tax or spending plans, or other economic policy proposals, with enough detail to estimate whether they would add to deficits or reduce them.

Total federal debt is now about $35 trillion, up from about $20 trillion when Trump took office in 2017, Treasury Department data shows. It grew by about $7.8 trillion on Trump’s watch and has increased by about $7.3 trillion on President Joe Biden’s watch thus far.

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Mike Pence won’t vote for Trump — or Harris — and says GOP in 2024 is ‘unmoored’ — 12:42 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Pence confirmed that he’s sitting out the presidential race this November. But he explained his decision with a complex mix of praise and criticism for Trump – and made clear he is not remotely interested in supporting Harris.

“I cannot endorse President Trump’s continuing assertion that I should have put aside my oath to support the Constitution, and act in a way that would have overturned the election,” Pence told an assembly of conservative activists hosted by radio personality Erick Erickson.

Trump has argued that Pence should have used his power presiding over the Electoral College to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

“President Donald Trump was not only my president, he was my friend,” Pence said, adding that is “part of what made the way our administration ended much more difficult.”

Pence said multiple times that he was proud of the Trump administration’s accomplishments, and he lauded Trump for his reaction to being nearly assassinated.

But the former vice president was critical of the direction the Republican Party has taken under the former president in his comeback bid. He was especially critical of GOP support for tariffs, a more isolationist US role on the world stage and the move away from calling for a national ban on abortions.

“The fact that we have a platform that made no mention of the national debt, advocated massive taxes at our borders, and abandoning commitments we have to our allies around the world is troubling,” Pence said, explaining the current GOP identity as “a populism unmoored to conservative principle.”

That time Trump nearly died in a helicopter crash? Didn’t happen. — 12:03 p.m.

By The New York Times

Trump told a jaw-dropping story on Thursday about nearly dying in a helicopter ride with Willie Brown, the former California politician and ex-boyfriend of his rival, Harris.

There was only one problem with the story. Or maybe two. Or maybe three.

It wasn’t the famous former San Francisco mayor on the helicopter flight at all. It was Gov. Jerry Brown, the former governor of California, who bears little resemblance to Willie Brown.

There was also no emergency landing, and the helicopter’s passengers were never in any danger at all, according to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who was also on the flight.

Jerry Brown, who left office in January 2019, said through a spokesman, “There was no emergency landing and no discussion of Kamala Harris.”

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Georgia Governor Kemp calls Trump attacks ‘noise’ and says he’s still focused on winning — 10:40 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp insists he’s not getting bogged down by Republican nominee and Trump’s intraparty attacks over Kemp’s refusal to help overturn the 2020 presidential election.

The Republican governor called Trump’s recent broadsides at an Atlanta campaign rally and on the Truth Social platform “a lot of noise” and jokingly compared Trump to a tropical storm.

“This big storm came through the state this week – and now we’re dealing with Tropical Storm Debby,” Kemp said at conservative radio host Erick Erickson’s annual conference, “The Gathering,” in the Buckhead section of Atlanta.

Kemp repeated his pledge to support the GOP nominee and renewed his warnings that Republicans should stop focusing on the 2020 election and false assertions that Biden won Georgia and nationally because of fraud.

“We’re going to use our political operation to win Georgia despite past grievances,” Kemp told Erickson, adding that the efforts would “help Republicans up and down the ticket.”

Of course, Kemp’s political operation is focusing on competitive Georgia legislative districts that are key to maintaining GOP majorities at the statehouse, meaning potential Republican voters in other swaths of the hotly contested state may not be reached by the Kemp organization before November.

Throughout the discussion with Erickson, Kemp did not say Trump’s name.

Biden, Harris to make first joint trip since Biden dropped out — 5:14 a.m.

By the Associated Press

President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris next week will make their first trip together since Biden ended his candidacy and Harris took over as the Democratic standard-bearer.

The White House announced Friday morning that Biden and Harris will head to Maryland on Aug. 15 for an event to “discuss the progress they are making to lower costs for the American people.” They did not disclose the location or more specifics.

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Harris and Walz head to Arizona, where a VP runner-up could still make a difference — 5:03 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Vice President Kamala Harris and her new running mate will hold a rally in Arizona on Friday as part of their tour of electoral battlegrounds, visiting a state where Harris passed over a prominent Democrat in favor of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, a former astronaut and gun control advocate, had been a top contender for running mate. He’s won two tough races in politically divided Arizona.

In passing over Kelly, Harris may have also lost the chance to win over people like Gonzalo Leyva, a 49-year-old landscaper in Phoenix. Leyva plans to vote for former President Donald Trump, a Republican, but says he would have backed a Harris-Kelly ticket.

“I prefer Kelly like 100 times,” said Leyva, a lifelong Democrat who became an independent at the beginning of Trump’s term in office. “I don’t think he’s that extreme like the other guys.”

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Trump heads to Montana in a bid to oust Senator Tester after failing to topple the Democrat in 2018 — 4:26 a.m.

By the Associated Press

With control of the Senate potentially at stake, Trump is visiting Montana on Friday hoping to remedy some unfinished business from 2018, when he campaigned repeatedly in Big Sky Country in a failed bid to oust incumbent Democratic Senator Jon Tester.

Tester has tried to convince voters he’s aligned with Trump on many issues, mirroring his successful strategy from six years ago. While that worked in a non-presidential election year, it faces a more critical test this fall with Tester’s opponent, former Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy, trying to link the three-term incumbent to Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

Harris has benefitted nationally from a burst of enthusiasm among core Democratic constituencies, who coalesced quickly around her after Biden withdrew from the campaign last month. She’s drawn big crowds in swing states, touring this week with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, her choice to be her vice presidential nominee.

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By The New York Times

For about 2 1/2 minutes, at least five Pennsylvania law enforcement officers converged around the warehouse where a gunman had clambered onto a roof near a rally held by Trump, struggling to reach the attacker before he shot at Trump, newly released police videos and a social media video show.

The body camera and dashcam footage, paired with an eyewitness video posted on YouTube, provide new insight into the presence of and the response by Pennsylvania law enforcement at the building where the gunman, Thomas Crooks, was positioned. They reveal for the first time the critical moments — starting around 6:08 p.m. — when officers establish Crooks’ location, frantically try to find a way to get onto the roof and determine that he is armed. By around 6:11, Crooks opens fire.

Before the release of the videos, the exact movements of nearby law enforcement officers — and the actions they took to address a newly identified threat — were unclear. Testimony from state police and Secret Service officials provided some details, but the footage obtained by The New York Times through a public records request gives the first second-by-second retelling from the perspectives of two of the officers near the gunman at the time of the shooting.

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Democrats and Republicans descend on western Wisconsin with high stakes up and down the ballot — 2:25 a.m.

By the Associated Press

For a brief moment this week, the fierce competition for swing voters in swing-state Wisconsin converged on the tarmac of the tiny Chippewa Valley Regional Airport.

Minutes after Harris landed with her newly minted running mate Walz for their first campaign stop in the state, Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance arrived. He walked across the tarmac to check out Air Force Two, just missing Harris.

The close encounter of the political kind could be written off as a coincidence if it happened anywhere other than Wisconsin, one of a small number of states that will not only determine the winner of the presidential race but could also shape the balance of power in Congress. But it sent a much louder signal that both parties understand the importance of a region that could tip the balance of power in more ways than one.

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A win for the Harris-Walz ticket would also mean the country’s first Native American female governor — 1:08 a.m.

By the Associated Press

If Harris and her running mate, Walz, are elected this fall, not only would a woman of color lead the country for the first time, but a Native woman also would govern a state for the first time in U.S. history.

Peggy Flanagan, the lieutenant governor of Minnesota and a citizen of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe, is poised to serve as the state’s next governor should Walz step down to accept the role of US vice president. Her rise to power has been watched closely by Indigenous peoples in Minnesota and across the country who see her as a champion of policies that positively affect Native Americans.

In recent years, Minnesota has integrated tribal consultation into numerous aspects of the state government, created one of the country’s first state offices for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives and strengthened its laws protecting Native children in the adoption system. Many Indigenous leaders point to Flanagan as the driving force behind these changes, as well as a significant rise in respect for tribal sovereignty and autonomy in state policy.

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Friday, Aug. 9

Kamala Harris isn’t giving interviews. Any questions? — 12:16 a.m.

By The New York Times

The press has questions for Harris. She isn’t giving a whole lot of answers.

In the nearly three weeks since President Joe Biden withdrew his candidacy, catapulting Harris to the top of the Democratic ticket, the vice president has shown little eagerness to meet journalists in unscripted settings. She has not granted an interview or held a news conference. On Thursday, after a rally in Michigan, she held her first “gaggle” — an impromptu Q&A session — with reporters covering her campaign.

It lasted 70 seconds.

Harris replaced a Democratic nominee who has hosted fewer White House news conferences than any president since Ronald Reagan. Now she is taking a similarly cautious approach, relying on televised rallies and prepared statements amid a tightly controlled rollout of her candidacy.

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How Tim Walz’s personal finances compare to JD Vance, other politicians — 10:58 p.m.

By The Washington Post

Walz, the Democrats’ recently selected vice-presidential nominee, owns no businesses, individual stocks, a home or other real estate - a modest financial position that may put him on par with other former high school teachers but creates a striking contrast with Vance .

The financial disclosure form Walz filed with the state of Minnesota this year is nearly blank, listing no assets other than income from his government job and his wife’s work in education. Gwen Walz, a career teacher, has held several positions in recent years at Augsburg University in Minneapolis.

The couple earned a combined income of a little over $166,000 in 2022, according to their tax return, including Walz’s $115,485 annual salary as governor.

As vice president, Walz would earn a salary of $284,600, a major pay raise.

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GOP attacks on Walz’s military service echo ‘swift-boating’ of Kerry two decades ago. Democrats say they’ve learned since. — 8:50 p.m.

By Jim Puzzanghera, Globe Staff

At the 2004 Democratic National Convention, then-Massachusetts Senator John Kerry took the stage and began his acceptance speech with a simple but powerful gesture to highlight his Vietnam War service.

But the distinguished Vietnam record that Kerry had made the centerpiece of his campaign quickly came under attack by a shadowy outside veterans group, one that helped sink his White House bid.

Now, with the first military veteran on the Democratic presidential ticket since Kerry, that tactic is resurfacing. And it’s being led by Republican Donald Trump’s campaign and its chief, who was a key part of the 2004 attacks on Kerry.

Within a day after Minnesota Governor Tim Walz was unveiled as the Democrats’ vice presidential pick, Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, led the Republican attack on Walz’s 24-year service in the Army National Guard.

But Democrats said they’ve learned from 2004, when Kerry’s campaign responded slowly to what they called smears by the group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth after the type of small river patrol craft that Kerry commanded in the war.

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Trump praised Walz in 2020 for response to unrest over Floyd’s murder, audio shows — 6:18 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Despite now hammering Walz over his response to the violence that erupted after George Floyd’s murder, Trump at the time told the governor that he fully agreed with how Walz handled it.

“What they did in Minneapolis was incredible. They went in and dominated, and it happened immediately,” Trump told Walz and other governors and officials in a phone call on June 1, 2020. The Associated Press on Wednesday obtained an audio recording of the call, which has taken on new significance now that Walz has been tapped as Harris’ running mate.

ABC News reported on the call earlier Wednesday, a day after Harris introduced Walz as her vice presidential pick. CNN posted a transcript of the call back in 2020.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that he was responsible for deploying the National Guard. In reality, it was Walz who gave the mobilization order in response to requests from the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Although Walz came under criticism at the time for not moving faster.

Harris agrees to debate Trump on Sept. 10 — 5:31 p.m.

By the Associated Press

The ABC debate will take place on a day her campaign has long stuck to as the Republican nominee waffled on his commitment.

“I hear that Donald Trump has finally committed to debating me on September 10,” she wrote on the social media site X. “I look forward to it.”

Earlier, Trump recommitted to the Sept. 10 debate — which had been arranged when Biden was still in the race — and proposed additional debates on other networks. The Harris campaign has not responded to Trump’s proposal of more debates.

The second gentleman rallies donors at Paris fundraiser — 4:40 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris’s husband, Doug Emhoff, has rallied a group of enthusiastic donors in Paris, France, telling them his wife is “ready” and heaping praise on her newly minted running mate, Governor Tim Walz.

The private fundraiser held in the French capital’s tony 16th arrondissem*nt was hosted by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s mother, Judith Pisar, the widow of Holocaust survivor Samuel Pisar, who died in 2015. Organizers said it had raised $285,000.

Emhoff, who took time out of his Olympic duties as head of the US delegation to the closing ceremony in Paris, was quick to highlight her choice of Walz, saying “she made the right choice” and touted the governor’s resume.

Harris addresses United Auto Workers — 4:06 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris is tying her Oakland, California, upbringing by a single mother with running mate Walz’s childhood in small-town Nebraska in an address to United Auto Workers.

“The same people raised us, good people, hardworking people, people who had pride in their work,” she says in the Detroit union hall. “People who had pride in knowing we were a community of people who looked out for each other.”

“No one should ever be made to fight alone,” she said. “We are all in this together.”

Harris and Walz will speak at a Detroit union hall — 3:42 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris and Walz are set to play up their support for organized labor during an appearance at a Detroit-area union hall.

The two are on stage, waiting to speak to several dozen United Auto Workers members at Local 900 Hall, which represents Ford’s Michigan Assembly Plant.

Those members were the first Ford workers to strike in 2023 when the union’s contract with the company expired. Workers at the assembly plant went on strike Sept. 15 and remained on the picket lines until Oct. 25, when the union announced a tentative agreement with Ford.

Trump attacked Harris’s intelligence, claims he hasn’t ‘recalibrated’ his campaign — 3:23 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump said he has not “recalibrated” his campaign despite facing a new opponent, a dynamic some Republican strategists have quietly complained about.

Trump continued to criticize Biden, against whom he has been running since before the 2020 election, during his press conference at his home in Palm Beach, Florida, all while hurling personal insults at Harris, the new Democratic nominee.

When asked what assets Harris possessed, Trump said, “She’s a woman. She represents certain groups of people.”

Four times he questioned the intelligence of Harris, a former California attorney general and former US senator.

He said the strategy for the campaign would not change because it’s not about Harris, it’s about the policies of the Biden-Harris administration that will decide the election.

Trump’s news conference concludes — 3:16 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Trump has ended his news conference at Mar-a-Lago, where he answered questions from the press for over an hour.

Abortion ‘has become much less of an issue,’ Trump says — 3:15 p.m.

By the Associated Press

During his news conference, Trump suggested that abortion “has become much less of an issue” since the Supreme Court ended the federal right to abortion services and returned control of the matter to state governments.

Trump argued that Democrats, Republicans and “everybody” is pleased with the results of the 2022 ruling that overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.

Trump’s actions within the GOP, however, suggest he knows that Democrats have already capitalized on Republican opposition to abortion rights and could do so again this fall. Trump single-handedly ensured that the Republican Party platform adopted at the 2024 convention in Milwaukee does not call for a national abortion ban, and he has said repeatedly that hardliners in the party could cost the GOP in November.

The court’s decision, issued months ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, is widely cited as a reason why Democrats fared much better than expected in House and Senate contests. And Democrats have hammered Trump on paid advertisem*nts blaming him and the justices he appointed for ending Roe.

The assassination attempt hasn’t changed Trump’s mind on gun control — 3:05 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump says almost being assassinated by a gunman has not changed his position opposing any new federal regulations or restrictions on weapons.

“People need the guns for protection,” he said, pointing to US cities that have attempted local gun restrictions and still see violent crime.

Trump accused Harris of wanting to “take away everyone’s guns.” Harris’ proposals call for universal background checks and a ban on certain near-military grade weapons like those that were banned from 1994 until a decade later when then-President George W. Bush and Republicans on Capitol Hill allowed the ban to expire.

Fact Check: Trump claims ‘nobody was killed on Jan. 6′— 3:00 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump has falsely claimed that “nobody was killed on Jan. 6,” the date in 2021 when pro-Trump rioters breached the US Capitol amid Congress’ effort to certify Biden’s 2020 election victory.

Five people died in the riot and its aftermath, including Ashli Babbitt, a Trump supporter shot and killed by police, and Brian Sicknick, a police officer who died the day after battling the mob.

Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran from San Diego was shot and killed by a police officer as she climbed through a broken part of a Capitol door during the violent riot. To be sure, Trump has often cited Babbitt’s death while lamenting the treatment of those who attended a rally outside the White House that day and then marched to the Capitol, many of whom fought with police.

Federal prosecutors had weighed charging the officer involved in the shooting but opted not to file charges.

“I think those people were treated very badly when you compare it to other things that took place in this country where a lot of people were killed,” Trump said.

ABC News confirms Sept. 10 Harris-Trump debate — 2:54 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

ABC News’s Washington bureau chief Rick Klein confirmed on X the ABC debate for Sept 10.

Trump repeats falsehoods about his 2020 election loss — 2:45 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump is misrepresenting the realities of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and the electorates of several Southern states as he repeats the lie that Biden’s victory in 2020 was due to fraud.

He insisted there “was a peaceful transfer of power” after the 2020 election. Certainly, Biden was inaugurated on schedule. But Washington was on lockdown that day, with the streets patrolled by military personnel and domestic police two weeks after Trump’s supporters had attacked the Capitol as Congress convened to certify Biden’s win.

Trump, meanwhile, argued, “You don’t win Alabama and South Carolina by records and lose Georgia. It doesn’t happen.” Except Alabama and South Carolina are overwhelmingly Republican and Georgia has been trending toward a two-party battleground for years.

Alabama and South Carolina have about 5 million residents and heavily Republican electorates. Georgia, driven by decades of growth in metro Atlanta, now has about 11 million residents — and 5 million presidential voters.

As a comparison, former President Barack Obama lost Georgia by about 5 percentage points in 2008 without spending significant resources in the state. That same year, he lost Alabama by more than 22 points and lost South Carolina by 9 points.

Trump attacks his present (and former) rivals — 2:36 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump began his press conference with a three-pronged attack on Harris, her new running mate Governor Walz of Minnesota and even Biden, who has been out of the presidential race for weeks.

Trump began the event with a statement before calling into question Harris’ legitimacy as the nominee. “We have somebody who hasn’t received one vote for president,” he said. Harris was nominated by virtual roll call by the Democratic National Committee on Tuesday.

He called Walz “a radical left man,” adding that “he has positions that it’s not even possible to believe they exist.”

And he said “the presidency was taken away” from Biden, whom Trump has spent years focusing on, even as he said he did not plan to recalibrate his campaign, in light of a new opponent.

Trump says he will do three debates with Harris — 2:25 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

During his news conference, Trump said he is “looking forward” to three debates with Harris. He said he would do three separate debates in September, on Fox News, on NBC, and on ABC.

Trump opens at Mar-a-Lago with a dark portrait of America — 2:20 p.m.

By the Associated Press

He’s warning of World War III, a depression of “the 1929 variety” and a nation overrun with migrants from south of the US-Mexico border.

“I think that our country is right now in the most dangerous position it’s ever been in, from an economic standpoint, from a safety standpoint,” he said, adding that President Biden is the “worst president in the history of our country” and that Harris also ranks at the bottom of the people to hold the No. 2 spot.

Trump’s supporters typically hear his “America First” and “Make America Great Again” rallying cries as a fundamentally optimistic vision for fixing deep-seated problems. The question is whether more moderate voters hear the same message or are turned off by such sweeping, often hyperbolic critiques of the country.

Trump holds news conference in Florida — 2:04 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Trump will speak at a news conference at his private Mar-a-Lago club, making his first public appearance since Harris selected Walz as her running mate.

Harris’ husband to lead US presidential delegation to Paris Olympics’ closing ceremony — 1:20 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris’s husband, Doug Emhoff, is leading the US presidential delegation to the Paris Olympics’ closing ceremony Sunday, cheering on with American athletes over the next few days and holding events such as a UNESCO roundtable to discuss combating antisemitism.

At the roundtable, Emhoff said the Biden administration is “working with Congress” to support a $2.2 million grant for UNESCO’s international program on Holocaust and genocide education.

Walz’s military record under scrutiny as Vance, GOP question his service — 12:56 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Walz’s military record has come under scrutiny since he was named as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket, with Republicans questioning both Walz’s characterization of his time in uniform and his departure from service.

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Harris campaign launches ad aimed at Latino voters — 12:01 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

The Harris campaign launched a new ad aimed at Latino voters in key battleground states, focusing on her background as the daughter of immigrants.

”Determination is how Kamala Harris went from working in McDonald’s to prosecutor, state attorney general, US senator, and our vice president — in only one generation,” the narrator said in the minute-long video.

Biden and his wife to meet with campaign staffers in Delaware — 11:40 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Biden and his wife, Jill, will meet with campaign staffers in Wilmington, Delaware, using the time to thank them for their hard work over the past year and their continued work in support of Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee. That’s according to a person familiar with the president’s plans, who insisted on anonymity to discuss plans that are not yet public.

The event at a local venue in Wilmington will feature food and, naturally for Biden, ice cream.

The president exited the presidential race two weeks ago and wanted to say hello to the hundreds of staffers expected to attend.

Trump praised Walz in 2020 for response to unrest over Floyd’s murder, audio shows — 9:20 a.m.

By the Associated Press

While former president Donald Trump and running mate JD Vance have been hammering Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz over his response to the violence that erupted after George Floyd’s murder, Trump told the governor at the time that he fully agreed with how Walz handled it.

“What they did in Minneapolis was incredible. They went in and dominated, and it happened immediately,” Trump told Walz and other governors and officials in a phone call on June 1, 2020. The Associated Press on Wednesday obtained an audio recording of the call, which has taken on new significance now that Walz has been tapped as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate against Trump and Vance.

Other administration officials on the call included Defense Secretary Mark Esper; Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and Attorney General William Barr.

ABC News reported on the call earlier Wednesday, a day after Harris introduced Walz as her vice presidential pick. CNN posted a transcript of the call back in 2020.

Protests erupted in Minneapolis and around the world after Floyd was murdered by Derek Chauvin, a white former officer who knelt on the Black man’s neck for nearly 9 1/2 minutes, on May 25, 2020. A bystander video captured Floyd’s fading cries of “I can’t breathe.” His death forced a reckoning with police brutality and racism.

Trump will hold a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida — 8:42 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Former president Donald Trump says he will hold a news conference Thursday at Mar-a-Lago, his Florida beachside compound, making his first public appearance since Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democratic presidential nominee and selected Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate.

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Harris and Walz showing support for organized labor with appearance at Detroit union hall — 8:15 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, are set to play up their support for organized labor during an appearance at a Detroit-area union hall as the new Democratic ticket lavishes attention on a crucial base of support.

Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, and Walz, who joined the ticket on Tuesday, plan to speak on Thursday to several dozen United Auto Workers members.

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In Tim Walz, Kamala Harris found a partner to advocate for reproductive rights — 7:30 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The makings of a presidential ticket began in an unusual spot six months ago: a Minnesota abortion clinic.

At the time, it was a historic visit for Vice President Kamala Harris — no president or vice president had ever made a public stop at one. But the visit laid the groundwork for Harris to connect with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and learn about his interest in reproductive health, an issue Harris has taken the lead on during her White House term.

At first glance, the 60-year-old governor might not seem the most likely of political surrogates to talk about abortion and pregnancy. But Harris found a partner who has a track record of increasing abortion access in his state and can speak comfortably about his own family’s struggles with infertility.

Already, Walz has captivated crowds in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin with the story of his daughter’s birth, made possible through in vitro fertilization treatments. The procedure involves retrieving a woman’s eggs and combining them in a lab dish with sperm to create a fertilized embryo that is transferred into the woman’s uterus in hopes of creating a pregnancy.

His wife, Gwen, went through seven years of fertility treatments before their daughter arrived. Phone calls in those years from Gwen often led to heartbreak, he’s said, until one day when she called crying with the good news that she was pregnant.

“It’s not by chance that we named our daughter Hope,” he told crowds in Philadelphia and again Wednesday in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

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Secretaries of state urge Elon Musk to fix AI chatbot spreading election misinformation on X — 6:15 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Five secretaries of state are urging Elon Musk to fix an AI chatbot on the social media platform X, saying in a letter sent Monday that it has spread election misinformation.

The top election officials from Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Washington told Musk that X’s AI chatbot, Grok, produced false information about state ballot deadlines shortly after President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race.

While Grok is available only to subscribers to the premium versions of X, the misinformation was shared across multiple social media platforms and reached millions of people, according to the letter. The bogus ballot deadline information from the chatbot also referenced Alabama, Indiana, Ohio and Texas, although their secretaries of state did not sign the letter. Grok continued to repeat the false information for 10 days before it was corrected, the secretaries said.

The letter urged X to immediately fix the chatbot “to ensure voters have accurate information in this critical election year.” That would include directing Grok to send users to CanIVote.org, a voting information website run by the National Association of Secretaries of State, when asked about US elections.

Thursday, Aug. 8

Majority of Americans say democracy is on the ballot this fall but differ on threat, AP poll finds — 5:03 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Roughly 3 in 4 American adults believe the upcoming presidential election is vital to the future of US democracy, although which candidate they think poses the greater threat depends on their political leanings, according to a new poll.

The survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that most Democrats, Republicans and independents see the election as “very important” or “extremely important” to democracy, while Democrats have a higher level of intensity about the issue.

More than half of Democrats say the November election is “extremely important” to the future of US democracy, compared to about 4 in 10 independents and Republicans.

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Harris responds to Michigan rally protesters: ‘I’m speaking’ — 10:15 p.m.

By the Associated Press

People chanting about the war in Gaza attempted to interrupt Kamala Harris’s campaign speech outside Detroit.

At first, Harris said to those trying to disrupt her, “I am here because I believe in democracy and everybody’s voice matters.”

”But I am speaking now,” she said, sparking cheers from most of the audience.

The chants opposing the Israeli-Hamas war, which strikes at the heart of parts of suburban Detroit, such as Dearborn, continued until Harris’ tone changed.

”If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that,” she told them sternly. “Otherwise, I’m speaking.

”It was then that the majority of the audience picked her up, chanting: “We’re not going back! We’re not going back!”

Harris calls on supporters to ‘fight for it’ — 10:05 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Capping the biggest day yet of her presidential campaign, Kamala Harris reached a new crescendo with thousands of supporters in an airplane hangar outside Detroit Wednesday.

“Michigan, ultimately in this election we each face a question. What kind of country do we want to live in?” she said in a low voice.

Then she began to raise her voice, saying, “The beauty of our democracy is we each have the power to answer that question.”

“So, in the next 90 days we need you to use your power,” she said, asking rallygoers if they would knock on doors, register voters and mobilize neighborhoods.

She culminated in a full-throated entreaty: “Are you ready to make your voices heard? Do we believe in freedom? Do we believe in opportunity? Do we believe in the promise of America?”

“And are we ready to fight for it?” she roared. “And when we fight, we win. God bless you. God bless you.”

Steve Martin turns down Tim Walz impersonation role on ‘SNL,’ dashing internet’s casting hopes — 9:37 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Steve Martin’s next role will not be the Midwestern politician the internet hoped he’d portray.

With Maya Rudolph’s wildly popular impression of Kamala Harris on “Saturday Night Live,” fans clamored to see who the late-night comedy show would pick to play Harris’ new running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

With similar hairstyles and their signature glasses, many fans quickly drew comparisons between Walz and Martin, who’s been a frequent “SNL” guest but never a formal cast member.

The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday that “SNL” producer Lorne Michaels called Martin to offer him the role on the upcoming 50th season, premiering Sept. 28, which he declined.

“I wanted to say no and, by the way, he wanted me to say no,” Martin said. “I said, ‘Lorne, I’m not an impressionist. You need someone who can really nail the guy.’ I was picked because I have gray hair and glasses.”

Walz says he’s had an ‘interesting 24 hours’ — 9:22 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz began his second stop on his first full day on the Democratic presidential campaign at a rally with Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris in an airplane hangar outside Detroit.

Walz took the stage before an audience of thousands, with a bow and clasped hands. “We Minnesotans, we’re a stoic people,” he said, smiling and laughing. “But holy hell, can you throw a party here in Michigan.”

Walz traveled Wednesday with Harris from Wisconsin, another upper Midwestern battleground state.

Walz is testing his message and style in the hopes of helping securing Midwestern votes in these states and Pennsylvania, a bloc viewed as pivotal to the November election.

“It’s been a pretty interesting 24 hours for me, I have to be honest,” he said.

Vance and other Trump allies amplify a false claim about Harris’s racial identity — 5:55 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Vance defended on Wednesday a false claim Trump made about Harris’s racial identity, suggesting wrongly that Harris had downplayed her Black heritage in trying to suggest she’s inauthentic.

“What I took it as was an attack on Kamala Harris being a chameleon,” he told reporters when asked in Michigan about the former president’s suggestion that Harris, the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, had only recently identified as Black.

“I think he was observing the basic foundational reality that Kamala Harris pretends to be something different depending on what audience she’s speaking to,” Vance said. “She fakes who she is depending on the audience she’s in front of, and that’s who she is and that’s who she’s always been.”

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Harris shuts down chants of ‘lock him up’ — 3:59 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris has during recent events tried to tamp down the chants of “Lock him up. Lock him up,” a mantra crowds have appropriated from similar chants that Trump campaign audiences in 2016 used in reference to Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Harris motioned with her hands in Philadelphia on Tuesday to avoid the chants.

Today, she had a new comeback for the group, as she referred to herself and Walz as “joyful warriors.”

When crowds chanted to put Trump in jail, she said, “Hold on. Let the courts take care of that. We’re going to beat him in November,” igniting cheers.

Walz to appear in Rhode Island next week — 3:48 p.m.

By Steph Machado and Alexa Gagosz, Globe Staff

Harris’s newly minted running mate is coming to the Ocean State next week for a fundraiser hosted by several prominent Rhode Island Democrats.

Walz, who was named Tuesday as Harris’s nominee for vice president, is expected to attend a Democratic fundraiser in Newport, R.I., just a few days before the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, according to Marc Crisafulli, who is one of the co-hosts.

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Vance jokes about checking out Air Force Two — 3:03 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Vance said he had a bit of fun trying to catch up with Harris as the pair used the same Wisconsin airport as part of competing campaign travel.

“I just wanted to check out my future plane,” he joked with reporters after walking off the Donald Trump campaign plane and walking straight over to Air Force Two, which had landed with vice president and her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.

Vance used the stunt to jab Harris for not having conducted an extended interview or full press conference since she began her campaign July 21 after President Joe Biden ended his reelection bid.

“I also wanted to go say hello to the vice president and ask her why Kamala Harris refuses, why does she refuse to answer questions from the media,” Vance said. “I don’t think the vice president waved at me as she drove away.”

Harris and Vance cross paths on the tarmac at Wisconsin’s Chippewa Valley Regional Airport — 2:26 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Eau Claire, Wisconsin, specifically Chippewa Valley Regional Airport, is the center of the political universe at the moment.

Harris and Vance both landed and were on the tarmac outside the northwestern Wisconsin city, planning to hold separate campaign events scheduled for the same time in the afternoon.

Harris, who arrived in Air Force Two, disembarked and left for her event, where she was to speak with her running mate, Walz.

Vance’s aircraft could be seen taxiing as he prepared for his rally. Before leaving for his event, Vance walked over to get a closer look at Air Force Two, the aircraft he hopes to consider his main form of travel beginning in January.

Wisconsin is among the handful of states considered the most competitive, where Biden won by fewer than 21,000 votes in 2020.

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Harris campaign has raised $36 million since Walz announcement — 1:09 p.m.

By the Associated Press

The Harris campaign is continuing a strong fundraising wave after the vice president picked Walz as her running mate.

The campaign said Wednesday that it has raised $36 million in the first 24 hours after the formal vice president candidate announcement.

Senator Ron Johnson says Wisconsin voters will reject Walz as being too liberal — 12:47 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Once Wisconsin voters learn more about Minnesota Governor Tim Walz’s record, they will reject him as being too liberal, Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson said ahead of Walz making his first visit to the battleground state as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate.

Harris and Walz are scheduled to hold a rally in western Wisconsin, only about an hour east of the Minnesota border.

“He is part of the radical, crazy left as is Vice President Harris,” Johnson said on a news conference call. “I don’t think that appeals to Wisconsinites if the mainstream media actually reports on his position instead of something nobody is talking about: (Project) 2025.”

Wisconsin Republican Party chair Brian Schimming said Harris picked Walz because she’s worried about carrying Minnesota and wants to shore up Democratic support in the so-called blue wall states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

“I actually think this pick hurts her in Wisconsin because of Gov. Walz’s policies,” Schimming said. “A pick like Tim Walz is not one that expands the appeal of the ticket. It’s extremely ideological.”

Vance says he was welcomed in Michigan ‘despite the fact that I’m an Ohio State guy’ — 10:33 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Vance is using a stop at a Michigan police department to talk about what he sees as failed immigration policies that are Harris’ fault.

“We’ve got to throw Kamala Harris out of office, not give her a promotion,” Vance said, arguing that he and Trump support law enforcement and law and order, while Harris does not.

Shelby Township Police Chief Robert Shelide introduced Vance, who said he received a briefing from officers ahead of his remarks.

Vance invoked the longstanding sports rivalry between his home state and Michigan: “These guys have given me an incredible welcome despite the fact that I’m an Ohio State guy.”

Trump says he’ll debate Harris and predicts there’ll be an announcement about it soon — 9:15 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The former president’s comments came after he pulled out of a scheduled debate on ABC News.

“I hear she’s sort of a nasty person but not a good, good debater. But we’ll see because we’ll be debating her, I guess in the pretty near future. It’s going to be announced fairly soon but we’ll be debating her,” Trump in an interview on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” on Wednesday.

Trump said he wants to debate Harris and he would prefer it to be on Fox, which is perceived as being friendlier to him, but said “every network loves me very much right now” and even suggested openness to debating on ABC News despite his protestations in recent weeks as he claimed the network was biased against him.

He claimed there “might be” a conflict with ABC News because he sued the network in March following a statement by anchor George Stephanopoulos that Trump had been found “liable for rape.” A New York jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing advice columnist E. Jean Carroll but rejected her claim that she was raped.

“You could use that as an excuse. I could use that. I’ve said that, is there a conflict. And you know, there might be,” Trump said.

Trump agreed to the ABC debate two months after filing his lawsuit at the time when he initially was expected to face President Joe Biden. He’s recently cited his frustrations with Stephanopoulos as reason why he would not keep the debate commitment, along with the fact that he agreed to it when he thought he would be debating Biden, not Harris, and claimed that agreement was scuttled by Biden ending his reelection bid.

But Trump on Wednesday noted that ABC had said the debate would be moderated by “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir and “ABC News Live Prime” anchor Linsey Davis, which he didn’t voice any objections about.

Trump didn’t offer any further details.

Senator JD Vance is hitting the campaign trail again Wednesday, but he’s not going it alone — 8:22 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The GOP vice presidential nominee boarded his campaign plane along with his wife, Usha.

Vance is heading to the battleground states of Michigan and Wisconsin — the same two states his Democratic opponents are hitting, on the same day.

The Democrats’ Midwest swing comes a day after Vice President Kamala Harris officially unveiled Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate and appeared with him at a rally in Philadelphia, just hours after Vance made a campaign stop in the same city.

Both campaigns had planned to journey to North Carolina this week as well but called off those plans due to inclement weather concerns.

Walz’s decades-old drunken driving arrest draws new attention — 7:14 a.m.

By the New York Times

On the night of Sept. 23, 1995, a 31-year-old Tim Walz was pulled over by a Nebraska state trooper for driving a silver Mazda at 96 mph in a 55 mph zone. The officer smelled alcohol, and after Walz failed a field sobriety test and a preliminary breath test, he was arrested and initially charged with speeding and driving while intoxicated.

At the time, Walz was living in Alliance, Nebraska, coaching football, teaching at Alliance High School and serving in the Nebraska Army National Guard. His political career would not begin for more than a decade. He ultimately agreed to resolve the issue in court by pleading to a reduced charge of reckless driving, a misdemeanor, and paying a $200 fine.

But the issue was not resolved in the court of public opinion, where it has resurfaced periodically throughout the Minnesota governor’s career and, now that he’s been selected by Vice President Kamala Harris as her running mate, is bubbling up once again.

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An underappreciated jump-start for Walz — 6:42 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Tim Walz had two jump starts, the first largely unnoticed, the second underappreciated.

The first came earlier this year when the governor and the vice president visited a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Paul. That visit underscored shared values between the two, according to people familiar with Harris’ thinking. Key issues that resonated with Harris included Walz’s advocacy for in vitro fertilization and child tax credits — an idea Walz has used in Minnesota.

The next key moment came July 23, two days after Biden’s withdrawal, when Walz went on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and uttered a dig at Trump and Vance that quickly went viral.

“These guys are just weird,” Walz said, in his signature conversational, informal manner.

For years, Democrats, including Biden and Harris, have leveled high-minded attacks on Trump as a threat to democracy. They spotlighted his legal troubles, racist and sexist rhetoric, the hard-right policies found in the “Project 2025″ agenda that Trump disavows. The jovial governor of Minnesota encapsulated it all in one word: “weird.” And he smiled while doing it.

Social media did its thing, and the Harris campaign took notice. Within days, the vice president — and other vice-presidential contenders — were using “weird” like an epithet.

Harris’s pick of Walz amps up excitement in Midwestern states where Democrats look to heal divisions — 6:30 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will spend their first full day as running mates on Wednesday rallying Democrats across the Midwest, a politically divided region that is crucial to their effort to win the White House in less than three months.

The trip, which begins in Wisconsin before shifting to Michigan, is aimed at shoring up support among the younger, diverse, labor-friendly voters who were instrumental in helping President Joe Biden win the 2020 election. But that coalition showed signs of fraying over the summer, particularly in Michigan, which has emerged as a focal point of Democratic divisions over Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

With Biden now out of the race and Harris officially the Democratic nominee, leaders of the Arab American community and key unions say they are encouraged by the choice. Walz’s addition to the ticket has soothed some tensions, signaling to some community leaders that Harris heard concerns about another leading contender for the vice presidential slot, Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, who they felt had gone too far in his support for Israel.

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Picking a running mate: Inside the 16 days between Kamala Harris’s launch and her choice of Tim Walz — 6:23 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Kamala Harris’s whirlwind process to select Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate can be summed up in a word: weird.

With President Joe Biden and Harris, his vice president, seeking a second term together, Democrats weren’t supposed to have a veep search at all. But as soon as the 81-year-old president ended his campaign and endorsed Harris, it was go time. And there was no playbook for the newly elevated candidate and a vetting team that in a normal campaign would have months, not days, to make such a critical decision.

What followed was a 16-day blitz on parallel tracks. There was the behind-the-scenes action: Harris lieutenants furiously researching contenders, the vice president debating options with top aides and confidants, and, finally, a weekend of interviews with finalists. And there was the public campaign: Contenders found every cable news camera, stumped in battleground states for the prospective boss, tried out attack lines on Republican nominee Donald Trump and his understudy, Ohio Sen. JD Vance — all while rival factions made their pitches and wielded their knives.

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How Kamala Harris trusted her gut and picked Tim Walz — 5:13 a.m.

By the New York Times

When Vice President Kamala Harris gathered some of her closest advisers in the dining room of the Naval Observatory Saturday, they had more choices than time.

Her team had just wrapped up the fastest, most intensive vetting of potential running mates in modern history, a blitz of paperwork and virtual interviews that had concluded only Friday. The advisers were there to present their findings on a list that still technically ran six deep to Harris, who had less than 72 hours to sift through it to make her final decision.

One by one, the circle of her most trusted confidants ran through the pros and cons of each possible No. 2. The sessions went long enough to be broken up with sandwiches and salads as the team eventually focused on the three men she would meet the next day for what would prove to be pivotal in-person interviews: Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro.

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Harris-Walz vs. Trump-Vance: It’s now an expanded battle for both the Sun Belt and Rust Belt — 4:16 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The most turbulent presidential campaign in generations is now set to play out as a 90-day sprint across two fronts: the Rust Belt and the Sun Belt.

With her choice of a Midwestern governor as a running mate, Vice President Kamala Harris pushed to shore up “Blue Wall” states — Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — that Democrats need to win to keep the White House. Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, had already signaled that she would also contend in Sun Belt states that increasingly seemed out of reach for President Joe Biden.

Harris, the first Black woman and woman of South Asian descent to head a major party ticket, and former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, will also be locked in Sun Belt competition to win Georgia, Arizona, Nevada and North Carolina, an electoral map that has expanded since Biden’s decision to withdraw from the race.

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Wednesday, Aug. 7

Trump campaign’s attacks on Walz over felony voting rights raise eyebrows — 12:31 a.m.

By the New York Times

Republicans wasted no time in criticizing Gov. Tim Walz after Vice President Kamala Harris picked him as her running mate. But one of the Trump campaign’s attack lines landed awkwardly.

Walz’s “policies to allow convicted felons to vote” in Minnesota are evidence that he “is obsessed with spreading California’s dangerously liberal agenda far and wide,” said Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the Trump campaign.

But critics of the former president were quick to point out that, if not for such policies, Trump himself would be barred from voting.

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Wesley Bell defeats ‘Squad’ member Cori Bush. A pro-Israel group spent $8.5 million to help oust her. — 11:20 p.m.

By the Associated Press

St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell has defeated U.S. Rep. Cori Bush in a Democratic primary in St. Louis, marking the second time this year that one of the party’s incumbents has been ousted in an expensive contest that reflected deep divisions over the war in Gaza.

Bush, a member of the progressive congressional group known as the “Squad,” was seeking a third term in Missouri’s 1st Congressional District, which includes St. Louis city and part of St. Louis County. Bell is heavily favored to carry this overwhelmingly Democratic district in November, when his party is aiming to retake control of the U.S. House.

“I am committed to serving the St. Louis region in Congress with integrity, transparency, and dedication,” Bell said in a statement. “Together, we will tackle the challenges ahead and build a community where everyone has the opportunity to thrive.”

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Walz, a middling fundraiser, energizes Democratic donors — 10:56 p.m.

By the New York Times

The new Harris-Walz ticket raced Tuesday to collect more than $20 million from energized Democrats — including from some big donors who had tried to persuade Vice President Kamala Harris to choose someone else as her running mate.

The momentum from small donors was undeniable. The progressive fundraising platform ActBlue recorded an average of $3 million an hour in the half-day following the news of Harris’ choice of Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, making it one of the biggest days for Democratic digital fundraising of the 2024 cycle.

But Harris did not seem to prioritize fundraising chops as part of her decision. Walz does not have deep fundraising relationships with large donors, relative to his rival contenders. And his selection threatened to upset some of the prospective givers who had lobbied behind the scenes for other prospective vice-presidential candidates.

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With Walz now on the ticket, Vance previews expected GOP attack lines — 9:39 p.m.

By the Washington Post

Republican vice-presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance (Ohio) sees one similarity with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the man he’s now tapped to face off against: “We’re White guys from the Midwest.”

But the two men — sons of America’s heartland, who both joined the military as teenagers — are far different on policy, Vance stressed in his first public remarks since Walz’s selection Tuesday as Vice President Harris’s running mate.

“I guess there’s similarities there, but what’s different is the actual ideas about how best to serve people, White, Black, or anything else in the Midwest and everywhere else,” Vance said.

Speaking about four miles from where Harris and Walz made their first public appearance together, Vance said Walz was “one of the most far-left radicals in the entire United States government at any level,” pointing to a new Minnesota law that lets any resident regardless of immigration status obtain a driver’s license. Vance also criticized Harris over her decision to not select Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as her running mate, saying she was bending “the knee to the most radical elements of her party.” Democrats have sought to re-engage progressives angered by the Biden administration’s aid to Israel amid the conflict in Gaza, and Shapiro, who is Jewish and has been supportive of Israel, was seen by some as a risky choice.

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Walz finishes his remarks and again calls Vance ‘weird’ — 7:08 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Saying “God bless America,” Walz pivoted amid the applause to wrap his arms around Harris in a bear hug.

The two clasped hands as Harris grinned and, with her other hand, pointed at Walz to the cheering audience.

Their spouses joined them on stage for waves and applause before the new Democratic ticket stepped off the stage and to the edge of the crowd for photographs and handshakes with voters in the Temple University auditorium.

Walz is reprising the “weird” phraseology to describe Republicans that has become a hallmark of his stump appearances and garnered the governor plaudits from younger Americans.

Taking swipes at Vance, Walz said his GOP rival and Trump “are creepy and yes, they’re weird as hell.”

“I can’t wait to debate the guy,” Walz added.

Stumping earlier today in Pennsylvania, Vance said, “I absolutely want to debate Tim Walz,” but not until after the Democratic convention.

Walz is showcasing what he says is his ability to work across the aisle — 6:43 p.m.

By the Associated Press

It’s the general election, and Walz is showcasing what he says is his ability to work across the aisle.

Of his time in the U.S. House, Walz says he worked toward bipartisan solutions on topics including veterans issues and agriculture.

“I learned the art of compromise without compromising my values,” he said, of his more than a decade representing Minnesota’s 1st District.

Walz sometimes talks about his native state of Nebraska more than the one he leads. He spoke about West Point, Nebraska, the “small town of 400″ where he was born, and where he spent “the summers working on the family farm.”

“My mom and dad taught us to show generosity towards our neighbors and work for a common good,” he added.

Walz began his remarks by thanking Harris for selecting him. The campaigner known as being upbeat said, “Thank you for bringing back the joy!”

Following a shoutout to Gov. Josh Shapiro, Walz praised his wife, a 29-year public school teacher, wryly plugging a key constituency, “Don’t ever underestimate teachers.”

Harris campaign rakes in over $20 million — 6:32 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris’ selection of Walz as her running mate has been another fundraising boon for the Democratic presidential ticket.

Her campaign announced shortly before 6:30 p.m. that it has raised more than $20 million since the vice president unveiled the Minnesota governor as her running mate.

The Harris campaign has seen a surge in fundraising since she took over the top of the ticket, raising more than $310 million in July. Well over $200 million of that total came after Harris took over top billing from President Biden on July 21.

Walz is certified by the DNC — 6:30 p.m.

By the Associated Press

As Walz took the stage with Harris in Philadelphia, his status as Democrat’s No. 2 for the general election was announced as official.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison and Minyon Moore, chair of Democrats’ upcoming convention, said in a statement that Harris and Walz had been certified as their party’s nominees.

Late Monday night, Harris officially secured the delegates needed to become her party’s presidential nominee. Hours later, she named Walz as her running mate.

Harris highlights Walz’s teaching credentials — 6:25 p.m.

By the Associated Press

“Under those Friday night lights Coach Walz motivated his players,” Harris said referring to his time as high school football coach, “Going from a winless record to the school’s first-ever state championship.”

She went on to note how as football coach he helped start the school’s gay-straight alliance “because he’s the kind of person who makes them feel like they belong,” she said.

“That’s the kind of vice president he’s going to be and that’s the kind of vice president America deserves.”

Sergeant major, congressman, and coach — 6:22 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris introduced Walz as “more than a governor” by running through the titles he’s held over the years.

Beyond that of husband and father, Harris said he was “Sergeant Major Walz” to his fellow veterans, “Congressman” to voters of southern Minnesota, “Mr. Walz” to the high school students he used to teach and “Coach” to the football players he coached.

“And in 91 days, the nation will know Coach Walz by another name: vice president of the United States,” Harris said to cheers.

‘I set out to find a partner who can help build this brighter future,’ Harris says — 6:19 p.m.

By the Associated Press

In preparing to hand off to Walz, Harris is building him up as the partner she had been looking for during her quick search for a running mate.

“I set out to find a partner who can help build this brighter future, a leader that will help unite our nation and move us forward,” she said.

“Pennsylvania, I’m here today because I found such a leader, Governor Tim Walz of the great state of Minnesota.”

The crowd errupts — 6:05 p.m.

By the Associated Press

The pair ignited sustained cheers as they appeared before thousands at Temple University’s Liacouras Center.

Walz, the 60-year-old governor and former US House member from rural south central Minnesota, put his hands together and bowed to the crowd. He stood alongside Harris as she waved to the audience and put her hand over her heart, wrapping the other around Walz.

Harris and Walz take the stage — 6:00 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris has made her first appearance with her newly chosen running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.

Harris and Walz have taken the stage together at a packed rally in Philadelphia.

According to excerpts provided by the campaign, Walz planns to use his speech to say that Minnesota values are American values.

Watch live: Harris and Walz hold rally in Philadelphia — 5:45 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Harris and her newly announced running mate, Walz, are hitting the campaign trail in Philadelphia. This marks their first rally together since she revealed her vice president pick earlier today. The rally has started, and Harris is set to speak shortly.

Trump will sit for an interview with Elon Musk — 5:22 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump says that he will do an interview with billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk next week. Musk endorsed the Republican for president after Trump survived an assassination attempt.

“ON MONDAY NIGHT I’LL BE DOING A MAJOR INTERVIEW WITH ELON MUSK — Details to follow!” Trump posted on his social media network.

His campaign did not immediately have more details to share.

Trump, a longtime opponent of electric cars, said over the weekend at his rally in Atlanta that he favors electric cars “for a small slice” of the population, saying, “I have to be, you know, because Elon endorsed me very strongly.” He added: “So I have no choice.”

The last politician to face off against Tim Walz has some advice for JD Vance — 5:14 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Dr. Scott Jensen, a physician and former Republican Minnesota state senator, was the last political candidate to run against Walz in a general election but lost by nearly 8 points. Jensen says Vance should be prepared for Walz’s fast-talking debate style. He also thinks Walz’s appeal in rural areas has been overstated.

“Tim Walz can talk around a topic extremely effectively. He will give people the impression that he is the candidate of the common, everyday person,” Jensen said. “But if you look at the results of the 2022 election, Tim Walz really won the election because of the Twin Cities, Duluth and Rochester.”

He also pointed out that in the 2022 governor’s race, Walz lost many of the counties in the district he previously represented in Congress.

“Tim Walz lost the district in which the people who knew him best were offered the opportunity to make a decision about his candidacy,” Jensen said. “I think that’s telling.”

Expect Walz to extol Harris during his first running mate appearance — 5:05 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Ahead of a rally in Philadelphia, the Harris campaign has released experts of Walz’s prepared remarks where he’ll introduce himself to the nation, highlight his support for Harris and emphasize stopping Trump at the ballot.

Walz will say that the vice president “has fought on the side of the American people” and “brings joy to everything she does.”

“Minnesota’s strength comes from our values — our commitment to working together, to seeing past our differences, to lending a helping hand,” Walz plans to tell the rally. “Donald Trump — he sees the world differently. He doesn’t know the first thing about service — because he’s too busy serving himself.”

Diet Dew, piglets, and Beyonce Day: VP candidate Tim Walz has had his share of viral moments — 5:00 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

There was a visit to the Minnesota State Fair, when he held a squealing baby pig in his arms. The time he received a group hug from young students after signing free school lunches into law. His love of Mountain Dew.

During his tenure as governor of Minnesota, Walz has had no shortage of viral moments. Now that Vice President Kamala Harris has named Walz as her 2024 running mate, those moments have begun to resurface, offering glimpses into his personality and introducing him to a wider electorate for the first time.

Walz, 60, is a former high school teacher who served 24 years in the Army National Guard and six terms in the House. Elected governor of Minnesota in 2018, he’s known to appear at press conferences in a T-shirt and a baseball hat. He’ll become a more familiar face as he accompanies Harris on a tour of battleground states in the coming days and sets out to make a case for the Harris-Walz ticket over the next three months.

Beyond his now-viral branding of former president Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance as “weird,” Walz has appeared alongside his daughter in social media posts to highlight Minnesota policies and traditions and established himself as an animal lover and Diet Mountain Dew drinker.

Here are some of Walz’s notable moments.

READ MORE

See the moment Harris asked Walz to be her running mate — 4:01 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Harris posted a video on social media of the moment she asked Walz to he her running mate.

”Listen, I want you to do this with me. Let’s do this together. Would you be my running mate and let’s get this thing on the road?” Harris asked the Minnesota governor on speakerphone.

During the call exchange, Harris told Walz that she has the “utmost respect” for him and his dedication to the country.

”I would be honored, Madam Vice President. The joy that you’re bringing back to the country, the enthusiasm that’s out there, it’ll be a privilege to take this with you across the country,” Walz told her.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear says Walz is a good pick for Harris’s running mate — 3:17 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Beshear said it was “a true honor of a lifetime” to be considered for Harris’s running mate and that Walz was a good pick.

“He is a great friend,” Beshear told reporters outside his office in the Kentucky Capitol on Tuesday afternoon. “He’d be an amazing vice president. I am 100% onboard with doing everything I can to elect the Harris-Walz ticket this November.”

Beshear declined to comment on the process — when he was interviewed for the job and if he heard from Harris or her team this morning.

Walz posts campaign video: ‘We’re ready to fight’ — 3:01 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Walz posted a 90-second campaign video on social media. The video highlights his background as a public school teacher, football coach, and National Guardsman before he entered politics.

He compares his middle-class upbringing to Harris’s, saying, “She too goes to work every day ensuring families can not just get by, but get ahead. We believe in the promise of America. In those values I learned in Nebraska, and we’re ready to fight for them.”

‘I’m definitely going with Harris’: An independent voter in N.H. is ‘excited’ for Harris-Walz ticket — 2:56 p.m.

By Amanda Gokee, Globe Staff

Rosemary Shea had supported Republican Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, before he dropped out of the presidential race. But now that Harris has picked Walz to be her running mate, she said, “I’m excited.”

”I’m very happy,” said Shea, 61, a semi-retired designer who lives in Hampton and identifies as a political independent. She said Walz’s age and background make him a good candidate.

“He’s only 60 years old. That’s great. He’s been in government,” she said. “He has a background of being a teacher, and being able to talk non-political, talk to the common man, and have them understand and trust him.”

And she said she’s now optimistic about the Democrats’ odds of beating Trump.

”I’m definitely going with Harris,” she said. “I believe in Democracy. I want to keep it.”

Takeaways from a Harris-Walz ticket now that the stage is set for a reimagined presidential race — 2:49 p.m.

By the Associated Press

The stage is set for an election that was unimaginable mere weeks ago when Biden was atop the Democratic ticket. Now Harris has tapped Walz as her running mate to take on Trump and his running mate Vance.

As different as they are, Walz and Vance both qualify as picks meant to reassure their party’s loyal base voters rather than adding homegrown heft in a critical battleground state.

The two No. 2s will also get a chance to square off in almost real time as Walz is traveling this week with Harris to Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona and Nevada, while Vance will follow an overlapping itinerary to offer his own counterprograming in some places.

Some takeaways on the race now that Harris has settled on Walz:

READ MORE

Who is Gwen Walz, the wife of Tim Walz? — 2:03 p.m.

By The New York Times

Gwen Walz, the wife of Walz, has forged a career as an educator and school administrator, a background she has leveraged in her work as the state’s first lady.

Now with her husband selected as Harris’s running mate, she could bring that work with her to Washington if Harris wins in November.

Gwen Walz has taught at public and alternative schools, and she spent a large part of her career as an administrator in the public school district at Mankato, Minnesota. On her website, she says she has focused on equity in education.

READ MORE

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi welcomes Walz to the race — 1:41 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi welcomed the Minnesotan to what she called the Harris-Walz “freedom ticket.”

“In the Congress, I saw firsthand Tim Walz’s leadership, collaborative spirit and effectiveness in bringing people together and getting the job done,” Pelosi said in a statement.

The former Democratic House speaker was pivotal in reshaping the presidential race as President Joe Biden stepped aside and she said the field of potential VP candidates “demonstrated the strength and vitality of the next generation of Democratic leadership.”

Voto Latino co-founder says Walz as running mate will help energize Latino voters — 1:15 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Voto Latino co-founder and President Maria Teresa Kumar said Walz’s selection to the ticket would help energize Latino voters who want a more inclusive democracy.

Kumar said in a statement that Walz’s “strong record of defending democracy, protecting voting rights, and standing up for working families in Minnesota aligns perfectly with the values our organization and the Latino community hold dear.”

She added that she knows the vice president and governor personally and knows they’ll represent a powerful voice for “progress, equality and opportunity for Latino communities and all Americans.”

Senator Mark Kelly urges supporters to contribute to the Harris-Walz ticket — 1:07 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Arizona Senator Mark Kelly said he and his wife, former Representative Gabby Giffords, will do everything they can to elect Harris and Walz after Kelly was passed over for the Democratic ticket.

Kelly sent an email to supporters urging them to contribute to the Harris-Walz ticket.

“Tim has years of experience representing Minnesota both in the House of Representatives, where he served with Gabby, and as Minnesota’s governor,” Kelly wrote. “In that time, he has shown up time and time again for working families and I know he’ll continue that work in the White House.”

Meanwhile, the head of GIFFORDS, a gun-control advocacy group founded by Kelly and Giffords, called Walz “a strong gun safety champion.”

“Gun violence is a top concern for Americans this election cycle and we know the Harris-Walz ticket is the only one that will stand up to the gun lobby and save lives,” said GIFFORDS Executive Director Emma Brown, who managed Kelly’s 2022 Senate campaign and was his deputy campaign manager when in his first race two years earlier 2020.

Healey calls Harris-Walz a ‘dream ticket’ — 12:44 p.m.

By Matt Stout, Globe Staff

Healey praised Harris’s selection of Walz as a running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket, calling Harris’s pairing with the Minnesota governor a “dream” in remarks to a Globe reporter Tuesday.

”He is somebody who really gets what needs to happen,” Healey said of Walz, saying she believes he “really, really helps” Harris’s bid to beat Trump in November.

Walz is “from the Midwest and [is] really, really well-liked and well-respected across many states and by all of us as governors. ... This is a dream ticket.”

Healey, once a top surrogate for Biden, was among the first Democratic governors to publicly suggest that he “carefully evaluate” whether he should remain the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee.

Healey, like many Democrats, lined up in support of Harris, including urging fellow Democratic National Convention delegates to quickly endorse her.

Biden calls Harris-Walz ticket ‘a powerful voice for working people’ and middle class — 12:30 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Biden called on Democrats and all Americans to rally behind them.

“They will be the strongest defenders of our personal freedoms and our democracy,” Biden said in a social media post. “And they will ensure that America continues to lead the world and play its role as the indispensable nation.”

Biden said choosing a running mate is a party nominee’s first major decision and praised Harris’ choice. He said he’s known Walz for nearly two decades, praising his background as a teacher, football coach and National Guard soldier.

“Every generation of Americans faces a moment where they are asked to defend American democracy,” Biden said. “That moment is now.”

White House Senior Deputy Press Secretary Emilie Simons says Biden and Harris spoke on the phone Tuesday morning ahead of the official announcement that she selected Walz and that Biden spoke with Walz to congratulate him.

Vance says Walz pick as running mate ‘highlights how radical’ Harris is — 12:11 p.m.

By the Associated Press

In his first public comments since his general election foe was set, JD Vance on Tuesday called Walz a choice that “highlights how radical Kamala Harris is.”

In a gaggle with reporters aboard his campaign plane upon landing in Philadelphia, Vance said Walz “is a person who listens to the Hamas wing” of the Democratic Party and “who wants to make the American people more reliant on garbage energy instead of good American energy.”

Vance is speaking more to reporters in Philadelphia on Tuesday ahead of campaign events across Midwestern battleground states on Wednesday, in a path that somewhat mirrors Harris and Walz’s planned trajectory.

Warren praises Walz’s record and ‘good Midwestern sensibility’ — 12:07 p.m.

By Jim Puzzanghera, Globe Staff

Senator Elizabeth Warren said Walz’s “good Midwestern sensibility” will help the Democratic ticket in that region and around the country.

”He’s been willing to take on tough fights, always with a tilt toward, ‘How does this make life better for working families?’ " she told the Globe, citing his work to provide free school lunches among other initiatives in Minnesota. “Walz will be great in battleground states because he’s got the right values and he’s energetic and plain-spoken.”

Warren noted the contrast Walz will provide with Trump’s running mate, first-term Ohio Senator JD Vance, another Midwesterner.

”Tim Walz has delivered for the people of Minnesota day after day after day,” she said. “He’s got a list of accomplishments as long as your arm. JD Vance can’t hold a candle to that.”

Harris’s running mate pick is good news for man who owns rights to

By the Associated Press

Jeremy Green Eche was in the middle of getting his toddler dressed the moment news broke that Harris had selected Walz to be her running mate.

And he was amped.

Eche was uniquely invested in Harris’ pick. He currently owns the rights to HarrisWalz.com, a site he bought in 2020 — along with a slate of other Harris sites — when the would-be vice president was in the midst of a primary campaign for president. Four years and one vice presidential pick later, Eche is willing to sell the slate of Harris websites, including the one featuring Walz, for $15,000.

“I was constantly refreshing four different news sites on my phone,” he told The Associated Press on Tuesday. “I was very excited.” He said he “almost immediately” began getting calls from both journalists and “friends I hadn’t heard from in a while.”

This is not a new scenario for the 36-year-old trademark lawyer in Brooklyn, New York. Eche is a cyber squatter, someone who buys a domain with someone else’s name or brand in it for very little money, hoping to sell it to that person or brand for a large profit in the subsequent months or years. In 2011, when it looked likely that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee in 2016, then Jeremy Peter Green – he took his wife’s last name – purchased ClintonKaine.com.

“The Harris campaign has hundreds of millions of dollars, so if they don’t buy their own domain, that is kind of on them,” he said Monday. But he isn’t convinced they will buy the domain.

“I don’t want to be too confident that somebody will reach out,” he said after Walz was selected. “I would say there’s a 75% chance that one of the campaigns, or a PAC, will buy it from me.”

Former colleagues on Capitol Hill appear thrilled with Walz as the VP pick — 11:51 a.m.

By the Associated Press

“Great choice,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

“Having served for years with Tim in the House of Representatives, I can say without reservation: there’s no better person Vice President Harris could have picked to run and then govern alongside her,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.

Walz “has always put our country first,” Van Hollen said, and he’s excited to campaign for the Harris-Walz ticket for “a brighter future for all Americans.”

Rep. Mark Takano of California recalled how after Walz beat him during an internal House caucus vote to become the top Democrat on the Veterans Affairs Committee, his colleague “immediately brought me into the fold because that’s the type of leader he is: a collaborative bridge builder.”

And Vermont Sen. Peter Welch, who entered Congress with Walz in 2007, said he “has always had this very straightforward, direct, open approach to things.”

Welch described Walz as “one of these guys in the gym who wouldn’t undo his tie” because it would be faster for him to get back to work.

‘I cannot wait to call him Mr. Vice President,’ Representative Pressley says of Walz — 11:38 a.m.

By Amanda Kaufman, Globe Staff

Massachusetts Representative Ayanna Pressley hailed Harris’s choice, writing in a statement that Walz “knows that we can advance meaningful policies to change people’s lives for the better.”

”I cannot wait to call him Mr. Vice President,” she wrote.

Young N.H. voter says he’s motivated by Harris-Walz ticket — 11:26 a.m.

By Amanda Gokee, Globe Staff

Tuna Akmehmet, 20, a rising junior at Dartmouth College, said having Walz on the ticket with Harris will motivate young voters like him.

”I had some reservations about voting for Biden, but I can say I have no reservations voting for this ticket,” he said.

He called it an exciting ticket, and said he believes Walz will complement Harris in many ways.

”I actually like this pick a lot,” he said, adding that Walz has proven himself to be an effective governor. He pointed to progressive policies Walz helped pass in Minnesota such as free school meals, free college tuition for families earning less than $80,000, and family and sick leave.

And, Akmehmet said, he likes what Walz has to say. “His rhetoric is really powerful, too,” he said, noting Walz’s sharp response to potential Republican attacks on his record and how he’s shaped national Democratic discourse by calling Republican leaders “weird.”

Obama says Harris has chosen ‘an ideal partner’ — 11:19 a.m.

By Amanda Kaufman, Globe Staff

Former president Barack Obama praised Harris’s choice in a statement, calling Walz an “ideal partner.”

“Governor Walz doesn’t just have the experience to be vice president, he has the values and the integrity to make us proud,” Obama said.

“Like Vice President Harris, Governor Walz believes that government works to serve us,” he said. “Not just some of us, but all of us. That’s what makes him an outstanding governor, and that’s what will make him an even better vice president, ready on day one.”

Several black and white SUVs have left the Governor’s residence in St. Paul — 11:18 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The SUVs left amid cheers from residents lined up on the sidewalk.

Governor Healey ‘thrilled’ with Harris’s VP pick — 11:06 a.m.

By Samantha J. Gross, Globe Staff

Governor Maura Healey endorsed Harris’s pick for running mate in a statement Tuesday, calling Walz “a person of deep integrity and empathy.”

”I am thrilled with this selection,” Healey said. “As Governor, Tim has been a champion for the working families of his state and brings a common-sense approach to getting things done for the people he serves. He will be an outstanding partner to Kamala Harris during this campaign and as her Vice President.”

Healey and Walz both serve on Biden’s Council of Governors, and Walz serves as chair of the Democratic Governors Association, of which Healey is a member.

”I’m a proud colleague of Governor Walz,” Healey said. “Tim had a two decade career as a teacher and in the Army reserves before he became an elected official. He is a person of deep integrity and empathy. As Governor, Tim has been a champion for the working families of his state and brings a common-sense approach to getting things done for the people he serves.”

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, who was a VP contender, releases a statement — 10:58 a.m.

By Amanda Kaufman, Globe Staff

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, who was in the running to be Harris’s running mate, said in a statement that Walz is “an exceptionally strong addition to the ticket” and that his work in Pennsylvania is “far from finished.”

Shapiro said Harris asked him about two weeks ago to undergo the vetting process to be considered as her running mate, and on Sunday, he spoke with Harris directly “about her vision for the role and the campaign ahead.”

“As I’ve said repeatedly over the past several weeks, the running mate decision was a deeply personal decision for the Vice President — and it was also a deeply personal choice for me. Pennsylvanians elected me to a four-year term as their Governor, and my work here is far from finished — there is a lot more stuff I want to get done for the good people of this Commonwealth.”

Shapiro said Walz will “help Kamala move our country forward,” and he vowed to travel across Pennsylvania to campaign for them.

Walz says it’s the ‘honor of a lifetime’ to join Harris’s campaign — 10:43 a.m.

By Amanda Kaufman, Globe Staff

Walz released his first statement since he was chosen as Harris’s running mate, saying in a post on X that he’s “all in.”

“It is the honor of a lifetime to join [Kamala Harris] in this campaign,” he wrote. “Vice President Harris is showing us the politics of what’s possible. It reminds me a bit of the first day of school.”

Environmental group cheers selection of Walz as the Democratic vice presidential candidate — 10:42 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Manish Bapna, president and CEO of the NRDC Action Fund, the political arm of the Natural Resources Defense Council, called Harris and Walz “the winning ticket on climate. The Harris-Walz administration will be ready, on day one, to build on the strongest climate action ever and lead by example in the global fight against the existential challenge of our time.’’

Walz has made Minnesota a national climate leader, Bapna said. Under his leadership, the state committed to 100% clean energy by 2040, and Minnesota was the first Midwestern state to adopt California’s strict tailpipe emissions standards. Walz also signed a bill last year directing $240 million to replace lead service water lines statewide.

“The stakes in this election couldn’t be higher nor the choice more clear. Trump would bow to billionaire oil and gas donors, slam climate progress into reverse and leave our kids to pay the price. Harris is a proven climate and justice leader with two decades of public service on the front lines of needed progress and change. She’s shown us what leadership looks like, and she’s earned the chance to lead,” Bapna said.

The National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund praises Walz’s selection — 10:33 a.m.

By the Associated Press

“The National LGBTQ Action Fund expected a strategic and bold choice as a strong addition to the ticket as a Vice-Presidential candidate,” Sayre E. Reece, vice president of the National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund, said Tuesday in a statement. “In Governor Walz we have gotten both.”

Reece continued: “Governor Walz has been a steadfast ally and advocate for the LGBTQ community, including support for trans affirming care, bodily autonomy and reproductive freedom and gun control. As Governor, Walz signed a ban on so-called ‘conversion therapy’ into law, ending the harmful and cruel practice that has cost LGBTQ people their dignity and their lives. Under Walz’s leadership, Minnesota is both a ‘trans sanctuary’ and immigration sanctuary state.”

The National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund describes itself as lobbying for legislation and ballot initiatives that “achieve justice” for LGBTQ people.

Harris announces Walz as her pick — 10:26 a.m.

By Amanda Kaufman, Globe Staff

Harris took to X on Tuesday morning to announce Walz as her choice for running mate.

“As a governor, a coach, a teacher, and a veteran, he’s delivered for working families like his,” the post said. “It’s great to have him on the team.”

At Walz’s residence in Minnesota — 10:13 a.m.

By the Associated Press

A growing crowd of residents and news reporters gathered outside Walz’s residence in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Tuesday morning.

Black and white SUVs periodically pulled into the driveway as onlookers waited to catch a glimpse of Walz leaving the 20-room governor’s mansion near the Mississippi River.

Trump attacks Walz in a fundraising email — 9:54 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Donald Trump sent a fundraising email calling Walz “Dangerously Liberal” and saying he would “unleash HELL ON EARTH.”

Moments after Harris’ VP pick became public, the former president and Republican nominee said Walz would be the worst vice president in history, claiming the Minnesota governor would “light TRILLIONS of dollars on fire” and open U.S. borders to criminals.

“HE’S THAT BAD,” the email says.

The selection process that led Harris to pick Walz as her running mate — 9:34 a.m.

By the Associated Press

A team of lawyers and political operatives led by former attorney general Eric Holder pored over documents and conducted interviews with potential vice presidential selections.

And Harris herself met with her three finalists on Sunday. She mulled the decision over Monday with top aides at the vice president’s residence in Washington and finalized it Tuesday morning.

Walz emerged as the choice.

Republicans begin reacting to Walz as Harris’s choice — 9:20 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis called it the “most left-wing ticket in American history” and accused Walz of not doing enough to protect Minnesota during the 2020 protests over the killing of George Floyd.

He said “Walz sat by and let Minneapolis burn.”

See more Republican reactions:

The viral clip that buoyed Walz’s VP candidacy — 9:12 a.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Walz was the first Harris backer to use the term “weird” to describe the Republican ticket, a characterization that has since picked up steam among Democrats.

“These are weird people on the other side,” Walz said in the clip. “They want to take books away, they want to be in your exam room... These are weird ideas.”

Harris selects Tim Walz as her running mate, the AP reports — 9:01 a.m.

By Sam Brodey, Globe Staff

Vice President Kamala Harris has made her first major decision as the new presumptive Democratic presidential nominee: selecting Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota, an experienced politician with a record of progressive governance, as her 2024 running mate, according to the Associated Press.

READ MORE

Pelosi warns in her new book that political threats and violence ‘must stop’ — 6:17 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Nancy Pelosi thought briefly she might have died on Jan. 6, 2021.

Not quite two years later, the threat of political violence would come for her husband at their home.

“Where’s Nancy? Where’s Nancy?”

That was the chilling question the intruder posed to Paul Pelosi before bludgeoning the then-82-year-old over the head with a hammer in their San Francisco house. It echoed the menacing jeers of the rioters roaming the halls of the Capitol calling out “Nancy, Nancy” on Jan. 6.

The through line of escalating political rhetoric and violence in American public life serves as the opening and closing message of Pelosi’s new book, “The Art of Power, My Story as America’s First Woman Speaker of the House.”

READ MORE

Harris wins Democratic presidential nomination in virtual roll call. Here’s how the process worked. — 5:58 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Democratic delegates have selected Vice President Kamala Harris to be the party’s presidential nominee, according to final vote results released late Monday by the Democratic National Committee. But don’t expect a balloon drop just yet.

Harris officially claimed the nomination following a five-day online voting process, receiving nearly 4,600 votes, which it said was 99% of participating delegates. The party did not release a precise number of votes that were cast for “present” or the state-by-state breakdown of “present” votes, though it did release state-by-state numbers for Harris.

Harris had already secured the majority of votes needed to claim the nomination by Friday afternoon, DNC Chair Jaime Harrison announced in a live video presentation that day to mark the milestone, but the result was not official until after the voting period closed at 6 p.m. ET on Monday.

READ MORE

Tuesday, Aug. 6

Kamala Harris is now Democratic presidential nominee, will face off against Donald Trump this fall — 12:04 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Vice President Kamala Harris, a daughter of immigrants who rose through the California political and law enforcement ranks to become the first female vice president in U.S. history, formally secured the Democratic presidential nomination on Monday — becoming the first woman of color to lead a major party ticket.

More than four years after her first attempt at the presidency collapsed, Harris’ coronation as her party’s standard-bearer caps a tumultuous and frenetic period for Democrats prompted by President Joe Biden’s disastrous June debate performance that shattered his own supporters’ confidence in his reelection prospects and spurred extraordinary intraparty warfare about whether he should stay in the race.

Just as soon as Biden abruptly ended his candidacy, Harris and her team worked rapidly to secure backing from the 1,976 party delegates needed to clinch the nomination in a formal roll call vote. She reached that marker at warp speed, with an Associated Press survey of delegates nationwide showing she locked down the necessary commitments a mere 32 hours after Biden’s announcement.

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A race at warp speed: For Harris, there are advantages in a late start — 11:48 p.m.

By The New York Times

Presidential campaigns follow a rhythm. The candidates are generally known by late spring. They are nominated at conventions over the summer. The fall campaign kicks off on Labor Day, at which point the public’s attention turns to the candidates who have spent months preparing for the next eight weeks.

Not this time.

The sudden elevation of Kamala Harris to replace President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket has transformed what had been a long slog between Biden and former President Donald Trump into a 100-day sprint to Election Day. This campaign is now playing out in fast forward, with a vice-presidential pick, convention, the debate on debates, the production of television advertisem*nts and the crafting of strategy all taking place in the crunch of weeks rather than months.

READ MORE

Kamala Harris nears her big VP reveal after fierce lobbying from Democrats — 10:13 p.m.

By The New York Times

Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to reveal her running mate Tuesday morning, a decision that will end a 16-day sprint to vet, interview and choose a person who could potentially become the future leader of the Democratic Party.

Harris’ announcement, coupled with a major rally she plans to hold with her running mate Tuesday evening in Philadelphia, will also cap a frenzied period that had, in recent days, exposed some of the party’s internal fissures on matters ranging from labor rights to Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip.

With only days to consider a range of contenders, Harris and her team were inundated with unsolicited advice — much of it public — about whom she should pick. In the final hours, her allies, fellow Democrats, progressive activists and even some of the potential nominees themselves tried to find ways to sway her decision.

READ MORE

Harris prepares to name running mate and launch multi-state tour — 8:08 p.m.

Washington Post

Vice President Harris holed up at her residence at the Naval Observatory on Monday to finalize the selection of her running mate, perhaps the biggest decision of her nascent campaign, as plans coalesced for the joint campaign swing that Democrats hope will generate excitement for the ticket this week.

Harris met Sunday in Washington with at least three finalists: Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona and Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota. After the running-mate announcement, which is expected to include several online components, including a video, Harris and her newly minted election partner plan to launch a multistate tour with a rally in Philadelphia on Tuesday night.

As strategists in both parties awaited the selection - on which an enormous amount of strategy, messaging and advertising will depend - a Harris campaign spokesperson, Kevin Munoz, said just before 4:30 p.m. Monday that Harris had not yet made her decision.

The campaign was nonetheless moving forward with plans for the national campaign swing. The trip is set to start in Philadelphia before heading to Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada through Saturday.

Democrats are hoping the five-day tour will help sustain the enthusiasm that has so far accompanied her campaign, enabling her to ride Democrats’ excitement into the party convention beginning Aug. 19.

The campaign announced that the indie folk group Bon Iver would perform at the second stop in the campaign tour, Wednesday in Eau Claire, Wis. Last week, the rapper Megan Thee Stallion performed at Harris’s rally in Atlanta.

A stop later in the week in Savannah, Ga., was postponed because of Hurricane Debby, which made landfall in Florida on Monday morning and is expected to move up the East Coast.

In the meantime, the Harris campaign has been using the highly anticipated announcement to raise money, telling supporters they could be among the first to know the identity of the running mate if they donate at least $20. Such donors would be able to “join an exclusive live stream with the Vice President and her running mate,” according to recent emails to supporters, which did not give any timing for the live stream.

Bill Weld among Republicans backing Kamala Harris — 7:26 p.m.

State House News Service

Former Republican Governor Bill Weld is once again crossing the aisle to oppose Donald Trump, joining other GOP figures in an endorsem*nt of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris for president.

The Harris campaign on Sunday rolled out a “Republicans for Harris” program that organizers said would “further outreach efforts to the millions of Republican voters who continue to reject the chaos, division, and violence of Donald Trump and his Project 2025 agenda.”

Among the effort’s initial backers is Weld, a Republican who spent two terms as Massachusetts governor in the 1990s after working as an assistant US attorney general under President Ronald Reagan.

“Donald Trump belongs nowhere near the White House. With democracy hanging in the balance in this election, I’m standing with Kamala Harris to defeat Donald Trump and his attacks on our democratic institutions,” Weld said in a statement provided by the Harris campaign. “I look forward to working with the Republicans for Harris program to bring that message to the hundreds of thousands of moderate Republicans in battleground states who know Donald Trump doesn’t represent their beliefs in freedom, democracy, and the Constitution.”

RFK Jr. posed with a dead bear cub and other revelations from The New Yorker exposé — 6:34 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

A New Yorker profile of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., published on Monday disclosed new details about the independent presidential candidate, including the story behind his decision to leave a dead bear cub in Central Park a decade ago and a recent text exchange regarding former president Donald Trump.

Here are three revelations from the magazine’s profile on Kennedy.

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Harris’ reversal on fracking becomes a talking point in Pennsylvania — 5:13 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Fracking – formally named hydraulic fracturing – is nearly always on the ballot in battleground Pennsylvania.

Republicans routinely attack Democrats over the practice to drive a wedge into the party’s fragile alliance between its left wing, which is hostile to fossil fuels, and its bedrock building trades union base, whose workers are building an expanding network of gas pipelines, power plants and processing facilities in Pennsylvania.

Facing the need to win the state, Harris is swearing off any prior assertion that she opposed the practice, but that hasn’t stopped Trump from wielding her now-abandoned position to win over voters in a state where the natural gas industry means jobs.

Trump has repeatedly warned that Harris would ban fracking — a position she held as a presidential primary candidate in 2019 — and devastate the economy in the nation’s No. 2 natural gas state. Harris’s campaign insists she would not ban fracking, calling Trump’s claims an “attempt to distract from his own plans to enrich oil and gas executives at the expense of the middle class.”

Ex-Trump attorney Jenna Ellis to cooperate in Arizona fake electors case, charges to be dropped — 4:25 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump’s campaign attorney Jenna Ellis, who worked closely with Rudy Giuliani, will cooperate with Arizona prosecutors in exchange for charges being dropped against her in a fake electors case, the state attorney general’s office announced Monday.

Ellis has previously pleaded not guilty to fraud, forgery and conspiracy charges in the Arizona case. Seventeen other people charged in the case have pleaded not guilty to the felony charges — including Giuliani, Trump presidential chief of staff Mark Meadows and 11 Republicans who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Trump had won Arizona.

Last year, Ellis was charged in Georgia after she appeared at a December 2020 hearing hosted by state Republican lawmakers at the Georgia Capitol during which false allegations of election fraud were made. She had pleaded guilty in October to one felony count of aiding and abetting false statements and writings.

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Trump revives false claim about Canadian PM Justin Trudeau’s parentage — 3:47 p.m.

By the Associated Press

In a conversation with streamer and influencer Adin Ross, Trump brought up an old, false theory that former Cuban President Fidel Castro is the father of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“They say he’s the son of Fidel Castro and could be. Anything is possible in this world,” he said, before saying that Trudeau has become more progressive and that a conservative candidate would be able to defeat him.

The Canadian government has denied this story in the past. Trudeau’s parents never visited Cuba until several years after Trudeau was born.

The comment may come across as an insult of a critical national ally. Relations between the U.S. and Canada faced moments of tension during the Trump administration after the former president suggested new tariffs against Canada and he and top aides assailed Trudeau as a “weak” and “dishonest.”

Who heads up Project 2025? — 3:34 p.m.

By the Associated Press

A chief architect of Project 2025 — the controversial conservative blueprint to remake the federal government — Russell Vought is likely to be appointed to a high-ranking post in a second Trump administration. And he’s been drafting a so-far secret “180-Day Transition Playbook” to speed the plan’s implementation to avoid a repeat of the chaotic start that dogged Trump’s first term.

Among the small cadre of Trump advisers who has a mechanic’s understanding of how Washington operates, Vought has advised influential conservative lawmakers on Capitol Hill, held a top post in the Trump White House and later established his own pro-Trump think tank. Now, he’s being mentioned as a candidate to be Trump’s White House chief of staff, one of the most powerful positions in government.

Led by the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 is a detailed 920-page handbook for governing under the next Republican administration. A whirlwind of hard-right ambitions, its proposals range from ousting thousands of civil servants and replacing them with Trump loyalists to reversing the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of medications used in abortions.

Former Republican governor of New Jersey endorses Harris — 3:02 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Former Republican governor of New Jersey and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Christine Todd Whitman was among a handful of Republicans who backed Vice President Kamala Harris’s bid for the White House.

Whitman, who was the first woman elected governor of New Jersey, has been a prominent critic of Donald Trump.

“I was a proud Republican, but Donald Trump is unfit to lead our nation,” she said in a statement. “It’s time to move forward by electing Vice President Kamala Harris.”

Whitman has roots in the same county in New Jersey where Trump’s Bedminster golf club is located. Whitman endorsed President Joe Biden in 2020 over Trump as well.

Harris postponing Georgia trip as Tropical Storm Debby moves across the region — 2:05 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Vice President Kamala Harris is postponing a scheduled trip to Georgia amid the ongoing effects of Tropical Storm Debby.

Harris’s campaign said her stop planned in Savannah, Georgia, on Thursday, was being put off due to the storm.

Harris is choosing her running mate and will introduce the choice during a rally in Philadelphia on Tuesday. The pair will then travel together starting Wednesday to a series of key battleground states: Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada. But the Georgia leg of the original journey has been pulled down, for now.

Debby made landfall in Florida on Monday as a Category 1 hurricane and was expected to bring potentially record-setting rainfall to South Carolina and Georgia as it heads east.

Harris’s nomination to become official after online balloting ends Monday night — 1:58 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris’s nomination will become official after a five-day round of online balloting by Democratic National Convention delegates ends Monday night and the party announces the results. The party had long contemplated the early virtual roll call to ensure Biden would appear on the ballot in every state.

An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted after Biden withdrew found 46 percent of Americans have a favorable view of Harris, while a nearly identical share has an unfavorable view of her.

But more Democrats say they’re satisfied with her candidacy compared with that of Biden, energizing a party that had long been resigned to the 81-year-old Biden being its nominee against Trump, a Republican they view as an existential threat.

JD Vance’s wife defends his ‘childless cat ladies’ remark, calling it a ‘quip’ — 1:15 p.m.

By Alyssa Vega, Globe Staff

Usha Vance, the wife of Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance, responded to the backlash surrounding her husband’s remarks in 2021 in which he referred to Democrats as “childless cat ladies” running the country.

In a prerecorded interview with “Fox and Friends,” Usha Vance defended her husband’s comment as a “quip,” saying that it was meant to highlight the inadequacy of US policies in supporting families.

“The reality is, JD made a quote — I mean, he made a quip, and he made a quip in service of making a point that he wanted to make that was substantive,” Usha Vance told host Ainsley Earhardt in her first solo interview since her husband joined Trump’s ticket.

“I just wish sometimes that people would talk about those things and that we would spend a lot less time just sort of going through this three-word phrase or that three-word phrase, because what he was really saying is that it can be really hard to be a parent in this country, and sometimes our policies are designed in a way that make it even harder,” she added.

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Rally dates are set. Venues are chosen. The only thing missing for Harris’s blitz is her VP choice — 12:20 p.m.

By the Associated Press

The dates are set. The venues are chosen. The only thing missing from this week’s campaign blitz with Harris and her 2024 running mate is the name of the running mate.

After a weekend spent interviewing finalists, Harris must decide on her wingman before the two set off Tuesday on a tour across key battleground states where they will introduce the new Democratic ticket to voters and highlight the stakes of the election.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in court to fight lawsuit saying he falsely claimed to live in NY — 12:12 p.m.

By the Associated Press

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. arrived at a New York court to fight a lawsuit alleging he falsely claimed to live in New York as he sought to get on the ballot in the state.

Kennedy appeared and sat at his attorneys’ table during legal arguments Monday morning, ahead of a civil trial expected to start later in the day in the state capital of Albany. Under state election law, a judge is set to decide the case without a jury.

The lawsuit alleges Kennedy’s nominating petition falsely said his residence was in New York’s northern suburbs while he actually has lived in Los Angeles since 2014, when he married “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actor Cheryl Hines.

The suit seeks to invalidate his petition. The case was brought by Clear Choice PAC, a super PAC led by supporters of Democratic President Joe Biden.

Governor Josh Shapiro on status of Harris running mate selection: ‘I got nothing for you, man’ — 11:35 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro didn’t say anything about the status of the vice presidential candidate selection Monday morning as he arrived at the state Capitol in Harrisburg.

“I got nothing for you, man,” the first-term Democrat said and told an Associated Press reporter “have a great day” as he headed into the governor’s offices, flanked by an aide and several state troopers.

The officers and press secretary Manuel Bonder were waiting for Shapiro when he arrived just after 11 a.m. in a black SUV.

Trump blames Harris and Biden for drop in markets — 10:58 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump is blaming Harris and Biden for the tumbling of markets in Wall Street and around the world.

Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, made a series of posts on his network Truth Social, attacking his opponent Harris.

“Kamala is even worse than Crooked Joe. Markets will NEVER accept the Radical Left Lunatic that DESTROYED San Francisco and California, as a whole,” he wrote, and is labeling the plunging market the “Kamala Crash.”

In another post, Trump called it a “preview of the world markets without Donald J. Trump in the White House.”

The S&P 500 was down 3.1% in early trading with rising fears about a slowing U.S. economy. Japan’s Nikkei 225 helped start Monday by plunging 12.4% for its worst day since the Black Monday crash of 1987.

JD Vance: Harris’s running mate pick doesn’t matter to him — 9:44 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, told Fox News on Sunday that Harris’s pick doesn’t matter to him.

“Whoever she chooses, the problem is going to be Kamala Harris’s record and Kamala Harris’s policies,” he said, adding “it’s not going to be good for the country.”

Harris will begin a tour of 7 battleground states — 9:05 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris and her running mate — whoever that is — will launch into an aggressive, seven-state battleground tour that begins in Philadelphia on Tuesday and winds through Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada.

Her early rallies have attracted enthusiastic thousands. Campaign officials say each stop will be loaded with local election officials, religious leaders, union members and more in an effort to show the diversity of her coalition.

Campaign officials are aware that momentum can be fleeting and are working to capitalize on the energy now, while managing expectations by continuing to emphasize that the race with Republican nominee Donald Trump is tight.

Vice president’s campaign launches ‘Republicans for Harris’ — 10:35 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Over the weekend, Harris’s campaign launched “Republicans for Harris” as she looks to win over Republican voters put off by Trump’s candidacy.

The program will be a “campaign within a campaign,” according to Harris’ team, using well-known Republicans to activate their networks, with a particular emphasis on primary voters who backed former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley.

Hospitality workers’ union endorses Harris — 7:26 a.m.

By the Associated Press

The hospitality workers’ union UNITE HERE endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president, a rejoinder to Republican Donald Trump’s effort to woo restaurant and hotel workers by promising to make their tips tax-free.

The endorsem*nt includes a commitment by the union to have its members knock on more than 3.3 million doors for Harris in swing states.

Harris’s seven-state battleground tour begins tomorrow — 6:31 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Harris and her running mate are set to launch into an aggressive, seven-state battleground tour that begins tomorrow in Philadelphia and winds through Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada.

Russell Vought, a Project 2025 architect, is ready to shock Washington if Trump wins second term — 4:38 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Russell Vought sounds like a general marshaling troops for combat when he talks about taming a “woke and weaponized” federal government.

He recently described political opposition as “enemy fire that’s coming over the target,” while urging allies to be “fearless at the point of attack” and calling his policy proposals “battle plans.”

If Trump wins a second term in November, Vought may get the opportunity to go on the offensive.

A chief architect of Project 2025 — the controversial conservative blueprint to remake the federal government — Vought is likely to be appointed to a high-ranking post in a second Trump administration. And he’s been drafting a so-far secret “180-Day Transition Playbook” to speed the plan’s implementation to avoid a repeat of the chaotic start that dogged Trump’s first term.

Focus on economy and answer the Harris ‘Freedom’ message: What GOP strategists think Trump should do — 2:43 a.m.

By the Associated Press

One Republican strategist who has run campaigns against Trump says he recognizes what the former president is doing against Harris, even as Trump swings back and forth between attacking her record and questioning her racial identity.

It’s what he’s done against other opponents.

“He figures out what their perceived weakness is and drills down on it,” said Terry Sullivan, who was a senior adviser to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2016 Republican presidential campaign. “He’s spending a few weeks probing, and I think he needs to take that time.”

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Harris once wanted to ban fracking. Trump wants voters in energy-rich Pennsylvania to remember. — 1:15 a.m.

By the Associated Press

Facing the need to win battleground Pennsylvania, Harris is swearing off any prior assertion that she opposed fracking, but that hasn’t stopped Republican Donald Trump from wielding her now-abandoned position to win over voters in a state where the natural gas industry means jobs.

Last week, in his first appearance in Pennsylvania since Harris became the Democrats’ presumptive nominee, Trump repeatedly warned that Harris would ban fracking — a position she held as a presidential primary candidate in 2019 — and devastate the economy in the nation’s No. 2 natural gas state.

“She’s against fracking, she’s against oil drilling, she wants everybody to have one electric car and share it with the neighbors,” Trump told rallygoers at a Harrisburg rally on Wednesday, which was also his first appearance in the state since he was wounded in a July 13 assassination attempt in Butler County. “Harris has stated repeatedly that she supports, quote, banning fracking. I’ll ban fracking, I’ll ban it on my first day.”

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Monday, Aug. 5

Harris faces party divisions as she chooses a running mate — 12:04 a.m.

By The New York Times

The competitive, divisive primary that many Democrats long wanted to avoid has arrived anyway — playing out largely behind closed doors in a fight over the bottom of the ticket.

The final stage of the campaign to be Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate reached something of an ugly phase in recent days as donors, interest groups and political rivals from the party’s moderate and progressive wings lobbied for their preferred candidates and passed around memos debating the contenders’ political weaknesses with key demographics.

They turned most sharply on one of the favorites to join the ticket, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who has drawn opposition from progressives and even a senator in his home state.

The fissures among Democrats emerged as three leading contenders — Shapiro, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz — met with Harris at her residence in Washington on Sunday, before a decision that her campaign said would be announced by Tuesday.

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