2024 election updates: Harris, Trump in virtual dead heat in battleground states
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) — The race for the White House is heading into the final stretch with most polls showing Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump neck-and-neck in key states with just about two weeks to go.
Harris, Cheney to make the case to disaffected Republican voters
Harris is stumping with former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney on Monday in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan. The two will hold a moderated conversation in each of the “blue wall” states.
Cheney endorsed Harris in early September, warning Trump posed a threat to democracy after what happened on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Donald Trump was willing to sacrifice our capitol to allow law enforcement officers to be beaten and brutalized in his name and to violate the law and the Constitution in order to seize power for himself,” Cheney said at her first joint appearance with Harris earlier this month.
“I don’t care if you are a Democrat or a Republican or an independent, that is depravity, and we must never become numb to it,” she continued. “Any person who would do these things can never be trusted with power again. We must defeat Donald Trump on Nov. 5.”
Trump to survey hurricane damage before rally in North Carolina
At noon, Trump will survey devastation caused by Hurricane Helene in Asheville, North Carolina.
He’ll later hold a 3 p.m. rally in Greenville before a 6:30 p.m. meeting with faith leaders in Concord.
Trump has criticized the Biden-Harris response to the storm, and spread misinformation about the federal government’s recovery efforts and assistance. Such misinformation, Biden and other officials have said, is harming those who need assistance and resulting in threats against FEMA workers.
Polls show close race between Harris, Trump
The latest polling averages from 538 show the two candidates running even in key swing states Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Trump, meanwhile, has a slight lead over Harris in Georgia and Arizona.
Overall, 538’s national polling average shows Harris ahead by just 1.8%.
(WASHINGTON) — With the economy the top issue for many voters in the home stretch of the election, Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to announce record lending from the federal government to small business owners on Thursday, according to a White House fact sheet shared exclusively with ABC News.
The Small Business Administration (SBA) provided a record $56 billion in loans to small businesses from October 2023 through September 2024, the fact sheet said, with more than 100,000 small businesses receiving the loans — the highest number in 16 years — while lending to Black-owned businesses has tripled in the past four years.
The SBA lends money to small businesses as a way for them to get off the ground, expand or rebuild — especially when other financing options might not be available — and companies must meet eligibility requirements, such as being based in the United States or only having a certain number of employees, to qualify for the loans.
“Small businesses are the backbone of our economy. And we know that small business owners need access to capital to hire more employees, grow their businesses, and advance innovation,” Harris said in a statement to ABC News. “Today I am proud to announce that the U.S. Small Business Administration has made record lending to over 100,000 small businesses in the last year, the most by the agency in over 15 years. When small businesses thrive, our local economies thrive.”
The agency has been under pressure after the White House said last week that its disaster loan program, which provides low-interest lending to disaster survivors, ran out of funds in the wake of Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
The announcement from Harris comes as she seeks to dispel voters’ doubts over the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of the economy and inflation. Polls consistently show former President Donald Trump outranks Harris in handling the economy.
The latest report from the National Federation of Independent Business, which represents small businesses nationwide, found uncertainty among its members is at an all-time high ahead of the election.
Last month, Vice President Harris unveiled a proposal to increase the tax deduction for new small businesses ten-fold, from $5000 to $50,000.
(PHILADELPHIA) — Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump will meet for the first time on Tuesday for the ABC News presidential debate.
It is the only debate the two have scheduled and comes at a critical point as polls show a neck-and-neck race with just eight weeks until Election Day.
The two will face off on key issues starting at 9 p.m. ET. The debate will air on ABC and stream on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu.
Here’s how the news is developing:
Trump campaign spokesperson says he’s not engaged in traditional debate prep
Trump campaign spokesperson Danielle Alvarez said Tuesday morning on ABC News Live that Trump “does not do traditional debate prep” and reiterated that he has been campaigning and engaging in policy discussions instead.
“I would say that the president does not do traditional debate prep. He’s on the campaign trail constantly. We see him in key battleground states every week, joined by tens of thousands of patriots,” she said. “We know that he does tough interviews, both nationally, locally.”
“That’s truly how he prepares for these debates, having those conversations every day. He’s ready to step back into the White House,” she continued. “We also know that he prefers to have those policy discussions, and he’s been doing that with elected members in Congress like Matt Gaetz, with former Congress member Tulsi Gabbard and others — very similar to what he did to prepare for that first debate against Joe Biden. He has prepared in a similar way again, just by getting out there and talking every day to voters and talking to media.”
-ABC News’ Soorin Kim, Lalee Ibssa and Kelsey Walsh
Harris not ‘underestimating’ Trump ahead of debate: Source
Just hours away from the debate, a campaign source is setting expectations that Harris is not “underestimating” Trump’s ability to debate, and that it would be a “mistake” to do so.
The Harris team expects Trump to be “good” at debating, stressing that Trump has done this more than anybody else, while it will be Harris’s first presidential debate.
The Harris campaign is “happy to get under [Trump’s] skin,” and they hope that bringing former Trump officials into the spin room later this evening will accomplish this.
On a campaign call last night, a source said Harris is ready for any version of Trump that shows up — whether it’s the presidential Trump, the more mellow Trump during the Biden debate or a more aggressive version.
-ABC News’ Selina Wang
8 hours until the Harris-Trump ABC debate, here is how to watch tonight
The consequential Harris-Trump face-off will air live tonight at 9 p.m. ET on ABC and stream on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu.
ABC News Live is available on Samsung TV+, The Roku Channel, Amazon Fire TV devices, YouTube, Tubi, the ABC app, and ABC.com.
ABC News Digital and 538 will live blog the latest from the debate stage with coverage, analysis and fact checks.
SiriusXM users can listen to the debate on Channel 370.
The prime-time pre-debate special, “Race for the White House,” will air at 8 p.m. ET and stream on ABC’s platforms.
President Joe Biden will be watching the debate from New York, where he’s going to be for 9/11 memorial events, according to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
“The president will definitely be watching,” she said in Monday’s briefing.
Jean-Pierre wouldn’t give details on any conversations about the debate between Harris and Biden or whether he’s given her any takeaways from his own last face-off with Trump, but she said the president was “very proud” of Harris.
“What I can say is, that he’ll be watching, he supports, obviously, the vice president, is very proud of her, and I just don’t have anything else to add,” she said.
– ABC News’ Cheyenne Haslett
5 things to watch in the high-stakes Harris-Trump faceoff
Harris and Trump square off Tuesday at what could be their only presidential debate, setting high stakes for an event expected to be viewed by millions of Americans and a key sliver of undecided voters. Here’s what to look out for.
Can Trump stay focused on policy? Staying on message on his four-year economic record is key, while veering into personal attacks would be counterproductive, allies told ABC News.
Harris has dual goals: make the case for herself as someone who would be a capable president and get under Trump’s skin. How will she introduce herself to undecided voters?
Read the rest of the five things to watch for in the debate here.
Walz fundraising email says ‘Trump is sure to talk about his twisted version of freedom’
Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ running mate, previewed the vice president’s upcoming debate with Trump in a fundraising email on Tuesday morning — contrasting their campaign’s message on the economy and freedom with Trump’s platforms.
“She’s going to show everyone watching what this movement is all about: supporting families like yours and mine and building a future where everyone has the opportunity not just to get by, but to get ahead,” the email reads. “Donald Trump is sure to talk about his twisted version of freedom,” Walz claimed in the email.
-ABC News’ Isabella Murray
Harris and Trump to have various surrogates in spin room
Harris and Trump will have a handful of surrogates representing them in the spin room following the debate.
Harris will have Govs. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Gavin Newsom of California, Roy Cooper of North Carolina and Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico representing her in the spin room post debate, a campaign official confirmed to ABC News.
In addition to attending a watch party hosted by the Trump campaign, GOP vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance will also participate in the spin room.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Gov. Doug Burgum, tech entreprenuer Vivek Ramaswamy, Sen. Marco Rubio, Rep. Bryon Donalds, and Sen. Rick Scott are also expected to appear on behalf of Trump.
-ABC News’ Fritz Farrow, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim, Will McDuffie, Kelsey Walsh, Lalee Ibssa, and Soo Rin Kim
Debate will show ‘strength and success’ of Trump vs. ‘devastation and weakness’ of Harris: Stefanik
House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik teed up her expectations for tonight’s presidential debate, telling reporters that Harris “cannot hide forever.”
“Tonight at the debate, the country will finally get to see the stark contrast between the strength and success of President Trump’s America-first policies and the devastation and weakness of Kamala Harris’s radical, failed, far-left agenda,” Stefanik, the fourth-ranked House Republican, claimed at a news conference in the Capitol Tuesday morning.
-ABC News’ John Parkinson
Harris campaign says it’s hosting 1,300 watch parties, Walz to deliver remarks in Arizona
Harris’ campaign said it’s hosting more than 1,300 debate watch parties across the country, and running mate Gov. Tim Walz will deliver remarks at one of them in Phoenix Tuesday night.
The watch parties will be in all 50 states, with more than 100 planned on college campuses, according to the campaign. The events will be used for volunteers to make calls to battleground-state voters and share debate content on digital platforms.
More than 300 of the planned watch parties will be group specific, including Republicans for Harris-Walz and Veterans for Harris-Walz events in Arizona, North Carolina and Georgia. There will also be Latino house parties in Arizona and labor-organized events in Pennsylvania, according to the campaign.
-ABC News’ Fritz Farrow, Gabriella Adbul-Hakim and Will McDuffie
Harris tweet: ‘America, see you tonight’
Looking ahead to Tuesday night’s debate, Vice President Kamala Harris tweeted “America, see you tonight.”
Before departing for Philadelphia on Monday, Harris told reporters that she’s feeling “good.” She also gave a thumbs up.
The vice president’s tweet also included a link to a list of debate watch parties the campaign is hosting across the country.
-ABC News’ Fritz Farrow
Harris releases new ad repurposing Obama’s dig at Trump
Vice President Kamala Harris repurposed former President Barack Obama’s suggestive dig at Trump over what Obama called his “weird obsession with crowd sizes” while speaking at the Democratic National Convention last month.
“Here’s a 78-year-old billionaire who has not stopped whining about his problems …” Obama said in the clip used in the ad, just before a clip of Trump at rally plays.
“Ooh, she had a big crowd! Ooh, that crowd,” Trump said in the snippet, mocking news reports about turnout for Harris.
“This weird obsession with crowd sizes… it just goes on, and on, and on,” Obama says as the ad returns to him, followed by shots of small Trump crowds and sounds of crickets chirping.
“America’s ready for a new chapter. We are ready for a President Kamala Harris,” Obama says.
The Harris campaign said the ad, titled “Crowd Size,” will air on Fox News the day of the debate because “Trump is known to watch” the network.
The 30-second ad is set to air nationally on cable news and in local West Palm Beach and Philadelphia markets.
– ABC News’ Fritz Farrow, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim, and Will McDuffie
Anthony Scaramucci among former Trump officials to serve as Harris surrogates in Philadelphia
Anthony Scaramucci and Olivia Troye, former Trump administration officials, will serve as Kamala Harris surrogates in Philadelphia today, the Harris campaign announced.
“Listen, don’t take it from us: Take it from the ones who know Donald Trump the best and who are telling the American people exactly how unfit Trump is to serve as president,” Harris spokesman Michael Tyler said.
Scaramucci served as Trump’s White House communications director. Troye served as the Homeland Security adviser to Vice President Mike Pence, as well as a top aide on the Trump White House coronavirus task force.
According to the campaign, they plan to discuss their support of Harris ahead of tonight’s debate.
They are among numerous former Trump staffers who continue to speak out.
– ABC News’ Will McDuffie, Fritz Farrow, and Gabriella Abdul-Hakim
Debate day arrives in Philadelphia
The stage is set for tonight’s high-stakes showdown in Philadelphia.
The lecterns are placed six feet apart at the National Constitution Center – where Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will meet in person for the first time.
The 9 p.m. ET matchup comes with just eight weeks to go until Election Day amid a tumultuous and unpredictable campaign.
The debate, moderated by David Muir and Linsey Davis, will air on ABC and stream on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu. Viewers can also stream the debate on the ABC app on a smartphone or tablet, on ABC.com and connected devices. A prime-time pre-debate special will start at 8 p.m. ET.
(ATLANTA) — Vice President Kamala Harris plans on Friday to give her first abortion speech in Atlanta, where she will address the deaths of two Georgia women who, according to a senior campaign official, highlight the “dangerous consequences” of what Harris calls “Trump Abortion Bans.”
Reproductive rights have been one of the driving issues of the Harris’ campaign. Her team launched a “reproductive freedom” bus tour in early September with their first stop in Palm Beach County, former President Donald Trump’s backyard.
According to that same senior official, Harris plans to warn Georgians to not believe what the campaign describes as Trump’s flip-flopping record regarding abortion — noting that, if given the chance, he would ban abortion nationwide.
Trump during this month’s debate noted that he had returned the regulation of abortion care to state governments, saying it should be up to the states to decide. He would not commit during the debate to vetoing a potential federal abortion ban if it came to his desk as president. Instead, he said that situation would not arise.
Harris on Friday plans to speak about two women who died in 2022. Amber Thurman and Candi Miller’s deaths were a direct result of Georgia’s six-week ban, according to reporting by ProPublica. The Georgia ban went into effect after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade.
Thurman died two weeks after the Georgia ban was passed in 2022, after waiting 20 hours in a suburban Atlanta hospital for an incomplete abortion, according to the report. Miller died after declining to seek medical care for complications from abortion medication, the report said.
Thurman’s family appeared on Oprah Winfrey’s “Unite for America” live-streamed event that featured Harris on Thursday. In one of the more emotional moments of the program, her mother, Shanette Williams, tearfully proclaimed that she would not let her daughter become a “statistic.”
“Initially, I did not want the public to know my pain,” Williams recounted through tears. “I wanted to go through in silence. But I realized that it was selfish. I want y’all to know that Amber was not a statistic. She was loved by a family, a strong family, and we would have done whatever to get my baby, our baby, the help that she needed.”
Georgia is a key battleground state that Biden narrowly won in 2020, beating former Trump by about 12,000 votes. Recognizing that she could not only rely on voters in the metro-Atlanta area to keep the state blue, Harris visited rural counties in southeastern Georgia during a two-day swing that culminated in a rally in Savannah.
Currently, Harris is neck-and-neck with Trump in the polls in the state, according to 538’s average. Trump leads by a one-point margin in Georgia, with 48% compared to Harris’ 47%.
The vice president is scheduled to head to Madison, Wisconsin, for a rally later on Friday evening.