How the economy will sway voters in battleground Pennsylvania
(LEWISBURG, Pa.) — If elections are about “the economy, stupid,” Ben McDuffee has not had the kind of confidence-boosting year that would make him feel good about keeping Democrats at the top of the ticket for four more years. And he is a Democrat.
The Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, resident lost his job late last year. He worked in financing for the auto industry and was unemployed for three months. During that time, he applied to more than 200 jobs. In March, he accepted a position at a local credit union — and a $30,000 pay cut.
That income hit, combined with higher prices at the grocery store and a recent increase in their monthly rent, meant tightening the budget. He and his wife put plans on hold to buy a home for themselves and their 11-year-old son, as interest rates rose, too.
“You know, ultimately, the question that voters ask when they go to the polls every four years is, am I in a better spot than I was four years ago? And when we’re swiping our card for groceries every week, we are absolutely not in a better spot than we were four years ago,” McDuffee said in an interview with ABC News at his home.
“So, we have to balance that with — what do we think will happen with the country if we pick the other guy?”
From what he sees everyday in his rural Pennsylvania town — a sliver of one of the most critical swing states in the country — dislike of “the other guy,” former President Donald Trump, might not be enough for Vice President Kamala Harris to overcome what he sees as a major liability: the economy.
It’s the reality of this election, and it rings especially true in his battleground state: despite a strong recovery from the global pandemic — including record-low unemployment, increased wage growth and consistently sturdy consumer spending — the economy is still a top concern for voters.
According to an ABC News-Washington Post/Ipsos poll, more than 85% of adults rank the economy and inflation as highly important for their vote for president, by far the two highest-ranking issues. And voters trusted Trump over Harris on both issues by 9 points.
“There’s a disconnect between these macroeconomic numbers that are coming out and then what we’re hearing people are reporting about how they feel about the economy,” Heidi Shierholz, the president of the Economic Policy Institute and a former chief economist for the Department of Labor during the Obama administration.
A major reason it’s such a steep political challenge, she says, is that high prices are more obvious to people on a daily basis than national statistics or even their own pay raise.
“People’s living standards are actually growing despite the higher price level. So what’s going on now is actually what we want to see,” Shierholz said. “But it still is frustrating when you go to the grocery store or wherever and you see these high prices. You don’t always think in the back of your head, ‘Well, I also got that big wage increase, I can cover this and still be okay’.”
Since the peak of the pandemic recession, the U.S. has seen an increase in overall consumer prices by 20%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while the inflation-adjusted wages have also risen, on average, by about 25%.
That leaves some people feeling worse off than they actually are — and for people like McDuffee, who have seen their income fall or stay flat, the squeeze of higher prices is particularly sharp.
“I don’t doubt the numbers. But it all comes down to what you can do with the money that you have for your family. And you don’t feel all of all these great numbers,” McDuffee said.
It’s a perception Harris knows she will need to reverse to win over voters in critical battleground states like Pennsylvania, which could be key to winning her the presidency.
“Today, by virtually every measure, our economy is the strongest in the world,” Harris said in a recent campaign rally focused on the economy in North Carolina. But she was also careful to try not to alienate voters who don’t feel those impacts.
“We know that many Americans don’t yet feel that progress in their daily lives. Costs are still too high. And on a deeper level, for too many people, no matter how much they work, it feels so hard to just be able to get ahead,” Harris added.
To address this concern, Harris and President Joe Biden have pushed a “lowering costs” campaign, a handful of policies aimed at bringing down daily prices for people.
Efforts like negotiating down the price of drugs covered by Medicare, so seniors pay less for their prescriptions, and passing regulations that require companies to disclose “junk fees” on products like hotel rooms or concert tickets. For nearly 4.8 million people, the administration has canceled student loans.
For McDuffee, these policies aren’t cutting through.
He will reluctantly vote for Harris, he says, but he knows that many voters will prioritize their bank accounts in November.
“The only thing that I think a lot of consumers feel is when they swipe their card at the gas pump, at the grocery store, you know, buying back-to-school clothes, all of those items are more expensive than they were four years ago,” McDuffee said. “And I think that’s what resonates.”
Three hours southeast, though, Philadelphia City Councilmember Katherine Gilmore Richardson says she’s an example of why the Biden administration’s piecemeal policies are working — and have exponentially changed her family’s economic trajectory.
“No hesitation at all. I’m better off than I was four years ago. My family is better off because of the work of the Biden-Harris administration. And my children will be better off because of the Biden-Harris administration, if nothing more,” she said in an interview at her home in West Philadelphia.
Richardson, who has worked for the city for over 20 years, had her student debt canceled as part of major reforms to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, or PSLF, which allows peoples’ remaining debts to be forgiven after they’ve worked in public service and made loan payments for 10 years.
She has since helped her husband and her sister, who both work in non-profits and social work, respectively, to have their debts canceled, as well.
Through her family’s savings on student debt payments, Richardson, a mother of three, enrolled her two youngest children in one-on-one reading camp this summer.
Yet Richardson knows that receiving debt relief is a unique reason to feel good about the economy. Of the 43 million Americans with student loan debt, roughly one in 10 have so far had loans canceled by the Biden-Harris administration.
“I do hear from my constituents who have a number of concerns regarding the economy and their ability to be able to afford good quality housing to, you know, for food costs and to be able to take care of their families,” Richardson acknowledged.
Still, a delegate to the Democratic National Convention and a big fan of both Biden and Harris, Richardson says she believes her story reflects ongoing efforts to reduce financial burdens and a reason to re-elect the Democrats.
“I think we have to do a better job of telling that story and talking about the work that they’re seeking to do,” she said.
(WASHINGTON) — Vice President Kamala Harris is back in Washington and is preparing to roll out her economic plan on the road in North Carolina on Friday, which will mark her first major policy rollout since becoming the Democratic nominee. As Donald Trump looks for a campaign reset, he spoke with Elon Musk live on Tuesday and will deliver remarks on the economy in North Carolina on Wednesday.
Here’s how the news is developing:
Walz says he’s ‘damn proud’ of military record, thanks Vance for his service
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, in his first solo campaign appearance, defended his military record and thanked his vice presidential opponent, Sen. JD Vance, for his service.
“I am damn proud of my service to this country,” Walz said to applause at the AFSCME convention in California. “And I firmly believe you should never denigrate another person’s service record. Anyone brave enough to put on that uniform for our great country, including my opponent, I just have a few simple words: thank you for your service and sacrifice.”
Vance has repeatedly criticized how Walz has talked about his military record, which included 24 years in the Army National Guard before he retired to run for Congress in 2005. Vance served as a combat correspondent for four years in the U.S. Marine Corps.
Read more about Vance’s comments and Walz’s background here.
Biden says he would attend Trump’s inauguration if he were elected
President Joe Biden on Tuesday, as he was departing the White House, said he would go to Trump’s inauguration in January if he were to win this year’s election.
“I have good manners, not like him,” Biden told reporters after being asked if he’d attend. Trump did not attend Biden’s inauguration in 2021.
Biden also defended his calling Trump “a genuine danger to American security,” a comment he made during his CBS News interview over the weekend. Asked whether that contradicted his calls to cool heated political rhetoric, Biden shot back: “That’s just a statement. That’s a factual statement.”
-Fritz Farrow
Judge’s ruling means independent Cornel West can appear on North Carolina ballot
Independent presidential candidate Cornel West will be allowed on the general election ballot in North Carolina following a judge’s ruling that reversed a decision that would have kept him off the ballot in the battleground state.
In a ruling on Monday, U.S. District Judge Terrence Boyle ordered the North Carolina State Board of Elections to certify Justice for All North Carolina as a political party in the state. That party, started by West’s campaign, is nominating him as its candidate in North Carolina and some other states. The board had previously voted to deny certifying the party over concerns about how signatures were gathered for its petition to become a certified party.
Justice for All North Carolina called the decision a “monumental day for our party” but West’s campaign still faces headwinds. The Democratic National Committee filed a complaint with the FEC alleging that West’s campaign received “illegal In-Kind Contributions” from firms it used to collect signatures for ballot access petitions in Arizona and North Carolina — allegations West has pushed back on.
“We’ve always said we’re going to ensure the third party candidates are playing by the rules, and it’s clear his campaign isn’t playing by the rules,” DNC spokesperson Matt Corridoni told ABC News after the complaint was filed.
-Oren Oppenheim
Walz to make his 1st solo campaign appearance
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Tuesday will embark on his first solo Harris-Walz campaign event as Harris’ running mate with a stop in Los Angeles for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) international convention.
Walz is set to speak at 3:35 p.m. ET.
Walz emerged as a popular candidate among labor unions during Harris’ search for a vice president pick, sources said. AFSCME represents 1.4 million public service members, and the union’s president, Lee Saunders, previously released a statement endorsing Harris for president.
Harris to roll out economic plan on Friday
Harris will outline her economic policy in a speech in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Friday, her campaign announced, making it her first major policy rollout since jumping into the race.
Harris’ speech will detail her plan to “lower costs for middle-class families and take on corporate price-gouging,” a campaign official said.
The vice president has heavily focused her stump speech on the economy while on the campaign trail in recent weeks, saying over the weekend she would look to eliminate taxes on tips earned by service workers — a proposal Trump announced earlier this summer.
Harris’ college sorority creates PAC
The historically Black Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc., of which Vice President Kamala Harris counts herself a member, started its own political PAC last week, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission posted Monday.
The committee is named Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority PAC, Inc., or AKA 1908 PAC, the filing shows.
Harris has been an AKA since her days as a student at the historically Black Howard University in Washington, D.C. Harris on Monday visited the campus, her office confirmed to ABC News, but it’s not clear why she was there.
In July, before President Joe Biden dropped out of the race, Harris spoke at the AKA’s annual Boulé in Dallas, Texas. Since then, as a candidate, she’s also addressed similar national gatherings of two other historically Black sororities, Zeta Phi Beta and Sigma Gamma Rho.
Trump says he will return to Butler, Pennsylvania after assassination attempt
After discussing the assassination attempt made against him in Pennsylvania in July, former President Donald Trump said he’s planning a trip back to Butler in October.
“We’re going back to Butler; we’re gonna go back in October,” Trump said, adding, “Butler is a big, great area.”
Addressing what he’ll say when he returns, Trump told Musk, “I think I’ll probably start by saying I was so horribly interrupted.”
Trump discusses assassination attempt with Musk, says he turned head at ‘perfect angle’
During his conversation with Musk, former President Donald Trump addressed the assassination attempt made against him during a campaign rally in July.
“It was amazing that I happened to be turned just at that perfect angle,” Trump said of the bullet, which grazed his right ear while his head was turned.
During the discussion, Trump mentioned the man who was killed in the shooting, saying, it was a “very sad situation.”
“We lost somebody that was firefighter, a great Trumper,” Trump said of Corey Comperatore, adding, “He was a just a fantastic family [man] and a fantastic man.”
Trump and Musk’s conversation on X appears to be delayed
The conversation between former President Donald Trump and Elon Musk appears to be delayed, with many X users reporting they cannot access the Spaces conversation.
“This Space is not available,” appeared for some users on X.
The conversation was scheduled to begin at 8:00 p.m. ET.
Judge orders RFK Jr. off New York ballot
A New York judge ruled Monday that the thousands of signatures gathered by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s campaign in the state were “invalidated” after a Democrat-aligned group argued he misled voters by listing as his home an address he rarely visits.
The judge, Christina Ryba, ordered the New York Board of Elections to not include Kennedy’s name on the ballot this fall.
A lawyer representing Kennedy told reporters last week they would appeal any ruling that went against them.
The ruling could prompt Democrats to bring similar lawsuits against Kennedy in other states where he gathered signatures from registered voters to appear on the ballot.
The FBI is investigating alleged attempts by Iran to target the then-Biden-Harris campaign, sources familiar with the matter confirmed to ABC News.
The alleged targeting via spear-fishing emails occurred before Biden announced he would exit the 2024 presidential race, the sources said.
While the campaign was targeted, the alleged hack was not successful, sources added.
The FBI is investigating a purported hack of the Trump campaign, according to a brief statement from the agency earlier Monday.
The FBI did not attribute the hack to anyone in its statement.
A source familiar with the matter told ABC News that Trump adviser Roger Stone has also been informed that his email accounts have been compromised, and that he’s cooperating with any investigation into the matter.
The Washington Post first reported the news.
-ABC News’ Luke Barr, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim, Will Steakin and Katherine Faulders
Biden, Obama, Clintons tentatively slated to speak at DNC: Sources
President Joe Biden, former President Barack Obama, and Bill and Hillary Clinton are all tentatively slated to speak at the Democratic National Convention next week, sources familiar said.
The working speaking schedule, which can always change, is as follows, according to the sources:
Monday: President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Tuesday: Former President Barack Obama Wednesday: Vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, former President Bill Clinton Thursday: Vice President Kamala Harris
-ABC News’ MaryAlice Parks and Fritz Farrow
Trump posts on X ahead of Musk interview
Trump posted on X for the first time in nearly a year ahead of his conversation with Elon Musk scheduled for Monday night.
The video posted is a previously released campaign ad referencing his multiple indictments and telling supporters, “They are not coming after me, they are coming after you.”
The last time Trump posted on X was Aug. 24, 2023. It was a picture of his mugshot from Fulton County, when he turned himself in to authorities following his election interference indictment in Georgia.
-ABC News’ Lalee Ibssa, Kelsey Walsh, Soorin Kim
Trump to be interviewed by Elon Musk tonight
Trump, in a post to his conservative social media site Truth Social, announced he will be interviewed live by Musk on X at 8 p.m. ET.
It will mark a major return for Trump to X, formerly known as Twitter, since he was banned from the site following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump was reinstated in late 2022 but declined to become active on the site again, despite boasting 88 million followers.
Musk endorsed Trump following the July 13 assassination attempt against the former president. Recently, Musk has amplified misinformation about voting and elections on his X feed.
Walz discusses ‘whirlwind’ 1st week on the campaign trail
In a video posted on his X account, the Minnesota governor discussed what he called “not a normal week” since being named as Harris’ running mate.
Walz confirmed some details reported previously by ABC News and others, including that he informed Harris’ vetting team that he had not used a teleprompter before.
“Not a normal week, which is a good thing. Started by missing a call from the Vice President, pretty important one. And then got that call and honored to join the ticket with Kamala Harris to take us in a great direction,” Walz said.
“After that, it has been a whirlwind. We got on a plane and we flew to Philly, and they told me that in an hour I’d be giving a speech and there would be a teleprompter, something I had never used in my life, so certainly terrified, but was lifted up by the folks in Philly.”
-ABC News’ Will McDuffie
Harris wraps battleground state blitz, Vance makes rounds on Sunday shows
Over the weekend, Harris closed out a cross-country tour that included stops in battleground states Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia and Arizona, as well as North Carolina and Nevada.
New polling released Saturday showed Harris taking the lead over Trump in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin among likely voters. The New York Times/Siena College polls showed Harris at 50% among likely voters in each state, while Trump polled at 46%.
Vance, too, campaigned in key 2024 states and made the rounds on the Sunday shows. During his cable news appearances, Vance reiterated campaign talking points on immigration and repeatedly hit Harris for not sitting down for extensive media interviews and laying out her agenda. Harris has done brief gaggles with reporters and said she’d unveil an economic policy platform this week.
Vance responds to mass deportation plan: ‘Let’s start with one million’
Sen. JD Vance told ABC News he blamed Vice President Kamala Harris and the Biden administration’s policies, such as ending “Remain in Mexico,” for the ongoing migrant crisis.
When asked how he and Trump would accomplish their stated goal of mass deporting as many as 20 million immigrants — a proposal experts previously told ABC News would be a “nightmare” — Vance said they would take a “sequential approach.”
“I mean do you go knock on doors and ask people for their papers? What do you do,” Karl asked.
“You start with what’s achievable,” Vance said. “I think that if you deport a lot of violent criminals and frankly if you make it harder to hire illegal labor, which undercuts the wages of American workers, I think you go a lot of the way to solving the illegal immigration problem.”
“I think it’s interesting that people focus on, well, how do you deport 18 million people? Let’s start with one million. That’s where Kamala Harris has failed. And then we can go from there,” Vance said.
Harris cautions donors to ‘not take anything for granted’
Vice President Kamala Harris attended a fundraiser in San Francisco Sunday where she maintained her campaign “will win this election,” but cautioned donors to “not take anything for granted.”
“I know there’s a lot of enthusiasm out there,” Harris said, adding, “And you know, I’ve never been one to really believe in the polls — whether they’re up or they’re down.”
“What we know is the stakes are so high and we can take nothing for granted in this critical moment,” she continued. “So we will fuel our campaign as we have, with enthusiasm and optimism, but also with a deep commitment to the hard work it’s going to take, and to campaign.”
Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi introduced Harris at the event, touting the accomplishments of the Biden-Harris administration and the background of vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, several times calling the Harris-Walz ticket “the freedom ticket.”
“[Harris] makes us all so proud. She brings us so much joy. She gives us so much hope,” Pelosi said, calling the vice president “politically very astute.”
(FLINT, Mich.) — Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Tuesday took aim at Vice President Kamala Harris’ family life, saying the presidential candidate “doesn’t have anything keeping her humble.”
The governor said during a rally for former President Donald Trump that her children are a “permanent reminder of what’s important” and they “keep me humble.”
“You can walk into a room like this where people cheer when you step onto the stage and you might think for a second that you’re kind of special,” Huckabee Sanders told a crowd in Flint, Michigan. “Then you go home, and your kids remind you very quickly you’re actually not that big of a deal.”
She added, “So my kids keep me humble. Unfortunately, Kamala Harris doesn’t have anything keeping her humble.”
Whether politicians have biological children has become a partisan issue in recent weeks, following comments made by Sen. JD Vance, who is running alongside Trump. In a resurfaced interview from 2021, Vance argued that voters without children should be subject to a higher tax rate.
Vance also in 2021 took aim at Harris, saying she was among a group of “childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made.” Speaking to Fox News, Vance accused that group of wanting “to make the rest of the country miserable too.”
When Taylor Swift endorsed Harris earlier this month, the pop star signed her endorsement with “Taylor Swift, Childless Cat Lady.”
Harris is the stepmother of two adult children, Cole and Ella Emhoff, from the first marriage of her husband, second gentleman Doug Emhoff.
“Cole and Ella keep us inspired to make the world a better place,” Kerstin Emhoff, their mother, said on social media in response to Huckabee Sanders.
She added, “Kamala Harris has spent her entire career working for the people, ALL families. That keeps you pretty humble.”
(NEW YORK) — When Kamala Harris and Donald Trump met on the ABC News debate stage this week, the vice president reiterated her changed energy position, saying she would not institute a “fracking ban” if elected.
The debate was held at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. Pennsylvania is a key swing state in the race with the second-highest oil and gas economy in the country.
“Let’s talk about fracking because we’re here in Pennsylvania,” Harris said Tuesday evening.
Harris vowed she would not enact a national ban on fracking despite having voiced support for anti-drilling measures at a climate crisis town hall in 2019, during her first campaign for the White House.
When she joined President Joe Biden’s ticket, however, she moved away from that stance and helped pass the administration’s landmark 2022 infrastructure bill — which invests in both domestic oil production and green energy solutions.
“I will not ban fracking. I have not banned fracking as vice president of the United States. And, in fact, I was the tie-breaking vote on the Inflation Reduction Act, which opened new leases for fracking,” Harris said Tuesday.
Energy experts told ABC News after the debate that Harris and Trump’s conversation surrounding fracking was misleading on both sides of the aisle, saying the president has less control over fracking than may be publicly perceived.
“I heard some confusion on both sides, really, in the debate last night, when we talk about fracking,” Tim Tarpley, president of the Energy Workforce and Technology Council, told ABC News.
“Both candidates were throwing around this so-called fracking ban to each other, but there wasn’t a lot of clarity about what they were actually talking about and how that would actually work in practice,” Tarpley added.
The Harris and Trump campaigns did not immediately respond to ABC News’ requests for comment.
What is fracking?
Hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking, is an extraction technique used to recover oil and gas from shale rock, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Producers drill into the earth and direct a high-pressure mixture of water, sand and chemicals at shale rock layers to release the gas inside.
Fracking accounts for the bulk of America’s domestic oil and gas production with 95% of new wells being hydraulically fractured, creating two-thirds of the total U.S. gas market and about half of U.S. crude oil production, according to the U.S. Energy Department.
Can it be banned?
On the debate stage, Trump went after Harris’ energy position, saying, “She will never allow fracking in Pennsylvania. If she won the election, fracking in Pennsylvania will end on Day 1.”
The notion that a president could ban all fracking in America is misleading, with Congress ultimately having the final say on such actions.
Additionally, fracking wells in the U.S. are predominantly on private land, with federal land leases only accounting for 24% of the total number of wells. The president’s jurisdiction over banning fracking would only account for federal land, according to Tarpley and the American Petroleum Institute.
“When we get into this back-and-forth on the leases, it’s very important to know it is only 24% of total production, most of productions on private land. So I think, I think those facts are important to point out, as we have that discussion,” Tarpley said.
While Trump did not lay out his energy plan during the debate Tuesday, the former president has been vocal about approving increased fracking leases on federal land and reviving plans for the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline, which Biden canceled after taking office.
Why is this important in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania sits atop the Marcellus Shale, a rock formation that covers about two-thirds of the state. The massive oil-producing shale also extends into parts of New York, Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky, and Virginia.
As of April 2024, the Marcellus Shale contained about 120 million barrels of oil, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
David Callahan, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition (MSC), told ABC News “The natural gas industry is very important to Pennsylvania.”
Housing 11,000 fracking wells in the state, Pennsylvania accounted for 18% of the total U.S. natural gas production and 32% of U.S. shale gas production, according to Callahan and MSC data shared with ABC News from 2022.
That same year, the industry contributed more than $41 billion in economic activity, which said boosted the state’s gross domestic product (GDP) by nearly $25 billion, according to according to MSC.
The oil and gas industry also equates for a large portion of the state’s workforce. In 2022, the industry supported 123,000 jobs, with an average wage of $97,000, according to MSC.
Will fracking ever make the U.S. energy independent?
United States continues to produce and export the most crude oil out of any country, at any time, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Under the Biden-Harris administration, crude oil production averaged 12.9 million barrels per day in 2023, breaking the previous U.S. and global record of 12.3 million, set in 2019 under Trump’s leadership, according to the agency.
Harris touted this boom during the debate while promoting more investments in diverse sources of energy to “reduce our reliance on foreign oil.”
“We have had the largest increase in domestic oil production in history because of an approach that recognizes that we cannot over-rely on foreign oil,” Harris said.
Experts say, however, energy independence is not as cut and dry as one might think, with the global oil market being deeply embedded into production needs and refining capabilities.
“Even in a scenario where we were producing enough oil and gas here in the United States to be completely self-sufficient, we wouldn’t necessarily have the refining capacity,” Tarpley said.
Many American refineries were largely built before the nation’s fracking boom over the last 20 years, according to Tarpley, which means the infrastructure is designed to process heavier crude oil, predominately from Russia and the Middle East.
Energy independence won’t be found at the bottom of an American fracking well, he says, because “those refining assets cannot easily be retooled to take U.S. crude.”
Alternative energy sources such as wind, solar and nuclear power are not limited to the same global constraints but are not yet at the infrastructure capacity to meet energy needs.
In 2023, the United States generated about 4,178 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity from utility-scale generators, according to the U.S. Energy Information Association.
Of that, approximately 19% came from nuclear energy, 21% from renewable energy sources such as wind and solar, and 60% from oil and gas.