Harris will not speak as tearful supporters leave watch party
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(WASHINGTON) — Vice President Kamala Harris will not be speaking as election night went into Wednesday morning, according to Harris Campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond who took the stage at a Harris watch party at Howard University.
Photos show partygoers thinning out and Harris supporters crying as results continued to come in.
The mood at Howard University had dampened over the last couple of hours. The night started out with music pumping and crowds dancing.
Later on in the evening, muted crowds watched as the results came in, with many glued to the screen.
The crowd cheered anytime races are called for Harris and booed whenever states were called for Trump.
Former President Donald Trump was reported to be riding over to the convention center with his family and his top campaign leadership team.
Despite Vice President Kamala Harris’ being viewed widely as the winner of last week’s presidential debate against former President Donald Trump, her performance did not cause a notable change in her favor, according to a ABC News/Ipsos poll released Sunday — which Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said does not surprise her.
“We know that this is going to be a close race,” she told “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz on Sunday. “Kamala Harris says that she’s an underdog, but what’s important is that she and Tim Walz have built a campaign for a close race.”
In Trump and Harris’ match up last week, voters had the opportunity to directly compare the candidates before they cast their ballots in what will be a tight election. Americans by 58-36% say Harris won the debate, according to the new polling. Last week, she sought to capitalize off her post-debate momentum, campaigning in Johnstown and Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania — two counties Trump won in 2016 and 2020.
“The enthusiasm has been really strong. And I think what’s very important also is that she and Tim are playing for every voter, they’re going to red counties,” Healey said. “They’re going to red districts, right? Because, as she said in her closing argument, ‘I’m going to be a president for all Americans.’”
During the debate, Harris falsely claimed that there isn’t a single member of the U.S. military “who is in active duty in a combat zone, in any war zone around the world — the first time this century.”
Raddatz asked Healey why Harris would make that unsubstantiated remark when there are 900 U.S. military personnel in Syria and 2,500 U.S. service members in Iraq that have been under regular threat for months, as well those patrolling in the Red Sea, where Houthi rebels in Yemen have targeted commercial shipping.
The Massachusetts governor deflected, saying, “I think what’s important here, Martha, is that Kamala Harris, in contrast to Donald Trump, demonstrated herself to be commander in chief.”
“You say she demonstrated her ability to be commander in chief, but did she not know about these people in Syria and Iraq?” Raddatz pressed. “Why would she say that?”
“That was a comment in a debate,” Healey answered. “I think the point that she was trying to make was a broader point. And of course, we have military in place all around this country. That’s important. We’re the United States of America.”
“She respects our military,” she continued. “She respects our service members. Donald Trump calls them suckers and losers, and it’s why Donald Trump’s former military generals support Kamala Harris.”
On the issue of abortion, Raddatz said Harris didn’t clarify during the debate whether she supports any restrictions on the procedure and asked if the vice president should let voters know where she stands and draw some sort of a line.
“She already did, Martha. What she said is, ‘let’s go back to Roe,’” Healey said before hitting Trump for not saying that he would veto a national abortion ban.
“In fact, he supports abortion bans, just like the Trump abortion ban that’s on the ballot in Florida, and it’s appalling,” she said. “It’s appalling what that means for women, for families, for their health. And you know, that is a clear, clear distinction in this race.”
Turning to the economy, Raddatz pointed to rising grocery and home prices under the Biden-Harris administration and how many many view Trump as handling the economy better. Trump leads on the issue by seven points over Harris in the new ABC News/Ispos poll.
Healey put the blame for the economy on the former president and his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“There had to be a huge infusion of money to save our small businesses and to help all of our states,” she said. “Inflation rose as a result. And what’s happened under the Biden Harris administration is they’ve actually worked to bring down inflation. There is still work to do.”
“Kamala Harris has said, ‘I’m going to lay the foundation to see further reductions in the interest rates’, which I think we’ll see soon, and prices are going to come down. But it is very unfair to start that in the middle of the movie when the Biden-Harris team came in, and we’re dealing with a lot,” Healey continued. “We have the strongest economy of any country in the world right now, and they are committed to making life more affordable for people on housing, drugs, groceries and the like. Donald Trump isn’t.”
(NEW YORK) — Israelis broadly pick former President Donald Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris as better for Israel’s security and in turn favor Trump for the U.S. presidency, albeit with sharp political divisions, a national survey by Langer Research Associates and PORI (Public Opinion Research Israel) finds.
Fifty-eight percent of Israelis in the survey, conducted in September, said Trump would be better for Israel’s security, vs. 20% for Harris. If they had a vote in the U.S. election, Israelis said they’d pick Trump over Harris by a similar 54%-24%, with the rest taking a pass.
To a large degree, these attitudes follow the fault lines in Israeli politics. Among people who would support parties in the ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if an election in Israel were today, 88% picked Trump as better for Israel’s security and 84% preferred him for the U.S. presidency — results that may reflect tensions between Netanyahu’s government and the Biden administration.
Supporters of Israeli opposition parties, by contrast, split closely, 39%-37%, Harris-Trump, in preference for the presidency. That said, even opposition party supporters picked Trump over Harris as better for Israel’s security, albeit by a comparatively close 41%-32%.
While much attention now is on the conflict with Hezbollah and Iran, another question finds majority Israeli rejection of the suggestion that Israel is doing too little to avoid civilian casualties in the war in Gaza. To the contrary, “considering the challenges of conducting battles in populated areas,” 54% said Israel is doing too much to avoid such casualties. Twenty-eight percent said it’s doing the right amount; 14%, too little.
The three questions in this study were included in a random-sample, face-to-face survey of 1,012 Israelis, with fieldwork by PORI, Sept. 8-22, before the bulk of Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah and Iran’s subsequent missile attack this week. (Eighty-two percent of interviews were completed before Sept. 17, when thousands of Hezbollah pagers exploded.)
The U.S. election
In addition to the political gaps in attitudes toward the U.S. presidential candidates, ethnic and religious differences are sharp. Sixty-four percent of Jews picked Trump over Harris as better for Israel’s security, while Arabs, who account for about 17% of Israel’s adult citizen population, divided essentially evenly, 27%-24%; 36% saw no difference between the two. In vote preference, Jews went for Trump by 58%-23%, while Arabs split 28%-26%; the rest said they wouldn’t participate or didn’t express a preference.
Gaps also are present within the Jewish population. The shares picking Trump as better on security ranged from 53% of secular Jews to 88% of Orthodox Jews. Patterns are similar in preference for the presidency: Secular Jews favored Trump by 11 points, 46%-35%, widening to 65%-17% among traditional Jews and 69%-3% among ultra-Orthodox Jews, and peaking for Trump at 85%-4% among Orthodox Jews.
U.S. election preferences among Israeli Jews overall are sharply different from those of Jews in the United States. In ABC News/Ipsos polling, combining late August and mid-September surveys for an adequate sample size, U.S. Jews favored Harris over Trump by 63%-33%.
Another difference is by age. In the United States, Harris does best with younger adults. In Israel, it’s Trump who does best in this group, with 65% of those younger than 35 picking Trump on security and 58% supporting him for president. These drop to 52% and 48% for Trump, respectively, among Israelis age 65 and older.
Trump also prevails among Israelis in strength of sentiment. Thirty percent overall said they’d “surely” support Trump for president, vs. 10% who said this about Harris; and 37% said Trump would be “much” better for Israel’s security, compared with 12% for Harris.
Civilian casualties in Gaza
There also are ethnic, religious and political gaps in views of efforts to avoid civilian casualties in Gaza, given the challenges of urban combat. Strikingly, while just 7% of Jews said Israel is doing too little to avoid such casualties, that rises to 50% of Israeli Arabs.
Among Jews, about eight in 10 of those who are Orthodox or ultra-Orthodox said Israel is doing too much to avoid civilian casualties. This falls to 63% of traditional Jews and 47% of secular Jews.
Politically, among those who favor coalition parties, 76% said Israel is doing too much to avoid civilian casualties. This declines to 41% of opposition party supporters, with 21% saying Israel is doing too little; 34%, about the right amount.
About this survey
This survey is a joint project of Langer Research Associates, a New York-based firm that specializes in the design, management and analysis of public opinion research domestically and internationally; and PORI (Public Opinion Research Israel), a leading Israeli public opinion research firm founded in 1966. The study’s questions were asked as a part of PORI’s September face-to-face omnibus survey.
The survey was conducted in Hebrew and Arabic among 1,012 respondents across Israel via area probability sampling. One hundred primary sampling units were randomly selected, with households selected via random walk and respondents selected via the last-birthday method. Up to three revisits were made at each selected household. In quality control, 20% of each interviewer’s work was re-checked randomly by phone.
Data were weighted for probability of selection and calibrated to census data for sex by age and region. Results have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 points for the full sample, including a design effect due to weighting of 1.05. As in any survey, error margins are larger for subgroups. Sampling error is not the only source of differences in polls.
(WASHINGTON) — House Speaker Mike Johnson said transgender women cannot use women’s restrooms in the Capitol and House office buildings. This also applies to changing rooms and locker rooms, Johnson said.
“All single-sex facilities in the Capitol and House Office Buildings — such as restrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms — are reserved for individuals of that biological sex,” the statement said Wednesday.
Johnson continued, “It is important to note that each Member office has its own private restroom, and unisex restrooms are available throughout the Capitol.”
Mace said Tuesday that the bill she introduced to ban transgender women from using women’s restrooms at the U.S. Capitol was “absolutely” in response to Rep.-elect Sarah McBride’s entering Congress.
“Yes, and absolutely. And then some,” Mace told reporters at the Capitol.
“I’m not going to stand for a man, you know, someone with a penis, in the women’s locker room,” she said.
In terms of how Johnson plans to enforce this policy is not entirely clear, but the speaker has “general control” of facilities, according to House rules.
After winning her election earlier this month to be Delaware’s sole representative in the House, McBride will be the first openly trans member of Congress.
McBride responded to Mace in a post on X, saying, “This is a blatant attempt from far right-wing extremists to distract from the fact they have no real solutions to what Americans are facing.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
ABC News’ Isabella Murray and John Parkinson contributed to this report.
