US presidential election briefing: Obama, Sanders and AOC, rally for Harris as Trump says he is ‘opposite of a Nazi’
With eight sleeps to go until Americans head to the polls on Tuesday 5 November, campaigning kicked up another notch on Monday as Kamala Harris and Tim Walz appealed to young, first-time voters in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen spoke in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – where the former US president described Donald Trump’s event in Madison Square Garden as featuring “the most racist, sexist, bigoted stereotypes”.
In Wisconsin, the New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, appearing with the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, also addressed the racist remarks, specifically those made by a comedian about Puerto Rico. AOC, who is of Puerto Rican descent, said: “They knew exactly what they were doing; let’s dispense with this idea that this is a joke,” and added that Trump’s words echoed those of Adolf Hitler.
Trump, meanwhile, told voters in Atlanta, Georgia, that he was the “opposite of a Nazi”; and the billionaire Jeff Bezos wrote a column in the Washington Post, the paper he owns, explaining the decision taken by its editorial board not to endorse a candidate this election, for the first time in 30 years.
Here’s what else happened on Monday:
Kamala Harris election news and updates
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Campaigning for Harris in Wisconsin, Bernie Sanders said: “You have Mike Pence saying I can’t support the guy I worked with for four years” and “We cannot allow someone to be president of the United States who is a pathological liar and who is working night and day to undermine American democracy.”
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Sanders also released a video addressing voter concerns over the Biden-Harris administration’s record on Gaza, saying: “After Kamala wins, we will together do everything that we can to change US policy towards Netanyahu.”
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Before performing at a rally with Obama in Pennsylvania, Bruce Springsteen said: “I’m Bruce Springsteen and I’m here today to support Kamala Harris and Tim Walz and to oppose Donald Trump and JD Vance … I want a president who reveres the constitution, who does not threaten but wants to protect and guide our great democracy, who believes in the rule of law and the peaceful transfer of power, who will fight for women’s rights … [and] create a middle-class economy that works for all our citizens.”
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Anita Hill, a former clerk to the US supreme court justice Clarence Thomas, has said “racist, misogynist and sexist insults” aimed at Kamala Harris “must sting”. In a New York Times opinion piece published on Monday, the Brandeis University professor – who was famously brought before Thomas’s confirmation hearings only to have her sexual harassment allegations against him picked apart by sitting senators – wrote that she sympathises with the US vice-president.
Donald Trump election news and updates
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Donald Trump faced mounting suspicion of hatching a plot to steal next week’s presidential election as Democrats and commentators focused on his references to a “little secret” at Sunday night’s tumultuous Madison Square Garden rally.
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Outrage is continuing to mount following the racist anti-Puerto Rican remarks at that rally in New York as Democrat politicians, celebrities and even some Republicans condemned the scenes there.
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The Philadelphia district attorney’s office has filed a lawsuit seeking to stop Elon Musk’s political action committee giving $1m daily to registered voters in swing states. The lawsuit by the district attorney, Larry Krasner, accuses the tech billionaire and his America Pac group of attempting to influence voters in the US presidential election with hopes of winning a cash prize.
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Trump’s aides have floated the idea of granting immediate security clearances to officials in a second term and doing away with FBI background checks for appointees who might otherwise fail the process, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail
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Hundreds of early ballots cast for the US presidential election have been burned in two suspected attacks in Washington and Oregon, exacerbating tensions ahead of next Tuesday’s knife-edge contest. Police believed the fires in the two states were connected and a vehicle involved had been identified, the Associated Press reported.
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Jeff Bezos argued that the Washington Post editorial board’s decision not to endorse a candidate was taken in order to avoid the perception of bias. Bezos – who founded Amazon – said he had taken the decision because he was worried that people had lost trust in the traditional US media and were getting their news from social media, leaving them vulnerable to disinformation. The decision not to endorse has rocked the Post and seen the loss of 200,000 subscribers who have cancelled their subscriptions.
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Just before Trump took the stage on Monday afternoon, Georgia’s early vote count crossed the 3m mark. More than 40% of Georgia voters have already cast a ballot. About 5 million people in Georgia voted in the 2020 presidential race.
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