August 30, 2024, presidential campaign news

Former President Donald Trump told Fox News he will be voting “no” on the Florida abortion amendment.

A “no” vote would pave the way for a 6-week abortion ban, which Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed last year. As CNN has repeatedly noted, it’s illegal in every state to kill a baby after it is born.

The Florida amendment reads, “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider. This amendment does not change the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.”

Most experts say fetal viability occurs at around 23-24 weeks of gestation.

Trump has previously called the six-week limit a “terrible mistake.”

Here’s more background: Trump, whose ever-evolving views on reproductive health have traversed every side of the debate, has long expressed concerns about the political fallout from the 2022 Supreme Court decision to end the constitutional right to an abortion. Though he has sought credit for installing the three conservative justices that tipped the court to overturn Roe v. Wade, Trump earlier this year said future questions about access should be left to the states.

Donald Trump’s legal team has asked New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan to refrain from issuing decisions on “any substantive motions” — including Trump’s motion to set aside his criminal conviction — until the former president’s new request to move the case to federal court plays out.

The letter cites Special Counsel Jack Smith’s move this week to secure a new indictment against Trump in the election interference case that tailors the allegations in light of the Supreme Court’s immunity decision. That new indictment, Trump’s lawyers say, helps Trump’s argument for a dismissal in the New York case.

It’s the first time that Trump’s lawyers have used that new indictment in their numerous ongoing appeals in the New York case.

Merchan said he would issue a ruling on the week of September 16 on Trump’s motion to vacate the New York hush money conviction in the wake of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling. Remember, that ruling from the Supreme Court said that Trump has broad sweeping immunity for “official acts” while he was in office.

Trump also filed a petition Thursday asking a federal court in Manhattan to remove his state criminal case from its jurisdiction, considering the Supreme Court ruling. The filing in federal court also says the state court cannot sentence Trump until that federal request for removal is litigated. 

Trump asked Merchan to delay the sentencing earlier this month — a request DA Alvin Bragg’s office did not oppose — and the judge was expected to rule on that as soon as next week, according to CNN’s reporting. In the latest letter, Trump’s attorneys say “there is no good reason” to sentence him before Election Day, asking Merchan to delay the sentencing currently scheduled for September 18 indefinitely.

TOPSHOT - Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz speaks during a campaign rally at Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on August 20.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will mark Labor Day by delivering remarks at the Milwaukee Area Labor Council’s Laborfest 2024 event on Monday. 

His remarks in Milwaukee, the third trip to battleground Wisconsin for Vice President Harris’ running mate, will also be the third organized labor gathering he has addressed since joining the Democratic ticket earlier this month.

He spoke at a firefighters union convention in Boston earlier this week after addressing a government employees union in Los Angeles earlier this month.

Also on Monday, Harris and President Joe Biden will campaign together in Pittsburgh, the White House previously announced. 

It will mark the first time the president and vice president are appearing jointly in a battleground state since Harris moved to the top of the Democratic ticket. 

CNN’s Arlette Saenz contributed reporting to this post.

Former President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event at Alro Steel on Thursday in Michigan.

Months after Donald Trump declared the debate over reproductive rights in America settled, the former president is still straining to navigate the new era of post-Roe politics that he helped create.

The latest display of his unease came Thursday, when the former president infuriated religious conservatives with an inartful attempt to sidestep questions about a Florida referendum that will decide the future of abortion access in his home state. The campaign quickly clarified in a statement that Trump had not, in fact, picked a side.

Later that day, surrounded by steel and machinery inside a Michigan warehouse, Trump abruptly detoured from remarks on manufacturing to offer women a new incentive to vote for him: a promise for universal coverage of in vitro fertilization if he is elected.

But senators in his own party — including his running mate, JD Vance — had defeated a bill with a similar provision earlier this summer.

Trump, whose ever-evolving views on reproductive health have traversed every side of the debate, has long expressed concerns about the political fallout from the 2022 Supreme Court decision to end the constitutional right to an abortion.

Though he has sought credit for installing the three conservative justices that tipped the court to overturn Roe v. Wade, Trump earlier this year said future questions about access should be left to the states.

But that position, intended to end the conversation, has done anything but, and Trump has strained to appease activists in his party as he stares down an electorate that remains overwhelmingly troubled by the current state of abortion access in many GOP-led states.

A new survey from Quinnipiac University found 55% of voters think Vice President Kamala Harris is better equipped to tackle the issue, compared with 38% for Trump. Meanwhile, nearly 7 in 10 voters focused on abortion favor Harris over Trump, according to a recent CBS News poll conducted by YouGov.

Read more.

Days after Donald Trump expressed opposition to mail-in voting in an interview, there is an electronic sign inside the arena where the former president is set to take the stage encouraging attendees to “secure a mail-in ballot today.”

Trump will speak later today at the 1st Summit Arena in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. The sign also highlights key dates that Pennsylvania voters should remember.  

The messaging aligns with Republicans’ ongoing effort to encourage voters in the Keystone State to utilize mail-in ballots. The Republican National Committee and Trump’s campaign touted a new website this week that provides easy access to Pennsylvania’s election resources, allowing voters to request mail-in or absentee ballots directly.

But the same day the campaign introduced the website, swampthevote.com, Trump directly opposed mail-in voting during an interview with Dr. Phil, saying, “Mail-in ballots shouldn’t be allowed.”

“What we have to do is get control, and then we have to change it, and it’s a very simple change: same-day voting, everybody votes,” Trump said.

Read CNN’s fact checks on Trump’s claims of mail fraud.

Minnesota first lady Gwen Walz attacked former President Donald Trump in a social media post on Friday, blaming him for access to fertility treatments being in jeopardy.

Walz, who conceived through fertility treatments, criticized Trump after he proposed to make in vitro fertilization treatments paid for by either government or insurance companies.

Her statement comes as Democrats seek to reframe the conversation around fertility treatments on legal protections, following Trump’s pledge to make the treatments more affordable.

Walz campaigned in Virginia on Friday, where she reiterated the importance of protecting fertility treatments, an issue she and her husband, Democratic vice presidential nominee Gov. Tim Walz, have focused on since he joined Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign earlier this month.

In campaign speeches, Tim Walz had characterized the issue of access to IVF treatment as “personal” to him and his family while sharing the story of his and his wife’s journey to conceiving their two children. Gwen Walz clarified in a statement to CNN earlier this month that she did not use in vitro fertilization, but a different fertility treatment called intrauterine insemination. Like IVF, it’s a common fertility procedure used by couples trying to conceive.

A senior embryologist at West Coast Fertility Centers in Fountain Valley, California, adds media to petri dishes containing embryos, before freezing the embryos, on February 29.

Democrats are seeking to center the conversation on access to in vitro fertilization around the legal protections for the treatment after former President Donald Trump pledged to have either government or insurance companies cover the costs of treatments if he’s reelected.   

On a Harris campaign call with reporters on Friday, Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren said Trump’s promise to have fertility treatments paid for is “just smoke and mirrors” without a commitment to protect the treatments from legal threats. She pointed to the Alabama Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that deemed that frozen embryos are children, jeopardizing the legality of IVF treatments before Alabama’s Republican governor signed a law protecting IVF access in the state after Trump said he supports the treatment. 

She also cited a Senate bill to codify access to IVF nationwide that was blocked by the GOP in June and a House GOP bill that seeks to legally define life as beginning at the moment of conception or fertilization to draw the contrast on protections for reproductive health care. 

When asked specifically if she feels Democrats should mandate insurance companies or create a government program to provide fertility treatments, Warren sidestepped the question, insisting “the threshold question” is around legal protections for fertility treatments.  

Mini Timmaraju, president of Reproductive Freedom for All, echoed Warren’s argument, calling Trump’s proposal a “distraction” from the “underlying issue.” She said that the bigger question is “should IVF be legal, period. One party and one ticket supports that, and one does not.”

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign is continuing to needle former President Donald Trump’s campaign on the topic of muted vs unmuted microphones at the upcoming presidential debate hosted by ABC News. 

Remember: CNN has previously reported that ABC intends to mute Trump and Kamala’s microphones while their opponent speaks during the debate, according to a copy of the formal rules obtained by CNN.

Fulks’ comments mirror those made earlier by the Harris campaign’s senior adviser Brian Fallon, who posted on X that Trump’s “handlers don’t trust him to spar live with VP Harris.”  

During an event in Virginia on Monday, Trump said of the microphones, “We agreed to the same rules, I don’t know, doesn’t matter to me, I’d rather have it probably on, but the agreement was that it would be the same as it was last time.” 

But in a post on his Truth Social platform the next day, Trump added, “The Rules will be the same as the last CNN Debate, which seemed to work out well for everyone except, perhaps, Crooked Joe Biden.”

ABC’s rules, which were first shared with the campaigns last week, largely mirror the format of CNN’s presidential debate in June between Trump and President Joe Biden, during which the candidates’ microphones were muted as their opponent spoke, a rule the Biden campaign had insisted on but something the Harris campaign had sought to change in recent days. 

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Vice President Kamala Harris are interviewed by CNN’s Dana Bash at Kim’s Cafe in Savannah, Georgia, on August 29

Vice President Kamala Harris sat down with CNN’s Dana Bash for her first major TV interview since becoming the Democrats’ presidential nominee.

The interview was conducted in Savannah on the sidelines of a bus tour through the key Sun Belt state of Georgia and alongside her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Here are some of the key lines:

What would she do on Day One in the White House?

After a broad claim about focusing on the middle class, Harris made a larger point about moving on from Donald Trump.

Pushed by Bash about her specific plans, Harris said she would focus on her “opportunity economy” plan to bring down the cost of everyday goods and give parents of newborns a $6,000 tax credit “to help them buy a car seat, to help them buy baby clothes, a crib.” She also mentioned housing affordability.

But what about people who feel groceries were less expensive and housing more affordable when Trump was president?

Read more of the key lines from Harris’ interview.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.

In a survey conducted entirely after the Democratic National Convention, Quinnipiac University’s poll finds Vice President Kamala Harris at 49% among likely voters nationwide, with former President Donald Trump at 47% — a result within the poll’s margin of sampling error, suggesting no clear leader in the race.

The survey is the first from Quinnipiac that reports the results among likely voters, and is not directly comparable to past polling from the school.

Nationally, the poll finds Harris and Trump tied at 45% each among political independents. There is a wide gender gap in the results, with women splitting 58% to 37% in Harris’ favor, while men break the other direction, 57% Trump to 39% Harris.

Harris holds advantages among younger voters (52% to 39% among those age 18-34) and Black voters (75% to 20%), but those leads are narrower than President Joe Biden’s performance nationally among 2020 voters, according to exit polls.

Trump and Harris are also tied among Hispanic voters in the poll, with 48% support for each of them.

Here are some other takeaways:

The poll was conducted August 23-27 by phone among a random national sample of 1,611 likely voters, and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.4 percentage points.