“The defense lawyer for Michael Flynn told a judge on Tuesday that she talked about his criminal case in a meeting with President Trump, who has been highly critical of the prosecution of his former national security advisor for lying to FBI agents,” CNBC reports.
Mueller Pushes Back on Tell-All Book by Ex-Prosecutor
Former special counsel Robert Mueller pushed back against a prosecutor in his office whose tell-all book alleges investigators should have done more to hold President Trump accountable, suggesting the account was “based on incomplete information” and asserting that he stood by his decisions in the case, the Washington Post reports.
“The rare public statement from Mueller came on the day Andrew Weissmann, a former prosecutor in the special counsel’s office, released a book alleging the group failed to fully investigate Trump’s financial ties and should have stated explicitly that they believed he obstructed justice.”
Where Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation
- Amazon Kindle Edition
- Weissmann, Andrew (Author)
- English (Publication Language)
- 396 Pages - 09/29/2020 (Publication Date) - Random House (Publisher)
Which State May Indicate a Biden Victory First?
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Trump Expected to Attack Biden’s Son
CNN reports President Trump “is preparing to go after Hunter Biden for getting lucrative jobs overseas when his father was vice president that he will say the younger Biden was not qualified for. Trump and his allies have repeatedly made unfounded and false claims to allege that the former vice president and his son acted corruptly in Ukraine.”
“Their hope is that it knocks Biden off his game — either causing him to blow up or say something incorrect.”
“Biden’s team has been working with him to be ready for Trump to go after his son in a way he hasn’t had to deal with as directly before. Trump advisers have also spent time working with the President to stay calm if Biden retaliates by invoking Trump’s daughter and son-in-law, both White House aides with no previous government experience. A source familiar with Biden’s prep, however, says his plan is to pivot away from this issue, not engage.”
Biden Releases 2019 Tax Return Hours Before Debate
Joe Biden and his running mate Sen. Kamala Harris released their 2019 federal and state tax returns, hours before the former vice president meets face-to-face with President Trump in the first debate of the 2020 presidential race, The Hill reports.
The Hate at the Heart of Conspiracy Theory
David French: “Something bothers me about the most common explanations for why conspiracy theories are spreading on the American right. When trying to account for the rise of the Q-Anon movement, for example, pundits and social scientists tend to use terms like ‘distrust.’ But to understand how so many Americans can believe that ‘they’ have dark and evil designs, we need to resort to a more primal emotion: hate.”
“Here’s what I mean. I don’t trust my car dealer. When it comes to matters like car pricing, car repairs, and car warranties, I adopt Ronald Reagan’s mantra from the days of the Cold War: ‘Trust, but verify.'”
“But though I don’t trust my car dealer, I don’t dislike anyone at the dealership. So if you told me that the guy who sold me my 2018 Honda Accord was part of a global pedophile ring that cannibalizes slaughtered children—central elements of the Q-Anon conspiracy theory—my first response would be total confusion. Distrust alone wouldn’t come close to preparing me to hear those words. I’d have to hate him before I believed something so evil.”
New York City’s Infection Rate Jumps
“New York City’s coronavirus positivity rate has ticked up to 3.25%, its highest since June, Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a news conference on Tuesday,” Axios reports.
“The jump — from 1.93% on Monday — came on the first day that public elementary classrooms reopened in the city after months of closures, but guidelines state that all public schools will have to shut if the citywide seven-day positivity rate stays above 3%.”
Ohio Could Keep Trump from Contesting the Election
Yahoo News: “To nip any disaster scenario in the bud, they say, Biden also needs to flip one or more ‘nail-in-the-coffin states’ — that is, the ones that on election night itself could quickly and decisively prove that Trump has no remaining path to victory.”
“Ohio, the site of this year’s first presidential debate, could be Biden’s best option.”
How Trump’s Tax Returns Could Affect The Election
Geoffrey Skelley: “All in all, past surveys and research suggest that The Times’s latest story — which is more significant in scope and covers a more recent part of Trump’s business dealings than past revelations — could put a dent in how the public views Trump’s business acumen. Whether that actually happens may come down to how much sustained media attention the story receives. For example, will the first presidential debate, on Tuesday night, dwell on Trump’s tax returns?”
“If the tax returns do stay in the spotlight, there is reason to think they could hurt Trump electorally. For one, Trump is an underdog for reelection at the moment and the clock is ticking — any day during which he’s not making up ground is a problem. But the malleability of voters’ views of Trump’s business record is also notable because we have reason to think Trump’s business credentials played at least some role in his electoral success in 2016, and may continue to undergird some of his support today.”
Related for members: Why the Trump Tax Story Could Finally Move the Polls.
Trump’s Pennsylvania Problem
Aaron Blake notes that the Democratic candidate has carried the Philadelphia suburbs by between 7 and 17 points in every presidential race since 2004.
Trump’s deficit there in the new New York Times-Siena poll is 24 points and in the new Washington Post-ABC News poll is 38 points.
Trump Wants to Inspect Biden’s Ears
President Trump’s campaign wants Joe Biden’s campaign to allow a third party to inspect the ears of each debater for electronic devices or transmitters, Fox News reports.
Some Brooklyn Absentee Voters Getting Wrong Envelopes
“With five weeks left until the Nov. 3 election, many voters are eager to cast their ballots absentee and early. A growing number of registered voters in Brooklyn, however, received ballots on Monday with an incorrect return address,” NBC New York reports.
Fox News Uses ‘Hate’ More Than Other Networks
“Fox News is up to five times more likely to use the word ‘hate’ in its programming than its main competitors,” according to a new study.
Also interesting: “We found Fox’s usage of ‘they hate’ has increased over time, with a clear spike around the polarizing 2016 Trump-Clinton election. But Fox’s use of ‘hate’ really took off when Trump’s presidency began.”
What Biden Can Expect Tonight
Philippe Reines: “Donald Trump is a very bad debater. Donald Trump is very difficult to debate.”
“These two seemingly contradictory statements are equally true. He’s a dangerous opponent. In 2016, it was because he had nothing to lose. Now, it’s because he has everything to lose.”
“I would know. In the last cycle, I had a unique assignment: playing Trump’s stand-in during Hillary Clinton’s mock debates. Before donning the ill-fitting suit I had tailored, my preparation included studying the 11 Republican primary debates in which Trump participated, watching each three times: once start to finish; then only exchanges involving Trump; and finally only Trump, standing at a lectern in my living room with the sound off to focus entirely on his gestures and body language.”
Postal Workers Quietly Resist Changes
“This summer, as controversial new procedures at the U.S. Postal Service snarled the nation’s mail delivery and stirred fears of how the agency would handle the election, rank-and-file workers quietly began to resist,” the Washington Post reports.
“Mechanics in New York drew out the dismantling and removal of mail-sorting machines until their supervisor gave up on the order. In Michigan, a group of letter carriers did an end run around a supervisor’s directive to leave election mail behind, starting their routes late to sift through it. In Ohio, postal clerks culled prescriptions and benefit checks from bins of stalled mail to make sure they were delivered, while some carriers ran late items out on their own time. In Pennsylvania, some postal workers looked for any excuse — a missed turn, heavy traffic, a rowdy dog — to buy enough time to finish their daily rounds.”
Biden Campaign Slams Facebook for ‘Regression’
The Biden campaign slammed Facebook as “the nation’s foremost propagator of disinformation about the voting process,” Axios reports.
Wrote Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon: “Rather than seeing progress, we have seen regression… Facebook’s continued promise of future action is serving as nothing more than an excuse for inaction.”
Nathan Deal Backs Doug Collins for Senate
Former Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal (R) endorsed Doug Collins’ (R) bid for U.S. Senate, making him the most prominent state Republican to support the four-term congressman’s challenge to Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) in a nasty fight that has divided the Georgia GOP, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.
Ex-Prosecutor Says Trump Committed Tax Fraud
Nick Akerman, who served on the prosecution team during the 1970s Watergate investigation, told CNN he believed President Trump would likely face tax fraud charges upon leaving the White House.
Said Ackerman: “Tax avoidance is simply taking the tax code and getting the most deductions you can get under the code that is perfectly legal. Tax fraud, however, is lying about what your income was, lying about what your deductions are, and there’s a couple of items that just stand out in that report from the New York Times that really appear to go beyond tax avoidance.”
