Meghan McCain revealed on her podcast that she’s turned down “Dancing with the Stars” on three separate occasions.
Said McCain: “I’ve been asked to do ‘Dancing With the Stars’ three times, and I said no each time, because I just don’t want to publicly humiliate myself.”
She added: “I do not do reality TV, because there’s still a tiny little window in my life that I want to run for office at some point, and you can’t do both. You just can’t. It’s just not serious.”
Donald Trump’s campaign sent an email out to its entire staff warning them not to communicate with the press in the next two months before the presidential election in November, NBC News reports.
From the memo: “You should not be independently speaking or communicating with any members of the press—on or off the record.”
Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears (R) has filed paperwork to run for Virginia governor in 2025, WRIC reports.
Allan Lichtman has updated his “Keys to the White House” forecasting model and predicts Kamala Harris will win the presidential election.
“Donald Trump is scaling back his campaigning in three states he was targeting just six weeks ago, a sign of how Kamala Harris’ rise in the polls has shifted the dynamics of the presidential race,” Axios reports.
“Trump’s campaign is placing less emphasis on New Hampshire, Minnesota and Virginia. Instead, it’s pouring resources into the ‘Blue Wall’ states — Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin — that are crucial to both sides’ chances of victory.”
“Trump’s also refocusing on other states — North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada — where he had significant polling leads before Harris made them competitive.”
“Jury selection is set to begin Thursday in Los Angeles for Hunter Biden’s trial on federal tax charges,” Axios reports.
“U.S. Senate candidate Tim Sheehy recently said he parachuted into Glacier National Park as part of his military training in Montana — an activity a national park spokesperson said is not permitted,” the Daily Montanan reports.
“Sheehy, a Republican and a former U.S. Navy SEAL, made the comment at a campaign event last month, according to a video posted on Facebook and shared multiple times…”
“However, a Glacier National Park official said parachuting, hang gliding and base jumping are not allowed in the park. A public information spokesperson said the park does not grant special permission for the U.S. military, and if the activity is taking place, it is illegal.”
Said the spokesman: “There is no way to get permission.”
“Donald Trump plans to outline a suite of economic proposals in a speech here Thursday, including introducing a government efficiency commission recommended by Elon Musk, taking an even more aggressive swipe at regulations than during his first White House term and pledging to rescind certain unspent funds appropriated during the Biden administration,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
New York Times: “There is no indication that noncitizens are voting in large numbers. And yet the notion that they will flood the polls — and vote overwhelmingly for Democrats — is animating a sprawling network of Republicans who mobilized around former President Donald Trump’s false claims of a rigged election in 2020 and are now preparing for the next one.”
Wired: “VoteAlert is a new app from the election conspiracy group True the Vote, a company with a rich history of combining tech with election conspiracies only to come up with nothing. In 2022, True the Vote claimed to have evidence showing that so-called ballot mules were being used to stuff drop boxes to sway the 2020 election in Joe Biden’s favor. Earlier this year they admitted in court they had no such evidence.”
“But that didn’t slow them down. The group has already rolled out one online tool this election season called IV3 to facilitate mass voter roll challenges, and with VoteAlert, the group now wants to give election workers and poll watchers the chance to get in on the action.”
“VoteAlert is designed to be a one-stop shop for all your election conspiracy needs, featuring a scrollable feed of the latest voting-related alerts, the ability to report your own claims, and even, apparently, a 24/7 hotline.”
“State Republican parties have nominated 14 of the 84 fake electors from the 2020 presidential election to serve again as Republican party presidential electors, an indication of the legitimacy that election deniers continue to hold in some quarters of the GOP,” The Guardian reports.
“The Republican parties of Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Nevada have each nominated one or more electors who attempted to submit themselves as electors for Donald Trump and Mike Pence in 2020 despite the former president losing in their states.”
“Lawyers for former President Donald Trump and special counsel Jack Smith are returning to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan’s courtroom Thursday for the first time since she regained control of the 2020 election-related case following the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling on presidential immunity,” CBS News reports.
“The attorneys are poised to lay out their proposed paths for how pretrial proceedings should move forward in the wake of the July decision, which offered Trump and all former presidents protection from federal prosecution for ‘official acts.'”
“Trump is not expected to attend Thursday’s hearing and has waived his right to appear.”
“There’s a polling crisis in America, and it has nothing to do with weighted averages, sampling errors, or the ‘shy Trump voter’ phenomenon. It’s the lack of reliable polling on House races this cycle,” National Journal reports.
“Ask any campaign strategist worth their salt, and they will grumble that, while presidential polling is a dime a dozen, there’s a serious lack of public data on the races that will decide control of an entire branch of government, especially in the House.”
Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball: “Democrats are still in the game, but they need to win all the closest races just to get to 50-50, and they are likely behind in at least one of those races, Montana.”
“Democrats appear to retain leads in 5 seats they are defending in presidential battlegrounds, although Republicans argue that the gravity of the presidential race will allow them to catch up.”
“We remain skeptical of the Democrats’ ability to truly put Florida and Texas in play, and the Republicans’ ability to put Maryland in play.”
“With Congress set to return to Washington next week after a very long absence, House Republicans have new targets in mind — Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz,” Punchbowl News reports.
“The House Republicans have turned the machinery of their committees against the Democratic presidential ticket. It’s a preview of what they’ll face if Republicans keep the House and Harris manages to defeat former President Donald Trump.”
“Donald Trump hasn’t set foot in New Hampshire since he won the state’s GOP primary in January. His campaign hasn’t sent a high-profile surrogate here since the spring,” Politico reports.
“And now, even as they insist he can win here, some of Trump’s most ardent supporters in this blue-leaning swing state are openly saying that his campaign should focus its efforts elsewhere.”
“It’s a marked shift from when New Hampshire was among the bluish battlefields where Trump’s campaign boasted it could expand its electoral map as President Joe Biden faltered.”
“The anti-abortion activists celebrating Donald Trump’s vow to vote no on Florida’s upcoming abortion-rights amendment have their sights on a bigger target: extracting a promise from the former president to staff his administration with staunch abortion opponents if he wins in November,” Politico reports.
“Trump’s rejection of Amendment 4 on Friday — 24 hours after criticizing the state’s six-week abortion ban — followed a public and private lobbying blitz from anti-abortion leaders.”
Playbook: “Among the wishlist for activists would be a list of judges he’d nominate or anti-abortion-rights advocates for top jobs. But the Trump campaign so far has not released any such commitments or responses to the entreaties.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.