US Election Updates: In final 2 weeks, Harris & Trump tailor ad campaigns for fence-sitters

As the US presidential election race entered final two weeks, Harris and Trump have tailored their ad campaigns for fence-sitters.

Harris and Trump are going all-in to woo the undecided voters who are bound to play a key role in deciding the election, particularly in key swing states.

In October, Trump and his allies devoted a third of all spending on broadcast ads about transgender healthcare whereas Harris and her allies continued to focus on taxes, Trump’s character, and healthcare while lowering investment on abortion, according to CNN.

As Trump descends to vulgarities in his speeches, levelling profanities on Harris, the Democrats are focussing on his character to portray him as unbecoming of presidency to undecided moderate voters.

Instead of appealing to their core base, in the final leg of the race, the Democrats are reaching out to moderate Republicans and independents repulsed by Trump’s far-right platform and profanity-laden election campaign.

In the July-September quarter, the Harris campaign set the record for the biggest fund-raiser ever.

Harris raised around $1 billion in three months ending Sept. 30, with $359 million in September alone, according to The New York Times.

Since taking over the Democratic ticket, Harris has revitalised the Democrats’ campaign against Trump. The donors have doubled down on her and poured in money in all-out effort to beat Trump.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited Ukraine on Monday, in a show of Washington’s support for Kyiv just two weeks ahead of a U.S. presidential election that is casting uncertainty over the future of Western support.

Austin’s trip, his fourth and likely final visit as President Joe Biden’s Pentagon chief, will include in-depth discussions about U.S. efforts to help Kyiv shore up its defences as Moscow’s forces advance in the east.

But it is not expected to include a new U.S. agreement to some of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s biggest requests, like lifting U.S. restrictions on using U.S.-supplied weapons to hit targets far beyond Ukraine’s borders.

A group of about 2,000 migrants left Mexico’s southern border Sunday hoping to reach the country’s north and ultimately the United States. The development comes weeks before the U.S. presidential election, in which immigration has been a key issue.

Both the lack of jobs in Mexico’s south due to a new wave of incoming foreigners and a delay in asylum appointments in the U.S. have motivated more groups of migrants to leave the region in the past month.

The group leaving Sunday was the third and the largest since the beginning of the administration of new Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who so far has made no changes in immigration policies established by her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

Groups of 800 and 600 migrants left the region earlier in October.

Activist Luis García Villagrán estimates about 40,000 migrants are currently stranded in southern Mexico.

Jews represent a sliver of the voting-age population in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, the so-called blue wall of states that Democrats have come to rely on in recent presidential elections. In a close election, they are a big enough constituency that the campaigns of Harris and Trump see the potential for any slippage to swing a close contest.

That has forced Harris to walk a line between traditional Democratic constituencies with strong feelings about the war in Gaza, both Jews and Arab Americans — balancing support for Israel with outrage over the deaths of Israeli and Palestinian civilians and destruction in the region. The Biden administration has been pressuring Israel to end its attacks, which continued last week with the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar by Israeli troops.

Trump has looked to exploit the opening among Jewish voters especially, saying Harris “ doesn’t like ” Jewish people, Jews who don’t vote for him “need their head examined ” and that he’ll be the “ best friend Jewish Americans have ever had in the White House.”

Immigration has become a source of fright and frustration for voters in this presidential election — with possible outcomes that could take the United States down two dramatically different paths. Nowhere are the stakes higher than in Nevada, where 19% of residents are foreign-born and around 9% of the total workforce doesn’t have U.S. legal status.

The influx of illegal border crossings has strained city and state resources across the nation, even in Democratic strongholds. And yet immigration has fueled job growth in ways that strengthen the economy and improve the federal government’s fiscal health.

So black and white in the candidates’ rhetoric, immigration is actually incredibly complex in reality — a fact that reveals itself every day in Nevada.

Donald Trump’s appearance on Sunday at the Pittsburgh Steelers versus New York Jets NFL game illustrates the ongoing intersection of sports and politics in American campaigns. His arrival was met with supporters displaying “Trump Nation” banners and chanting “USA,” demonstrating how fan-driven environments can serve as venues for political expression. With the election just weeks away, Trump’s presence at this high-profile game in Pennsylvania—a crucial swing state—was a strategic move aimed at energising his base in a context where regional pride and political affiliation converge.

For the first time in the US election campaign, Republican nominee Donald Trump has overtaken Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, according to a new forecast.

Just two weeks before the November 5 election, former President Trump has overtaken Vice President Harris, according to the latest Decision Desk-Hill forecast.

The forecast shows that Trump currently has 4 per cent more chances of winning the US presidential election than Harris.

While Trump has 52 per cent chances to win the election, Harris has 48 per cent chances, as per the forecast.

McDonalds, a staple of American culture, has unexpectedly found itself at the heart of the 2024 US presidential election. Both Democratic and Republican candidates have used the fast-food chain as a symbol in their campaigns.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited Ukraine on Monday, in a show of Washington’s support for Kyiv just two weeks ahead of a U.S. presidential election that is casting uncertainty over the future of Western support.

Austin’s trip, his fourth and likely final visit as President Joe Biden’s Pentagon chief, will include in-depth discussions about U.S. efforts to help Kyiv shore up its defences as Moscow’s forces advance in the east.

But it is not expected to include a new U.S. agreement to some of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s biggest requests, like lifting U.S. restrictions on using U.S.-supplied weapons to hit targets far beyond Ukraine’s borders.

As Biden’s administration winds down, Austin signalled continuity in U.S. support.

As Democratic nominee Kamala Harris struggle to hold on to Black voters, particularly Black men, Trump has piled up endorsements from Black celebrities.

Polls have shown that Harris has significantly lost the support of Black voters, particularly men, over the years.

Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla and Space X and owner of X who’s gone all-in on Republican Donald Trump’s candidacy for the White House, has already committed at least $70 million to help the former president. Now he’s pledging to give away $1 million a day to voters for signing his political action committee’s petition backing the Constitution.

The giveaway is raising questions and alarm among some election experts who say it is a violation of the law to link a cash handout to signing a petition that also requires a person to be registered to vote.

The presidential race in North Carolina is playing out in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and alongside a governor’s race in which the Trump-endorsed GOP nominee, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, has seen his campaign collapse amid multiple controversies, potentially splintering GOP unity.

Both the Harris and Trump campaigns are ramping up their activity here again after the storm. Trump has three North Carolina stops Monday, including a visit to see storm damage in Asheville. Former President Bill Clinton appeared last week with Harris’ running mate, Tim Walz, and followed with several visits in eastern North Carolina.

With 15 days until Election Day, North Carolina is critical to the Electoral College math that will decide whether Trump gets a White House encore or Harris hands him a second defeat and, in the process, makes history as the first woman, second Black person and first person of south Asian descent to reach the Oval Office.

Democrat Kamala Harris is out to win over suburban voters uneasy about Republican Donald Trump as she touches down in three Midwestern battleground states on Monday to hold moderated conversations with Republican Liz Cheney.

The vice president will make appearances in three suburban counties won by Republican Nikki Haley before she dropped out of the race for the GOP nomination: Chester County, Pennsylvania; Oakland County, Michigan; and Waukesha County, Wisconsin.

Harris’ travel companion, Cheney, is a former GOP congresswoman from Wyoming and a fierce critic of Trump. Their conversations will be moderated by a conservative radio host and a GOP strategist.

With just over two weeks to go before the presidential election and the race a dead heat, the Democratic nominee is looking for support from every possible voter. Her campaign is hoping to persuade those who haven’t made up their minds, mobilize any Democrats considering sitting this one out, and pick off voters in areas where support for Trump may be fading.

US Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump are set to battle it out to become the 47th president of the United States.

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With only 16 days till Election Day, the Democratic governors of the three “Blue Wall” battleground states praised Vice President Kamala Harris’ ground effort and predicted her victory in their states, while acknowledging the closeness of the presidential race.

“I think Kamala Harris wins, but make no mistake, it’s close,” Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro told ABC News’ “This Week” co-host Martha Raddatz.

Shapiro, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, and Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers met down with Raddatz in Pittsburgh for an exclusive conversation that aired on Sunday. The interview took place on the governors’ bus tour of the key battlegrounds that some analysts believe represent Harris’ best road to the president.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump attended Sunday night’s NFL game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and New York Jets as the guest of an unidentified suite holder at Acrisure Stadium.

Trump arrived about midway through the first quarter and was greeted by a small crowd of supporters wearing Pittsburgh jerseys toting a banner that read “Trump Nation.” He later waved from the suite, with some fans chanting “USA.” A female fan wearing black-and-gold — the Steelers’ colors — jumped onto the field in the third quarter carrying a pro-Trump sign, briefly disrupting play. She was quickly escorted from the field by authorities.

The former president’s visit capped a dizzying weekend in pivotal Pennsylvania for Trump’s campaign with the election a little over two weeks away.

Trump has been criticised online for allegedly calling anchor Sage Steele “Pagie” at the outset of his town hall on Sunday afternoon.

With 16 days until Election Day, Kamala Harris says she will do everything she can to battle any misinformation spread by her opponents.

She was replying to a question from Al Sharpton on MSNBC, who indicated she was known as “Kamala the cop” by some, referring to her tenure as a public prosecutor. He claimed that image could be detrimental in the eyes of some black voters who are sceptical about police enforcement.

He stated that there are “all sorts of people who are going to throw a bunch of things out that will include mis and disinformation, with the intention to dissuade certain people from voting”.

Speaking earlier in Pennsylvania, Trump stated that he believes all presidential candidates should be subjected to a cognitive test, while also emphasising his own mental fitness for office.

He remarked of Kamala Harris, “I have no cognitive problem – she may have a cognitive problem.”

At a town hall meeting in Lancaster, the 78-year-old stated, “I actually call for a cognitive test for all people wanting to run for president. Not based on age. I’m not 80, and I’m not that close to 80.”

Republican Donald Trump, who still refuses to accept that he lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden, says he wants a presidential victory on Nov. 5 to be so overwhelming that the results are “too big to rig.”

“We want a landslide,” he recently told supporters in Georgia. “We can’t let anything happen.”

No matter the margins, Republicans and Democrats are preparing for a potentially lengthy battle over the results once they come in. Dozens of lawsuits that could set the stage for challenges after the votes are counted are already playing out in courts nationwide. Most have been filed by Republicans and their allies. Many of the cases involve challenges to mail-in balloting, ballots from overseas voters and claims of voting by people who are not U.S citizens.

Trump, who faces federal criminal charges over his efforts to overturn his 2020 defeat, has repeatedly declined to state unequivocally that he will accept this year’s results.

Trump promised that if he wins the election, he will “immediately” address problems at the southern border during his appearance today in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

Trump, whose pledge to “build a wall” helped launch his first campaign for the presidency, has attempted to utilise immigration as a major point of contention in this race.

In response to the moderator’s question about how soon he believed he could make changes, Trump said, “Almost immediately.”

“Breaking” news, screamed an online post by a conservative American influencer as he pushed disinformation about Kamala Harris, illustrating how journalism lingo has been co-opted as a tool to amplify election falsehoods.

The misuse of the term, typically deployed by media outlets to relay major news developments, is part of a persistent assault on reality across tech platforms that researchers say have relaxed their guardrails against false information in a crucial election year.

It is yet another disinformation trend undermining trust in traditional media — already at historic lows, surveys show — alongside the proliferation of fake “news” sites and the growing tactic of attributing false information to legitimate media outlets.

Disinformation peddlers “commonly use terms like ‘breaking’ in an apparent attempt to convey legitimacy,” Sam Howard, politics editor at the watchdog NewsGuard, told AFP.

Harris, who marked her 60th birthday on Sunday while campaigning in Georgia, participated in two worship services outside of Atlanta on Sunday.

At Divine Faith Ministries International in Jonesboro, Georgia, music icon Stevie Wonder performed, singing his hit “Higher Ground” and a version of Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song.” Harris said she had checked off a “whole big one” on her bucket list when Wonder sang “Happy Birthday” for her.

Harris, who was raised in the teachings of the Black church and sang in a church choir, earlier spoke at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Stonecrest, Georgia.

There, she drew a sharp contrast to the harsh and divisive rhetoric of the current political climate, although she did not mention Trump by name.

Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, on Sunday called on law enforcement to investigate billionaire Elon Musk for his promise at a weekend pro-Trump rally to give away $1 million each day until Election Day.

Musk on Saturday gave a $1 million check to an attendee at the rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, which was hosted by America PAC, a political action group the Tesla CEO set up to back Republican Donald Trump in the Nov. 5 presidential election.

Shapiro said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Musk’s plan to give money to registered voters in Pennsylvania is “deeply concerning” and “it’s something that law enforcement could take a look at.”

As the race for the White House intensifies, former US President Donald Trump briefly manned the fry station at a McDonald’s, bringing the fast-food chain into the political debate. The Republican presidential nominee served fresh fries at the restaurant on Sunday, and the move was seen as a potshot at Vice President Kamala Harris’s past experience working at a McDonald’s.

However, Trump faced his own share of challenges during his visit, one of them being dodging questions about increasing the minimum wage. Wearing an apron, the former reality TV star lifted fries out of the hot oil, shook them, salted them and placed them into containers for service. He lauded the staff and the fast food chain, later to be popping his head out of the drive-through window and waving at the crowd.

With just a few weeks left for the 2024 US presidential contest, Vice President Kamala Harris celebrated her 60th birthday on the campaign trail on Sunday. The Democratic presidential nominee rallied Black voters in Georgia with “souls to the polls” events at two community churches.

While Harris was celebrating her birthday with her supporters, her Republican rival Donald Trump doubled down on his provocative rhetoric referring to Democrats as “enemies from within”. The two candidates have been campaigning aggressively and attempting to shore up support in key states before the November polls.

Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota responded to former President Donald Trump’s employment at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania on Sunday by drawing a comparison between Trump’s history of “stifling” workers and Vice President Kamala Harris’ support for them.

In a social media post, Walz praised Harris’ time spent working at McDonald’s during his undergraduate years and criticised Trump for opposing hikes in the minimum wage and reducing overtime benefits for employees while in office.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz slammed former President Donald Trump for making vulgar comments about retired professional golfer Arnold Palmer during a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday.

Speaking to supporters at a campaign fundraiser in Boston on Sunday, Walz brought up Trump’s narrative, which lasted more than fifteen minutes and contained comments about Palmer’s nude body.

US Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday said her election rival Donald Trump “demeans” the office of the president with his use of coarse language, a day after the Republican insulted her using an expletive.

Speaking in an interview aired on US broadcaster MSNBC, Harris said Trump’s comment was an insult to the office and degraded the United States’ moral authority internationally.

“What you see in my opponent, a former president of the United States, really it demeans the office,” she said, in response to a question about the comments.

Addressing a rally in the key swing state of Pennsylvania on Saturday, Trump referred to Harris as “a shit vice president,” to roars of approval from his supporters.

Republican fast food enthusiast Donald Trump on Sunday donned a black-and-yellow apron over his white shirt and red tie to serve french fries at a McDonald’s restaurant in Pennsylvania.

The campaign stunt was intended as a jab at opponent Kamala Harris, who says she worked at the fast-food franchise in her youth.

Trump has repeatedly said, without offering evidence, that Harris never worked at a McDonald’s while in college, an experience she has spoken about on the campaign.

On Sunday, an employee of the restaurant patiently showed the 78-year-old Republican how to scoop fries into cartons to be distributed at the drive-through window, as media gathered for the photo-op outside.

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump, left, hands off an order of fries after working alongside an employee during a visit to McDonald’s in Feasterville-Trevose, Pa., Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024. AP