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u.s. news Diaranson 23 september 2020

Is this suddenly a new election?

(AP) - Presidential politics sessed with the election-eve
move fast. What we’re watch- nomination fight. The stakes
ing heading into a new week are huge for the future of
on the 2020 campaign: Days the U.S. judiciary and sev-
to general election: 43 Days eral major issues, abortion
to first debate: 8 rights among them. But it's
less clear that the persuadable
The narrative voters of Florida, Pennsylva-
The October surprise of 2020 nia and Arizona are equally
came early. interested in the Supreme
The death of Ruth Bader Court battle.
Ginsburg injects another
generational fight to an elec- Americans For Prosper-
tion year that already featured ity President Tim Phillips,
the deadliest public health a conservative leader whose
threat in a century, the worst organization has spent
economic collapse since the months knocking on swing-
Great Depression and the state voters' doors and has a
most significant civil unrest keen sense of the electorate,
since the civil rights era. Six is skeptical that the court bat-
weeks before Election Day, tle will change the direction
the fight to replace Ginsburg of the election. He was out
is set to dominate headlines, canvassing over the weekend
with the prospect of reshuf- and tells us that the Supreme
fling voters' priorities and Court didn't even come up. Any nominee will have a re- tacks combined. multiple fronts, having been
campaign strategies, espe- He notes that most Ameri- cord and a background that The scary part is that there are caught on tape encourag-
cially for President Donald cans are dealing with much will undergo intense scrutiny. still several hundred Ameri- ing foreign governments to
Trump. more imminent crises: mil- Democrats will be praying cans dying each day heading meddle in the election be-
Still, the pandemic rages on. lions of children can't go to for unearthed baggage that into flu season. Before this is fore presiding over the worst
Millions of school children school, grandparents remain might delay the process or re- over, COVID could overtake economic collapse and public
are stuck at home. The eco- in isolation, and Main Street flect poorly on Trump, as was cancer and heart disease as health crises in a century.
nomic recovery is dragging. in towns across the nation the case with the president's the leading cause of death in Biden has the experience and
And nearly 200,000 Ameri- is struggling to stay open.If last nominee. Trump's team the United States this year. the ammunition to do real
cans have died. anybody says they know how will do everything in its pow- damage. But a week before
Coming soon: one of the this nomination fight will or er to make sure that doesn't Trump, who largely left states the debate, thanks to Trump's
most highly anticipated pres- won't reshape the 2020 land- happen. to deal with the pandemic on messaging, the Democrat is
idential debates in the mod- scape, they're only guessing. Under normal conditions, their own, has been escalat- the perceived underdog.
ern era is just eight days away. Supreme Court nominations ing his promises of a vaccine ___
And the nominee is?Those are immensely important. In in the near future to stop the The final thought
The big questions close to the president are en- this case, the pick could di- death. But the president's Biden's home state of Penn-
Is this suddenly a new elec- couraging him to announce rectly or indirectly reshape well-documented history of sylvania is increasingly look-
tion? his Supreme Court nomi- all three branches of the U.S. spreading false information ing like 2020's premier battle-
A presidential election that nee on or before the day of government. about the pandemic and oth- ground state. While it's true
was shaping up to be a refer- the first presidential debate, What will Trump say about er issues has badly damaged that both candidates have
endum on Trump's divisive which is Sept. 29. 200,000 dead Americans? his credibility, and as a result, multiple paths to 270 elector-
leadership through duel- He has promised to pick a The pandemic's death toll, roughly half of Americans al votes, their chances of win-
ing crises may suddenly be woman, and Republicans are which is approaching 200,000 report that they may not take ning would decrease dramat-
transformed into one about hopeful that a female pick people, is staggering, by far the vaccine when it's avail- ically if they fail to capture
Trump's next lifetime ap- could help Trump's GOP the highest in the world. For able. the state's 20 electoral votes.
pointment to the nation's with its problem with sub- context, more Americans There has been little public
highest court. Or not.It's urban women and serve as a have now been killed by CO- Can Trump reset expecta- polling in recent weeks, but
clear that the most passion- counterweight to Biden's his- VID-19 than were killed in tions for the first debate? each side privately tells us the
ate partisans in Washington toric selection of Sen. Kamala all the military conflicts after Trump and his allies have race there is tightening.
and elsewhere will be ob- Harris as his running mate. World War II and the 9/11 at- spent much of the summer Trump is scheduled to cam-
degrading Biden's men- paign in Pennsylvania twice
tal acuity, portraying the this week. And after Florida,
77-year-old Democrat as a no state will see more spend-
senile old man who has lost ing on presidential advertis-
the capacity to speak or think. ing over the coming six weeks
Polling suggests that this line than Pennsylvania, according
of attack has not been effec- to the ad tracking firm Kan-
tive, and worse for Trump, tar/CMAG. Also, just days
it's dramatically lowered ex- ago, Biden unveiled a frame
pectations for Biden in the for the election that's decid-
first debate. edly Pennsylvania-focused:
It may be too late already, This is a campaign between
but Trump's team has to shift “Scranton and Park Avenue,"
those expectations — at least Biden declared, drawing a
a little — before their first contrast between his work-
debate. ing-class Pennsylvania roots
and Trump's privileged up-
Biden is a far more expe- bringing in New York.
rienced debater and has a Trump became the first Re-
much better command of publican since 1988 to win
global affairs and domestic Pennsylvania four years ago.
policy than Trump. At the But he did it by just 44,000
same time, Trump will en- votes out of more than 6 mil-
ter the debate vulnerable on lion cast.