Jacob Fischler States Newsrooms

Three states are at risk of losing some federal transportation funding because they are not enforcing President Donald Trump’s executive order that commercial truck drivers must be proficient in English, U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday.

New Mexico, Washington and California will have 30 days to comply with the order or risk losing funding from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration — among the smaller of the Transportation Department’s agencies — Duffy said, standing behind a lectern with an “America First” banner on it at the department’s Washington, D.C., headquarters.

California stands to lose $33 million, Washington could lose $10.5 million and New Mexico would lose $7 million, Duffy said. He urged the states to comply with the executive order, which Trump signed in April and took effect in June, or face increasingly draconian penalties.

“We don’t want to take away money from states,” Duffy said. “But we will take money away and we will take additional steps that get progressively more difficult for these states. There’s a lot of great tools that we have here that we don’t want to use.”

All three states contributed to a Florida crash this month in which three people were killed, Duffy said. The truck driver involved had a commercial license from California and Washington, and had been pulled over for speeding in New Mexico prior to crashing in Florida, Duffy said.

“So this one driver touched all three states,” he said.

The Florida driver, an immigrant from India who did not have permanent legal authority to be in the country, made an illegal U-turn on the Florida Turnpike, according to local reports.

Duffy said the Florida driver did not understand road signs, but did not further specify how his lack of English comprehension led to the crash, which reportedly involved making a U-turn across lanes of traffic. But Duffy repeatedly said the issue was one of safety.

Duffy said that when the Trump executive order went into effect, it received negative publicity.

“There was a lot of press that complained to us that we were being unfair to people, that we were being mean to people,” he said. “And what we said was, ‘No, this is a safety issue.’ Making sure drivers of very heavy, 80,000-pound rigs can speak the language is truly a critical safety issue. And some complained about it.”

Newsom hits back

On social media, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s press office said the federal government approved a permit for the Florida driver.

“This is rich,” Newsom’s office wrote on X. “The Trump Administration approved the federal work permit for the man who killed 3 people — and now they’re scrambling to shift blame after getting caught. Sean’s nonsense announcement is as big a joke as the Trump Administration itself.”

A DHS spokesperson denied the federal government issued the driver a work permit and blamed Newsom.

“These innocent people were killed in Florida because Gavin Newsom’s California Department of Motor Vehicles issued an illegal alien a Commercial Driver’s License—this state of governance is asinine,” a spokesperson wrote in an email to States Newsroom.

Newsom has increasingly over the past few months used his social media channels to mock Trump.

Washington State Patrol spokesman Chris Loftis wrote in an email that the agency was “reviewing the matter with our state transportation partners” and would soon have a more detailed response.

That state’s Gov. Bob Ferguson, a Democrat, made a defiant statement last week about complying with the Trump administration’s demands on immigration enforcement.

“Washington State will not be bullied or intimidated by threats and legally baseless accusations,” he wrote to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.

He has amplified that message several times since.

The New Mexico Department of Transportation deferred a request for comment to the state’s Department of Public Safety, which did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

Investigating testing

Duffy said he was puzzled by commercial drivers who were able to pass a skills test without understanding English, and said the department was investigating that issue.

“This is something we’re looking at and working on when someone, an individual, comes in to take their test to become a commercial driver, and then they do a skills test… at that point, it would be clear that this driver doesn’t understand all the road signs and doesn’t speak the language, but miraculously, they’re passing the skills test,” he said. “I think any common-sense analysis would say, well, that doesn’t make sense.”

The federal department would be looking at whether the skills tests are being correctly administered and whether there is “some gaming of the system that we have to address.”

This article was published in partnership with the Creative Commons. Read the full story here.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy urged patience Wednesday from Democratic and Republican members of the U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee who asked about a backlog of approved grants the department has yet to pay out to state and local governments.

Duffy, in his first appearance before the panel, said former President Joe Biden’s Transportation Department approved an unprecedented 3,200 grants between Election Day 2024 and President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January 2025. Duffy told the panel his department was working to send out the remaining 1,300 grants, but that the task would take time.

He added that his hope was to complete the review by late summer or early fall.

“We have been left 3,200 grants — that is a historic number — from the last administration,” he said in response to a question from ranking Democrat Rick Larsen of Washington. “I know you all want your grants, but I don’t think everyone recognizes the workload that was left to us.”

Duffy also promoted the inclusion in Republicans’ budget reconciliation law of $12.5 billion to overhaul the nation’s air traffic control system, calling it a “down payment” on a $31.5 billion need. He called on Congress to fund the remaining $19 billion.

The air traffic control system has been targeted for reforms and technical upgrades for years. Renewed urgency on the issue came this year after a deadly crash near Washington Reagan National Airport in Northern Virginia during Duffy’s first full day on the job.

‘Leaving construction jobs on the table’

Larsen pressed Duffy on the delayed grants, and several members of both parties also asked about the status of grants to projects in their districts.

“I urge you to get on with the review of the remainder of these grants, because we’re leaving construction jobs on the table without these grants going out the door,” Larsen said. “Holding up these grants stalls badly needed job training, construction investments, and we need to get them going on that.”

Duffy said the department processed more grants in the first three months of the year than previous administrations had during the same period, but acknowledged that members of Congress and state transportation departments still wanted faster movement.

“I know that’s not enough for everybody,” he said. “Everyone wants their grants right now, and so we are working diligently to do that as quickly as possible.”

But some Democrats also complained about seven grants that had been canceled outright. Six of the seven were in Democratic states, California Democrat John Garamendi said. The seventh was a grant to the University of New Orleans, he said.

The projects appeared to be targeted because their titles included words related to diversity, equity and inclusion, Garamendi said.

Duffy said those grants departed from what the department’s priorities should be, such as decreasing the 40,000 traffic deaths per year.

“The racial stuff, as opposed to keeping people safe, that’s my drive,” Duffy said.

Air traffic control modernization

Duffy noted many members of the panel did not vote for the reconciliation law that extended 2017 tax cuts while slashing spending on Medicaid and nutrition assistance programs. No Democrats voted for the law.

But he said he thought everyone on the committee would have supported the $12.5 billion for air traffic control.

Chairman Sam Graves, a Missouri Republican, praised the provision.

“This funding will allow the administration to immediately get to work to replace critical telecommunications infrastructure and radar systems, invest in runway safety and airport surveillance projects and replace antiquated air traffic control facilities,” Graves said.

That initial payment would be insufficient to the total need of the system, Duffy said.

“We are going to need more money from the Congress than this $12.5 billion,” he said. “We will need more to do it. No offense to anybody, but the way Congress spends money, we’re talking $31.5 billion to do the full project. And my hope is that we’ll have an additional conversation about how we can do that. And I think time is of the essence.”

Electric vehicles

Democrats said they wanted to restore funding, provided in the bipartisan 2021 infrastructure law, for electric vehicle, or EV, chargers.

Republicans said that money could be better spent on other priorities, such as dedicated parking spaces for truckers, an issue raised by Rep. Rick Crawford of Arkansas. Crawford, a former chair of the panel’s Highways and Transit Subcommittee, applauded the department’s recent move to redirect $275 million for truck parking.

“Our nation was not and is still not at a point where rapid rollouts of charging infrastructure is a pressing issue,” Crawford said. “In contrast, our trucking industry is certainly not in a position where transitioning to electrification is a priority, but we do need parking.”

Duffy told the panel that the Biden administration’s rules for building EV charging were part of the reason why relatively few electric vehicle chargers had been built. He told Wisconsin Republican Tony Wied and New Hampshire Democrat Chris Pappas that the previous administration’s requirements regarding social justice and climate requirements in contracts delayed construction.

“There were so many rules about how the money could be spent, and it was polluted with ideas of the DEI and all the green work, which made it really challenging for states to build,” he said.

Duffy, a former House member from Wisconsin, said he would carry out laws passed by Congress, including funding for EV charging, even though he disagreed with it. But he also said he supported Trump’s attempt to revoke funding.

Pappas told Duffy his state was ready for the new guidelines.

“We’re ready to put shovels in the ground in New Hampshire,” Pappas said.

A federal judge in Maryland on Wednesday denied the Trump administration’s attempts to dismiss a lawsuit by wrongly deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was returned to the United States last month.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis submitted a brief paperless order that did not elaborate on her reasoning for denying two government requests to dismiss the civil case, other than saying she discussed it during a Monday hearing.

The U.S. Justice Department had sought to have Abrego Garcia’s suit tossed for lack of jurisdiction while he was detained in his native El Salvador, arguing the federal government was powerless to compel a foreign government to action. The department’s lawyers made the same argument once he was returned, contending the suit seeking his return had become moot.

Xinis is scheduled to hold another hearing in the high-profile case at her Greenbelt, Maryland, courtroom Thursday.

Justice Department attorneys conceded in March that Abrego Garcia, who entered the country illegally but had been granted legal protections from deportation to his home country and had lived for years in Maryland with his family, had been wrongly removed that month to the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador.

But the administration insisted for months it was unable to bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States, while also claiming he was a gang member involved in human trafficking who should not have been allowed to reside in the country. Abrego Garcia, who remains in custody in a jail in Tennessee, has denied those charges.

A sealed federal indictment brought charges against him in May and U.S. authorities the next month extracted him from El Salvador to Tennessee, where his criminal case is proceeding.

Daily Montanan is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: info@dailymontanan.com.

President Donald Trump’s administration will pursue a ban on Chinese ownership of U.S. farmland as part of an effort to strengthen farm security, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Tuesday.

Appearing alongside other Cabinet officials, Republican governors and members of Congress at an event outside the U.S. Department of Agriculture headquarters in Washington, D.C., Rollins announced a department initiative to block “foreign countries of concern” from owning U.S. agriculture lands.

Rollins said officials will even try to revoke lands already owned by China-backed entities.

The administration will “take swift legislative and executive action to ban the purchase of American farmland by Chinese nationals and other foreign adversaries,” she said.

The executive branch will also work with state and local officials “to do everything within our ability, including presidential authorities, to claw back what has already been purchased by China and other foreign adversaries.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the nation’s food supply was a national security issue on par with energy and water supplies.

Plan details

The seven-part initiative, titled the National Farm Security Action Plan, is based on the idea that “farm security is national security,” according to a preamble to USDA’s written plan.

U.S. farmers dominate the global industry, the preamble said.

“Because that dominance is earned and not assured, it is critical we continuously adapt our approach to American agriculture security and elevate it to the top echelon of national security priorities,” the document read.

To protect U.S. farmland, the USDA, with help from the Justice Department, Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security and cooperative state and local governments, will seek to block investment by foreign adversaries and launch an online tool to help farmers report on potential unknown foreign ownership.

The administration will look for vulnerabilities in the agricultural supply chain and attempt to ensure crop and nutrition programs are not being used to fund terrorist or criminal activity, while cutting down on fraud and abuse. The plan instructs the administration to strengthen biosecurity measures.

The initiative also calls for making sure foreign governments cannot access USDA research grants or other department funding programs.

The USDA will continue to work with the national security establishment and law enforcement to protect the agriculture sector’s critical infrastructure, according to the plan.

After Republican Sens. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama and Roger Marshall of Kansas at the event criticized the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, an executive branch agency, for not having a spot for the Agriculture secretary, Rollins said she would be joining the panel as of Tuesday afternoon.

Farmland security

At the Tuesday event, speakers offered few specifics about the initiative but praised the administration for elevating the issue of foreign investment in farmland.

“A country has to be able to feed itself, fuel itself, and fight for itself to truly be free,” Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. “We now have a president who understands it and is willing to do everything within his power to make sure the United States continues to be the greatest country on the face of the planet.”

“Our farmland is not just dirt, it is our national security, it is our economic future, it is our children’s heritage,” Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee said. “And it is under threat, and the leaders here recognize that.”

Speakers emphasized what they called the threat of Chinese ownership of U.S. farmland.

“Today, we tell China to get the hell out of American agriculture,” Marshall said.

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen said his state had moved to ban Chinese equipment from telecommunications infrastructure and has worked to deny Chinese companies from owning farmland. He related a story of stonewalling Chinese-owned Syngenta, which sought a meeting with the governor.

“I said, ‘I have no interest in having a meeting,’” he said. “‘Have no interest in you being in Nebraska. My suggestion would be to leave. My suggestion would be to get a different job.’”

The company later sold their assets in Nebraska, Pillen said.

Alabama and China

Tuberville, who is running in the state’s gubernatorial race next year, appeared to say China owned 2.2 million acres of farmland in his state alone – a number that actually describes the acres of land owned by all foreign entities in the state. Chinese entities own no acres in Alabama, according to USDA data.

“China is a threat,” he said. “They’re not a threat. They are dominating us in almost everything that they do because we’ve sat back and the politicians have been counting their money instead of doing what’s right and helping this country stay in the front. We’ve got to be number one. We can’t be number two. We’ve got to fight back.

“They are coming into our country and buying our farmland. In my state of Alabama alone, they own 2.2 million acres of farmland. That’s right in Alabama. Foreign adversaries.”

Asked about the comment, Tuberville spokesperson Mallory Jaspers said he was referring not only to Chinese ownership but all foreign adversaries and indicated that he opposed any foreign ownership of U.S. farmland.

“Sen. Tuberville believes American farmland should be owned by Americans,” she wrote in an email.

The most recent year-end USDA report on foreign investment, in 2023, showed Chinese-linked investors held about 276,000 acres of U.S. farmland nationwide.

An analysis from the American Farm Bureau, an advocacy group, estimated Chinese investors accounted for only about .02% of all foreign owned U.S. agricultural land.

GOP governors back plan

In addition to Lee, Huckabee Sanders and Pillen, who spoke outside of USDA, the Republican governors of Indiana, Idaho, Iowa, South Dakota and Oklahoma signed a Tuesday letter to Rollins in support of the plan.

“As America First Governors, we firmly stand together in our unwavering support of President Donald J. Trump and his administration’s National Farm Security Action Plan,” they wrote. “This plan is a critical and decisive response to the invasion of our land, food system, and sovereignty by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).”

U.S. House passes bill targeting voting by noncitizens, which is already against the law

by Jacob Fischler, Daily Montanan
April 10, 2025

The U.S. House passed a bill Thursday to require voters to provide proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote, approving a Republican priority over the objections of Democrats who said the bill would only create hurdles for eligible voters without actually improving fraud protection.

The 220-208 vote sent the measure to the U.S. Senate, where it faces an uphill road to overcome the chamber’s 60-vote requirement for most legislation. If enacted, the bill would require states, which are responsible for administering elections, to obtain from people registering to vote in federal elections documents that prove U.S. citizenship.

Acceptable documents under the act include any valid photo ID issued by the federal government, a state or tribe that shows the applicant’s place of birth was the United States, or a combination of a valid government-issued photo ID and another document proving citizenship such as a birth certificate or certificate of naturalization.

Four House Democrats – Jared Golden of Maine, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington, Ed Case of Hawaii and Henry Cuellar of Texas – joined all Republicans present to vote in favor of the bill.

Supporters of the bill say it is needed to keep immigrants in the country without legal status from voting.

It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, though some local governments allow noncitizen residents to vote in local elections.

GOP priority

By tackling fraudulent voting and targeting immigrants in the country illegally, the bill addresses two planks of the Republican platform under President Donald Trump. Trump has consistently positioned himself as a hardliner on immigration and continues to voice the debunked claim that fraud caused his 2020 election loss.

During floor debate this week, the bill’s sponsor, Texas Republican Chip Roy, said the measure, titled the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE, Act, responded to the message voters sent by electing Trump and Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress last year after inaction from Democratic President Joe Biden.

“Republicans are responding to an American people who are tired of the previous administration that was allowing illegals to come into our country, kill our citizens, vote in our elections, undermine our country,” Roy said. “And we are addressing their concerns and our colleagues on the other side of the aisle don’t want to address it.”

Hurdle for citizens

Democrats, though, said the measure was unnecessary to prevent the exceedingly rare cases of noncitizens voting in federal elections and would only make voting harder for citizens who are eligible, including married women who may have changed their name but have not updated their documents.

“I think the gentleman from Texas will be happy to learn that it already is the law that only American citizens can vote in federal elections,” Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, said following Roy’s remarks. “Our problem with the SAVE Act is that it is an attempt to make it more difficult for women in this country, women who are U.S. citizens, to be able to vote.”

At a virtual press conference Thursday, Democratic secretaries of state – the office in most states responsible for elections administration – highlighted the difficulties it could create for eligible voters.

“Losing your driver’s license or birth certificate, letting your passport expire or even getting married and taking your partner’s last name could all prevent a voter from making their voice heard in free and fair elections if the SAVE Act passes,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said. “Replacing just one of those documents – let alone multiple documents that would be needed to register – takes time and money that not every American has.

“Women who are citizens – who are eligible to vote – should not be stopped at the ballot box by (House Speaker) Mike Johnson and Donald Trump.”

Last updated 2:37 p.m., Apr. 10, 2025

Daily Montanan is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: info@dailymontanan.com.

Democratic AGs sue National Institutes of Health over disrupted medical research grants

by Jacob Fischler, Daily Montanan
April 4, 2025

Sixteen states with Democratic attorneys general sued the National Institutes of Health on Friday, claiming the agency has purposefully delayed and disrupted medical research grant awards and terminated grants that had already been issued.

In an 82-page complaint that names Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and NIH Director Jayanta Bhattacharya as defendants, the attorneys general said since President Donald Trump retook office, NIH has delayed the review approvable process for grants that should have been awarded.

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The agency has refused to pay for multi-year grants that were approved under previous administrations, citing disagreements over race and gender issues, the suit filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts says.

Massachusetts, California, Maryland, Washington, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Hawaii, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island and Wisconsin filed the suit.

NIH work ‘in jeopardy’

The attorneys general in those states praised the NIH as “the crown jewel” of health research that has fueled medical breakthroughs and spurred economic growth across the country.

“That critical work is now in jeopardy,” they wrote. “By law, NIH provides much of its support for scientific research and training in the form of grants to outside institutions. Since January, however, the current Administration has engaged in a concerted, and multi-pronged effort to disrupt NIH’s grants.”

Starting last month, NIH sent “hundreds of letters” to research institutions in the states canceling grants that had already been issued. The institutions were told the grants “no longer effectuate… agency priorities,” according to the complaint.

Those cancellations stem from three executive orders Trump signed on his first day back in office targeting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and recognition of transgender people. Agency leaders followed up with directives to pause related grants.

The letters to research institutions declare “the grant in question has been terminated because of some connection to ‘DEI,’ ‘transgender issues,’ “vaccine hesitancy,” or another topic disfavored by the current Administration,” the attorneys general wrote.

HHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

Yet another legal battle

The department is also facing a suit from a wider group of Democratic states over the cancellation of other grants that were initially issued during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those states say the department overrode extensions of the grants and rescinded $11 billion in funding that has led to layoffs and work stoppages.

A federal judge on Thursday ordered those grants to be temporarily restored as the case unfolds.

Last updated 2:22 p.m., Apr. 4, 2025

Daily Montanan is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: info@dailymontanan.com.

by Jacob Fischler, Daily Montanan

March 26, 2025

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday to impose a 25% tariff on imported cars and light trucks.

Trump, who campaigned on bringing down consumer costs, said during an Oval Office signing event the additional tax on foreign goods would spur U.S. production.

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Asked if, like other tariffs Trump’s threatened, trade partners could do anything to avoid the fee on cars and trucks, Trump answered no. This tariff will remain in place until he leaves office, he said, and was meant to protect the U.S. industry.

“I think our automobile business will flourish like it’s never flourished before,” he said.

The tariff will go into effect April 2, he said. It will add to – not replace – any other applicable existing tariffs, he said.

“We’re going to charge countries for doing business in our country and taking our jobs, taking our wealth, taking a lot of things they’ve been taking over the years,” he said. “They’ve taken so much out of our country, friend and foe alike. And frankly, friend has been oftentimes much worse than foe.”

The measure could bring in $100 billion in tax revenue, a White House aide said during the Oval Office event.

Trump said the administration would have “very strong policing” to enforce the tariffs.

Trump said he did not seek advice from White House adviser Elon Musk, the CEO of U.S. electric carmaker Tesla, because “he might have a conflict.”

Trump said the tariffs may be good or neutral for Tesla, which he noted had large plants in Texas and California.

“Anybody that has plants in the United States it’s going to be good for,” he said.

Last updated 5:14 p.m., Mar. 26, 2025

Daily Montanan is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: info@dailymontanan.com.

Former President Donald Trump questioned polls showing a close race against Vice President Kamala Harris and complained about the conditions of an upcoming debate during a Fox News interview Wednesday in Pennsylvania.

Under questioning from a friendly interviewer, Sean Hannity of Fox News, in front of an arena of cheering supporters in Harrisburg, the Republican presidential nominee also reiterated a pledge to conduct a massive deportation operation if elected to another term and attacked Harris for her former position to ban the natural gas extraction technique known as fracking.

Trump agreed to the interview, which had been advertised as a town hall but did not include audience questions, after Harris rejected his proposal for a Fox News debate on the same date. He said Wednesday he would have preferred to be meeting Harris on stage.

But Trump spent part of the hour Wednesday criticizing the details of the 90-minute debate the campaigns have agreed to, in Philadelphia on Sept. 10 on ABC.

He called ABC News “the most dishonest network, the meanest, the nastiest,” claimed the network purposely released poor polls ahead of the 2016 election to suppress turnout and said, without evidence, executives would share questions with Harris ahead of the event. Hannity said he should host the debate instead.

Trump also claimed the family of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, endorsed him. Charles Herbster, who sought the GOP nomination for Nebraska governor in 2022, posted to X a photograph of a group of Walz’s second cousins wearing Trump shirts.

Walz’s sister, Sandy Dietrich, told The Associated Press the family was not particularly close with that branch, and said she would be voting for the ticket that included her brother.

Walz’s brother, Jeff Walz, made disparaging remarks about the Minnesota governor on Facebook, but later told NewsNation he would not comment further.

Bad polls

Hannity’s introduction Wednesday noted polls showed a tight race, but Trump said the enthusiasm among his supporters made that seem unlikely.

“I hear the polls are very close and we have a little lead,” he said. “I just find it hard to believe, because first of all, they’ve been so bad.”

Trump has sought to delegitimize polls and even election results that have not shown him ahead, including during the 2020 campaign, when he said he could only lose by fraud. After his loss to Joe Biden, he made a series of spurious fraud allegations that led to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

He said Wednesday he did well in 2016, when he won the election, but “much better” in 2020, which he lost. The enthusiasm for the current campaign tops either, he said.

Trump also complained that Harris’ entry into the race, after Biden dropped out following a bad debate performance in June, was “a coup” against Biden.

Immigration claims

Trump spent much of the hour talking about immigration, an issue he has highlighted throughout his time in politics. He repeated claims, without evidence, that immigrants entering the country illegally were largely coming from prisons and “insane asylums” and said terrorists were entering the country through the southern border.

He described immigrants as a threat to public safety and to safety net programs like Medicare and Social Security. “These people are so bad,” he said. “They’re so dangerous. What they’ve done to our country is they’re destroying our country. And we can’t let this happen.”

He seemed to reference a viral claim that Venezuelan immigrants had “taken over” an apartment in Aurora, Colorado. Residents of the building have disputed that description.

Fracking and Pennsylvania

Playing to the audience of supporters in Pennsylvania’s state capital, Trump also attacked Harris for her former position on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a technique for extracting natural gas that is a major industry in the commonwealth.

Harris said during her short-lived campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in the 2020 election she supported an end to fracking. Trump and Hannity brought that up several times Wednesday, with Trump saying it should disqualify her for voters in Pennsylvania, whose 19 electoral votes will be key in deciding the election.

“You have no choice,” he said. “You’ve got to vote for me, even if you don’t like me.”

Harris has said this year she does not support a ban on fracking.

More to come

The event was advertised as a town hall and Hannity several times said audience questions would be upcoming, but no members of the pro-Trump audience were given an opportunity to ask a question.

During the interview, Hannity acknowledged Dave McCormick, the Republican challenger to Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey in one of the nation’s most competitive Senate races, in the crowd. Hannity indicated at the end of the broadcast that taping would continue, with McCormick asking “the first question,” and air Thursday night.

In an email following the event, Fox News spokeswoman Sofie Watson said the portion of the event with audience questions would air “later this week.”

Iowa Capital Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Iowa Capital Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kathie Obradovich for questions: info@iowacapitaldispatch.com. Follow Iowa Capital Dispatch on Facebook and X.

CHICAGO — Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride, who in November is expected to become the first openly transgender person elected to Congress, told LGBTQ delegates to the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday that her candidacy marked a milestone for trans representation.

But she also emphasized at an afternoon LGBTQ+ Caucus meeting the importance of the example she would set if elected to the seat considered by election forecasters safely Democratic.

Just as Vice President Kamala Harris’ election to the presidency would show “a young Black girl and a young South Asian girl that she can have dreams that reach for the stars,” McBride’s election would send a similar message to trans people, she said.

“We can show a young trans person that no matter what extremists say or do, that here in America, they belong,” she said. “They belong in our schools, they belong in our communities, and yes, they even belong in the halls of Congress.”

She also marveled at how unlikely her candidacy may have been considered in the recent past.

“If you could have told my 10-year-old self that there’d be a room full of amazing Democrats chanting my chosen name, I never would have believed it,” McBride, 34, said after taking the stage to a standing ovation.

McBride pledged to advance LGBTQ rights in Congress, but also to work toward other issues, including making health care and child care more affordable and protecting reproductive rights.

‘We have power here’

Chasten Buttigieg, husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who became the first openly gay candidate to win the most delegates in a presidential nominating contest in the 2020 Iowa Democratic caucuses, echoed McBride in discussing the feeling of belonging for LGBTQ people in the party.

“I keep thinking about what it was like walking the halls of high school as a closeted teenager, and had I ever passed a room like this that said LGBTQ Caucus, how I would have ran away, that I would have never have had the courage to walk through that door,” he said.

“How remarkable it is today to be surrounded by friends and family, to look at our neighbor and know that not only do we belong here, not only should we take up space here, but we have power here,” he added. “I think that’s pretty remarkable.”

Pete Buttigieg is scheduled to speak as part of the convention’s prime-time program Wednesday at the United Center.

Backing Harris-Walz

McBride, Chasten Buttigieg and other speakers at the meeting described Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, as LGBTQ allies.

Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison said Harris still bore a scar from a childhood fight against a bully who picked on a friend. The episode showed she was a forceful ally who would fight for justice, he said.

Walz, as a high school teacher and football coach before entering politics, helped start the school’s gay-straight alliance, Harrison said.

“He was a pioneer standing up to be an ally to the LGBTQ community, helping to create an atmosphere for a young gay person who could stand up and be themselves,” Harrison said. “That is who we have leading us in the Democratic Party.”

Chasten Buttigieg said he thought of young people today who would be scared, as he was, or didn’t feel safe enough to live openly.

“So let’s go out there and show them that there can be a better way,” he said. “And I know we can do that by electing Kamala Harris and Tim Walz this November. They are your ally. They are our allies. And I hope that we can remember to be pro-family is to be pro-every-family.”

Texas state Rep. Julie Johnson, the Democratic candidate in a safely Democratic U.S. House seat who said she would be the first openly gay member of Congress elected from a Southern state, called on LGBTQ people to continue being politically active and for LGBTQ candidates to embrace their identity.

She amended a Harris campaign slogan to drive home the point.

“When we fight, we win,” she said. “And gay people fight like hell.”

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CHICAGO – The leader of Democrats’ U.S. Senate campaign arm projected confidence Monday at a Politico event organized outside the Democratic National Convention, saying the party would sweep competitive races this cycle and retain control of the chamber with a win in the presidential race.

U.S. Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, who chairs the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, told Politico’s Jonathan Martin that incumbents Jon Tester in Montana and Sherrod Brown in Ohio would overcome partisan disadvantages in their states to win reelection on the strength of their individual brands.

“Jon Tester is as authentic a person from Montana as you could possibly get,” Peters said. “He understands folks in Montana. He’s out in the community. Montana is a really big state geographically, but population-wise is smaller, and so he’s gotten to know a lot of folks in a more personal way that allows you to transcend some of that.”

Tester is being opposed by Republican Tim Sheehy, an entrepreneur and former Navy SEAL.

The same went for Brown in Ohio, Peters said.

“I’ve always said I don’t know if any Democrat can win Ohio, unless their name is Sherrod Brown,” he said. “Which is why I say, in this election, I have really good news for folks: I got a guy named Sherrod Brown who’s running in Ohio.”

Republican businessman Bernie Moreno is challenging Brown.

Democrats have no margin for error this Senate election cycle.

With the departure of Sen. Joe Manchin III, a West Virginia independent who was elected as a Democrat and is retiring rather than seeking reelection this fall, and no Republicans in seriously competitive states up for reelection, they must win the remaining competitive races. In addition, Vice President Kamala Harris must prevail in the presidential race to keep control of the chamber.

In addition to Tester’s and Brown’s races, Democratic incumbents are up for reelection in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Nevada, while retirements have created open races in Michigan and Arizona. Winning all seven would give Senate Democrats a 50-50 tie that could be broken with the vote of a Democratic vice president.

The races in Michigan, Montana and Ohio are rated “toss-up” by The Cook Political Report with Amy Walter. The other four are rated “lean Democrat,” meaning the Democratic candidate is slightly favored.

Relationship with Arab American community

Peters said Harris should work to communicate with his state’s Arab American voters on the Israel-Hamas war.

The roughly 200,000 Arab American voters in Michigan make it unique among swing states.

Many of those voters opposed President Joe Biden’s aborted reelection race, and Peters said they should now listen to the new candidate at the top of the Democratic ticket.

“She is talking to a lot of folks who feel very frustrated that they’re not being listened to by folks — not just this administration but generally — about what’s happening in Gaza,” he said.

Peters said Harris has communicated that Israel has a right to defend itself against Hamas, “a horrible terrorist organization that has engaged in unspeakable atrocities,” but has also been sensitive to the “innocent folks caught in the middle.”

He said a cease-fire in the Middle East was needed.

Asked directly if Harris would differentiate her policy views from Biden’s, Peter said she would.

To win Michigan, Peters said it was important to authentically communicate her own message on that issue.

“It shows that she’s her own person, she thinks her own way,” he said.

Iowa Capital Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Iowa Capital Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kathie Obradovich for questions: info@iowacapitaldispatch.com. Follow Iowa Capital Dispatch on Facebook and X.

CHICAGO –– Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic candidate for vice president, made a surprise appearance at a Democratic National Convention breakfast program for the delegation from Wisconsin — one of a handful of battleground states — to encourage attendees to continue their hard campaign push to the Nov. 5 election.

Repeating a refrain from his short time on the campaign trail so far, Walz urged the Wisconsinites to sprint to Election Day to elect Vice President Kamala Harris. She is scheduled to deliver an acceptance speech as the party’s presidential nominee Thursday evening.

“We’ve got 78 days of hard work,” said Walz. “We can sleep when we’re dead.”

Harris’ entrance into the race less than a month ago — following President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw — has energized Democrats, leading to a flurry of new volunteers signing up for the campaign, Walz said.

Walz told the crowd to focus not only on defeating former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, but to take motivation from their own agenda.

“It’s not just beating those guys,” Walz said. “It’s about the idea of the things that we believe in, whether it’s democracy or freedom or the strength of our public schools.”

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore sounded a similar tone in his remarks to the delegation.

“The reason we are all fired up … is not because we are afraid of the alternative,” Moore said. “We don’t need to spend any more time talking about how dangerous that alternative is. The reason that we are going to fight, the reason that we are going to win, is not because we are afraid of the alternative, it is because we are so hopeful and so optimistic about what the future is going to be like in a Harris-Walz administration.”

A Democratic administration would address housing insecurity, child poverty and gun violence, Moore said.

The message of Democratic unity resonated with Michael Jones, a Wisconsin delegate and special education teacher in Madison.

“While we all understand how terrible the alternative is, we’re not just talking about that, but we’re also talking about the joy and the positivity of when we come together,” he said.

Swing state

Speakers noted the importance of Wisconsin as one of a handful of toss-up states in the presidential election.

“You know what you have to do,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul told the group. “The nation is counting on you.”

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers told reporters, following his prepared remarks, that Democrats in the state would work to turn out voters in the presidential election.

“That’s our job,” he said. “We can’t expect Tim Walz or Kamala Harris to be showing up in Wisconsin every day. So we’re going to do it.”

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York also addressed the delegation, saying Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s reelection race was critical to retaining a Democratic majority in the chamber.

“We can’t keep the Senate without” Baldwin winning, he said.

Schumer promoted Baldwin’s work in the Senate, including on a bipartisan bill to promote microchips manufacturing.

Education a top issue

The drop-in from Walz energized delegates, including Terri Wenkman, from Jefferson, Wisconsin.

“I was excited most about the surprise visit from Tim Walz,” Wenkman, a former school board member, said. “Public education is a huge piece for me, so the selection of somebody that was a public school teacher and a true huge advocate for public education, I really identify with that.”

Wenkman added that Walz’s message to drive hard to the finish line resonated, saying that the shortened campaign season may benefit Democrats.

Walz’s background as a high school teacher and football coach came through in his delivery, Jones said.

Evers, also a former teacher and state schools superintendent, made a reference during his prepared remarks to Walz’s teaching career.

“We know what happens when we elect teachers,” he said.

Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris interviewed contenders to be her running mate over the weekend, continuing a closely watched deliberation that is set to wrap up with an announcement Monday or Tuesday.

Harris met with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona at the vice president’s residence at the Naval Observatory in Washington on Sunday, according to multiple media

reports. Some reports indicated those three were the finalists for the position, while others said more candidates may have been interviewed virtually.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker also have been considered in the running.

Reporters staked out at the vice president’s residence spotted former Attorney General Eric Holder, who is leading the vetting of potential running mates for Harris, entering the complex on Saturday morning.

Harris is scheduled to kick off a seven-state campaign tour with her running mate in Philadelphia on Tuesday evening.

Spokespeople for the Harris campaign did not respond to a message seeking comment Monday morning.

Kelly tweets scrutinized

Kelly’s activity on social media Sunday fueled speculation about his status. He tweeted, then deleted, a post about his background in the U.S. Navy and as a NASA astronaut that ended with “Now, my mission is serving Arizonans.”

Some read the post to reflect that Kelly was no longer a contender for vice president.

He later sent another post with a similar theme about his biography that instead ended with, “I’ve learned that when your country asks you to serve, you always answer the call.”

Jacob Peters, a spokesman for Kelly, tweeted that Kelly’s posts had been overanalyzed.

“An Arizona senator tweeting about being an Arizona senator is not news!” he wrote. “Go back to your Sundays everybody!”

Interviews to probe weaknesses

Jon Green, a political science professor at Duke University in North Carolina, told States Newsroom the weekend interviews were likely to test the contenders’ responses to questions that will arise once they join the ticket.

Each potential pick would bring strengths and weaknesses, and Harris may be questioning how they would handle perceived concerns, he said.

Shapiro, the popular governor of a must-win state, has faced objections from progressive Democratic activists about his positions on school vouchers, which are deeply opposed by the teachers unions that form a part of the Democratic base, and his response to protests over Israel’s war in Gaza, Green said.

“I think Harris will likely be asking him, ‘How are you going to handle — or how are we going to handle, if you’re the pick — the coalitional dynamics there?’” Green said.

Shapiro’s known policy preferences on Israel are not out of line with other contenders, but he made harsher public comments about protesters at the University of Pennsylvania.

Kelly also may have had to answer how he’d handle being seen as “the least pro-labor” of the prospective running mates, Green said.

The Harris campaign may examine if Walz, who has emerged as a favorite of the party’s progressive wing, effectively balances Harris’ liberal profile, Green said.

Walz has spearheaded progressive bills through a closely divided state Legislature.

“That has endeared him to the left wing of the coalition,” Green said. “That might be seen as a potential liability in the general election campaign if the knock on the ticket is that they’re presenting this left-wing agenda, he’s almost too good at passing liberal legislation for the median voter.”

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The Democratic National Committee will unveil a confrontational digital ad campaign in battleground states, starting Friday in Atlanta, to press Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to debate Vice President Kamala Harris, the likely Democratic nominee, States Newsroom has learned.

Trump has not committed to debating Harris, who has said she is eager to keep a Sept. 10 debate date that was negotiated before she entered the race.

The ads, which will blanket major newspaper websites in battleground states where Trump is campaigning, starting with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, call the former president “afraid to debate” Harris, according to a news release from the DNC.

The DNC plans to replicate the ads running in Atlanta on the websites of other major newspapers in swing states on days Trump will be stumping in those states. The ads will generally run the day of a Trump campaign event, but the first ads in Atlanta will run for two days, Friday and Saturday, ahead of a Trump appearance there Saturday, a DNC spokesperson said.

The unusual ad buy highlights parts of Trump’s record that Democrats have been hammering throughout the campaign, including a conservative policy blueprint known as Project 2025 that calls for a nationwide abortion ban and the 34 New York state felony charges Trump was convicted of in May.

“Trump is a convicted felon whose Project 2025 would ban abortion nationwide,” one banner ad shared with States Newsroom before its launch reads. “No wonder he’s afraid to debate.”

Trump and his campaign have worked to distance the candidate from Project 2025, which was created by the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation, but have not produced a comprehensive policy document to replace it.

Debate about debates

Trump agreed in May to two debates with President Joe Biden, then the presumptive Democratic nominee. But weeks after Biden’s poor performance in the first, on June 27, the incumbent dropped out of the race and endorsed Harris to replace him on the top of the Democratic ticket.

Trump campaign communications director Steven Cheung said in a July 25 statement that Trump’s agreement to debate on Sept. 10 did not necessarily hold after Biden’s withdrawal, saying the Democratic nomination was still unsettled.

Harris is the only candidate for the Democratic nomination, which will be finalized during a virtual roll call of Democratic delegates that started Thursday. She is scheduled to accept the Democratic nomination at the party’s convention this month in Chicago.

The ads represent an escalation in Democrats’ pressure campaign to get Trump on a debate stage with Harris.

At her own Atlanta rally on Wednesday, hours after Trump made an unfounded comment about Harris’ racial identity, Harris challenged the former president to debate her.

“Donald, I do hope you’ll reconsider to meet me on the debate stage,” she said. “Because as the saying goes, if you got something to say, say it to my face.”

The Sept. 10 debate was set to air on ABC with moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis of ABC News. Further details, including location, were set to be announced closer to that date.

Democrats have said Harris will still participate in the debate whether Trump shows or not.

“No matter where Trump is on September 10, voters know where he stands,” DNC communications director Rosemary Boeglin said in a written statement. “Meanwhile, Vice President Harris will be on the debate stage to offer America the path forward – giving voters the choice to reject Trump’s MAGA extremism once and for all.”

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President Joe Biden called for a de-escalation in political rhetoric but kept up criticism of former President Donald Trump on Monday, in Biden’s first interview since a Saturday assassination attempt on Trump.

Talking to NBC News anchor Lester Holt, Biden said he called the injured Trump on Saturday to convey his well wishes.

But he argued to Holt that Trump, whom Republicans officially nominated as their presidential candidate at their convention Monday, remains a threat to U.S. democracy who routinely employed violent rhetoric and led an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Biden said it was a mistake to use the word “bullseye” on a call with Democratic donors last week, when telling them to concentrate on the Republican candidate instead of the fallout from Biden’s poor debate performance.

Many elected officials and fundraisers after the debate wondered if Biden should withdraw from his reelection campaign.

“I meant focus on him,” Biden said of Trump. “Focus on what he’s doing. Focus on his policies.”

The former president survived a shooting on Saturday that killed one person and left two others injured at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. The gunman was killed at the scene.

Biden said he did not intentionally use violent rhetoric, but did not apologize or back down from his criticisms of Trump as a “threat to democracy.”

“How do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when a president says things like he says?” Biden said.

“I’m not engaged in that rhetoric,” Biden said. “My opponent is engaged in that rhetoric, talking about there will be a bloodbath if he loses.”

Trump pick of J.D. Vance as running mate opens new battlefront in presidential race

He also noted Trump said he would commute the sentences of those convicted for attacking the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and mocked then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband after he was assaulted by a man with a hammer during a home invasion.

“This doesn’t sound like you’re turning down the heat,” Holt said.

Biden responded that some ideas that Trump champions — continuing to challenge the 2020 election results despite losing in dozens of court cases, demanding a loyalty pledge from Republicans, calling political opponents “vermin” and saying he would be a dictator on day one of a second term — were antithetical to democracy.

Biden focused especially on the Jan. 6 attack, when a mob of Trump supporters sought to stop Congress and Vice President Mike Pence from certifying Biden’s 2020 victory over then-President Trump.

“When you say there’s nothing wrong with going to the Capitol, breaking in, threatening people, a couple cops dying, putting up a noose and gallows for the former vice president, and then you say you’re going to forgive people for that? That you’re going to pardon them?” Biden said.

“Violence is never appropriate,” he said. “Never, never, never, never, never in politics.”

He pledged to “keep talking about the issues” and chastised Holt and the rest of the news media for what he said was a lack of focus on real policy issues.

“Sometime come and talk to me about what we should be talking about, OK? The issues,” Biden said at the close of the roughly 20-minute interview.

Classified documents charges

Holt asked Biden about the news earlier Monday that Judge Aileen Cannon, a federal judge in South Florida, dismissed the charges against Trump in a case accusing him of improperly storing classified documents from his presidency.

Biden said he felt the decision from a Trump-appointed federal judge was reached in error.

“I’m not surprised,” Biden said. “But my generic point is that … the basis upon which the case was thrown out, I find specious.”

Debate fallout

Asked by Holt if he’d “weathered the storm” of Democratic discontent over his June 27 debate performance that shook confidence in his candidacy, Biden said he was staying in the race, citing his victories in primaries and caucuses that didn’t see a serious challenge to his reelection.

“Look, 14 million people voted for me to be the nominee in the Democratic Party, OK?” Biden said. “I listen to them.”

Biden again conceded he’d “had a bad, bad night” at the debate, but told Holt that news reports should have paid more attention to Trump’s performance.

“I screwed up,” Biden said. “Why didn’t the press cover all the lies he told?”

After Trump assassination attempt, Secret Service comes under heavy criticism

Asked about comments from senior members of his party in Congress, including Pelosi and former No. 3 House Democrat Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, seeming to leave open the possibility he could step aside, Biden said he remained ready to campaign on a strong record.

The race remains close even after the poor debate, Biden said. He added that he’s had one of the most successful presidencies since Franklin Roosevelt nearly 100 years ago.

“I’ve gotten more done than any president has in a long, long time in three-and-a-half years, so I’m willing to be judged on that.”

Biden, 81, said he understood the concerns about his age and called it a “legitimate” question” to ask how he would perform over the next four years.

But when Holt asked if Biden was motivated to “get back on the horse” and debate Trump again “in the next few weeks,” Biden pushed back, noting a packed public schedule since the debate.

“I’m on the horse,” he told the interviewer. “Where you been?”

Vance pick

Trump’s choice of U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio as his running mate showed that he would surround himself “with people who agree completely with him,” Biden said.

Holt noted Vance has made comments about Biden, but the president urged Holt to examine Vance’s comments about Trump. In 2016, as a private citizen with a somewhat public profile as a businessperson and memoirist, Vance made several harsh comments about Trump.

Biden expressed some frustration that Holt did not seem interested in that history.

“He said some things about me, but see what he said about Trump,” Biden said. “What’s with you guys? Come on, man.”

The president said Vance has endorsed Republican positions to severely restrict abortion, cut taxes on high-income earners and to deny climate change.

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President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump will get a crucial opportunity to reach undecided voters and set the terms for the 2024 presidential campaign at Thursday night’s debate in Atlanta.

Partisans on either side have already made up their minds about which candidate they’ll support. And with this year’s race serving as a rematch of 2020, many Americans have already formed strong and possibly unchangeable opinions about the candidates.

Yet there is a sizable group of voters who haven’t decided who they’ll support in November, Christopher Stout, a professor of political science at Oregon State University, said in an interview with States Newsroom.

“On one hand, opinions about Joe Biden and Donald Trump are baked in,” Stout said. “On the other hand, there’s a lot of people who aren’t paying any attention to politics and this is their first time thinking about the 2024 election.”

For Biden, a major objective will be to show voters the 81-year-old incumbent can be energetic and forceful, Stout and political strategists said.

Trump, 78, may focus on appealing to voters in the ideological middle and wavering Republicans who want a conservative candidate but are turned off by the former president’s antics.

On policy, each candidate has issues they will capitalize on as strengths. Trump will probably press Biden on immigration and inflation, while Biden undoubtedly will be eager to criticize Trump on reproductive rights.

The debate, sponsored by CNN, will be moderated by the network’s Jake Tapper and Dana Bash and begin at 9 p.m. Eastern, with no studio audience. It is set to last for 90 minutes and will air live on CNN with simulcast available for other cable and broadcast networks.

Each candidate’s microphone will be muted while the other is speaking. No props are allowed but each man will be given a pen, pad and bottle of water, CNN said.

Can Trump be boring?

Trump could gain ground with moderate and independent voters by appearing steady.

After winning the presidency in 2016, Trump lost to Biden in 2020 amid a sense that Republican-leaning voters were weary of his unorthodox style and tendency to create scandal.

“If he’s boring and he looks like a typical politician, that’s going to be a big plus for him,” Stout said. “If he looks like a typical politician and he seems more moderate, then there’s the opportunity to bring back a set of voters who were once Republican who have now left the party.”

At the same time, there’s likely not too much down side for Trump if he does go off-script, as voters have come to expect outlandish comments and behavior, Republican strategist Doug Heye said.

“Donald Trump is gonna say something crazy,” Heye said. “That is all factored in and that’s not changing anybody’s mind.”

Heye cited recent remarks Trump has made about shark attacks, electrocution from oversized batteries and taking his shirt off to reveal psychic wounds inflicted by political opponents.

In a move reminiscent of his reality-show past, Trump has teased a possible announcement of his vice presidential pick at the debate.

But even if voters expect some degree of eccentricity from Trump, that will not help him win over the undecided voters who will decide the election, said Rodell Mollineau, a co-founder and partner at the Washington-based strategy firm ROKK Solutions and a veteran of Democratic campaigns.

“If you’re actually trying to reach voters, I’m not sure how Trump ranting and raving, talking about delusional conspiracy theories, helps him win independent voters,” Mollineau said.

Trump will face an additional unique challenge if he tries to look like a traditional presidential candidate: his 34 felony convictions in New York last month and the three other felony prosecutions against him pending, including two related to his efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 election that led to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.

“I’m watching to see how he talks about or doesn’t talk about his many court dalliances and the conviction and whatever else he has hanging over his head,” Mollineau said.

Can Biden be forceful?

Biden faces different questions he must answer.

Voters have doubts about the incumbent’s ability, due in part to his age, inclination for misspeaking and a concerted effort by Republicans and GOP-aligned media to portray Biden as past his prime.

“I think Biden in part is going to be trying to overcome the image that Trump and Republicans in general have been very successful in creating,” University of Georgia political science professor Charles Bullock said. “They’ve been working on this now for at least five years, and that is the image of Biden being too old, being not up to it physically or mentally to continue to serve as president for another four years.”

Biden countered that narrative — at least temporarily — with an exuberant performance at the State of the Union address this year, several observers said.

Matching that energy will help him have a positive debate, they said.

But Heye noted that despite rave reviews from Democrats, the president’s State of the Union performance did not improve his standing in polls.

“The reaction from Democrats was: game changer,” Heye said. “And if we look at the polling, the game didn’t change at all.”

Biden would also benefit by reminding voters of his policy record, and contrasting it with Trump’s, Stout and Mollineau said.

“It will advantage him if he can talk about policy,” Stout said. “People don’t know the things he has done and so there’s hope maybe to inform people and sway the electorate.”

Biden should target left-leaning voters by reminding them of his achievements on climate and the environment and his administration’s efforts to create jobs, Stout said.

Mollineau added that Biden must remind voters of Trump’s tumultuous time in office and Biden’s achievements thus far, while balancing that message with an acknowledgment that many Americans are unsatisfied.

An early debate

The debate, which will be broadcast from CNN’s Georgia headquarters, comes much earlier in the election cycle than usual, even before the party conventions that typically symbolize the start of the general election.

The candidates agreed to the unusual schedule after rejecting a proposal from the Commission on Presidential Debates, a nonpartisan organization that has organized the events for decades, typically with three meetings between presidential candidates and one between would-be vice presidents.

All debates are usually in the fall.

This year’s June schedule could give the candidates a chance to frame the race moving forward, as many voters will be tuning in to the contest for the first time.

But the nearly 19 weeks remaining until Election Day could also mean a candidate with a weak performance has time to recover, or that a strong performance could diminish.

“I do not believe anyone is going to either win or lose the election this week,” Mollineau said.

Bullock, the Georgia professor, differed.

Because of the unpopularity of both candidates, and the sense that voters will be choosing the one they view as “the least of two evils,” either could provide a voter’s “final straw,” he said.

“They may hear something coming out of the mouths of one of these and say, ‘Yeah, that’s it,’” Bullock said. “‘That’s the final straw. I can’t support that one. It helps me make up my mind to go with the other person.’”

Ross Williams contributed to this report.

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