US election as it happened: Donald Trump holds rallies in Michigan, Wisconsin while Joe Biden hits Georgia as third coronavirus wave continues to sweep nation
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Summary
As President Donald Trump clocked up the air miles, holding three rallies in Michigan, Wisconsin and Nebraska, his campaign website was briefly taken over and defaced by hackers.
Former US president Barack Obama has mocked Trump during an appearance in Orlando, saying he was "jealous of COVID's media coverage".
Melania Trump has made her first solo appearance of the campaign, slamming Joe Biden, Democrats and the media.
3.52pm on Oct 28, 2020
We'll be back tomorrow!
By
Thank you for joining us today as President Donald Trump hosted rallies in Michigan, Wisconsin and Nebraska, while his Democratic rival Joe Biden appealed to voters in the battleground state of Georgia.
First lady Melania Trump made her first solo campaign appearance in Pennsylvania, while Democratic vice-presidential candidate Kamala Harris rallied the troops in Las Vegas.
We will be back with you tomorrow and every day until election day on November 3, and beyond.
This Thursday, join our subscriber-only virtual discussion to hear US Correspondent Matthew Knott and Senior Journalist Farrah Tomazin, in conversation with former US Correspondent Nick O'Malley, for an in-depth analysis of the race to the White House. Herald and Age subscribers can register for this free and exclusive event.
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Our weekly newsletter will deliver expert analysis of the race to the White House from our US correspondent Matthew Knott. Sign up for The Sydney MorningHerald's newsletter here, The Age's here, Brisbane Times' here and WAtoday's here.
2.35pm on Oct 28, 2020
Summary: Trump sees a wave of red at three campaign rallies while Biden makes a play for key southern state
By
US President Donald Trump and challenger Joe Biden.
A week out from the US election, here's a recap of the day.
President Donald Trump's supporters waited four hours in wet, near-freezing temperatures in Lansing, Michigan to hear him tell suburban women: "We’re getting your husbands back to work."
After a small and staid affair in Warm Springs in the key southern state of Georgia, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden turned up the volume at an invitation-only drive-in campaign rally in Atlanta.
Campaigning in Orlando, former President Barack Obama lashed out at President Donald Trump and urged state voters to turn out "like never before" to put Joe Biden in the White House.
Trump's second big rally of the day in West Salem, Wisconsin, was held just hours after state public health officials announced new highs in reported coronavirus-related deaths and hospitalisations.
Trump's campaign website was briefly taken over by hackers who defaced the site on Tuesday, local time. The defacement lasted less than 30 minutes, and a spokesman said "there was no exposure to sensitive data".
First lady Melania Trump, newly recovered from a bout of coronavirus, made her first solo appearance on the campaign trail, defending her husband's record on COVID-19 even as he continued to play down the threat of a virus that has killed more than 226,000 Americans.
Democratic vice-presidential candidate Kamala Harris rallied voters in Las Vegas, urging people to make a "special effort" not to let the circumstances of the coronavirus pandemic "disempower anybody".
More than 70 million Americans have cast ballots in the US presidential election, more than half the total turnout of the 2016 election with one week to go until election day, according to a tally from the US Elections Project.
2.09pm on Oct 28, 2020
Trump says midwest 'heated up' with coronavirus cases
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President Donald Trump on Tuesday night acknowledged that coronavirus cases are rising in "certain areas" of the Midwest, a rare admission during the final week of the presidential campaign.
"Certain areas that are heated up right now," Trump said at a rally in Omaha, Nebraska. "They'll go down. They'll go down very quickly. They'll be down within two weeks, they're figuring."
Trump has routinely downplayed the virus while making his closing argument to voters, who have rated his pandemic response poorly, according to opinion polls. Throughout his presidency, he has promised results for various initiatives in two weeks.
President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Omaha, Nebraska.AP
Trump said again at his final rally of the day that the country is "turning that corner" and pledged the virus would go away with or without a vaccine. He accused the news media of covering the pandemic in order to damage him politically and said the day after election day, "you won't be hearing that much" about it.
Coronavirus cases are soaring in states across the US and hospitalisations are up at least 10 per cent in the past week in 32 states, putting strain on the nation's health care system.
Outbreaks in Midwestern states have driven the most recent surge in virus cases. They're rising in Michigan, Illinois and Iowa, but have levelled off or fallen in Nebraska, Wisconsin and Minnesota. As a region, the Midwest's seven-day average of cases has slightly fallen, but is still near a record.
Bloomberg
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1.30pm on Oct 28, 2020
Trump campaign website defaced by hackers
By
Here's a bit more information on the hack of Donald Trump's campaign website. Trump's campaign website was briefly taken over by hackers who defaced the site on Tuesday, local time.
The defacement lasted less than 30 minutes, but the incident came as Trump's campaign and that of his opponent, Joe Biden, as well as law enforcement and intelligence agencies, have been on high alert for digital interference ahead of next week's election.
A screen grab purporting to show the Trump site hack.
In a statement, Tim Murtaugh, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, confirmed the website's defacement and said it was "working with law enforcement authorities to investigate the source of the attack."
He added, "There was no exposure to sensitive data because none of it is actually stored on the site. The website has been restored."
The FBI did not immediately comment on the incident. The defacement was first noted on Twitter by Gabriel Lorenzo Greschler, a journalist at the Jewish News of Northern California, while he was researching an article on climate change.
It was not clear whether the defacement was the work of foreign hackers or cybercriminals. But in a screed posted to Trump's website — donaldjtrump.com — the hackers claimed to have compromised "multiple devices" that gave them access to the "most internal and secret conversations" of the president and his relatives, including classified information. The New York Times
Seven reasons this year's US election is not a repeat of 2016
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Donald Trump trails Joe Biden in polls by an average seven percentage points but America's electoral college system is keeping the Republicans in the game, writes US correspondent Matthew Knott.
Donald Trump and Joe Biden during the final presidential debate. AP
With just nine days remaining until the US presidential election, Democratic nominee Joe Biden continues to lead President Donald Trump by significant margins in the polls.
If Trump was anybody else, the conventional wisdom would be that he had little to no chance of victory. But given Trump scored such a surprising win in 2016, few are willing to make bold predictions this time around.
The Biden campaign says their internal polling shows a close race and are urging Democrats not to become complacent. Trump continues to insist that not only he is going to win but he will achieve an even bigger victory than four years ago. It's a good thing, in many ways, that people are sceptical of polls: ballots around the world, including Brexit in the UK and last year's Australian election, have shown that polls are not infallible.
But it's worth keeping in mind some important ways that this year's election is not like 2016.
A day after election rallies in Pennsylvania, police shooting sparks protests
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Pennsylvania's governor deployed the National Guard on Tuesday, local time, after a police shooting on Monday sparked protests, just a week before the swing state will help decide the presidential election.
Governor Tom Wolf sent the National Guard to Philadelphia a day after demonstrators clashed with police following the death of a 27-year-old black man, Walter Wallace jnr. He was fatally shot by police, who said he was armed with a knife. Wallace's family said they had called for an ambulance to get him help with a mental health crisis, not for police intervention, the Associated Press reported.
Police arrest people after an officer was struck by a brick during a violent protest after police shot and killed a black man on a Philadelphia street.AP
Police cars and dumpsters were set on fire as police struggled to contain the crowds. More than a dozen officers, many with batons in hand, formed a line as they ran down 52nd Street chasing protesters away from the main thoroughfare. The crowd largely dispersed then.
Thirty police officers were treated for cuts and bruises, caused in most cases by bricks, rocks and debris thrown by protesters, a police spokesman told The New York Times. A sergeant was treated at a hospital for a broken leg after she was hit by a pickup truck, the spokesman said. Some businesses were damaged.
The clashes in Philadelphia reignited the issue of police shootings of black men in the waning days of a presidential campaign that has been shaped by protests since the May killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The city's African-American community is considered key to Democrat Joe Biden's push to win Pennsylvania's electoral votes. Donald Trump's narrow victory in the state four years ago helped send him to the White House. AP, Bloomberg
In the Bible Belt it's love thy neighbour, not thy politics
By Monique McCullough
Since Jesus was a boy, politics and religion have never made good bedfellows. This is painfully evident on Providence Lane in Charlotte, North Carolina. This has been my home away from home for the past 15 years. It is the buckle of the Bible Belt in the swingiest swing state for the 2020 US presidential election.
While the American South is known for its hospitality, the current political climate has resulted in a lethal cocktail of religious zealotry and political tribalism. Each side has retreated to its own echo chamber and is now firmly mired in the bogs of our own beliefs. We live in a black and white world of good versus evil, faithful versus faithless, oppressed versus suppressed, masked scaredy cats versus unmasked patriots.
A supporter of President Donald Trump at a North Carolina rally on October 15.AP
We are divided, and my street is a daily reminder of the deep ravine between us.
Our front yards reveal that we mirror the polls: half of us have cars in driveways with bumper stickers pleading for "Any Functioning Human 2020", while the other half display gargantuan MAGA flags signifying their land is "Trump Country". My street is in a tug of war between far-right Trump supporters and everyone else.
The issue is not that the United States – like so many other countries – is wrestling with an economic recession, a host of social reform issues, or the effects of COVID-19. Rather, the problem, as I have discovered on my own street, is that people on Providence Lane and all around the US have turned political issues into spiritual warfare. For those on the religious far right, the Democrats are not just the opposition party; they are agents of the Evil One, hell-bent on turning the US from that God-ordained "city upon a hill" into a soulless nation of amoral communists.
US early voting tops 70 million, continuing historic pace
By
More than 70 million Americans have cast ballots in the US presidential election, more than half the total turnout of the 2016 election with one week to go until election day, according to a Tuesday tally from the US Elections Project.
The tally, which shows a record-breaking pace that could lead to the highest voter turnout in percentage terms in more than a century, is the latest sign of intense interest in the contest between Republican President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden.
Democratic challenger Joe Biden and President Donald Trump.The Age
It also highlights voters' desire to reduce their risk of exposure to COVID-19 as the pandemic regathers strength heading into winter.
Democrats hold a significant advantage in early voting due to their embrace of mail balloting, which Republicans have historically cast in large numbers but have shunned amid repeated and unfounded attacks by Trump, who says the system is prone to widespread fraud.
Overall, Democrats hold roughly a two-to-one advantage in early voting numbers. However, Republicans in recent weeks have narrowed the gap in early, in-person voting, data shows.
The high level of early voting has led Michael McDonald, the University of Florida professor who administers the US Elections Project, to predict a record US voter turnout of about 150 million, representing 65 per cent of those eligible to vote, the highest rate since 1908.
US voters have already cast far more early votes during this presidential campaign than they did in all of 2016 when they passed the 47 million mark earlier this month, Reuters data shows.
Reuters
12.43pm on Oct 28, 2020
The whirlwind tour continues as Trump hits Nebraska
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It's rally number three for US President Donald Trump, who has turned his attention to Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District.
Nebraska is one of two states that awards electoral votes to each of its congressional districts, in addition to awarding electoral votes for winning the entire state.
In 2016, Trump managed to take all five of Nebraska’s electoral votes, but polls show the race for the Omaha area’s 2nd District — and its single electoral vote — could be more difficult this time around.
US President Donald Trump surveys the crowd in Nebraska.AP
Trump told the big crowd gathered on Tuesday at the city's Eppley Airfield: "We have to win both Nebraskas."
Trump added that he believed his appearance could also be helpful with the race in neighbouring Iowa, which Trump won easily four years ago but which polls suggest is a tight race this year.
AP
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12.36pm on Oct 28, 2020
Don't let pandemic 'disempower' you: Kamala Harris
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Kamala Harris is rallying voters in Las Vegas a week out from election day, urging people to make a "special effort" not to let the circumstances of the coronavirus pandemic "disempower anybody".
The Democratic vice-presidential nominee’s swing through Nevada on Tuesday, local time, including an earlier stop in Reno, came just days before early voting in the state concludes on Friday.
She described Joe Biden as a "student of American history" and "a truth teller" who can confront the crises facing the nation.
Vice-presidential candidate Senator Kamala Harris.AP
Harris ran through a litany of Biden’s policies, including how he proposes tackling the pandemic, systemic racism, climate change and the economy.
She seemed to relish contrasting Biden’s record with President Donald Trump's, laughing as she described how he recently said science doesn’t know what’s fuelling Western wildfires.
Talking about Trump’s comments that the nation is "rounding the corner" on the pandemic, Harris quipped: "Come on, man," before noting, "That’s a Joe Biden term."
Harris spoke in Las Vegas before roughly 230 voters, spread out on blankets and socially distanced. Nevada has a limit of 250 people for gatherings.