Surprise in the United States, 40 days before the vote. Adnkronos writes that Harris is given the lead at a national level by Nate Silver for the first time since the end of August. According to the analysis and forecasting system of the American polling guru, the vice president is at 48.9% against Trump’s 46.1%. A minimal advantage in what remains effectively a head-to-head, Silver writes in a post that also gives Harris the lead in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Nevada and Minnesota. While Trump overtakes her in North Carolina, Georgia and Arizona.
Faced with the continued swing in the polls in what is expected to be a razor-thin election, Harris, at a rally last night in Wisconsin, urged voters not to pay too much attention to the polls. “We have 46 days until the election,” the Democrat said, “and we know it’s going to be neck and neck all the way to the end. So let’s not pay too much attention to the polls because, let me be clear, we are the underdogs and we have a tough job ahead of us.”
Meanwhile, “Vice President Harris is ready for another opportunity to share the stage with Donald Trump, who should have no problem accepting this debate,” Harris’s campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon said today. Harris herself announced the decision in a post on X in which she said she “gladly accepted a second presidential debate” and hoped Trump “will join me” on the CNN stage on October 23.
Trump, however, is reportedly firm in his position of denial.
“The problem with another debate is that it’s too late, the voting has already started,” Trump said, speaking at a rally in Wilmington, North Carolina, justifying his opposition to a new debate. Regarding Harris’s acceptance of CNN’s invitation to a debate on October 23, he said: “Now she wants a debate right before the election on CNN because she’s losing big.” “Look at her past posts on Truth,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung had previously said in response to a CNN question. “There will not be a third debate,” Trump wrote last week, referring to his first with Joe Biden in June and then his second with Harris on September 10.
It is also learned that Harris and the Democrats raised $257 million in August, more than triple what Trump raised, which stood at $85 million according to documents from the Federal Election Commission. This means that the vice president began the final rush of the last two months before the November vote with $286 million in her campaign coffers, while the former president and the Republican committee began September with $214 million in their coffers. Harris’ campaign spent virtually all of the money raised in August, which was actually the first month of her campaign after Joe Biden announced his withdrawal on July 21, $258 million. While Trump spent more than he raised, $121 million.
But there is still the risk of ungovernability following the elections. As we learn from adnkronos sources, Kamala Harris continues to rise in the polls, but the Democrats are agitated by the specter of another January 6 in the event of her victory in the presidential elections in November. Perhaps less violent and insurrectional than the one four years ago, when thousands of Donald Trump supporters stormed Congress in an attempt to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s victory. But it could have an even more alarming and devastating impact on the institutional and constitutional stability of the United States, founded on the peaceful transfer of power.
According to Politico, the nightmare scenario for Democrats is that despite Harris’s victory in the White House, Republicans will retain their majority in the House, giving Speaker Mike Johnson the opportunity to find ways to hinder, if not completely block, the counting of electoral votes, which would give the House the final say in the presidential election, as required by the 12th Amendment to the Constitution.
It should not be forgotten that the then little-known Louisiana congressman led Republicans’ challenge to the Supreme Court in 2020 to overturn the results of key states that had sealed Biden’s victory.
The initiative was personally blessed by Trump, who also by virtue of this last October gave his approval to the election of Johnson as Speaker. And now, less than two months before the vote, the Republican leader is trying to pass a law to prevent what he calls the maneuvers of the Dems to make illegal immigrants vote en masse. Accusations that make it clear how the leadership of the Republican Party, now largely aligned with Maga’s positions, in the event of a new defeat of the tycoon, could strongly support any new accusations of fraud by Trump.
A position that is also widespread among the electoral base, since a poll by the World Justice Project, relaunched by The Hill, shows that 46% of Republican voters are not ready to accept the election results as legitimate in the event of a Dem victory. And 14% of these say they are ready to take action to overturn the results. It should be noted, however, that 27% of Democratic voters also say they are not willing to recognize a Republican victory, with 11% ready to move from words to deeds.
Speaking to Politico, sources in the Speaker’s entourage dismissed Democrats’ fears as part of a strategy aimed at raising more money for the campaign to retake the House. And of an “alarmist narrative” about a GOP victory that helped lead to Trump’s two assassination attempts. Another Republican close to Johnson then said he doubted the Speaker would give in so easily to Trump’s wishes.
It should not be forgotten that, in the event of a Democratic victory at the White House, Harris, who will continue to be vice president until January 20, will find herself, as president of the Senate, presiding over the session for the certification of electoral votes. As Mike Pence did on January 6, 2021, once the Congress of rioters had been cleared, guilty in the eyes of Trump and his supporters of not having accepted the outgoing president’s request to block the certification.
In addition, a new law was passed in 2022 that makes it harder to block the electoral vote count: Previously, a single member was enough to support an objection, but now 20% of each chamber is required. But Democrats also fear that Johnson could get enough Republicans to block some crucial electoral votes, or try to rewrite the rules that govern the January 6 electoral vote certification session to make it easier to challenge them.
Or even try to delay the session that by law must be called for January 6. All this while keeping in mind that no candidate receives at least 270 certified electoral votes, the Constitution provides for what is called the “contingent election”, a sort of emergency election, with the House electing the president and the Senate the vice president. A procedure that would favor the Republicans since each state must cast only one vote – so even the many small GOP-led states would have the same weight as the more populous ones, like California and New York, of a Dem orientation – and therefore a majority of at least 26 states is needed.
Christian Meier