Politics Election category, Page 282
In battleground states, absentee ballot rejections could triple
ATLANTA — Thousands of absentee ballots get rejected in every presidential election. This year, that problem could be much worse and potentially pivotal in hotly contested battleground states. With the coronavirus creating a surge in mail-in balloting and postal delays reported across the country, the number of rejected ballots in...
Trump open to inquiry into Louis DeJoy and campaign contributions
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says he’s open to an investigation of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy following published reports that former employees of DeJoy, a major donor to Trump and other Republicans, said they felt pressured to make campaign contributions to GOP candidates. The president also said Monday that DeJoy...
Trump questions Pentagon leaders’ motives
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Monday that top Defense Department leaders want to keep waging wars in order to keep defense contractors “happy.” Trump continues to fight allegations that he made offensive comments about fallen U.S. service-members, including calling World War I dead at an American military cemetery in...
In Labor Day blur, Harris meets Blake family; Trump steps up
MILWAUKEE — Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris met the family of a Wisconsin man shot by police last month to kick off her Labor Day visit to a critical swing state while President Donald Trump assailed the Democratic ticket and put the halting economic recovery under the best light....
Report: Former Louis DeJoy employees repaid for political donations
The former business of U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy for years reimbursed workers who made political contributions to Republican candidates, the Washington Post reported on Sunday, citing former employees. North Carolina’s attorney general called for an investigation into the company, New Breed Logistics, based in High Point, N.C. DeJoy sold...
Labor Day kicks off an uncommon campaign season for organized labor
Organized labor typically greets the end of the summer and the beginning of campaign season with a roar. But it is trading that for quiet celebrations of service and online education today. Although the 141,000- plus union members in the seven-county region ratcheted back their public celebrations of strength, the...
New Trump ads stoke racial bias among white people in Minnesota and Wisconsin
President Trump resumed television advertising after the Republican National Convention with two racially charged commercials airing in Minnesota and Wisconsin, battleground states racked by social upheaval after recent violent police encounters with Black men. Trump’s ads show how he is trying to replicate his 2016 success in stirring racial resentments...
QAnon conspiracy emerges in some state legislative races
PHOENIX — Candidates engaging with the QAnon conspiracy theory are running for seats in state legislatures this year, breathing more oxygen into a once-obscure conspiracy movement that has grown in prominence since adherents won Republican congressional primaries this year. Some of the legislative candidates have repeatedly shared QAnon memes and...
Frustration grows as covid restrictions remain, political rallies go on
As thousands gathered Thursday night in Latrobe at a rally for President Trump, others across Western Pennsylvania stayed home — working remotely and unable to go to schools, restaurants or sporting events. They were, as they have over the past six months, following Gov. Tom Wolf’s guidance to stop the...
Michael Cohen’s memoir casts him as ‘star witness’ against Trump
NEW YORK — Michael Cohen’s tell-all memoir makes the case that President Donald Trump is “guilty of the same crimes” that landed his former fixer in federal prison, offering a blow-by-blow account of Trump’s alleged role in a hush money scandal that once overshadowed his presidency. Of all the crises...
Eric Trump coming to Washington, Pa. on Thursday
Eric Trump will visit Washington County on Thursday, Sept. 10 to campaign for his father during a “Make America Great” event. President Trump’s campaign website has announced that Eric Trump will visit the American Legion Post 175 in Washington at 2 p.m. The event’s doors open at 1 p.m. and...
Pence to campaign in Westmoreland and Beaver counties Sept. 9
Vice President Mike Pence will campaign in Western Pennsylvania on Wednesday, as President Trump’s reelection effort continues its focus on swing state voters. Pence is scheduled to appear at events in Murrysville and New Sewickley in Beaver County. The two stops, less than a week after Trump’s rally at the...
Trump targets ‘white privilege’ training as ‘anti-American’
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has directed the Office of Management and Budget to crack down on federal agencies’ anti-racism training sessions, calling them “divisive, anti-American propaganda.” OMB director Russell Vought, in a letter Friday to executive branch agencies, directed them to identify spending related to any training on “critical...
Western Pa. veterans divided by report Trump disparaged military
Local veterans are divided in their reactions to a report President Trump disparaged fallen service members, with some defending the president’s record and others condemning his attitude toward the military. “If he said that, and I don’t know if it’s true or not, but if he said it he doesn’t...
Georgia candidate’s post removed for inciting violence
ATLANTA — Facebook removed a photo illustration showing a Republican congressional candidate in Georgia posing with a rifle next to three Democratic House members, saying Friday that it violated the social media platform’s policy against inciting violence. The illustration, a montage of four photos, was posted Thursday by Marjorie Taylor...
Thousands of supporters pack Unity airport, nearby roads, to hear Trump campaign speechVideo
Traffic was backed up for miles on the roads approaching Arnold Palmer Regional Airport on Thursday evening as thousands of Trump supporters turned out for the president’s campaign appearance near Latrobe. The president spoke in a hangar at L.J. Aviation, at the airport in Unity, but a viewing screen was...
Report: Trump disparaged U.S. war dead as ‘losers,’ ‘suckers’
DELRAY BEACH, FLa. — A new report details multiple instances of President Donald Trump making disparaging remarks about members of the U.S. military who have been captured or killed, including referring to the American war dead at the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery in France in 2018 as “losers” and “suckers.” The...
Trump fires up enthusiastic crowd at campaign stop at Arnold Palmer Regional Airport near Latrobe
President Trump glided into a Trump Country crowd in Westmoreland County on Thursday evening to rave reviews. The crowd of several thousand at Arnold Palmer Regional Airport near Latrobe erupted into screams of U-S-A!, U-S-A!, U-S-A! as Trump exited Air Force One into the twilight evening, vowing that “61 days...
Biden, in Kenosha, hails fight for racial progressVideo
KENOSHA, Wis. — Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden told residents in Kenosha, Wisconsin, that the turmoil their city has experienced in recent weeks over a police shooting and protests that turned violent can be part of an awakening that helps the United States confront centuries of systemic racism and social...
Heavy rains don’t dampen enthusiasm of Trump supporters ahead of Westmoreland rallyVideo
Frequent and sometimes heavy rains Thursday could not keep supporters of Donald Trump from flooding Arnold Palmer Regional Airport hours before the president’s scheduled campaign rally. Drenched crowds stood in line at the Unity airport waiting to board buses to take them to a fenced-in holding area in front of...
Dems blast Trump policies, ‘chaos’ ahead of president’s Westmoreland County rally
Westmoreland County Commissioner Gina Cerilli on Thursday issued a scathing rebuke of President Donald Trump ahead of his visit to Arnold Palmer Regional Airport in Unity. “To put it simply, Donald Trump is simply not up for this job. Pennsylvanians have suffered at the hands of a weak and incompetent...
Trump suggests polling place double-check for mail-in votersVideo
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Thursday that people who vote early by mail should show up at their local polling places on Election Day and vote again if their ballots haven’t been counted, a suggestion that experts said would lead to chaos, long lines and more work for election...
As covid-19 changes political campaigns, airport stops are nothing new
Covid-19 has changed the landscape of political campaigning as the presidential election draws near. President Donald Trump, who is scheduled to visit Arnold Palmer Regional Airport in Unity on Thursday evening, has been forced to trade in his large-scale Make America Great Again rallies for simpler, smaller stops. Thursday’s airport...
Trump faces pushback for urging people to vote twice as test
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is facing a backlash for urging voters in North Carolina to vote by mail and then try to vote again in person to test the mail-in ballot system in the Nov. 3 election. Trump was asked by a television reporter during his trip Wednesday to...
White House moves to revoke federal funding from ‘anarchist jurisdictions’
The Trump administration is taking steps to revoke federal funding from metropolitan cities he says are becoming “anarchist jurisdictions.” President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed a five-page memo ordering federal agencies to send information to the White House Office of Management and Budget that detail monies that can be redirected....
