Minnesota calls on Trump, Biden to follow virus guidelines

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz urged the campaigns of President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden on Tuesday to abide by the state’s guidelines for slowing the spread of the coronavirus when the candidates visit Minnesota on Friday.

“Partner with us in the fight against COVID-19,” the Democratic governor said in a letter to both campaigns.

Trump may be running as the “law and order” candidate, but that hasn’t stopped him and his campaign from openly defying state emergency orders and flouting his own administration’s guidelines as he holds rallies in battleground states. Trump has an airport rally scheduled for Friday in the north-central Minnesota city of Bemidji. Biden’s campaign has not yet announced a city or venue for his visit.

Walz said Minnesota requires face masks inside public places and strongly encourages them for outdoor gatherings.

The governor did not say in his letter how state and local officials will respond if either campaign fails to follow the guidelines for their events. Walz spokesman Teddy Tschann said they hope to hear back from the campaigns soon, and that they’ll comply voluntarily instead of forcing the state to enforce its guidelines.

“We’re hoping they don’t put us in a position where they have to do that, but that would be up to local regulatory agencies and local law enforcement,” Tschann said.

While an executive order that Walz signed in June contains an exemption for federal officials, Tschann said it doesn’t apply to the president in this context because he’s coming for a campaign rally and not acting in his official capacity. But even if that exception did apply, he said, it would apply only to federal officials, and not attendees.

FACT CHECK: The exploding trees, falling carbon, improving air quality and global cooling of Trump’s climate claims

Climate change became front and centre in the White House race this week as both Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden addressed the catastrophic wildfires raging in the American West. 

Mr Biden called the president a “climate arsonist” while Mr Trump was proud of his climate record improving air and water while reducing carbon.

The Independent’s senior climate correspondent Louise Boyle asks whether any of Trump’s wild climate change claims of the past two days are true. Spoiler alert: Mostly not.

Trump ramps up ad spending in bid to counter Biden

President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign says it is ramping up advertising spending in battleground states, a move that comes as some of his allies have grown worried because Democrat Joe Biden has outspent him in recent weeks.

The Trump campaign announced the “eight-figure” ad buy Tuesday, but declined to say specifically how much will be spent in states that include North Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Arizona and Pennsylvania. The campaign also said it intends to run ads targeting congressional districts in Maine and Nebraska — two states that do not use a winner-take-all approach toward awarding electors.

Trump has an outsized ability to command national media attention and has often shown himself adept at shaping the terms of political debate to his liking. But after struggling to significantly erode Biden’s standing in public opinion polls, advertising remains one of the best tools available to help alter the trajectory of an election that is quickly approaching.

That sets up a high-stakes dilemma for Trump campaign officials who are making key spending decisions at a time when Democrats have shattered fundraising records and overtaken what was once a formidable cash advantage enjoyed by Republicans.

“This week’s advertising continues our strategic plan to follow the dates on the calendar, the states that are voting early, the data that always guides our decision-making and our pathway,” Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien said in a statement.

Still, even as the campaign announced the renewed commitment, it continued to be outspent by Biden. It has also reserved significant amounts of air time in states that Trump won handily in 2016, including $15 million set aside for Ohio, according to data from the ad tracking firm Kantar/CMAG.

‘Lasting peace’: Self-interested parties and key missing pieces blur Trump’s Middle East declarations and risk instability

Donald Trump and three Middle East leaders were all smiles as they signed historic peace accords at the White House on Tuesday. But experts warn the agreements are missing their most important peace and could spawn further instability in the volatile region.

The US president sat beside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office and declared the “Abraham Accords” will deliver “peace without blood all over the sand” throughout the Middle East. Minutes earlier, he sat in the same place with Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, UAE’s foreign affairs minister, and predicted “real peace” soon would break out across the region.

Mr Trump, in his usually direct way, cut right to the chase during a ceremony on the White House’s South Lawn where the three countries, along with Bahrain, inked the first Middle East peace pacts in decades.

“We are here this afternoon to change the course of history. After decades of division and conflict we marked the dawn of a new Middle East,” Mr Trump said from the executive mansion’s Truman Balcony. “Thanks to the great courage of the leaders of these three countries we take a major stride toward a future in which people of all faiths and backgrounds live together in peace and prosperity.”

Trump aide apologizes for video slamming virus scientists

A Trump health appointee who used his position to launch political attacks and is accused of trying to muzzle a government publication apologized Tuesday for a video in which he reportedly disparaged scientists battling the coronavirus and warned of violence after the elections.

Michael Caputo, the top spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services, apologized to his staff for the Facebook video, said an administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.

The case of Caputo, a Trump loyalist and former New York political operative, has become the latest distraction for a White House still struggling to define its coronavirus response.

He also can be heard on an HHS podcast asserting that Democrats don’t want a coronavirus vaccine in order to punish President Donald Trump.

News reports alleged last week that his office tried to muzzle a scientific weekly published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Then on Monday came an account of a video on Caputo’s personal Facebook page in which he accused government scientists of conspiring against Trump and suggested “shooting” could break out after the election.

Caputo was named the top HHS spokesman in April, during a tense period in relations between the White House and HHS Secretary Alex Azar.

Carl Bernstein says Trump is using loyal supporters as ‘sacrificial lambs’ as president calls him a ‘nutjob’

Louise Hall writes: Veteran reporter Carl Bernstein has branded Donald Trump a “homicidal President” who is turning his own supporters into “sacrificial lambs” by allowing them to attend large indoor rallies amidst the pandemic.

The damming comments come after Mr Trump held an indoor rally in Nevada over the weekend, during which most rally-goers were not wearing masks or observing social distancing.

What does each side hope to gain from Israel’s ‘peace deals’ with UAE and Bahrain?

Bel Trew writes: US president Donald Trump has presided over the historic signing of diplomatic agreements between two Gulf states and Israel on Tuesday, a move that could dramatically alter the political landscape of the Middle East.

Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Emirati and Bahraini foreign ministers attended the ceremony at the White House, where they sealed the divisive “Abraham Accords” in front of more than 700 guests. Although hailed by Mr Trump as “peace agreements”, they do not end active wars. 

 Instead, they formalise normalisation between the UAE, Bahrain and Israel. Until recently Israel was, in the Arab world, recognised by only Jordan and Egypt because of regional stances on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 

Both deals in the accords have been vehemently rejected by the Palestinians as a “stab in the back” and “betrayal”.

White House shares clip of Trump celebrating ‘landmark deals’

Joe Biden is tearing into President Donald Trump for his reported remarks referring to fallen soldiers as “suckers.”

Biden held a roundtable in Tampa, Florida, focused on veterans in his first visit back to the battleground state since he became the Democratic presidential nominee.

Biden says Trump “doesn’t seem to be able to conceive the idea of selfless service,” referencing Trump’s reported comments calling fallen World War I soldiers “suckers” and “losers.” Trump has denied the comments, but many were confirmed independently by The Associated Press.

Biden went on to outline his commitments to the troops and his own experience supporting service members and their families as vice president. He spoke about his late son Beau’s service in the Delaware Army National Guard, declaring that “he’s no sucker.”

Biden says troops “deserve a commander in chief who respects their sacrifice” and “will never betray the values they defend.”

Trump fundraising group criticised for ‘support our troops’ ad featuring Russian planes

Andrew Naughtie writes: A fundraising group working on behalf of Donald Trump has run into trouble for posting an ad featuring Russian warplanes.

The Trump Make America Great Again committee, which serves as the fundraising arm of the president’s campaign, ran the offending digital ad for several days last week. It shows armed soldiers silhouetted below three fighter jets and above the words “Support our Troops”, with a link to donate to the group’s coffers.