The Trump campaign anticipates that Joe Biden will get a significant polling bump out of the Democratic National Convention. So the campaign has planned a week of heavy counterprogramming, with the president traveling to four battleground states.
The state of play: Vice President Pence will be in Wisconsin. Members of the Trump family will be campaigning, and two Trump-Pence bus tours with surrogates will be on the road and doing local media, said Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh.
Despite a tense recent phone call with President Trump — first reported by the New York Times — the most important mega-donor in the Republican Party, Sheldon Adelson, has signaled he is poised to spend big to support the president.
Behind the scenes: Last Monday morning a group of top Republican Party donors gathered at the Four Seasons resort in Jackson Hole, Wyo., for a Trump campaign fundraiser.
The "campaign plane" is becoming another casualty of the pandemic.
Driving the news: Joe Biden's team hasn't booked any air travel — and thus has no need to lease an aircraft with the Democratic nominee's name and logo emblazoned on the side, a candidate tradition for decades, people familiar with the plans tell Axios.
To the alarm of some government health officials, President Trump has expressed enthusiasm for the Food and Drug Administration to permit an extract from the oleander plant to be marketed as a dietary supplement or, alternatively, approved as a drug to cure COVID-19, despite lack of proof that it works.
Driving the news: The experimental botanical extract, oleandrin, was promoted to Trump during an Oval Office meeting in July. It's embraced by Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and MyPillow founder and CEO Mike Lindell, a big Trump backer, who recently took a financial stake in the company that develops the product.
58% of registered voters who support Joe Biden in the 2020 election say their vote is more in opposition to President Trump than in support of Biden, according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll out Sunday.
Why it matters: The Trump campaign has long insisted that the president's supporters are far more enthusiastic than Biden's, and that this will manifest in higher turnout during the election. Nearly three-quarters of Trump's supporters say their vote is more in support of the president than against Biden.
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner defended the Trump administration's response to the coronavirus pandemic on Sunday, telling CBS News' "Face the Nation" that the current rate of deaths is "still below" the May peak of 2,500 per day and that "we know a lot more than we did five months ago."
Why it matters: The U.S. is one of the few wealthy countries that has failed to suppress the outbreak, reporting a total of over 5.3 million confirmed coronavirus cases and nearly 170,000 deaths since the start of the pandemic — by far the highest death rate in the world, according to Johns Hopkins.
FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver said on ABC's "This Week" Sunday that his forecast for the 2020 election finds that President Trump currently has a 27% chance of defeating Joe Biden.
The big picture: Biden has an 8.7-point lead on President Trump in FiveThirtyEight's average of national polls. The president has seen his poll numbers tank since the coronavirus pandemic began, and as Americans took to the streets to protest the death of George Floyd in cities around the country.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said on CNN's "Reliable Sources" Sunday that Republican leaders must denounce QAnon now that a supporter of the far-right conspiracy theory has won a congressional runoff and is set to enter Congress in the next election.
Why it matters: Very few, if any, Republicans have been outspoken against QAnon, which baselessly claims that a powerful cabal of sex traffickers within the "deep state" is fighting to take down President Trump.
White House national security adviser Robert O'Brien on Sunday defended President Trump's track record on deterring Russian interference in the U.S. election, telling NBC's "Meet the Press": "We've put so many sanctions on Russia there's almost nothing left to sanction."
Why it matters: A top counterintelligence official revealed in a statement Aug. 7 that the Russian government is "using a range of measures" to "denigrate" Joe Biden ahead of the election, while China and Iran would prefer that Trump is defeated.
Top Democrats in the House and Senate called on Sunday for Postmaster General Louis DeJoy to testify at an "urgent" hearing before the House Oversight Committee on Aug. 24.
Why it matters: Democratic lawmakers say they're being inundated with complaints that changes to the Postal Service, which the Trump administration says are aimed at efficiency, could sabotage ballot-handling. DeJoy was previously scheduled to testify before the committee on Sept. 17.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) defended his decision to send ballots to all active registered voters, telling "Fox News Sunday" that mail-in voting during the state's July primary was "overwhelmingly successful."
Why it matters: President Trump and his campaign have sought to undermine universal mail-in voting, claiming it will lead to a "rigged election" and a delay in results.
White House chief of staff Mark Meadows argued for more than 20 minutes with host Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday over the viability of "universal" mail-in voting, arguing that states that are sending ballots to all registered voters are "just asking for a disaster."
Why it matters: The issue of mail-in voting during the pandemic has quickly become one of the most contentious debates in U.S. politics, especially in light of recent operational changes made to the U.S. Postal Service that have caused widespread delays and backlogs.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) called on Sunday for the House to return to session to pass a standalone bill to fund the U.S. Postal Service and use its oversight powers to investigate operational changes made by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy.
The state of play: House Democrats will hold a members-only conference call on Monday at 11:30 a.m. to discuss an early return to Washington to respond to "the attack on the Postal Service," Democratic sources tell Axios' Mike Allen.
Why it matters: Biden's experience losing his first wife and daughter in a car accident in 1972, as well as his son Beau in 2015, have helped shape his political persona. The president said of Robert Trump in a statement on Saturday: "He was not just my brother, he was my best friend. He will be greatly missed, but we will meet again."
In a group headlined by former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, 17 Democrats will jointly deliver a single keynote address at the virtual Democratic National Convention on Tuesday.
Why it matters: The illustrious speaking spot, which was famously given by little-known Senate candidate Barack Obama at the 2004 convention, is often awarded to rising stars within the party. Due to limited time for programming at the pared down convention, no member of the keynote lineup was given a solo speaking slot.
U.S. Postal Service Inspector General Tammy Whitcomb is reviewing recent policy changes and potential conflicts of interest involving Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, following a request from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and other Democrats, CNN reports.
Why it matters: A growing number of lawmakers are sounding the alarm over cost-cutting measures and modifications to mail-processing practices that they fear could delay election mail, disenfranchise voters and delay election results.
Far-right demonstrators clashed with anti-racism protesters in several U.S. cities on Saturday, per USA Today.
Driving the news: In Portland, counter-protesters at a pro-police rally were "aiming pepper spray and firing some kind of pellet gun at people" as Black Lives Matter demonstrators marked an 80th straight day of protests, the Oregonian reports.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib announced in a Twitter post Saturday night that she voted against the Democratic Party's 2020 platform and nominated for president Sen. Bernie Sanders, who suspended his campaign in April.
Why it matters: Democratic activists are pressing the DNC and former Vice President Joe Biden to enact bold policies and transform the party into a political force they feel meets the political moment, Axios' Alexi McCammond notes. Tlaib said she voted no to the platform, which is expected to pass, because it doesn't include a plan for a single-payer health care system. "We need a platform that works to rid our society of oppression and greed," she added. "[T]his platform does not do enough."
Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other House Democratic leaders discussed Saturday the possibility of bringing the House back early to act on what they see as a crisis with the Postal Service, a House Democratic aide told Axios.
Why it matters: The House is on recess and no votes are scheduled until September, but a vote on the matter could be held within two weeks, per Politico, which first reported the news.
