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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Maanvi Singh (now), Joan E Greve and Martin Belam (earlier)

Trump holds first rally since Covid diagnosis, as Senate opens bitter hearings on court pick – as it happened

Summary

A recap from me and Joan E Greve:

  • Donald Trump held his first rally since contracting Covid-19. Lagging in the polls, he was eager to appear healthy as he downplayed the severity of the pandemic and returned to classic stump talking points about the border wall and unfriendly media.
  • Dr Anthony Fauci said holding large rallies is “asking for trouble”. In an interview with CNN, he also reiterated that “it’s really unfortunate and really disappointing” that the Trump campaign took his words out of context in a campaign ad.
  • Joe Biden was on the offense, campaigning in red-state Ohio. The Democratic nominee spoke harshly of Trump’s response to the virus and his handling of his own infection. The former vice-president also accused Republicans of hypocrisy as they sought to portray Democrats as anti-religious during the supreme court hearings for the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett.
  • The Senate judiciary committee held the first day of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings. The supreme court nominee and every member of the committee delivered an opening statement. Questioning of Barrett begins tomorrow.
  • Barrett emphasized judges should not try to legislate from the bench in her opening statement. “Courts are not designed to solve every problem or right every wrong in our public life,” Barrett said. “The policy decisions and value judgments of government must be made by the political branches elected by and accountable to the people.”
  • Senate Republicans accused their Democratic colleagues of attacking Barrett’s Catholic faith, even though Democrats did not mention her faith. Instead, Democrats used their opening statements to warn that Barrett’s confirmation to the supreme court could jeopardize the Affordable Care Act.
  • Kamala Harris argued the Senate should postpone Barrett’s hearings and focus on passing another coronavirus relief bill. Delivering an opening statement virtually from her Senate office, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee said, “Senate Republicans have made it crystal clear that rushing a supreme court nomination is more important than helping and supporting the American people who are suffering from a deadly pandemic and economic crisis.”

Updated

Deeper look: Biden campaigns in red state Ohio

Joe Biden’s campaign went on a fresh offense against the Trump administration on Monday, campaigning in a red state and accusing Republicans of hypocrisy as they sought to portray Democrats as anti-religious during the supreme court hearings for the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett.

Biden campaigned in Ohio, attempting to expand the battleground map and keep Trump on the defensive in a state thought to be out of reach for Democrats after Trump’s wide margin of victory there four years ago.

A slew of recent polls has had the Democratic challenger leading Trump in national polls, often by double digits. Likewise, many battleground state surveys, though often narrower than the national picture, have Biden with healthy leads. The situation has led several top Republicans to make rare public warnings of losing the White House – and maybe even Republicans losing the Senate.

On the campaign trail Biden stressed an economic message and touted his own record while casting Trump as having abandoned working-class voters who helped him win rust belt states that put him in the White House in 2016.

In Toledo, Biden addressed United Auto Workers who represent a local General Motors’ powertrain plant. The former vice-president spoke in a parking lot with about 30 American-made cars and trucks arrayed nearby, and he struck a decidedly populist note, praising unions and arguing that he represented working-class values while the Republican Trump cared only about impressing the Ivy League and country club set.

“I don’t measure people by the size of their bank account,” Biden said. “You and I measure people by the strength of their character, their honesty, their courage.”

Meanwhile, the Biden campaign has hit back against Trump’s characterization of Biden as old and frail ...

After 74-year-old Trump told his ralliers, “I am not an old person, I am a young person,” and made references to his 77-year-old opponent’s choice to broadcast campaign events from his “basement”, among the Biden’s campaign’s responses were celebrations of the former vice-president’s relative mastery of walking up and down inclines.

Updated

Trump spoke for about 65 minutes – a bit shy of the usual hour and a half he normally takes up at his campaign rallies.

With just weeks to go before election day, and early voting underway, Trump has been eager to return to a full schedule of in-person rallies as he scrambles to hold on to his slipping supporters. Polls have his Democratic opponent Joe Biden ahead by an average 12 points, in polls taken since 1 October. Trump is also losing support from seniors, who are the most vulnerable in a pandemic that has already killed more than 214,000 Americans.

In a frenetic push to solidify support, Trump and his campaign have sought to downplay the threat of coronavirus. The president’s own demonstrations of reckless, maskless bravado appears to be key to that strategy, as Trump characterizes his opponent as frail and confined to his basement.

Updated

As Donald Trump declared himself “immune” at his Florida rally, a new case study published in The Lancet revealed a 25-year-old man in Nevada was infected with coronavirus twice this year.

This is the first confirmed case of reinfection in the US. The two infections in this one patient occurred six weeks apart.

Reinfections are rare – there are only five such cases documented worldwide. But much is still unknown about how or why this happens. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently advises that those who have recovered from Covid-19 generally appear to be protected from reinfection for three months – but this newly documented case bucks that expectation.

Updated

“You better vote for me Puerto Rico. You better vote for me,” Trump said.

Residents of Puerto Rico and other US territories are not entitled to vote for president in federal elections, though Puerto Ricans living in US states can vote for president (and Florida is home to hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans).

The territory’s Republican governor Wanda Vázquez Garced recently endorsed Trump.

Updated

Boasting about his recovery, Trump claimed he is “immune” to the virus now. “I feel powerful,” he said. “I’ll kiss the guys and the beautiful women and everybody – I’ll give a big, fat kiss.”

The president has been eager to appear energetic after a recent hospitalization following his Covid-19 diagnosis, repeatedly boasting that he’s “young” at 74 and even claiming, on Fox News that he is a “perfect physical specimen”.

Although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that those with mild or moderate coronavirus infections can return to being around others after 10 days, the research on whether or not people can get reinfected is still ongoing.

Updated

Biden and Trump hold very different campaign events

Audience members observe a social distance while listening to Biden deliver remarks at a Voter Mobilization Event campaign stop at the Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal in Cincinnati.
Audience members observe a social distance while listening to Biden deliver remarks at a Voter Mobilization Event campaign stop at the Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal in Cincinnati. Photograph: Tom Brenner/Reuters

In Cincinnati, earlier today, Biden addressed a socially distanced, sparse group. He took aim at the president’s comments downplaying the severity of the pandemic and emphasized his plans.

“I have a plan to deal with this pandemic responsibly,” Biden said. “Testing, tracing, masking, not politicizing the race for the vaccine. Plan for its safe and equitable distribution. Provide the funding for PPE and other resources for schools and businesses to reopen safely.”

Biden is leading Trump by 10 percentage points nationally, per an average of national polls.

Updated

Trump takes stage at packed rally

“We’re winning by a lot more now than we were four years ago,” Trump said. “We’re going to win four more years in the White House.”

A packed crowd of supporters standing shoulder to shoulder chanted “USA” in response.

Updated

If no other GOP senators end up exposed to coronavirus, the party may be on track to vote on Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination by the 22.

CNN’s Manu Raju reports that North Carolina’s Thom Tillis, who delivered his opening statement remotely after testing positive for Covid-19 is expected to return to the Senate tomorrow.

Mike Lee, the Republican senator of Utah, showed up and spoke during the first day of hearings without a mask, despite his recent Covid-19 diagnosis.

Updated

Analysis: Amy Coney Barrett’s hearing kicks off with hypocrisy and healthcare

That was rich. Senate Republicans, otherwise known as Donald Trump’s Praetorian Guard, lined up on Monday to pay pious homage to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the separation of powers and the halcyon days of political bipartisanship.

A visitor from outer space might have thought that they were the upholders of civics and civility at the start of Amy Coney Barrett’s supreme court hearing on Capitol Hill. No matter that Trump has played divider-in-chief or that Republicans blocked Barack Obama’s nominee to the court in 2016.

It was a morning of hypocrisy and healthcare.

Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Senate judiciary committee and the Trump appreciation society, reminded everyone that both Ginsburg and her ideological opposite, Justice Antonin Scalia, were confirmed almost unanimously.

“I don’t know what happened between then and now,” he said, wistfully. “We can all take some blame but I just want to remind everybody there was a time in this country where someone like Ruth Bader Ginsburg was seen by almost everybody as qualified for the position of being on the supreme court, understanding that she would have a different philosophy than many of the Republicans who voted for her.”

No justice has been confirmed so close to a presidential election. Graham, who promised not to confirm one in an election year (saying “Use my words against me”, which plenty of Democrats are), acknowledged a point everyone could agree on: “This is going to be a long, contentious week.”

As senator after senator drew their battle lines, 48-year-old Barrett, sitting silently in a big black face mask, resembled a prisoner in the dock.

Republicans sought to normalise her rushed nomination, arguing the Senate was merely doing its duty while setting up straw men: Democrats want to attack her Catholic faith (none did), Democrats want to play foul as they did with Brett Kavanaugh (hardly), Democrats want to expand the court (objection: relevance), Democrats want to conflate the judiciary with policy (true).

Trump returns to campaigning as usual, rallying with a packed Florida crowd

The president is en route to Florida, where a massive crowd of his supporters await. Per the White House press pool, the president was not wearing a mask when he boarded Air Force One, nor are most in the crowd that anticipates him.

Supporters cheer for speakers at a campaign rally prior to the arrival President Donald Trump at the Orlando Sanford International Airport Monday, Oct. 12, 2020, in Sanford, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)
Supporters cheer for speakers at a campaign rally prior to the arrival President Donald Trump at the Orlando Sanford International Airport Monday, Oct. 12, 2020, in Sanford, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux) Photograph: John Raoux/AP

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maintains that the highest risk events during the pandemic are “large in-person gatherings where it is difficult for individuals to remain spaced at least 6 feet apart and attendees travel from outside the local area” - which more or less describes a rally.

Although the campaign event is held outside, where the virus is less likely to spread – attendees lack of social distancing and masking don’t bode well.

Dr Anthony Fauci said holding large rallies is “asking for trouble” as a crowd amasses in Florida, for the Trump rally tonight.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases told CNN that Americans should be vigilant, as coronavirus cases tick up in many parts of the country. “We’ve seen that when you have situations of congregate settings where there are a lot of people without masks, the data speak for themselves,” Fauci told CNN. “It happens. And now is even more so a worse time to do that, because when you look at what’s going on in the United States, it’s really very troublesome.”

Trump’s rally crowds have recently flouted masks and social distancing – measures that could slow the spread of the disease. The president has planned to hold rallies in battleground states all weeks, without any new safety precautions.

Democrats face a tough fight to win back the White House in November, and with anti-racism protests raging nationwide, the coronavirus pandemic threatens the voting rights and turnout of their most powerful voting block: Black Americans. While they are 14% of the population, African Americans make up a third of all Covid-19 cases.

In Florida, a recent rise threatens turnout as Black people make up 13% of eligible voters. The state already ranks second in the nation in income inequality. But the pandemic, and recession that followed, worsened existing economic and healthcare disparities between white Americans, and Black communities.

With one in 1,000 Black Americans having died of the virus, progressives such as Angie Nixon are rallying voters ahead of the 2020 presidential election. Running uncontested, she’s the next state representative for Florida’s 14th congressional district representing Jacksonville and its outer suburbs.

“I think it’s really important that we work on legislation that addresses systemic racism and that is not just Band-Aids,” she said. “I’m pregnant. Yes, I have a degree. I have a good-paying job and I have healthcare, but I’m still concerned that if I go into the hospital, will I be listened to?”

As cases surged in Jacksonville, Nixon’s canvassing evolved into community wellness checks. Shortly after, she contracted the virus while pregnant before transmitting it to her mother. She said her “most mentally taxing experience” is a wake-up call for Democrats to get aggressive in facing the issues affecting their most
loyal voting bloc.

The president’s physician has released yet another update on the president’s health.

Sen Conley says Trump tested negative “on consecutive days” on the Abbott rapid tests. These tests are less accurate than the gold standard of Covid-19 testing – PCR tests.

Conley also did not specify which and how many consecutive days. He added that the rapid rests were not used “in isolation for the determination of the president’s negative status” and cited “additional clinical and laboratory data” including PCR tests – while still leaving many details about Trump’s condition vague.

Although CDC guidelines indicate that an individual with a mild or moderate case of Covid-19 can be around others after 10 days, it recommends that those with more severe cases isolate for 20.

Updated

Senator Gary Peters of Michigan shared his family’s personal abortion story, with Amy Coney Barrett hearings under way.

Peters, a moderate Democrat locked in a tight re-election race, shared with Elle Magazine that in the 1980s, his first wife Heidi had her water break when she was only four months pregnant, leaving the fetus without amniotic fluid.

When a miscarriage did not naturally occur, a doctor recommended an abortion – as the fetus had no chance of survival. But the hospital had banned the procedure. “The mental anguish someone goes through is intense, trying to have a miscarriage for a child that was wanted,” Peters told the magazine.

“It’s a story of how gut-wrenching and complicated decisions can be related to reproductive health,” he told Elle.

Heidi’s heath deteriorated, and her doctor told the couple that without an abortion she might lose her uterus. Still the hospital refused to make an exception to its anti-abortion policy.

Ultimately, the couple was able to find another hospital that would take Heidi in right away, as they were friends with the chief administrator – and Heidi received an abortion. The experience was “painful and traumatic”, Heidi told Elle. “If it weren’t for urgent and critical medical care, I could have lost my life.”

“It’s important for folks to understand that these things happen to folks every day,” he explains. “I’ve always considered myself pro-choice and believe women should be able to make these decisions themselves, but when you live it in real life, you realize the significant impact it can have on a family.”

Updated

What Amy Coney Barrett's likely confirmation means for America

1) What’s the significance of the likely Barrett confirmation?

The significance is hard to overstate. Barrett represents the culmination of a decades-long project by conservatives to control the high court. Her confirmation would extend the conservative reach into every corner of American life, well beyond the size of their shrinking electorate.

Barrett’s confirmation would give conservatives a bulletproof, six-justice majority on the nine-member court, which decides cases by a simple majority.

With that majority, the court could walk back rights and weaken protections on every issue of importance to progressives: healthcare, voting rights, the climate emergency, abortion, same-sex marriage, anti-discrimination measures, immigration, checks on the presidency … it’s all on the table.

2) Are the stakes really so high?

Yes. For example, a week after the election, the court is scheduled to hear a new challenge to Barack Obama’s healthcare law. Barrett has found fault with an earlier court decision that upheld the law. If Barrett ruled against the law in the new case – in a decision expected to be handed down in summer 2021 – tens of millions of Americans could lose health insurance, including people with pre-existing health conditions.

Or Barrett, a conservative Catholic who has lent her name to anti-abortion initiatives, could prevent the supreme court from striking down future state laws that place undue restrictions on abortion. Just last summer, the court struck down such a law by a narrow 5-4 majority, with chief justice John Roberts joining the court’s liberal bloc.

With Barrett on the court – while it is impossible to predict how any judge will rule – it potentially does not matter whether Roberts joins the liberal bloc; the conservatives still win.

Today so far

That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Maanvi Singh, will take over the blog for the next few hours.

Here’s where the day stands so far:

  • The Senate judiciary committee held the first day of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings. The supreme court nominee and every member of the committee delivered an opening statement. Questioning of Barrett begins tomorrow.
  • Barrett emphasized judges should not try to legislate from the bench in her opening statement. “Courts are not designed to solve every problem or right every wrong in our public life,” Barrett said. “The policy decisions and value judgments of government must be made by the political branches elected by and accountable to the people.”
  • Senate Republicans accused their Democratic colleagues of attacking Barrett’s Catholic faith, even though Democrats did not mention her faith. Instead, Democrats used their opening statements to warn that Barrett’s confirmation to the supreme court could jeopardize the Affordable Care Act.
  • Kamala Harris argued the Senate should postpone Barrett’s hearings and focus on passing another coronavirus relief bill. Delivering an opening statement virtually from her Senate office, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee said, “Senate Republicans have made it crystal clear that rushing a supreme court nomination is more important than helping and supporting the American people who are suffering from a deadly pandemic and economic crisis.”
  • Roberta McCain, the mother of John McCain, died at 108. Her death comes two years after her son, a Republican senator and former presidential nominee, died of brain cancer.

Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

Dr Anthony Fauci said it was “unfortunate” that some of his comments had been used in a Trump campaign ad.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said he believed the ad should be taken down because he is clearly not a “political person.”

“I think it’s really unfortunate and really disappointing that they did that,” Fauci said of the ad. “I have never either directly or indirectly endorsed a political candidate.”

Echoing a previous statement, Fauci said his comments about the the government’s coronavirus pandemic response had been taken out of context.

CNN host Jake Tapper asked what Fauci would say if he learned the Trump campaign was planning to do another add featuring his words.

“That would be terrible,” Fauci said. “That would be outrageous if they do that. In fact, that might actually come back to backfire on them. I hope they don’t do that.”

Trump is trying to raise baseless suspicions about Joe Biden’s health, less than two weeks after he himself tested positive for coronavirus.

“So Biden is coughing and hacking and playing ‘fingers’ with his mask, all over the place, and the Fake News doesn’t want to even think about discussing it,” Trump said in a tweet.

Biden has been taking daily coronavirus tests and releasing the results to the press. Biden’s most recent test was today, and his campaign said he tested negative.

In contrast, Trump was hospitalized with coronavirus for four days and has still refused to tell reporters when he last tested negative for the virus.

A new pair of polls show Joe Biden leading in Wisconsin and Michigan, both of which Trump narrowly won in 2016.

According to the New York Times/Siena College surveys, Biden leads Trump by 8 points among Michigan’s likely voters, 48%-40%.

The Democratic nominee has an even larger 10-point lead among Wisconsin’s likely voters, 51%-41%.

Trump won both Michigan and Wisconsin by less than 1 point in 2016. Even if the president loses both states on November 3, he can still secure a second term if he holds onto every other state he won in 2016.

However, polls of other key battleground states -- such as Pennsylvania, Arizona and Florida -- indicate Trump is trailing there as well, leaving him an increasingly narrow path to reelection.

Roberta McCain, mother of John McCain, dies at 108

Cindy McCain, the widow of John McCain, the late senator from Arizona who was the Republican nominee for president in 2008, has announced the death of Roberta McCain, her husband’s mother.

“It is with great sadness that I announce the death of my wonderful mother-in-law, Roberta McCain,” Cindy McCain wrote on Twitter. “I couldn’t have asked for a better role model or a better friend. She joins her husband Jack, her son John and daughter Sandy.”

Roberta McCain was 108. She was 106 when her son the senator died, aged 81, in August 2018.

The AP has some more on Biden’s speech in Toledo, Ohio, and on Vice-President Mike Pence’s doings in the same key swing state today, ahead of his boss’s return to the campaign trail in Florida tonight.

In Toledo, Biden addressed United Auto Workers union members who represent a local General Motors’ powertrain plant. In a parking lot with about 30 American-made cars and trucks arrayed nearby, the former vice-president struck a decidedly populist note, praising unions and arguing that he represented working-class values.

“I don’t measure people by the size of their bank account,” Biden said. “You and I measure people by the strength of their character, their honesty, their courage.”

Joe Biden arrives to speak at a campaign event in Toledo, Ohio.
Joe Biden arrives to speak at a campaign event in Toledo, Ohio. Photograph: Rebecca Cook/Reuters

Biden highlighted his role as the Obama administration rescued the US auto industry after the 2008 financial collapse. President George W Bush signed the aid package after the 2008 election, but the Obama administration managed most of the rescue program.

“The auto industry that supported one in eight Ohioans was on the brink,” Biden said, eliciting horn honks from people listening from their vehicles. “Barack and I bet on you, and it paid off.”

Pence staged his own event in Ohio’s capital, Columbus, concluding remarks at Savko & Sons, an excavation company that hosted Obama at one of its job sites in 2010.

“You said yes to President Donald Trump in 2016, and I know the Buckeye State’s going to say yes to four more years,” Pence said. “It’s on, Ohio. It’s on. You’ve gotta bring it.”

Pence also noted that Biden has refused to say whether he will heed the calls of some progressive Democrats who would like to see the party expand the number of seats on the supreme court, should Democrats win the White House and the Senate while retaining control of the House.

“It could be nothing less than the biggest power grab in American history,” Pence said. “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won’t tell the American people what they’re going to do.”

Biden has called for the late justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat to remain vacant until after the election but hasn’t answered questions about whether he would be open to expanding the court. He says doing so would be playing politics by Trump’s rules.

Trump carried Ohio over Hillary Clinton by eight points in 2016, but polls show this year’s race tightening.

The Biden campaign has increased advertising in Ohio, even as Trump has scaled back in the state and elsewhere. The president has seen his backing slip in cities including Cincinnati and Cleveland but he is looking to cancel that out by expanding already strong support in rural areas.

Biden counters that Trump has mishandled the coronavirus pandemic, exacerbating the economic fallout.

Updated

Biden to Ohio: Trump 'turned his back on you'

While Washington had its eyes on the Amy Coney Barrett confirmation hearing, Joe Biden was speaking at a drive-in rally in Toledo, Ohio. The Associated Press reports:

The Democratic presidential nominee told his audience Trump “turned his back on you” during the pandemic and its economic fallout.

Biden questioned why Republicans have time for supreme court hearings but not time to come to an agreement with House Democrats on another economic relief package to help individuals, businesses and city and state governments.

Trump has alternately called off Covid-19 relief talks, then pushed for a deal. Late last week, the White House boosted its offer to Democrats, but Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said it was unlikely Congress could pass a bill before the election and House speaker Nancy Pelosi said the White House offer didn’t include enough money.

The AP also reports that Biden’s press pack wasn’t with him in Toledo, after the press plane “had a malfunction and remained grounded in Wilmington, Delaware. Because Biden’s plane always takes off first, the candidate was already on his way to Ohio.”

To round off this post, I’m going to have some Fun With Polls. This is how fivethirtyeight.com has the averages at the moment, nationally and in some key battleground states. Note Ohio, where Biden is today:

  • National: Biden +10.5
  • Arizona: Biden +3.9
  • Florida: Biden +4.5
  • Michigan: Biden +8.1
  • Nevada: Biden +6.9
  • North Carolina: Biden +2.9
  • Ohio: Biden +0.7
  • Pennsylvania: Biden +7.2
  • Wisconsin: Biden +7.7

Here’s our own battleground tracker:

Updated

Speaking to reporters, Amy Klobuchar acknowledged that Senate Democrats “don’t have any special procedural” strategy for stopping Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination.

Democrats acknowledge that it will be extremely difficult for them to block Barrett’s confirmation in the Republican-controlled Senate.

But Klobuchar and Dick Durbin both expressed hope that Democrats’ questioning of Barrett over the next two days will encourage Americans to reach out to their Republican senators about her confirmation.

Senate Democrats are now holding a press conference about Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings.

The Democratic senators appeared before reporters wearing masks and holding posters of their constituents who have preexisting conditions.

The Democrats repeated their talking points from the nomination hearing, warning that Barrett’s confirmation to the supreme court would jeopardize the Affordable Care Act and threaten the healthcare coverage of millions of Americans.

First day of Barrett nomination hearings concludes

The first day of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings has now concluded, after the supreme court nominee and every member of the Senate judiciary committee delivered opening statements.

Lindsey Graham, the Republican chairman of the committee, said the committee would reconvene for the first day of questioning tomorrow at 9 am ET.

Patricia O’Hara, the dean of Notre Dame Law School, virtually delivered a statement to the Senate judiciary committee.

O’Hara was supposed to introduce Amy Coney Barrett before the supreme court nominee’s opening statement, but she was having some technical difficulties.

O’Hara offered an unambiguous endorsement of Barrett’s qualifications, and she noted she previously sent a letter of endorsement for Justice Elena Kagan, who was nominated by Barack Obama.

Judges should not try to legislate, Barrett says in opening statement

In her opening statement, Amy Coney Barrett emphasized that it is not the responsibility of judges to legislate from the bench.

“Courts have a vital responsibility to enforce the rule of law, which is critical to a free society. But courts are not designed to solve every problem or right every wrong in our public life,” Barrett said.

“The policy decisions and value judgments of government must be made by the political branches elected by and accountable to the people. The public should not expect courts to do so, and courts should not try.”

Barrett said she was honored to be nominated to fill the seat of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died last month.

“I have been nominated to fill Justice Ginsburg’s seat, but no one will ever take her place,” Barrett said. “I will be forever grateful for the path she marked and the life she led.”

Amy Coney Barrett opened her statement by thanking the Indiana senators who introduced her and the dean of Notre Dame law school, who was supposed to introduce Barrett virtually as well but was suffering some technical difficulties.

Barrett then introduced her husband and each of their seven children, several of whom are present in the hearing room.

Barrett is sworn in and delivers opening statement

Amy Coney Barrett has been sworn in for her supreme court nomination hearings.

Barrett is now delivering her opening statement to the Senate judiciary committee.

Supreme court nominee Amy Coney Barrett was introduced by the two senators who represent her home state of Indiana, Todd Young and Mike Braun.

All members of the Senate judiciary committee have now delivered their opening statements, and Amy Coney Barrett will soon deliver her statement.

Before turning things over to Barrett, Lindsey Graham, the Republican chairman of the Senate judiciary committee, introduced a letter from the Architect of the Capitol saying the hearing room was CDC compliant.

Graham said he received a coronavirus test a week ago due to brief exposure to Mike Lee, who tested positive 10 days ago. Graham’s test was negative.

“I’m not going to be told to be tested by political opponents,” Graham said.

Updated

Today so far

Here’s where the day stands so far:

  • The nomination hearings for Amy Coney Barrett are underway. The supreme court nominee is expected to deliver her opening statement this afternoon.
  • Senate Republicans accused their Democratic colleagues of attacking Barrett’s Catholic faith, even though Democrats have not mentioned her faith. Instead, Democrats have used their opening statements to warn that Barrett’s confirmation to the supreme court could jeopardize the Affordable Care Act.
  • Kamala Harris argued the Senate should postpone Barrett’s hearings and focus on passing another coronavirus relief bill. Delivering an opening statement virtually from her Senate office, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee said, “Senate Republicans have made it crystal clear that rushing a supreme court nomination is more important than helping and supporting the American people who are suffering from a deadly pandemic and economic crisis.”

The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

In his opening statement, John Kennedy reflected on the nomination hearings for supreme court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The Republican senator said that the 2018 Kavanaugh hearings, which became focused on Dr Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation of sexual assault against the judge, were a “freak show.”

“It looked like the cantina bar scene out of Star Wars,” Kennedy added.

Harris says Senate should be focused on coronavirus relief

Senator Kamala Harris delivered an opening statement at Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearing virtually, from her Senate office.

The Democratic vice-presidential nominee criticized Republicans’ “reckless” decision to hold the nomination hearings in the middle of a global pandemic and less than two weeks after committee members tested positive for coronavirus.

Harris, a member of the Senate judiciary committee, argued the chamber should postpone the hearings and instead focus on passing another coronavirus relief package.

“Senate Republicans have made it crystal clear that rushing a Supreme Court nomination is more important than helping and supporting the American people who are suffering from a deadly pandemic and economic crisis,” Harris said.

The California senator also accused Republicans of trying to overturn the Affordable Care Act through the supreme court because they failed to do so in Congress.

“Republicans finally realized the ACA is too popular to repeal in Congress, so now they are trying to bypass the will of voters and have the Supreme Court do their dirty work,” Harris said.

Updated

Cory Booker denounced Republicans’ decision to move forward with Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearing while voting is already underway.

“Donald Trump and most of my Senate Republican colleagues know the truth: They won’t be able to get away with this after the American people have spoken in this election,” the New Jersey Democrat said.

Booker argued Republicans’ efforts to advance Barrett’s nomination show they “don’t trust the American people.”

In her opening statement, Joni Ernst accused Democrats of attacking Amy Coney Barrett “as a mom and a woman of faith.”

But so far, only Republicans have mentioned Barrett’s Catholic faith.

Instead, Democrats on the Senate judiciary committee have focused their opening statements on warning Barrett’s confirmation to the supreme court could threaten the Affordable Care Act.

Ernst is facing a difficult reelection in Iowa, and a recent poll showed the Republican incumbent trailing Democrat Theresa Greenfield by 4 points.

Some Republicans on the Senate judiciary committee, including Josh Hawley, have used their opening statements to accuse Democrats of attacking Amy Coney Barrett for her Catholic faith.

But none of the Senate Democrats who have delivered opening statements so far have directly mentioned Barrett’s faith.

A spokesperson for Joe Biden accused Republicans of hypocrisy, noting the Democratic nominee would be only the second Catholic president in US history if elected next month.

“Where were these Republican senators when Trump outrageously attacked Biden’s faith, saying he’d ‘hurt God?’” Andrew Bates said in a tweet.

The president said during an August campaign event that Biden would “take away your guns, destroy your second amendment. No religion, no anything, hurt the Bible, hurt God.”

Trump added of Biden, “He’s against God, he’s against guns, he’s against energy, our kind of energy.”

Amy Coney Barrett nomination hearing resumes

The first day of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings has now resumed, with Democrat Mazie Hirono delivering her opening statement.

Once every member of the Senate judiciary committee has had the chance to deliver a statement, Barrett will speak for the first time today.

White House chief of staff Mark Meadows refused to speak to reporters while wearing a mask.

Meadows pulled a microphone toward him to speak to reporters on Capitol Hill and then began to remove his mask from his face.

When a reporter insisted he keep his mask on, he said he was more than 10 feet away. After the reporter objected, Meadows turned to leave, saying, “I’m not going to talk through a mask.”

In recent days, Meadows has been around several people who have tested positive for coronavirus, including the president. He has said he has repeatedly tested negative for the virus.

During the break in Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearing, Trump urged Republicans to push their own healthcare agenda in their opening statements.

“We will have Healthcare which is FAR BETTER than ObamaCare, at a FAR LOWER COST,” Trump said in a tweet. “PEOPLE WITH PRE EXISTING CONDITIONS WILL BE PROTECTED AT AN EVEN HIGHER LEVEL THAN NOW.”

Trump said in a separate tweet, “Republicans must state loudly and clearly that WE are going to provide much better Healthcare at a much lower cost.”

In reality, the Trump administration is supporting a lawsuit currently before the supreme court challenging the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act, which could jeopardize protections for those with preexisting conditions.

The president has said he wants to protect those with preexisting conditions, but he has not laid out a substantive plan to do so.

Democrats have used their opening statements during Barrett’s hearing to warn that her confirmation to the supreme court could threaten healthcare for millions of Americans.

First break in Amy Coney Barrett's nomination hearing

We have reached the first break in Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearing before the Senate judiciary committee.

The hearing is scheduled to reconvene in about 35 minutes, when more members of the committee will deliver their opening statements.

Barrett will deliver her own opening statement once every committee member has had the chance to speak.

At Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearing, Republican Josh Hawley accused his Democratic colleague, Chris Coons, of attacking the nominee’s Catholic faith by mentioning Griswold v Connecticut.

That landmark 1965 supreme court case affirmed that the Constitution protects the right of married couples to use contraceptives, and it was cited as a basis for Roe v Wade, which established women’s right to abortion access.

Trump’s reelection campaign manager is back in the office, 10 days after testing positive for coronavirus.

Bill Stepien told reporters that he was back in the office during a press call this morning, saying the move was in compliance with CDC guidelines because it had been at least 10 days since his positive test result.

Stepien was one of several Trump campaign officials who attended the president’s debate prep sessions and later tested positive for coronavirus.

The Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:

There were long lines in Georgia on Monday as voters flocked to the polls for the first day of early voting in the state, which has developed a national reputation in recent years for voting issues.

Voters who cast their votes at the State Farm Arena, a basketball stadium being used as an early voting site this year, faced more than an hour wait after a glitch with some of the equipment used to check voters in, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Poll workers rebooted the 60 machines at the site, the paper reported.

Adrienne Crowley, who waited more than an hour to vote, told the paper there wasn’t anything that would make her get out of the line to vote. “I would have voted all day if I had to.”

Voters began lining up outside polling stations in the predawn hours, some using their cellphone flashlights to help other voters fill out pre-registration forms, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

A line forms before dawn as early voting gets underway at the Mountain Park Activity Building in Stone Mountain, Georgia.
A line forms before dawn as early voting gets underway at the Mountain Park Activity Building in Stone Mountain, Georgia. Photograph: Atlanta Journal Constitution/JOHN AMIS/EPA

Georgia is the latest state to see extremely long lines during the first day of in person voting. Election officials have also seen unprecedented voter turnout on the first day of in-person early voting in states like Virginia and Ohio.

Nationally, more than 9.4m people have already voted, an unprecedented number, according to data collected by Michael McDonald, a political science professor at the University of Florida.

Democrats are trying to pick up a US senate seat in Georgia in a race where Democrat Jon Ossoff is challenging incumbent Republican David Perdue.

Georgia has long been seen as a Republican bastion, but many think recent demographic changes have made it a more competitive state. A recent poll shows Donald Trump and Joe Biden in a statistical tie in the state.

Joe Biden said he did not believe there should be questions about Amy Coney Barrett’s Catholic faith during her nomination hearings.

Instead, the Democratic nominee said, questions should focus on how her confirmation to the supreme court could put the future of the Affordable Care Act in jeopardy.

“Let’s keep our eye on the ball,” Biden said before boarding his campaign plane. He is en route to Ohio for two campaign events there today.

Mike Lee released a letter from the attending physician of the Capitol after some criticized the Republican senator’s decision to attending Amy Coney Barrett’s hearing in person.

The letter notes that Lee tested positive for coronavirus 10 days ago and last had a fever exceeding 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit on Thursday. He is also experiencing lingering fatigue from the virus, while his other symptoms have resolved.

“Based upon current CDC guidelines, you have met criteria to end COVID-19 isolation for those with mild to moderate disease,” Dr Brian Monahan wrote.

“Specifically, it has been greater than 10 days since symptom onset, you have had no fever in absence of fever reducing medication for at least 24 hours, and your other symptoms have improved.”

Lee has not said whether he tested negative for the virus before returning to the Capitol, but Monahan notes, “The CDC does not recommend repeat SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing if these criteria are met.”

While delivering his opening statement this morning, Lee spoke for several minutes without wearing a mask.

Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat of Rhode Island, denounced Republicans’ handling of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Whitehouse argued the hearings were “a microcosm of Trump’s dangerous ineptitude in dealing with the Covid pandemic.”

“Trump can’t even keep the White House safe,” the Democratic senator said, less than two weeks after the president tested positive for coronavirus.

Whitehouse said he had concerns about who in the Senate had and had not received coronavirus tests and what contract tracing had been done with those who had tested positive.

“The whole thing, just like Trump, is an irresponsible botch,” Whitehouse said.

After Mike Lee finished delivering his opening statement, Lindsey Graham joked that his Republican colleague’s lengthy legal analysis signaled he had recovered from coronavirus, 10 days after testing positive.

“Well, good news,” Graham said. “Senator Lee’s enthusiasm for the dormant commerce clause assures me you’ve made a full recovery.”

Lee said earlier today that the attending physician of the Capitol had cleared him to attend Amy Coney Barrett’s hearings in person, but he would not say if he had tested negative.

Senator Mike Lee, who tested positive for coronavirus 10 days ago, is now delivering his opening statement without wearing a mask.

Lee said earlier today that he would attend Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings in person, but he did not clarify whether he had tested negative for coronavirus.

Trump appeared to call for shortening Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings to quickly confirm her and shift the Senate’s focus to coronavirus relief negotiations.

“The Republicans are giving the Democrats a great deal of time, which is not mandated, to make their self serving statements relative to our great new future Supreme Court Justice. Personally, I would pull back, approve, and go for STIMULUS for the people!!!” Trump said in a new tweet.

Barrett’s hearings are scheduled to span four days, which is in line with other recent supreme court nominations.

Although the president can pressure Republicans to try to shorten the proceedings, that decision is ultimately up to Lindsey Graham, the chairman of the judiciary committee, and it would likely be difficult to alter the schedule at this point.

Last week, Trump briefly signaled he wanted to withdraw from coronavirus relief negotiations, but he then pivoted again, saying he wanted more spending than either party had proposed.

Reminder: there are 22 days until the presidential election.

Members of the Senate judiciary committee continue to deliver their opening statements for Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings.

The blog will be watching the hearing while keeping an eye on the other pressing issues of the day because Barrett is not expected to speak until later this afternoon.

Over on the House side of the Capitol, majority leader Steny Hoyer said no votes were expected this week on a coronavirus relief package, as negotiations continue between speaker Nancy Pelosi and treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin.

Patrick Leahy, a Democrat of Vermont, focused his opening statement on denouncing Republicans’ flip-flop on holding supreme court hearings in election years.

When Justice Antonin Scalia died in February 2016, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell refused to even consider Barack Obama’s nominee to fill the supreme court seat.

Lindsey Graham, the chairman of the Senate judiciary committee, used his opening statement to preemptively rebut these arguments from Democrats.

The Republican chairman noted that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died last month, previously said president serves for four years, not three.

But Graham did not mention that Ginsburg also gave a statement to her family shortly before her death expressing her wish for the president to wait to fill her seat until after next month’s election.

Chuck Grassley, the former Republican chairman of the Senate judiciary committee, is now delivering his opening statement, applauding Amy Coney Barrett’s professional achievements.

Every member of the Senate judiciary committee will be given the chance to deliver an opening statement before Barrett delivers hers.

Considering there are 22 members on the committee, Barrett will not speak until later this afternoon.

Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate judiciary committee, focused her opening statement on her concerns that Amy Coney Barrett would vote to scrap the Affordable Care Act.

The California Democrat noted the supreme court will be holding oral arguments on a case involving the ACA one week after the November 3 elections.

Feinstein pointed to past writings from Barrett criticizing supreme court Chief Justice John Roberts for voting to uphold the law in 2012.

Democrats on the committee are expected to hammer this theme of the ACA being in jeopardy for the rest of the week.

Meanwhile, senator Kamala Harris has arrived on Capitol Hill, where she will participate in Amy Coney Barrett’s hearings virtually from her office.

The Democratic vice-presidential nominee said her opening statement today would be focused on “establishing the context of this hearing.”

As a member of the Senate judiciary committee, Harris has become well-known for her tough questioning of Trump’s nominees, including supreme court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Lindsey Graham closed his opening comments by predicting this would be “a long, contentious week.”

The Republican chairman of the Senate judiciary committee asked members of the panel to keep the hearings “respectful” and “challenging.”

“Remember, the world is watching,” Graham said.

Lindsey Graham acknowledged the nomination hearings were unlikely to change the minds of anyone on the Senate judiciary committee.

“This is probably not about persuading each other unless something really dramatic happens,” the Republican chairman of the committee said.

Graham said he expected all Republicans to support Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination and all Democrats to oppose it.

Lindsey Graham justified the timing of Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearings, even though they come about three weeks before a presidential election.

The Republican chairman of the Senate judiciary committee said it was fair to confirm Barrett when both the White House and the Senate were controlled by Republicans.

No supreme court nominee has ever been confirmed between July and November of a presidential election year.

Lindsey Graham, the chairman of the Senate judiciary committee, laid out the schedule for Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination hearings.

Today will be dedicated to opening statements from Barrett and the members of the committee, followed by two days of questioning.

Graham said the panel would likely vote on her nomination on October 27, followed by a full Senate vote on October 27 -- one week before the elections.

Amy Coney Barrett nomination hearings begin

Supreme court nominee Amy Coney Barrett has taken her seat in the Senate hearing room. The nomination hearings are now underway.

Supreme court nominee Amy Coney Barrett and her family arrived on Capitol Hill for the Senate hearings moments ago.

This is Joan Greve in Washington, taking over for Martin Belam.

We are moments away from the start of the nomination hearings for Amy Coney Barrett, who could become the sixth conservative justice on the supreme court.

Barrett and members of the Senate judiciary committee are expected to deliver their opening statements this morning.

In a surprising turn, Republican senator Mike Lee, who tested positive for coronavirus 10 days ago, said he would be attending the hearings in person.

Back to the Amy Coney Barrett Senate hearings, which will be beginning very soon. Republicans have been moving swiftly to get her confirmed before the election, in order to try and pack the court with a 6-3 conservative majority ahead of any dispute that arises after the results of the 3 November vote.

Zalman Rothschild writes for us this morning on how he surveyed 74 court rulings on religious freedom and Covid lockdowns in the US in recent months, and was staggered by the partisan divide. His conclusion: Judges’ politics absolutely sway how they decide cases

I surveyed every merits-based federal court decision pertaining to a free exercise challenge to a stay-at-home order. The findings are staggering: 0% of Democrat-appointed judges have sided with a religious institution; the vast majority (67%) of Republican-appointed judges have sided with a religious institution; and 0% of Trump-appointed judges have ruled against religious institutions. In other words, all Trump-appointed judges have sided with religious institutions and all Democrat-appointed judges have sided with the state or city government. To be sure, my sample set – 74 cases – is not enormous. But the ability to predict to such a high degree the outcome of cases implicating the same free exercise question (in remarkably similar context) is illuminating. It suggests that Covid-19 has produced not only a partisan divide in the courts, but also that freedom of religion itself has become dramatically politicized.

Read more here: Zalman Rothschild – Judges’ politics absolutely sway how they decide cases. I crunched the numbers

I’m not entirely sure that I ever thought in my lifetime it would be my job to bring you the news that the president of the United States has announced that the state of California is going to hell, but here we all are…

New York, apparently, has already got there.

To add to the general mire of confusion of disinformation that the US president Donald Trump has been spreading about mail-in ballots, it emerges that the California Republican party has been installing unofficial ballot drop-off boxes. State officials say they’re illegal. Katie Shepherd writes for the Washington Post:

The metal boxes have popped up around Southern California in recent weeks, from churches to gun stores to gyms. On the front, an authoritative-looking sign beckons to voters: “Official ballot drop-off box.”

The California GOP has pushed voters to pop their mail-in ballots inside. Social media posts have advertised their locations, and one regional field director posted a photo to Twitter on Friday showing him holding a ballot in front of one of the boxes.

But those containers are not county-authorized ballot drop-off sites. In fact, the unofficial boxes are against the law, state officials said Sunday.

“Operating unofficial ballot drop boxes — especially those misrepresented as official drop boxes — is not just misleading to voters, it’s a violation of state law,” California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, a Democrat, told The Post in an email. “My office is coordinating with local officials to address the multiple reports of unauthorized ballot drop boxes. Californians should only use official ballot drop boxes that have been deployed and secured by their county elections office.”

For their part, Republicans have defended the practice, saying it is only a form of “ballot harvesting.”

In some states, ballot harvesting rules allow campaign volunteers to collect ballots door-to-door and return them to be counted on behalf of voters, and a law was passed permitting it by Democrats in 2016. The Republicans have defended the drop-off boxes on Twitter.

If a congregation/business or other group provides the option to its parishioners/associates/ or colleagues to drop off their ballot in a safe location, with people they trust, rather than handing it over to a stranger who knocks on their door — what is wrong with that?

Read more here: Washington Post – California GOP installed unofficial ballot drop-off boxes. State officials say they’re illegal

Kenya Evelyn reports for us in Jacksonville, Florida:

With one in 1,000 Black Americans having died of the coronavirus, progressives such as Angie Nixon are rallying voters ahead of the 2020 presidential election. Running uncontested, she’s the next state representative for Florida’s 14th congressional district representing Jacksonville and its outer suburbs.

“I think it’s really important that we work on legislation that addresses systemic racism and that is not just Band-Aids,” she said. “I’m pregnant. Yes, I have a degree. I have a good-paying job and I have healthcare, but I’m still concerned that if I go into the hospital, will I be listened to?”

As cases surged in Jacksonville, Nixon’s canvassing evolved into community wellness checks. Shortly after, she contracted the virus while pregnant before transmitting it to her mother. She said her “most mentally taxing experience” is a wake-up call for Democrats to get aggressive in facing the issues affecting their most loyal voting bloc.

“I don’t want [my daughters] to continue to fight for the same things that my mom and my grandmother had to fight for,” she said. “We’ve been the ones that have been turning out for the longest and we are going to lead this movement,” she said.

Nixon is part of a record number of Black women and women of color to run for office across the country. While she called on more to claim their political power and demand “a seat at the table”, she acknowledged that not all Black voters move left.

Read Kenya Evelyn’s report in full here: ‘We’re going to lead this’: a call for Black women in Florida to claim their political power

As well as tweeting about Portland and coronavirus, the president has repeated his claim that the 2020 US election is being rigged against him. The legal wrangling over Republican attempts at voter suppression meanwhile continues in the courts.

In Minnesota, Associated Press report, a federal judge has upheld a state court agreement that extends the states’s deadline for counting absentee ballots by seven days.

Republicans had asked US District Judge Nancy Brasel to block the seven-day extension that Democratic Secretary of State Steve Simon agreed to after a citizens’ rights group cited concerns about voter safety due to the Covid-19 pandemic. But Brasel ruled late Sunday that the plaintiffs in the case – a pair of Republicans serving as electors in the presidential election – don’t have standing and denied their motion for a preliminary injunction.

Previously, ballots had to be received by 8pm on election day but a consent decree allowed ballots postmarked on or before election day to be counted if they were received within the following seven days.

Brasel’s decision to keep the extension intact comes just days after a federal appeals court blocked a similar extension in Wisconsin in a win for Republicans who have fought attempts to expand voting across the country.

Meanwhile, in Georgia, a federal judge on Sunday expressed serious concerns about the state’s new election system, but declined to order the state to abandon its touchscreen voting machines in favor of hand-marked paper ballots for the November election.

The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by voting integrity activists that challenges the election system the state bought last year from Dominion Voting Systems for more than $100 million. The activists argued that the system places an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote because voters cannot be confident their vote is accurately counted.

One of the unknowns of this election, which is taking place with unprecedented levels of mail in and absentee ballots during a global pandemic, is just when we might find out the result. It is sure to be disputed, whatever happens, but Zach Montellaro and David Siders think the picture could be clearer than anticipated on the night. They write for Politico:

While vote counting could be delayed in many states due to a glut of mail ballots, Biden is challenging Trump in several fast-counting, Republican-leaning swing states the president carried four years ago. Election administrators in those states, especially Florida and North Carolina, are confident they should have most of the vote counted on election night.

The result: There are several narrow paths to a fast 270 electoral votes for Biden, and basically none for Trump — barring a major surprise in states he lost four years ago. The president likely cannot win another term in the White House without waiting days to find out, though Trump has hinted that he could try to claim he won on election night based on vote counts that won’t yet include many mail ballots, which more Democrats are planning to use this year.

They go on to outline several scenarios where Biden could be confident he had bagged 270 electoral college votes on the night – nearly all of which rely on him winning Florida.

If Biden can net Florida on election night — no sure thing regardless of timing — Democrats could secure the other 15 electoral votes in three ways: winning North Carolina, Ohio or the combination of Arizona and Iowa. For Democrats bullish on closing Trump out on election night, Ohio, with 18 electoral votes, is an especially appealing target.

Biden visits Ohio to campaign later today.

Read more here: Politico – How Biden could end 2020 on election night — and why Trump’s path is unlikely

President Donald Trump has tweeted about the rising numbers of coronavirus cases being reported in Europe, promising that “it will run its course” if the US is strong and vigilant.

Yesterday the US recorded 44,614 new coronavirus cases and 398 new Covid deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University coronavirus tracker. Here are the latest figures showing the extent of the coronavirus outbreak in the US.

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Erwin Chemerinsky writes for the Los Angeles Times this morning on “How the Senate should question Amy Coney Barrett to show the threat she poses”

The questioners should refrain from asking Barrett about her Catholic religious beliefs. No one should be appointed or defeated on account of his or her religion.

Instead, the senators should focus on her judicial philosophy. Judge Barrett, like Justice Antonin Scalia before her, has repeatedly described herself as an originalist, saying that the meaning of a constitutional provision is fixed when it is adopted and can be changed only by constitutional amendment. In this view, it is the intention of the framers that matters, and societal shifts over the centuries should never be considered in rendering an opinion.

With that in mind, one line of questioning should be to push Barrett on whether she can identify anyone holding this originalist approach who ever has supported abortion rights or the right of same-sex couples to marry.

A second line of questioning should focus on how little weight she would give to previous rulings. As a law professor, Barrett wrote that precedent deserves little, if any weight, in constitutional law, noting that, “a justice’s duty is to the Constitution and that it is thus more legitimate for her to enforce her best understanding of the Constitution rather than a precedent she thinks clearly in conflict with it.”

A third line of questioning should focus on Barrett’s writings compared to her rulings on the bench. As a law professor, she strongly criticized Supreme Court decisions protecting a woman’s right to abortion, upholding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and establishing a right of gay and lesbian couples to marry. She should be pressed to identify any instance as a judge where she took a position different from what she espoused as an academic.

Read more here: Los Angeles Times – How the Senate should question Amy Coney Barrett to show the threat she poses

Updated

The president has awakened, and his first tweet of the day is about overnight events in Portland, where protestors have toppled statues of Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln [see 6:43].

Some of the drama of today’s Senate judiciary committee hearing into the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett has been taken away by the fact that her opening statement has leaked. In it she will give a great deal of thanks to her family, teachers and to her legal mentors – notable Judge Laurence Silberman and Justice Antonin Scalia.

She will then go on to talk a little of her philosophy of applying the law:

There is a tendency in our profession to treat the practice of law as all-consuming, while losing sight of everything else. But that makes for a shallow and unfulfilling life. I worked hard as a lawyer and a professor; I owed that to my clients, my students, and myself. But I never let the law define my identity or crowd out the rest of my life.A similar principle applies to the role of courts. Courts have a vital responsibility to enforce the rule of law, which is critical to a free society. But courts are not designed to solve every problem or right every wrong in our public life. The policy decisions and value judgments of government must be made by the political branches elected by and accountable to the People. The public should not expect courts to do so, and courts should not try

That is the approach I have strived to follow as a judge on the Seventh Circuit. In every case, I have carefully considered the arguments presented by the parties, discussed the issues with my colleagues on the court, and done my utmost to reach the result required by the law, whatever my own preferences might be. I try to remain mindful that, while my court decides thousands of cases a year, each case is the most important one to the parties involved. After all, cases are not like statutes, which are often named for their authors. Cases are named for the parties who stand to gain or lose in the real world, often through their liberty or livelihood. When I write an opinion resolving a case, I read every word from the perspective of the losing party. I ask myself how would I view the decision if one of my children was the party I was ruling against: Even though I would not like the result, would I understand that the decision was fairly reasoned and grounded in the law? That is the standard I set for myself in every case, and it is the standard I will follow as long as I am a judge on any court.

Harry Enten at CNN has a look at some dispiriting numbers for the Trump campaign today, noting that Joe Biden is polling better than any challenger since 1936.

In the 21 previous presidential elections since 1936, there have only been five challengers who led at this time. Of those five, only one (Bill Clinton in 1992) was ahead by more than 5 points. None of those five were earning more than 48% of the vote in the polls.

In other words, Biden is the first challenger to be above 50% at this late juncture in the campaign.

This also continues to mark a massive difference with the 2016 campaign.

While Hillary Clinton was ahead of Trump by as high as 7 points in October 2016, she never came anywhere close to approaching 50% of the vote. Trump merely had to win the lionshare of the undecided or third party voters (who would bolt their candidate) to earn a victory in 2016.

Even if every undecided or current third party voter went to Trump now, he’d still be down about 5 to 6 points nationally. That’s never been the case with an incumbent since 1936 at this point.

Some word of caution, of course. Polls can be wrong and as Enten reminds us, it’s the Electoral College, not national share of vote that matters. But, he says:

There are very few universes in which Trump could win the Electoral College, if he were to lose nationally by 5 to 6 points.

Read it here: CNN – Joe Biden’s polling better than any challenger since 1936

Joe Biden will be in Ohio today, in a move which Julie Carr Smyth and Thomas Beaumont of the Associated Press say signals the former vice president’s hopes of winning the state Democrats lost by a significant margin in the 2016 election.

Biden plans an afternoon campaign speech in Toledo, then will head to Cincinnati for a voter mobilization event.

Vice president Mike Pence also plans a “Make America Great Again” campaign stop in Columbus on Monday, as he fills in for Trump before the president returns to the campaign trail later today with an even in Florida.

The Trump team are bullish about holding Ohio, which they won by 8 points last time around. “While Joe Biden and Democrats fumble to find Ohio at the 11th hour, Trump Victory never took the Buckeye State for granted and developed the strongest grassroots operation in the history of our state,” spokesman Dan Lusheck said in a statement Saturday. “We look forward to a big win for Team Trump on November 3rd.”

Biden extended his advertising presence in Ohio last week, adding money notably to radio in rural western counties and in the state’s eastern and southeastern Appalachian counties, where Trump won big four years ago.

Polls show the race in Ohio close, with Trump just about retaining an edge. Trump’s support has declined in suburbs across the state this year though, notably in and around Cincinnati, according to surveys by Republican legislative strategists, worrying them about whether Trump’s plan to turn out more voters than 2016 in the rural parts of the state can compensate for the losses.

You can keep up to date with the polling in the crucial swing states with our US election polls tracker.

Roosevelt and Lincoln statues toppled during protest in Portland, Oregon

There’s some dramatic images in from Portland, Oregon this morning, the city that has held over 100 consecutive days of #BlackLivesMatter demonstrations in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd.

Overnight protestors have toppled statues of Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.

One of the toppled statues in Portland’s South Park Block late Sunday.
The toppled statue of Abraham Lincoln in Portland’s South Park Block late Sunday. Photograph: Sean Meagher/AP

Shane Dixon Kavanaugh reports for The Oregonian/OregonLive:

A group of protesters toppled statues of former presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln and shattered the entrance to the Oregon Historical Society in Portland’s South Park Blocks late Sunday before moving into other areas of downtown, smashing storefronts and engaging in other acts of destruction.

Police declared the event a riot and ordered people rampaging through the city’s streets to disperse but did not directly intervene until nearly an hour after the first statue fell. The crowd scattered when police cruisers flooded the area, and officers in tactical gear appeared to make several arrests.

Protest organizers had promoted the event on social media as an “Indigenous Peoples Day of Rage.” Monday is the federally observed holiday of Columbus Day, but many states and cities now recognize the day instead as Indigenous Peoples Day over concerns that Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the Americas helped launch centuries of violence against indigenous populations.

Kavanaugh said that the group were around 200 strong, and targeted a bronze sculpture officially titled “Theodore Roosevelt, Rough Rider,” by putting chains around it and rocking it from side-to-side as others took a blowtorch to its base and splattered it with red paint.

The toppled statue of President Theadore Rosevelt during a protest in Portland, Oregon.
The toppled statue of President Theadore Rosevelt during a protest in Portland, Oregon. Photograph: Nathan Howard/Getty Images

Roosevelt’s plinth was daubed with “Stolen Land”, while the base of the Lincoln statue was spray-painted with “Dakota 38,” a reference to 38 men executed after the 1862 Dakota-US War. It was the largest mass execution in a single day in American history.

A protester stands over a toppled statue of Theadore Rosevelt.
A protester stands over a toppled statue of Theadore Rosevelt. Photograph: Nathan Howard/Getty Images

After the statues were toppled, protestors unfurled a banner that read “Stop honoring racist colonizer murderers.”

Poll: Majority say supreme court should uphold Roe v. Wade and Barrett confirmation should be delayed

ABC News have published some new polling data this morning about the rush to confirm Amy Coney Barrett as a new justice on the supreme court.

Six in 10 registered voters say the supreme Court should uphold Roe v. Wade as the basis of abortion law in the United States, and a majority in an ABC News/Washington Post poll – albeit now a narrow one – says the Senate should delay filling the court’s current vacancy.

Sixty-two percent in the national survey say they would want the court to uphold Roe, while 24% would want it overturned; 14% have no opinion. There are broad political, ideological and religious-based divisions on the question.

Separately, 52% say filling the seat opened by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg last month should be left to the winner of the presidential election and a Senate vote next year. Forty-four percent instead say the current Senate should vote on Trump’s nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the position.

Read more here: ABC News – Majority says wait on the SCOTUS seat; 6 in 10 favor upholding Roe: POLL

Updated

The last Senate confirmation hearings for a supreme court justice nominee were for Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, but you might need a refresher on the format of this week’s events. Deirdre Walsh at NPR has you covered:

Monday’s session will feature opening statements from the 22 senators on the committee — they will be allotted 10 minutes each. Barrett will be introduced, be sworn in by the chairman and deliver her own opening statement.

Tuesday’s hearing will begin the question-and-answer period; multiple rounds are expected. For the first round, senators will get 30 minutes each. The Q&A is expected again on Wednesday, and each senator will get 20 minutes for the second round and 10 minutes in any subsequent rounds.

For Thursday, the final day of the hearings, outside witnesses are expected to testify for and against Barrett’s nomination.

After the committee completes the hearings, which is expected to happen on Thursday, judiciary committee chairman Lindsey Graham can move for a committee vote.

Under committee rules, Democrats can move to hold over the nomination for one week, and it’s expected they will do that.

The committee is expected to vote on 22 October, and then senate majority leader Mitch McConnell will decide how quickly to move the nomination to the Senate floor. He’s expected to act quickly and schedule a vote by 29 October.

The 22 senators on the committee?

For Republicans, it is the chair, Graham, plus Chuck Grassley (Iowa), John Cornyn (Texas), Michael Lee (Utah), Ted Cruz (Texas), Ben Sasse (Nebraska), Joshua Hawley (Montana), Thom Tillis (North Carolina), Joni Ernst (Iowa), Mike Crapo (Idaho), John Kennedy (Louisiana) and Marsha Blackburn (Tennessee).

For the Democratic party, it is ranking member Dianne Feinstein (California), Patrick Leahy (Vermont), Dick Durbin (Illinois), Sheldon Whitehouse (Rhode Island), Amy Klobuchar (Minnesota), Christopher Coons (Delaware), Richard Blumenthal (Connecticut), Mazie Hirono (Hawaii), Cory Booker (New Jersey) and Kamala Harris (California).

Harris has come off the campaign trail this week to participate in the sessions. It all starts in the Hart Senate Office Building, Room 216 at 9am ET, and Joan E Greve will be along around that time to provide in-depth coverage for the blog.

Of all the cornucopia of tone-deaf and offensive remarks made by the president of the United States in almost four years in office, one proposition he made to the American people last week must surely rank among the top 10.

“Don’t be afraid of Covid,” he said in a tweet. “Don’t let it dominate your life.”

Donald Trump posted those words at 2.37pm on 5 October from the luxury of his four-room suite in Walter Reed medical center. He was surrounded by a team of a dozen world-class doctors infusing him with a unique cocktail of experimental drugs for Covid-19 that would have cost an ordinary American hundreds of thousands of dollars to procure.

About an hour earlier, data scientists at Johns Hopkins University released their latest figures for the pandemic. They showed that at least 7.5 million Americans had contracted the disease, and that 209,881 had died – a death rate towering over most developed countries and 2,000 times that of humble Vietnam.

Read more here: ‘He just thinks about himself’: America’s reckless, ill president

On that row over the mis-use of a clip of Dr Anthony Fauci in the Trump campaign ad, here’s what he actually said versus how the segment was used by the president’s team.

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics for Monday, the day that Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to fill the supreme court seat vacated by the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg moves on to the next stage. Here’s a catch up on where we are, and what we might expect to see today:

  • The nomination hearings for Amy Coney Barrett begin at 9am, with opening statements by Senate judiciary committee members and the nominee herself.
  • Barrett’s opening statement has been leaked and reveals she will say she would apply the “law as written”. Her faith is expected to feature heavily in the Senate examination.
  • Donald Trump has started to say that he is “immune” to Covid-19, contradicting evidence people can get it more than once and ignoring the lack of research about how long antibodies are effective. Twitter flagged his tweet claiming immunity, saying it contains misleading information.
  • Dr Anthony Fauci spoke out against a Trump campaign ad that used his words out of context.
  • A new national poll from ABC News and the Washington Post showed Joe Biden maintaining a 12% lead over Trump.
  • The president will hold a campaign rally in Sanford, Florida, at 7pm ET, marking his return to the campaign trail after being hospitalized with coronavirus.
  • Biden will be in Ohio, delivering remarks in Toledo on “building back the economy better for working families.” After that, he will attend a voter mobilization event in Cincinnati.
  • We’re hosting an online discussion panel on the US election on Tuesday 20 October, featuring senior political reporter Daniel Strauss; political correspondent Lauren Gambino; columnist Richard Wolffe; and Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland. There’s more details and tickets here.

I’m Martin Belam, and I will be with you for the next couple of hours…

Updated

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