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Wake Up To Politics - October 27, 2016

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

13 Days until Election Day 2016 + my 15th birthday (Nov. 8)I'm Gabe Fleisher for Wake Up To Politics, and reporting from WUTP world HQ in my bedroom - Good morning: THIS IS YOUR WAKE UP CALL!!!

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Election Central


  • Campaign Rundown The most important news from the 2016 campaign you need to know:
  • GOP Fundraising Woes will not hold any more high-dollar fundraisers to benefit the Republican Party, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday, "another sign of the GOP nominee’s struggling campaign and a serious blow to the party’s get-out-the-vote operations with less than two weeks to go until Election Day." Trump's campaign is already outmatched by Hillary Clinton's financial operation: this move will just increase that gap. Clinton is also not scheduled to appear at any more fundraisers through Election Day, but her running mate and daughter, as well as other surrogates (including Cher), are.
  • Effectively, Trump will stop funneling money to the Republican National Committee, as he will no longer hold events for the Trump Victory Fund (the joint fundraising operation of the campaign and the party), which hurts downballot candidates - as well as Trump himself, since much of his GOTV resources come from the RNC. The national party committee received $40 million from Trump Victory, as of the end of September, and used the funds to fuel its national field operation.
  • Meanwhile, POLITICO reported Tuesday that RNC chairman Reince Priebus will hold a conference call with RNC members today at 1pm to offer a "political update." Priebus' last nationwide conference call came two weeks ago, just after the 2005 video of Trump on "Access Hollywood" was released. Priebus is expected to indicate that the RNC will continue to pour resources into Trump's campaign at the same volume as before.
  • As Democrats are moving their focus from the presidential race to congressional races, Republicans announced Tuesday they will match that focus as they attempt to defend majorities in the House and Senate. POLITICO also reported on Tuesday that the Senate Leadership Fund, a top GOP super PAC, will invest $25 million into six top Senate races.
  • Trump, Clinton Respond to Obamacare Premium Hikes The U.S. Health and Human Services Department announced Monday that health care plans sold on the Affordable Care Act federal exchanges will see a 25% to 38% increase in premiums, news that both presidential candidates have responded to.
  • Democrat Hillary Clinton told a Miami radio station on Tuesday: "We are going to make changes to fix problems like that, the president and I have talked about it. Look, this is a major step forward, 20 million people, actually I'm sure you know this, predominately working people, African-American, Latino people now have access to insurance, but the costs have gone up to too much."
  • Clinton also vowed to "get copays and premiums and deductibles down" if elected, promising that costs would "skyrocket" if Trump is put in the Oval Office.
  • Meanwhile, Trump pledged Tuesday to "repeal and replace" Obamacare, saying that the legislation is "just blowing up." At at a Florida event, Trump declared: “Repealing Obamacare and stopping Hillary’s health-care takeover is one of the single most important reasons that we must win on Nov. 8." Trump also went after the "politicians who rammed this monster down our throats," and criticized Hillary Clinton (she "wants to keep it, she wants to spend a fortune on it...she wants to double down on Obamacare and make it even more expensive and worse.")
  • Later, speaking with employees of his Miami resort behind him, Trump said: "And I can say all of my employees are having a tremendous problem with Obamacare. You folks, this is another group. Is that a correct statement?” he asked his employees. “You look at what they’re going through with their health care is horrible because of Obamacare. So we’ll repeal it and replace it. But this is about jobs. And we have thousands of employees in Florida.”
  • Just after that event, however, Trump said that his employees actually don't use Obamacare. "I don’t much use Obamacare, I must be honest with you, because it is so bad for the people and they can’t afford it," he told Fox News in a telephone interview on Tuesday.
  • Powell Endorses Clinton Former Secretary of State Colin Powell will vote for Hillary Clinton in November, he announced at a Long Island Association luncheon on Tuesday. Powell served as Secretary of State under George W. Bush, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under George H.W. Bush (and briefly under Bill Clinton), and as National Security Advisor under Ronald Reagan, serving in the U.S. Army for 34 years and rising to the rank of a four-star General. Although he is a Republican, Powell endorsed Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, making his support for Clinton unsurprising.
  • However, Powell publicly complained about Clinton in August, saying that "her people have been trying to pin [her use of a private email server] on me," after the Clinton campaign claimed that Powell advised her to set up a server. On Tuesday, Clinton tweeted that she was "proud to have the endorsement of General Powell, a decorated soldier and distinguished statesman."
  • Trump Denies Plans for a TV Network "I have no interest in Trump TV," Donald Trump told a Cincinnati radio station on Tuesday. "“I hear it all over the place. I have a tremendous fan base, we have a tremendous base. We have the most incredible people, but I just don’t have any interest in that.”
  • Rumors have been rampant for months that Trump is planning to launch a media network for his "fan base," culminating in a Financial Times report earlier this month that Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner had approached a media dealmaker to test the waters for Trump TV.
  • Trump's campaign is already seeking to attract his supporters away from traditional media: on Monday, the Trump campaign launched a half-hour, broadcast news-style show to air on Facebook Live every weeknight until the Election.
  • When asked by CNN's Brian Stelter about the potential for Trump TV last week, Trump campaign CEO Steve Bannon merely responded: "Trump is an entrepreneur."
  • Today on the Trail The candidates' time is one of the most important resources in a presidential campaign, and where the nominees are travelling is a very important indicator of the campaign's strategy. Where are the 2016 candidates today?
  • Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton spends her 69th birthday in the key battleground state of Florida, for her second consecutive day of campaigning there. Clinton will hold two "Early Voting Rallies" in Florida today, to mark the recent opening of early voting in some Florida counties: an 11am event at Palm Beach State College in Lake Worth, and a 2:45pm rally at Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park in Tampa. The Sunshine State is central to both major-party candidates' paths to victory; according to the RealClearPolitics average, Clinton leads in the state by 3.3%.
  • Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine will hold "GOTV Events" in Pennsylvania at Bucks County Community College in Newtown (2pm) and at J. Conrad and Hazel J. Seegers Union in Allentown (6pm). The Democratic ticket has a 5.7-point advantage in Pennsylvania, according to RCP.
  • Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson holds a 8pm rally today at Rushmore Plaza Civic Center in Rapid City, South Dakota. According to a KELO/Mason-Dixon poll released earlier this week, Johnson's support in the Rushmore State stands at 7% - just above his national average.
  • Green Party presidential nominee will headline a 6:30pm rally at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. Other speakers at the event will include former FBI agent and whistleblower Coleen Rowley, who was recognized as TIME "Person of the Year" in 2002 (along with two other whistleblowers) for her testimony on the FBI's mishandling of information leading up to the 9/11 attacks. In 2006, Rowley ran as the Democratic nominee for a U.S. House seat (she lost); the onetime Republican has endorsed Stein and the Green Party candidate's call for a renewed investigation into the 9/11 attacks. Minneapolis City Councilmember Cam Gordon, one of the Green Party's approximately 100 local elected officials, will also speak. Jill Stein stands at about 1.7% of the vote in Minnesota, according to RCP; however, Stein's running mate Ajamu Baraka is not even on the ballot in the state. Due to early petition collecting, the Minnesota Green Party temporarily put activist Howie Hawkins on the ballot as Stein's running mate, but was unable to

Smart Reads


  • "WikiLeaks reveals fears and frustrations inside Clinton world." (Washington Post)
  • "The Senate's next millionaire class." (POLITICO)
  • "Teachers Use Nasty Election to Spark Polite Student Debate." (AP)
  • "What Drives Donald Trump? Fear of Losing Status, Tapes Show." (NYT)
  • "Ryan Likely to Survive Trump With Marred Presidential Hopes" (Bloomberg)

Today's Trivia


  • Today's Question If Hillary Clinton (who is 69 years old today) is elected President, she will become the second-oldest Chief Executive to be inaugurated (Ronald Reagan was the first). Who was the longest-lived President in U.S. history?
  • Email me (trivia@wakeuptopolitics.com) to answer; tomorrow's newsletter will feature readers who answer this question (and those who answered yesterday's question!)
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For more on Wake Up To Politics, listen to Gabe on NPR's "Talk of the Nation", St. Louis Public Radio, the Political Junkie podcast, and on StoryCorps; watch Gabe on MSNBC's "Up with Steve Kornacki"; and read about Gabe in Politico, the Washington Post, Independent Journal, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Salon, the Globe, and the St. Louis Jewish Light.