Biden clarifies ‘garbage’ comments threatening to overshadow Harris’s message of unity – US election live | Joe Biden

Local newspapers are just as relevant as ever this election, as the DNC takes out attack ads.

The adverts that paint Donald Trump as “unhinged, unstable, unchecked” are running in 25 local newspapers in the seven battleground states such as the Delco Times and Erie Times-News in Pennsylvania or the Macomb Daily and Northern Express in Michigan.

On of the ads takes up a full page and is plastered with Trump’s infamous mugshot snapped during his indictment on racketeering charges in Georgia. The ad calls the former president “unhinged, unstable, unchecked” and “unfit to lead”.

“In the final week of the election, Democrats are not leaving any stone unturned, reminding voters in key battleground states that their vote means the difference between chaos and revenge with Donald Trump, or a New Way Forward with Vice President Harris,” Jaime Harrison, the chair of the DNC, told the New York Times.

Donald Trump’s extremist attacks on top Democrats as “the enemy from within” and talk of deploying the military against political foes if he wins the election are stark signs Trump will endanger the rule of law in America, say former US justice department officials and scholars.

Trump’s threats – singling out ex-speaker Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff and others as “the enemy from within” and “more dangerous than China [and] Russia” – jibe with his earlier incendiary talk of using a return to the White House to seek “revenge” against political foes led by Joe Biden. He also suggested the military could be used to quell violence at the polls from “radical left lunatics”.

Those comments, along with Trump’s adamant refusal to say clearly he will accept the election results if he is defeated, prompt critics to say Trump poses unprecedented dangers to the US constitution …

The latest polls show Kamala Harris enjoys a small lead over her rival Donald Trump. However, the election is still too close to call and a small margin of error could see either candidate in the White House.

The key battleground states, so named because there is no entrenched support for Democrats or Republicans and could swing either way, are Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and North Carolina.

Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s controversial set continues to be used as a political football by both sides of the aisle as election night draws closer.

The joke that got everyone’s back up was when Hinchcliffe compared Puerto Rico to a floating island of garbage.

President Joe Biden said Puerto Ricans are “good, decent honorable people. The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters — his, his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American.”

Republicans seized on the president’s line, comparing it to Hilary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables,” comment during the 2016 election campaign.

Senator JD Vance of Ohio, Trump’s running mate, said: “This is disgusting. Kamala Harris and her boss Joe Biden are attacking half of the country.” Just one day earlier, Vance brushed off the Puerto Rico island-of-garbage comment, saying, “We have to stop getting so offended at every little thing in the United States of America.”

Biden backpedalled somewhat on social media: “Earlier today I referred to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump’s supporter at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage – which is the only word I can think of to describe it,” he wrote. “His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say. The comments at that rally don’t reflect who we are as a nation.”

If Donald Trump wins next week’s election, it would be the first time in US history that a candidate wins based on such a huge lie – his falsehood that we have “the worst economy ever”. The former president’s Big Lie has distorted the views of millions of Americans, wrongly convincing many that the US economy is in bad shape.

There’s no denying that many Americans are struggling economically and that inflation was painfully high back in 2022, but inflation is far lower now, and most economists agree that our economy is strong. The unemployment rate is low, inflation is way down, economic growth is solid, and job growth has been remarkably strong. Indeed, the country has added nearly 18m jobs – a record – under the Biden-Harris administration. Not only that, median household income has climbed to $80,610, higher than it was in Trump’s last year in office…

Welcome to our ongoing coverage of the US election campaign as Kamala Harris and Donald Trump continue to make their pitches to voters with less than a week to go to election day.

Current president Joe Biden was forced to clarify comments he made on Tuesday after he was seen in an edited video clip saying “the only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters”.

He said that a pro-Trump comedian’s “hateful rhetoric” about Puerto Rico was “garbage”.

Republican politicians and rightwing media outlets quickly picked up the clip to argue that Biden had called Trump’s supporters garbage, comparing his remarks with Hillary Clinton’s labeling of half of Trump supporters as belonging in “a basket of deplorables” in 2016.

Elsewhere:

• Urged by some allies to apologise for racist comments made by speakers at his weekend rally, Donald Trump took the opposite approach on Tuesday, saying it was an “honour to be involved” in such an event and calling the scene a “lovefest” – the same term he has used to describe the 6 January insurrection at the US Capitol.

• Harris will spend election night at her alma mater, Howard University, in Washington, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss her campaign’s plans. If elected, Harris would be the first graduate of a historically Black university to occupy the Oval Office.

• Michelle Obama took the stump in Georgia. The former first lady’s organisation When We All Vote hosted a rally for more than 2,000 people at an arena in College Park, near Atlanta’s airport – a slickly produced event that was dominated by earnest pleas to vote from a star-studded roster.

• JD Vance hit back at those who say Trump is a fascist, accusing Harris and her allies of disrespecting second world war veterans as he campaigned on Tuesday in one of the most hotly contested regions of battleground Michigan.