Democratic leaders across US work to lead resistance against Trump’s agenda

Democrats from California to Illinois prepare to ‘Trump-proof’ and ‘fight to death’ against his extreme proposals

After the November elections ushered in a new era of unified Republican governance in Washington, Democratic leaders across the country are once again preparing to lead the resistance to Donald Trump’s second-term agenda.

California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, said he would convene a special legislative session next month to “safeguard California values and fundamental rights”.

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Republican Dave McCormick wins Pennsylvania Senate seat in key race

McCormick ousts incumbent Democratic Bob Casey after contentious and expensive race, widening party’s majority

The Republican Dave McCormick won the Senate race in the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Thursday, denying the Democratic incumbent, Bob Casey, a fourth term and expanding his party’s majority in the upper chamber. Despite the call from the Associated Press, Casey has refused to concede the race, as the top state election official reported that tens of thousands of ballots remained uncounted.

When the AP called the race at 4.09pm ET on Thursday, two days after polls closed in Pennsylvania, McCormick led by 0.5 points. The narrow margin raised the possibility of a recount, although Casey faces an uphill climb in overcoming McCormick’s lead of roughly 30,000 votes.

Trump wins the presidency – how did it happen?

Full presidential election results and map

Abortion ballot measure results by state

Republicans retake control of the Senate

Senate, House and governor results

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US elections 2024: 10 key House races to watch

Democrats only need to flip a handful of seats to get back control of the lower chamber – here’s what to keep an eye on

Much attention has been paid to the historic race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, but the results of down-ballot elections will determine whether the new president will actually be able to implement a legislative agenda next year.

With Republicans defending a narrow majority in the House of Representatives, Democrats only need to flip a handful of seats to wrest back control of the lower chamber, and both parties are going all out to win.

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Trump and Harris scramble to win votes in key states in final day of campaigning

Ex-president hurtles through four rallies across three states as vice-president puts focus on Pennsylvania

Donald Trump began hurtling through four Maga rallies across three battleground states – and delivered a dark and dystopian speech about the supposed “migrant invasion” of murderers and drug dealers – while Kamala Harris put all her last chips on Pennsylvania in a frantic final day of campaigning from both candidates.

With the polls showing the contest essentially deadlocked between two vastly different political visions, both the ex-president and the vice-president were scrambling on Monday to drive home their message. Though early voting has smashed records across the country, there is still everything to play for in cajoling undecided and unengaged voters to the polls on election day.

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Senate and House races to watch

Lessons from the key swing states

Trump v Harris on key issues

What’s at stake in this election

What to know about the US election

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Blow for Republicans as supreme court rejects appeal over Pennsylvania ballots

Voters in key swing state will be able to cast provisional vote if they forget to put mail-in ballot in secrecy envelope

Pennsylvania voters will be able to cast a provisional vote if they make an error and forget to put their mail-in vote in a required secrecy envelope, the US supreme court ruled on Friday, a decision that could lead to thousands more votes being counted in a key battleground state where the presidential race is extremely tight.

The supreme court announced its decision on Friday on its emergency docket, giving no reasoning for its ruling, which is customary in emergency cases.

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Trump claims ‘nobody loves Puerto Rican community more than I do’ at Pennsylvania rally

Ex-president’s comments come after comedian at one of Trump’s recent rallies called Puerto Rico ‘island of garbage’

Donald Trump praised Puerto Ricans on Tuesday during a Pennsylvania rally, days after a comedian made a racist joke and referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” at one of his rallies.

“Nobody loves our Latino community and our Puerto Rican community more than I do,” the former president said a little over an hour into a rally in Allentown, in the Lehigh Valley, which has a sizable Latino population.

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Harris campaigns in Philadelphia with promise to win presidential election

Vice-president tells supporters she will win seemingly deadlocked race with just nine days left before election day

Kamala Harris addressed a boisterous crowd in North Philadelphia on Sunday, promising supporters that she would win a seemingly deadlocked presidential race with just nine days left before election day.

“Nine days left in one of the most consequential elections of our lifetime, and we know this is going to be a tight race until the very end,” the vice-president told hundreds of supporters. “And make no mistake: we will win.”

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Liz Cheney urges conservatives to back Kamala Harris over abortion

Ex-Republican congresswoman, longtime abortion rights opponent, campaigns with vice-president in swing states

Liz Cheney, a former Republican congresswoman and longtime opponent of abortion rights, on Monday condemned Republican-imposed bans on the procedure and urged conservatives to support Democrat Kamala Harris for US president.

Cheney was speaking during three joint events with the vice-president in three swing states aimed at prising suburban Republican voters away from party nominee Donald Trump. She has become the Democrat’s most prominent conservative surrogate and is rumoured to be in contention for a seat in a potential Harris cabinet.

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Kamala Harris visits church on birthday as Trump repeats ‘enemy within’ rhetoric

Vice-president marks birthday with call for compassion, while rival visits McDonald’s and attacks opponents

Kamala Harris celebrated her 60th birthday on the campaign trail on Sunday while Donald Trump visited a McDonald’s and doubled down on his dangerous rhetoric labeling Democrats as “enemies from within,” as both candidates tried to shore up support in key states ahead of the US presidential election.

Harris rallied Black voters in Georgia on Sunday with “souls to the polls” visits to two community churches.

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Biden’s economic legacy could decide the presidential race in Scranton

The politically split Pennsylvania town shows why the race is so close – and it’s unclear whether the president’s legacy will be enough to carry Harris over the line

From the north, motorists pull into Scranton via the Joseph R Biden Jr Expressway. Cutting through the scenic Pocono Mountains, now at the start of autumn color season, they are greeted with a towering, electric billboard, blaring an encapsulating – if divisive – message to this working-class town: “Democrats for Trump,” it reads. “Economy,” it continues, with a green checked box next to the word.

The sign in Biden’s hometown is the perfect fall 2024 welcome mat in this crucial swing state filled with voters whose economic anxiety or satisfaction will decide next month’s election.

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Harris to portray Trump as tyrant-in-waiting after his ‘enemy within’ remarks

At Pennsylvania rally, vice-president will hone in on Trump’s threat to use armed forces against his adversaries

Kamala Harris will this evening seek to portray Donald Trump as a potential tyrant-in-waiting who wants to jail his political opponents by seizing on his threat to use US armed forces against those he has branded “the enemy within”.

The US vice-president and Democratic nominee will hone in on the former president’s darkening campaign rhetoric at a rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, widely deemed the most crucial battleground state in a presidential race that multiple polls suggest will go down to the wire.

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‘Toxic mushrooms’ send 11 children and adults to hospital in Pennsylvania

Sickened people in stable condition, sheriff says, after emergency services report ‘mass casualty’ situation

Eleven children and adults were transported to a hospital on Friday night in Pennsylvania after eating and being sickened by “toxic mushrooms”, authorities said.

Emergency medical personnel responded to a report around 9.30pm of 11 people becoming ill after ingesting the mushrooms in Peach Bottom Township, the Delta-Cardiff volunteer company station 57 said in a social media post.

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Obama tells men to drop ‘excuses’ and support Kamala Harris over Trump

Ex-president campaigns in Pennsylvania and says fellow Democrat ‘actually cares about making your life better’

Barack Obama made his first appearance on the campaign trail for Kamala Harris on Thursday, speaking at a rally in Pennsylvania and at an event for Black voters, where he urged men in particular to support the vice-president.

In comments directed specifically to Black men in the swing state during an event at one of Harris’s campaign offices, Obama questioned their unwillingness to vote for her – a September NAACP poll showed that over one quarter of Black men under 50 say they will vote for Donald Trump.

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Trump repeats false anti-immigrant claims at Pennsylvania rally as Musk urges everyone to vote – live

Ex-president addresses crowd in Butler less than three months after assassination attempt there on 13 July

As the Trump and Harris campaigns host events across the country today – now one month before the 5 November election – the Guardian US is averaging national and state polls to see how the two candidates are faring. We will update our averages once a week, or more if there is major news.

As the Guardian’s Sam Levine writes today:

With her highest national polling average since July, Harris is now leading in five of seven key swing states. Nationally, the Guardian’s tracker shows Harris with 49.3% of the vote, compared with 46% for Trump. The election is a month away, and already an estimated 1.4 million Americans have voted as of midday on Friday.

The race is still extremely close. The simplest path to collecting the 270 electoral votes needed to win is still the blue wall of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. While Harris leads Trump in all three according to the Guardian’s analysis (Pennsylvania by 1.2 points, Michigan by 0.1 points and Wisconsin by 2.2 points), those advantages are quite slim.

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Trump to attend rally at site of July assassination attempt in Pennsylvania

Former president will appear with ‘quadruple’ the security, and also honor firefighter killed during shooting

Donald Trump plans to return on Saturday to the site where a gunman tried to assassinate him in July, as the former president sets aside what are now near-constant worries for his physical safety in order to fulfill a promise – “really an obligation”, he said recently – to the people of Butler, Pennsylvania.

“I’ll probably start off by saying, ‘As I was saying ... ’,” the Republican presidential nominee has joked, in a bit of black humor about a speech cut short when a bullet struck Trump’s ear and he was whisked off stage – fist aloft – with blood dripping across his face.

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Elon Musk says he will attend Trump rally at Pennsylvania shooting site

Republican presidential nominee returns to scene of first assassination attempt in July as tech CEO reiterates support

Elon Musk plans to attend Donald Trump’s rally on Saturday at the site in Butler, Pennsylvania, where the former president narrowly avoided assassination in July.

“I will be there to support!” the tech billionaire replied to a post by Trump on Musk’s social media platform, X, saying he was returning to the Butler Farm show grounds.

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Democrats laser in on Pennsylvania as they scramble to keep Senate majority

Democrats’ prospects in Montana and West Virginia look grim – and money is pouring in to help Trump-backed Dave McCormick

Pennsylvania has come into laser focus in the 2024 election as the must-win state of the presidential election. But further down the ballot is another race in the battleground state – one that could decide whether Democrats are able to hold on to a one-seat majority in the Senate.

With the party bracing to lose a seat in West Virginia and incumbent Jon Tester’s prospects looking grim in Montana, a lot of attention and money is flowing into the Senate race between Democrat Bob Casey and Republican Dave McCormick in Pennsylvania.

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Harris says cost of living ‘still too high’ as she lays out economic agenda

Democratic presidential nominee fleshed out economic vision for middle class and small businesses

Millions of Americans are struggling to make ends meet, Kamala Harris has said, as the Democratic presidential candidate fleshed out the economic agenda she hopes to adopt in the White House.

Conceding that the cost of living in America “is still just too high”, the vice-president argued this was true “long before” the Covid-19 pandemic ravaged the global economy, and she took office with the president, Joe Biden.

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Pennsylvania crucial to White House hopes, Trump says at campaign rally

Ex-president gives meandering address in swing state and paints dark vision of America under Democratic rule

Donald Trump returned to Pennsylvania, telling his rally attendees that their state was critical to his ability to win back the White House and encouraging them to turn out to vote, though he also called early voting “stupid stuff”.

“If we win Pennsylvania, we win the whole thing,” Trump said, soon after taking the stage more than 45 minutes later than scheduled. “It’s very simple.”

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Three Mile Island nuclear reactor to restart to power Microsoft AI operations

Pennsylvania plant was site of most serious nuclear meltdown and radiation leak in US history in 1979

A nuclear reactor at the notorious Three Mile Island site in Pennsylvania is to be activated for the first time in five years after its owners, Constellation Energy, struck a deal to provide power to Microsoft’s proliferating artificial intelligence operations.

The plant was the location of the most serious nuclear meltdown and radiation leak in US history, in March 1979 when the loss of water coolant through a faulty valve caused the Unit 2 reactor to overheat. More than four decades later, the reactor is still in a decommissioning phase.

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