Hallowed ground at arlington national cemetery as a campaign backdrop. Jim mccain calling it a violation police and protests raging for a third night in israel following the murders of six hostages, including american hersh goldberg, polin, the thousands of angry demonstrators demanding that their government strike a deal to free the remaining hostages i'm kaitlan collins, and this is the source but, labor day behind us, it is now full speed ahead until election day, just nine weeks from today, it is hard to believe, but yes, we're that close. And actually work even closer than that because in just three days from now, the first ballots will go out in the crowd critical battleground state of north carolina and as things are getting real, this reshaped race could not be closer as it stands at the moment donald trump and vice president harris both have potential path to victory and win the voting starting soon, listen to what trump is saying this timely plea that he's making to voters we don't have a long we have not a lot 60 days we don't have a long time. The votes start going very shortly and we have to we have to be prepared to fight very hard. Look, she's going to destroy our country if she's elected our country. Well be a different place. It'll be a disaster should note, it's 63 days, but still very soon until that election. But really look at what's happening one week from tonight when trump and harris will be facetoface on the debate stage at this hour, which will actually be the first time that they have ever met in person. We have new reporting ahead this hour on how harris is preparing for that showdown. We'll get to that in a moment. But today her campaign is primarily focused on needling trump's over the critical issue of reproductive rights, launching another bus tour, right in trump's backyard this time near maralago. And harris for her part, is going to be delivering a speech tomorrow. Row in new hampshire, rolling out new economic proposals. And speaking of the live free or die state, the trump campaign has just barred a top volunteer for the campaigns new england operation after that volunteer told supporters in an email that trump was effectively pulling out of new hampshire to focus on other battlegrounds. Dates because the campaign determined new hampshire was no longer one of them. I should note the trump campaign says that's not true, that they still have a strong ground presence there. But a lot to discuss tonight, my political sources who are here at the table with me, including vice president harris is former communications director jamal simmons. Trump's former white house community occasions director alyssa farah griffin, as well as cnn political commentator, and the host of spectrum news is the big deal with errol louis. Errol louis great to have you all here, but elicit, let me on this new hampshire stuff that's coming out, this is tom mountain. He's a volunteer. The trump campaign is downplaying his role, but in this email that he sent out to other republicans who is saying that there there are suspending all their resources in the state at this moment is thompson posting on truth social today about harris and new hampshire, where it will first and foremost, that would be the prudent thing to do. Trump is not going to carry new hampshire. That's simply a fact. There are important down ballot races, obviously, kelly ayotte isn't a tight race for the governor ship there. So i would you would hope that the republican party and trump campaign is directing resources to her, but listen, kamala harris upended the race. There was a moment when joe biden was stolen. They were talking about virginia being in play for republicans and for trump. Now, this looks like a competitive match word, the sunbelt is somewhere they're going to have to spend money. She's appearing in florida a state she's not going to win. But i think it gets speaks to the fact that this became a very narrow field. It is really going to come down to just a handle. Handful of these battleground states. And she has him on his toes. That said, it's neck and neck. We see these polls every single day. I could not put good money on who is going to win this election but she's got the resources and she's putting them out there yeah. When you heard trump saying you it's not gonna be closed, it is going to be closed despite that harris has a very particular framing of how she's talking about this race, errol, this is what she said today about it. It's going to be a tight race to the very end. So let's not pay too much attention to those polls. We are the underdogs in this race. I mean, she doesn't want anyone looking at any of the polls showing her up and in any of the battlegrounds and becoming too comfortable, that's exactly right. And regardless of the polls, the one that really counts if you really want to gauge what the campaign thinks is important and where they want her to be. Just look at where she's going, right. She's making yet another trip into georgia in the next few days. She's going to be making another trip into north carolina. We know what she's trying to do. We know why she's trying to do it, and that is what really matters. Polls, of course are a snapshot. The thing is, the snapshot of somebody who hasn't made up their mind yet. So you catch somebody on any given day they're going to look to the left, are going to look to the right. They might be leaning this way or that way. So she understands what's going on. I'm sure her campaign aides have pounded into her head that they have a chance to do something that will be historic. Historymaking. But that means you can't pay attention to the polls the way you normally would. You have to design your strategy, stick to your strategy, no matter what, not get thrown by stray comments from the other side and certainly not by the pulse. Well, and speaking of first, he's going she's want to be in pennsylvania for the whole week on starting on thursday, jamal, she's going to pittsburgh. And what we're being told by sources that she's just basically camping out there until that debate one week from today in philadelphia on tuesday, do think that's the right strategy. What do you make of that? she's got to focus on pennsylvania because pennsylvania is so important. The strategy that takes them to north carolina and georgia, and even some of these expansion states, arizona is once important because she has a chance of perhaps having an electoral college route if she catches the right wave, the problem is you've got to be there, but pennsylvania is linchpin to make sure this all works. They're going to be in debate camp mode right? so some of this is going to be like, let's camp out and do some day trips, right? there aren't going to tax the candidate too much get back and do more prep. They've got to figure out how do they make an argument about donald trump, not just throw a bunch of facts at the wall, right? the only people will remember the core argument that's made in that debate. And that means that there's going to be some things voters might want to hear. Hear about. They won't hear about because they just don't support the argument that the candidate in the campaign are trying to make during that debate? yeah and trump is looking at this debate. He's been doing debate prep for this earlier than he did for joe biden. It seems based on what we've been hearing, alice, i mean, what does that look like behind closed doors with trump, who has not successfully land? did an attack line on harris, really? yeah. And he frames it as policy time, which is basically different advisors going in and reminding him what his key points are on some of the core policies they're hoping he'll hit on and proactively talk about in the debate. He's never, you know, this, he's never been a traditional debate prep where you've got somebody playing the other candidate and he does it for 90 minutes and it's just asking a ton of questions. So i think that he is he's got staff around him who are trying to remind them of the issues that win for him with voters, the border, the economy, onshoring american jobs. But he also is going up against somebody who is so different than who thought he was running against a woman much younger than him, who he's never actually met. It has really strong feelings about they need to be prepping him to not go off the rails, to not lash out to not name call. It won't play well for him with the people he needs to win over. But it's donald trump. You just, you never know what you're going to get. Well, i'm so glad you brought that up because trump did this lengthy podcast today and he the person was essentially saying it's so much better when you're on message than when you you are not on message and it it's the most trumpian moment, errol, you just everyone should just watch it and see what trump's response was from my personal opinion, i think you are at your best when you're talking about a positive vision of the future versus criticizing the other side. Yeah i think you have to criticize though. I think i think they are nasty hey it was got to say reluctant with of course. Sadly, it is his duty to sort of be aggressive and nasty. What he's not really going to be ready for. I think this is really where he ought to spend some debate prep time is that kamala harris, unlike joe biden, is going to go on the attack. This is a professional process this is somebody knows how to break it down, hit you here, here, here, and then come back and do it again. And i think that's going to be the kind of narrative that she sort of builds in a way that he won't be able to wiggle out of the normal trump response is to say something so outrageous that it throws the opponent off guard. It captures the headline, it how many it's the debate. I don't know if that's going to be available to me. That's a great point because today, trump just pleaded not guilty formally, again, to that retooled indictment by jack smith in the election interference case, his attorneys are formally going to go and do that on thursday, trump has waived his right to an appearance, but one of the criticisms that i heard from democrats and white house officials after the cnn debate was biden didn't bring up trump's conviction enough, or his indictments enough. Is that something that you think she's in a bring up a lot depends on what their core argument is. They might decide that people know enough about that. It may also be that there's only one of them they really want to go out. There's only one when proof point, they need to make to make sure the voters are trying to target really understand it. But this is a key point about what errol was just saying, what they can't do is get into a policy point counterpoint because that's not going to convince anybody of anything is going to be a bunch of facts up against the wall. They got to have a core argument and somebody's job also has to be the debate prep can you say this word? a halt or national tv but somebody is but someone has got to be the here, like somebody's got to sit there and really pepper her and get her to get annoyed and aggravated because that's probably what trump's going to do. What you want her to do with the workout that aggravation in prep and not do it when she's on stage. But that's a great point. Does try i'll do that in prep though. Is he willing to let someone as jamal puts it, be the a whole to him. I mean, trump doesn't really like being criticized, not in my experience, and i never did presidential debate with him, but i did prep for town halls in media interviews, he does. Even if you prep him and say, hey, they might ask, you know, do you denounce white nationalism? this was an actual conversation i had before nbc town hall. He did they're going to ask that and flew off the handle, didn't want to answer it. So that's a hero like you and that's not easy thing to prep. And also a really easy answer by the way but he's not someone you could prep in a traditional sense, in the biggest thing for him is simply to not get in enraged or say something then crazy if he can stay at the baseline, that will work with the people who are already with him and not lose him support. But i think by the way, we forget the cnn biden debate. Biden imploded so much that trump kind of got it passed. He was a disaster for a solid half of that debate. The back half of it, he's talking about his golf handicap. He's going all over the map that won't fly next to someone like kamala harris, it just won't work the same. Yeah, hopefully there's no comparing of golf scores by people who want the nuclear codes there was this moment today, pat toomey, the former senator from pennsylvania, was on cnbc and was saying, he's not voting for donald trump lifelong republican. Everyone on capitol hill knows him let's just this interesting answer that he had about why this is what he had to say when you lose an election and you try to overcome the result, we want our we all are familiar was made. Well, those me, it is an acceptable position for me to say that neither of these candidates the hosts, there was arguing with him saying, you know, supreme court justices are the corporate tax rate should matter more, but, but to hear pat toomey, this lifelong republicans say you've lost me at this. How is trump really? he doesn't seem to be making any inroads to those kinds of voters. And that's look, that's a problem for him. I mean, what former senator toomey was saying was that what you did on january 6, donald trump that's a dealbreaker for me, you know, treason is a deal breaker for the insurrection is a deal breaker for me. I'm not, you know, you're not getting me back. And if there's enough of those people in the right states and he happens to be from pennsylvania. That's going to be a real problem. But the trump campaign, so will he dial it back in some way? i don't know. I may he's been talking about giving pardons to the hundreds and hundreds of people who have been convicted of federal crimes in connection with the insurrection. So it doesn't sound like he's prepared to try and get pat toomey back or the pat toomey of the world. But he also said he's not voting for harris how does she speak to people like the pad tomb is the world. Look, i think they've got a tear if people are going after right here are the people we can convince to vote for us and they don't vote for us, don't vote for him either, right? that's okay. What you do want to deprive them of that vote? it does feel like there are more and more republicans who are willing to say things in public today. That weren't willing to do that over the last couple of years, you saw jimmy mccain today. I think you going to talk about that. That's a big deal. That people are going to, because someone talks about the permission structure of giving other people the opportunity to say, you know what? i don't really like this guy. Maybe it's okay not to vote for him. I don't know. You live in this world more than any of us you make it i'm incredibly important point because i've lived in the space for the last four years. I'm not going to tell you to vote for a democrat as a lifelong republican who has never vote for a democrat. But i'm going to tell you why i don't think you should vote for trump. And when biden was falling behind, the response was, but then that's just a vote for donald trump. It's a little different when it's a lot tighter. Like, i honestly, they commonly harris shou