Votes. Joe biden rebuild the blue wall tour. 85 million have cast votes. Voting closing in seven states. Look at the map markers for today on the trail. It is a stunning in battleground math. The president visits michigan, wisconsin, minnesota. Vice president pence campaigns in arizona. Joe biden is in iowa, minnesota, wisconsin. Senator harris in a 2020 question mark, texas. The president in a very familiar place in need of a giant come back. Unlike in 2016, scant evidence of any late trump momentum. Coronavirus surge now perhaps the biggest head wind. Thursday was officially worst dave the pandemic if you view by case count. 88,000 plus added yesterday. U. S. Daily average is now 76,000. Ef everywhere, red and orange, more new infections. 43 states, more infections this week compared to last week. Only two pushing the case curve down. The president blames that dramatic rise in cases on testing. Thats simply a lie that defies science. A lie the president repeats often. Yes, testing is up, so is test positivity, so are hospitalizations, and increase in number of cases far outpaces the increase in number of tests. In a new closing ad, joe biden appeals to science and to unity. I am running as a proud democrat. I will govern as an american president. We will act on the first day of my presidency to get covid under control. If we to so, well once more become one nation, under god, indivisible. A nation united, strengthened, a nation healed. Four nights from now we start to fill this in. We think of campaigns in red and blue, talked about this quite a bit. We need to think about something else, we have to think about coronavirus which is everywhere in america. Never mind red and blue. Red and orange, the pink, darker colors, deeper the shading, higher the case count in counties across america. It is the collision of the campaign in coronavirus. A lot of this happens everywhere, but things are hurting in places that matter. We talked where the president is going. He is going to michigan, wisconsin, minnesota. One big circle. Wisconsin in particular. Incredibly hard hit. A lot of red everywhere, upper midwest and across. The president is traveling to where theyre seeing the pain of the virus. Florida, texas, everywhere. It is everywhere. Arizona, key battleground state, painful summer surge there. Small counties that supported the president and republicans for years, dealing with a huge coronavirus problem right now. If you think about where the president is traveling today, lets look at some of this. He is traveling to wisconsin and to minnesota and to michigan. Wisconsin especially hard hit now. Hospitalization issues. A 13. 2 positivity rate. Public Health Experts say try to get the positivity rate, what percentage of people that take a test are positive. Try to get it to 5, then push it down more. Nearly 8 in minnesota. 6 in michigan. Michigan performing best now, but the president is at war with its governor who thinks shes doing a good job fighting coronavirus. Thats one way to look at it. Joe biden is on the ballot against the president but the virus is also his opponent in this campaign without a doubt. Another way to look at it in sadness of the campaign, just in the last week, including yesterday, we are breaking records. The president says we rounded the final corner. President says things are fine. Thursday, 88,000 cases. 83,000 cases. 83,000 cases. Experts say 100,000 cases is a few days ahead of us. As we said, on these three days, the president s message on coronavirus, this is alarming. Not the president. We have the vaccines, theyre going to be great. With or without it, were rounding the turn. Normal life is all we want fully resuming, we want normal life to fully resume and thats happening. Did you hear him the other night . Its going to be a cold, dark winter. Very inspiring guy. We are rounding the turn, doing great. Our numbers are incredible. We know the disease, we social distance, we do all the things you have to do. If you get close, wear a mask. You know the bottom line, youre going to get better. Joining the conversation to start the hour, dana bash and maggie haber man of new york times. We talked about this before. In the final days, especially as we watch the case count surge, the president , it sounds at times, what i am about to say, people say it is disrespectful, sounds like he is in a parallel universe. John, theres no other way to describe it. I understand the president and his supporters feel as if they have been under siege, but were talking about objective data, about case counts and about deaths he is insisting isnt there. Thats just simply what we are talking about. He is describing a universe in which, and he has been saying this for months, we are rounding the corner on the virus. In fact, it is getting worse as we head into winter. Thats what his own government is saying, and he sounds totally detached from that. He is saying this as you know in places as part of the blue wall, formerly blue wall states in the midwest where he is competing and where there are a surge in cases and there are large concerns about the coronavirus. He says we have this figured out, yet he constantly makes fun of people for wearing masks. So i understand that this is the reality he wants it to be. He has been pushing this reality awhile, but objectively if youre talking about the math and the numbers, these are not good numbers. Theyre not. And dana, you get in a political campaign, any politician wants to try to bend the truth, shade the truth, stretch the truth. Theres sort of norms of political hyperbole. This is something the president is trying to tweet away or simply ignore. He blames it on bad communication. Not on a bad plan. He hasnt done anything to change the administrations strategy even as we watch the cases go up and up the past few weeks. He blames it on a bad communications plan. As you listen to him, his son right after seems to contribute to the problem. We are doing the greatest job, except with one thing, publicity. Our public relations, were spending too much time working, not enough time talking. No matter what you say to these people, wont make a difference. If i went to the cdc, i kept hearing about new infections. I was like why arent they talking about this . Oh, because the number is almost nothing, we have gotten control of this thing. Number one, the president says he has a pr problem, it is facts, it is data, it is thousands of americans getting infected with covid every day. To his sons point, the number is almost nothing. The number is a quarter million americans dead and the projections are that it will pass 300,000 in the next 100 days. And lets just play this out. Almost as ridiculous that we have to fact check that kind of remark. It is important to and i understand why. Lets just say he is right and that you are still getting the case numbers through the roof across the country. Thats not nothing. There are people that get sick and theyre fine. There are people that get sick and have remnants of it, the long haulers, for a very long time and it is a truly novel disease. No Health Expert really knows ultimately the long term effects and thats a really Big Public Health problem, no matter what the president s son says. On the president s comment, d john, he is his own communications director, he is the one that sets the tone and has the biggest megaphone, most twitter followers. If theres a pr problem, it is his problem. It is not a pr problem, it is a problem of the disease, it is a problem of the governments handling it under his leadership or maybe in this term in this vain, lack thereof, and thats why this four days out from the election, this is a referendum on the president. It is indeed. And maggie, before the president left the white house, as he left to hit the campaign trail, he was asked about new reporting you had this morning, that the original plan was for the president Election Night to go to his nearby hotel, Truck International hotel a few steps from the white house, now you say those plans are on hold or pause. This was the president s explanation a short time ago. We havent made a determination. We have certain rules and regulations, you know, washington, d. C. Is shutdown. The mayor shut it down. So we have a hotel. I dont know if youre allowed to use it or not, but i know the mayor shut down washington, d. C. And if thats the case, well probably stay here or pick another location. Does that track your reporting, the reason he thinks he cant do it, not allowed to have a large crowd in d. C. Or is there more to this . Thats one explanation i heard. I understand theyre trying to suggest were still assessing it, my understanding is it is not happening and maybe theyll get to that statement later. But yes. Look, theres a cap on gatherings in washington, d. C. , 50 people. They clearly knew this before they started sending fundraising solicitations for people to show up at the party. If the hotel violates that, they could be putting among other things Liquor License at risk. This is controlled by local authorities. I think thats one reason. I think another reason is that we dont know what kind of night this will be for the president , right . I think showing up at his self named hotel, if this isnt looking like a great night or if it is not clear, may not be the best option. I think were going into a very uncertain tuesday, unlike any we have seen in recent years and i think theyre aware of it. To that point, i am grateful to have two great reporters at the top of the hour. To that point, dana, if you look at the polling, look at the fact senator harris is in texas, read things that this is reagan versus carter, biden will have a ten point victory, the senate will flip, you can read that, see harris in texas, say democrats are bold and optimistic or hear joe biden and Kamala Harris spending a day monday in pennsylvania trying to protect those 20. So which is it . Nervous, play defense . Optimistic, play offense. All the above . It is all of the above because so many of these critical battleground states are so tight according to modeling in both parties, according to sources i have been talking to, in some of them they could go either way. The thing thats most interesting about the biden campaign, the biden strategy is yes, theyre planning for florida, but it is unlike donald trump, it is not a must win. Joe biden as you well know can win with another path that doesnt include florida. Thats why youre seeing a heavy push in the upper midwest, in pennsylvania because that is the kind of voter they think they can get. Rebuild the blue wall, bring back some of the working class white voters who were traditionally historically democrats, went for donald trump, took a chance on him four years ago. And arizona and texas, those are from the perspective of the democrats, would be nice, but they feel that they have played ball there before, whether it was two years ago in the senate race against ted cruz or look at arizona and they have not been successful. Democrats i am talking to, im sure both of you as well, think the demographic shifts in both those states make it worth a try. Thats why Kamala Harris is going to texas. And so maggie, flip the table. Biden campaign has a wider menu, more choices on the menu to get to 270. The president has a more narrow path. Their take when you talk to them, we did this four years ago, well do it again. Polls were wrong four years ago, were going to do it again. People came out of the wood work four years ago, theyre going to come out again. Is that spin, especially when you look at the democrats have to finish. Early voting in most places is advantage democrats, a great asset as long as you finish and execute in the final four days. Does the Trump Campaign really see this . There are members of the Trump Campaign that see it, john. The president himself does believe he is going to win. I think part of it is because he tends to believe things work out for him. This will be one of those times. They absolutely know they have a narrow path, if he does win, he is probably going to have a larger popular vote loss than last time, he would squeak by with fewer electoral votes than when he got 306 last time. It is a narrow path. Theyre serious, they think theres a chance it can happen. In terms of polls being wrong, i dont know what the Trump Campaign internal polling is showing, and we are obviously careful about internal polling. I suspect if it showed trump doing well or largely counter to the public polling and trump was up in a bunch of places they felt reliable about, they would release it. I think theyre seeing a tight race in a bunch of states, same as the biden people. Both campaigns said it does not match the larger margins of public polling. This is not 2016. Thats not to say the president cant win, but it is not the same race. It is not the same race. To echo that, several republican polsters have seen this rnc analytics analysis that shows a path to a Trump Victory and they simply dont believe it, some of the republican polsters. Well see. Thats why we have elections. Final weekend. Up next, a big ruling in minnesota up ends that states plan to allow absentee ballots to arrive past election day. And another one of the Late Campaign flashbacks. This to the final days of 2008, the year america made history. Friends, we need to bring real change to washington and we have to fight for it. Ive been fighting for this country since i was 17 years old and i have the scars to prove it. One voice can change a room. And if the voice can change a room, it can change a city. And if it can change a city, it can change a state. And if it can change a state, it can change a nation. And if it can change a nation, it can change the world. When i was in high school, this was the theater i came to quite often. The support weve had over the last few months has been amazing. I have a soft spot for local places. Its not just a work environment. Everyone here is family. Gonna go ahead and support him, get my hair cut, leave a big tip. If we focus on our local communities, we can find a way to get through this together. Thank you. If you are ready to open your heart and your home, check us out. Get out and about and support our local community. We thought for sure that we were done. And this town said not today. I have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. Now, theres skyrizi. 3 out of 4 people achieved 90 clearer skin at 4 months after just 2 doses. Skyrizi may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. Before treatment your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms such as fevers, sweats, chills, muscle aches or coughs, or if you plan to or recently received a vaccine. Nothing is everything ask your dermatologist about skyrizi. Nothing is everything and sweetie can coloryou just be. Gentle with the pens. Okey. Okey. I know. Gentle. Gentle new projects means new project managers. You need to hire. I need indeed. Indeed you do. The moment you sponsor a job on indeed you get a short list of quality candidates from our resume database so you can start hiring right away. Claim your seventy five dollar credit, when you post your first job at indeed. Com home. Is someone trying to steal your butterfinger . Call the bfi. Woah. Im going in. No one lays a finger on your butterfinger. Another key courtroom ruling came do you know how to handle ballots in a swing state. Minnesota. The Appeals Court says mail in ballots must be received by election day to be counted. Minnesota the latest state to hear a decision impacting ballot rules. Courtroom just mandated. Ballots in wisconsin also must be in by election day. In pennsylvania, North Carolina, courts are allowing those states to have more time to receive ballots, as long as they have an election day postmark. Joining me, analyst richard childress, thanks for being with us. As a layman, my advice to people when you see one state does this, there are different rulings for different states, my advice is go online, figure your own states plan, do it yourself. You have to take personal responsibility. As a constitutional scholar, are you seeing any legal theory come into play here that not only could in the next couple days before the election, could be meaningful for challenges after the election . Yes. The big legal issue across a number of cases like pennsylvania and minnesota now is the question about whether the state legislature in those states by setting dates in Election Code cannot be interfered with by state courts, by state secretaries of state who have been agreeing or by federal courts who have been agreeing to postpone the receipt deadline for absentee ballots by several days after election day, given that the Election Code says they have to come in election day. The big question here is how much are state legislatures protected by the federal constitution when they set these rules and this is a very big question could have significant implications, a lot of dimensions in play for litigation after the election. So let me try to follow up on that point. Lets say you have a ruling in one state thats allowed to accept ballots, theyre allowed to count ballots that come in after election day as long as theyre postmarked by november 3rd. If that state becomes critical, is it possible to challenge in the courts and say no, in this state and that state, you ruled they had to be in by election day, legislature didnt change the deadline, a judge did or the governor did or some executive action. Therefore, can you challenge it then off do you have to challenge it before the election . This is one big dimension to the problems. There are tremendous reliance interests they have in a state like minnesota. Until yesterday, they have have been told they can get ballots back six days after the election and theyre valid. Now ballots are being put in a separate pile, also put in a separate pile in pennsylvania, ones that come in within three days after the election. The question is are courts going to turn around and say even though we let you vote this way, even though the state policy let you vote this way, going to tell you sorry, too bad, theyre invalid . Theres a lot of relines in the rules in place before midnight hour, 11th hour decisions. Theres a substantive legal issue but also the reliance issues which are very powerful in this context. Well see how they come together after the election. So this is a collision of politics and law. Help me through this one. The president tweets about the North Carolina decision. This decision is crazy and so bad for our country. Imagine what will happen during that nine day period. The election should end november 3rd. One of the scenarios trump critics worry about, he comes out 1 0