The latest on the 2024 campaign

• Harris’ campaign today: Vice President Kamala Harris is meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington, DC. Former President Barack Obama is expected to endorse Harris soon, a source told CNN.
• Tight race: The likely  presidential election race  between Harris and former President Donald Trump begins with no clear leader, according to a CNN poll conducted after Biden ended his bid for reelection.
• Possible Harris-Trump debate: Harris on Thursday said she’s “ready” to debate Trump, and earlier this week, the former president has said he “absolutely” wants to debate Harris. Fox News has proposed a debate between Trump and Harris on September 17 in Pennsylvania.
• Veepstakes: Democrats on Wednesday adopted the rules for a likely Harris nomination, with voting expected to begin August 1. Vetting is underway for Harris’ running mate, with the goal to announce the pick before August 7, sources say.

Vice President Kamala Harris is meeting now with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the vice president’s ceremonial office.

“Welcome Mr. Prime Minister. I look forward to our conversation. We have a lot to talk about,” Harris said as she shook Netanyahu’s hand.

She did not take questions, and the press was escorted out quickly.

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley offered no apologies Thursday for the “tough things” she said about former President Donald Trump during their  bruising Republican primary fight, but she told CNN’s Jake Tapper she does not doubt her choice to support the former president over presumptive Democratic nominee  Kamala Harris  in the November election.

In her first interview since endorsing Trump and speaking at the Republican National Convention, Haley said  President Joe Biden ’s decision to drop out of the race Sunday did not come as a surprise.

“I wasn’t surprised, and I didn’t take happiness in it,” Haley said of Biden’s announcement. “I think through the whole campaign, I fought for mental competency tests. I wasn’t doing it to be disrespectful. I wasn’t doing it to be mean. I was doing it because I think it’s not just Joe Biden. There is an issue we have in DC, where people will go into office and they won’t let go. And then their staffers and their family keep propping them up, and it’s a problem for the American people.”

Haley added: “I never thought he would make it to the election. I always said a vote for Joe Biden is a vote for Kamala Harris, and I think that’s what’s playing out.”

Haley’s comments come in the wake of her  decision to endorse Trump  and speak at the GOP convention last week following a tumultuous primary, during which she repeatedly attacked the former president as “toxic,” “unhinged” and lacking “moral clarity.” In a wide-ranging interview, Haley brushed aside the rhetoric as just part of a campaign — which included Trump’s attacks on Haley and her husband while he was deployed overseas.

Read more from the interview with Haley.

House Speaker Mike Johnson is headed to Southern California on Thursday to visit the border, according to his office. He will be joined by Rep. Darrell Issa.

Johnson and Issa are expected to hold a news conference while in town and discuss the Biden/Harris administration’s border policies, as Republican attacks ramp up over the vice president’s record on the border.

Johnson’s office confirmed that the news conference will happen along the “Whiskey 8” section of the border in San Ysidro, California, and visit the US Customs and Border Protection facilities at the San Ysidro Port of Entry and Imperial Beach locations.

ABC News  first reported  the visit.

“RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars” ends its ninth season on Friday, but not without a PSA from a VIP:  Vice President Kamala Harris.

Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, stopped by the beloved reality show to remind viewers about the importance of voting. Her message will appear in Friday’s finale, which airs on Paramount+.

“Each day we are seeing our rights and freedoms under attack, including the right of everyone to be who they are, love who they love, openly and with pride,” Harris said, while surrounded by a crew including former NSYNC member Lance Bass, “Saturday Night Live” alumnus Leslie Jones and “Drag Race” judge Michelle Visage. (RuPaul was absent from the clip.)
“So as we fight back against these attacks, let’s all remember — no one is alone,” Harris said. “We are all in this together. And your vote is your power.”

Harris ended her message by encouraging viewers to register to vote and clapping along to RuPaul’s optimistic anthem “A Little Bit of Love.”

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a contender to be Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate, denied reports that he spoke with Harris campaign staff specifically yesterday about the role, but said he is in contact with the campaign about promoting their message to help Harris win in November.

Pritzker told reporters at a news conference in Chicago on Thursday he has had “a number of conversations” with people in the Harris campaign but denied a Chicago Sun-Times report that Pritzker spoke with Harris aides on Wednesday about the vice presidential role.

“The Harris campaign did not call me yesterday. I have had a number of conversations with people, I do regularly, with the campaign,” Pritzker said.

When pressed on whether he’s spoken to Harris aides, Pritzker suggested his conversations have focused on his role as a surrogate for the Harris campaign.

“Well, sure, I don’t know anybody who’s involved with Democratic politics that isn’t talking to their campaign,” Pritzker said. “I know people who work on the campaign, and I am involved in transmitting the message of the campaign and excited about the next days.”

Vice President Kamala Harris is a “steadfast” friend of Israel, White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said Thursday.

“I can tell you for sure because I’ve been in the room with her, since my two and a half years of being here at the White House, that Vice President Harris shares President Biden’s steadfast commitment to the nation of Israel, to the security of the Israeli people, to making sure Israel can defend itself against attacks like they suffered on the seventh of October. She’s been a full partner,” Kirby said.

However, he would not say whether she would consider herself a Zionist, similar to how President Joe Biden has described himself.

“I won’t speak for the vice president in that level of detail, but I can tell you having seen her at work: She absolutely believes in all the facets of a free, secure, independent Israel, the nation of Israel, and the safety and security of the Israeli people. And she has been working harder than just about anybody to make sure that that as a team we are looking after our commitments to our neighbors, and our allies, our friends in Israel,” he told CNN.

President Joe Biden’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today marks his first sit-down with a world leader since he exited the 2024 race on Sunday.

The high-profile meeting — and Netanyahu’s visit to Washington this week in general — has put one of the country’s most politically fraught foreign policy issues front and center for the presumptive Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, who will also meet with Netanyahu later Thursday.

Here’s what we know about the prime minister’s White House visit so far today:

Thanking Biden for his support: In remarks made in front of reporters, Netanyahu thanked Biden for “50 years of support” for Israel and said he looked forward to working with Biden for the rest of his term.

A photo shared by the Israeli Government Press Office showed Netanyahu had signed the guestbook in the Roosevelt Room and thanked Biden for “decades of friendship and support” for Israel.

Pressure campaign: Behind closed doors, Biden is expected to be as forceful as he has ever been in urging Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire agreement, sources tell CNN.

A planned meeting with the families of hostages still held in Gaza is viewed as an opportunity to hold Netanyahu accountable for his commitment to pursuing a peace deal, two US officials said.

One family member who will attend the Thursday afternoon meeting with Biden and Netanyahu told CNN they hope the president will use the setting to exert serious pressure on his Israeli counterpart — particularly now that Biden is free from the political burdens of a reelection campaign.

What the administration is saying: The differences remaining between ceasefire negotiators for Israel and Hamas “are narrow enough that, with some compromise and some leadership on both sides here, we believe that we can get this over the finish line,” White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told CNN on Thursday.

“We want to get this done,” he said on “CNN News Central,” adding that the Biden administration is pressuring leaders from both sides.

A State Department spokesperson also pushed back Thursday on Netanyahu’s claim to Congress that there were “practically” no civilian casualties in Rafah outside of one incident, saying “of course” there were civilian casualties in the southern Gazan city due to Israel’s military campaign.

CNN’s Michael Conte and Sam Fossum contributed reporting to this post.

Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, a possible contender for Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate pick, attacked Sen. JD Vance over his stance on abortion, Ukraine, and his comments about childless women.

“I have two daughters and a granddaughter. I really worry about their rights if Donald Trump is elected again and JD Vance is vice president. I mean, that really concerns me,” Kelly told CNN’s Manu Raju.

Kelly also said that Vance’s opposition to aid for Ukraine is deeply concerning.

“If Donald Trump and JD Vance were back in the White House, it would be an utter disaster, and it would have a significant negative impact on our national security and the national security of our allies for decades,” he told reporters.

Asked about Vance’s comments about childless women, Kelly replied, “You know, it’s a ridiculous thing to say about someone. You know, it’s obnoxious, it’s rude, it’s also not surprising.”

The Arizona Democrat refused to say what he spoke about with Harris, but indicated that he is ready to serve as her running mate if asked.

“I’ve been a public servant since I was, even before I was in the Navy. I drove an ambulance when I was in high school. You know, I was a astronaut for 15 years. I flew with an aircraft carrier,” said Kelly.

Sen. Tim Kaine, who ran on Hillary Clinton’s ticket in 2016, weighed in on Vice President Kamala Harris’ expedited search for her own running mate and shared that he has counseled many of those currently in consideration.

“You have to find someone that you trust will be brutally candid with you in a closed room, but then be completely publicly supportive and respectful outside of a closed room,” Kaine told CNN. “That’s a personal chemistry issue.”

He also said that he’s talked with several of the people who are currently being vetted and shared his experience with them directly: “It’s very intense, but it’s an honor to do it.”

While he declined to weigh in on any specific candidates, Kaine said that “she’s got a lot of good options.” CNN  previously reported  that Harris will choose a running mate in less than two weeks with the top contenders currently being North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly.

“It’s normally a two-month process, and they go to do it in two weeks,” Kaine remarked, adding “I’m sure they’ll do a great job.”

Vice President Kamala Harris said she is ready to debate former President Donald Trump.

“And I’ll tell you I’m ready to debate Donald Trump. I have agreed to the previously agreed upon September 10 debate, he agreed to that previously. Now it appears he’s back pedaling. But I’m ready,” Harris told reporters after landing at Joint Base Andrews.

About that date: Trump and President Joe Biden’s campaign had previously agreed to two debates this year, one  hosted by CNN  in June and another to be  hosted by ABC  on September 10. It’s not clear if that debate will still take place now that Biden has  dropped out.

Meanwhile, Fox News has proposed a presidential debate between Trump and Harris on September 17. Harris in her remarks today did not elaborate whether she would accept the debate proposed by Fox News.

“I think the voters deserve to see the split screen that exists in this race on a debate stage. And so I’m ready, let’s go,” Harris said Thursday.

Earlier this week, Trump told reporters on a press call he wants to debate Harris but that he has not yet agreed to anything.

“I haven’t agreed to anything. I agreed to a debate with Joe Biden,” Trump said on the call. “But I want to debate her, and she’ll be no different, because they have the same policies. I think debating’s important for a presidential race, I really do, you sort of have an obligation to debate.”

White House official John Kirby dismissed questions about whether President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from the race would impede his ability to either help secure a ceasefire and hostage deal for Israel and Gaza or secure the release of detained Americans abroad like Paul Whelan.

“We don’t believe it does, and in the conversations that we’ve been having in just recent hours, there’s no reason to suspect that his decision not to run for reelection is going to have an impact on our ability to get the deal done,” White House National Security Council spokesperson Kirby said when asked by reporters about the ceasefire deal. “We are close, we just have to finish it.”

Asked about wrongfully detained Americans abroad, like Evan Gershkovich and Whelan, Kirby said: “I can assure you that we continue to work extremely hard at getting all wrongfully detained Americans around the world, including those in Russia.”

Minutes into his first solo event as  Donald Trump ’s running mate,  Sen. JD Vance  had already divided his hometown audience here – over donuts.

While reconnecting with the locals in the crowd over shared memories and favored haunts, Vance posited taking his security detail to nearby Central Pastry Shop after his event.

Amid laughter, stans of a rival donut shop shouted at the stage: “Milton’s!”

The Ohio Republican, in damage control mode, offered to the dissenters, “I love Milton’s, too.” Crisis averted.

Vance has already faced far greater upheaval than pastry debates since joining the Republican ticket – more than perhaps any modern vice presidential nominee. The political landscape Vance stepped into 10 days ago is no longer recognizable after  President Joe Biden  abruptly ended his campaign. The fallout has left him without a Democratic counterpart after Vice President  Kamala Harris  quickly emerged as her party’s presumptive nominee. It could be more than a week before Harris selects her running mate.

“I was told I was going to get to debate Kamala Harris, and now President Trump’s going to get to debate her?” Vance joked Monday in the Middletown High School auditorium, surrounded by his wife and friendly faces from his childhood. “I’m kind of pissed off about that if I’m being honest with you.”

Watch video analysis of Vance’s early poll numbers since Trump’s VP selection.

Four days into the most consequential week of Kamala Harris’ political life, she has to confront the most fraught foreign policy issue facing the country by looking directly into the eyes of an Israeli prime minister.

Up until now, Harris has been defined by working for President Joe Biden, arguably the most explicitly pro-Israel American president, even though his relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu has frayed.

But now that she’s the presumptive Democratic nominee, Harris has to define what kind of president she wants to be — on this and every other issue, while Biden remains at the White House trying to nail down an Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal, and with some around him thinking that restarting the normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia could be a top legacy project for the remainder of his term.

Harris didn’t preside over Netanyahu’s speech to Congress on Wednesday, instead choosing to stick with a pre-scheduled trip to a sorority event in Indiana, as protests erupted near the US Capitol.

On Thursday, she’s set to welcome Netanyahu to her ceremonial office in the Old Executive Office Building.

But articulating a clear position on Israel will take more than that, according to CNN’s conversations with two dozen former and current aides, members of Congress and other political players.

Read the full story.

America’s most powerful industry is set to have a presidential candidate on the ballot from its home turf — Vice President Kamala Harris.

Top technology leaders are already showing their excitement for the Bay Area native, in the form of endorsements and donations for Harris, which have come from prominent names, such as longtime Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, Netflix Co-Founder Reed Hastings and philanthropist Melinda French Gates.

The Harris supporters represent a foil to the loud and powerful — although not necessarily large — contingent of (mostly) men in tech who have endorsed Former President Donald Trump’s White House bid,  including Elon Musk.

The pro-Harris movement within tech suggests that the vice president’s policies, as well as her long and friendly relationship with many top executives in the tech world, may ultimately make her Silicon Valley’s top choice for the White House.

To understand the wave of coconut tree and K-Hive content that’s hitting your social media feeds and your group texts this week, you need some context.

Deja Foxx has it. She worked for the Kamala Harris campaign as a social media strategist during the then senator’s failed 2019 run. She was just 19 at the time. Now, at 24, she can say she’s worked in politics for nearly half her life.

As she told Audie Cornish on The Assignment, the current internet obsession with remixing Harris’ 2023 White House speech invoking a coconut tree isn’t that surprising. The memes have power in part because they arose organically, created by Harris fans who were deliberately repurposing a moment that had originally been seen as a gaffe by detractors, who mocked the vice president’s delivery and laugh.

“Memes are meant to feel like insider language, right? That there is a certain group of people who understands them and can tap into them is what makes them potent,” Foxx said.

And the people wielding the memes — mostly Gen Z women who spend a lot of time on TikTok — have sharp insight into what it means to be very publicly online.

“Young women and girls are being forced to come of age, to go from girlhood to womanhood, in the public eye in a way that is just unprecedented,” Foxx said. “And I think that they have two kinds of people to look to. They look to their divas and their pop stars, and they look to politicians to see what it means to become a woman, in front of everyone.”

There’s a fine line between tapping into the zeitgeist and overdoing it with the coconuts, Foxx said. Political campaigns, Harris’ included, are smart to keep young people in the room and in positions of leadership in part because they’re the ones who will tell you when you’ve gone too far.

“They can create and uplift the messages that are arising organically without overdoing it or making it feel cringe,” she said. “This is where trusted messengers, I think, are really, really important.”

Listen to the full conversation on The Assignment here

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz says it’s “humbling” to be considered among the shortlist of potential running mates for Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential race.

It’s “surreal” to be among the list of contenders, the former teacher-turned-politician said in a Wednesday night interview with MSNBC.

“It is humbling, it’s a privilege, it’s surreal,” he said.

Walz, the chair of the Democratic Governors Association, called the fellow governors reported to be in contention to be Harris’ running mate “my friends,” and urged Harris to choose a governor.

“If you take a Democratic governor using the Biden-Harris policies that they put in place, you’re protecting reproductive rights, you got free school meals, you’ve got a working class that’s focused on organized labor and union labor,” he said. “So for me, I’m just proud. I’m proud of what we’ve done in Minnesota. I’m proud of what they’ve done across this country.”

Jabs at Vance: Walz also used the interview to take veiled jabs at the Republican vice presidential nominee, Ohio Sen. JD Vance. The governor referenced Vance’s previous remarks about Harris and other Democrats being “childless cat ladies.”

“Oh my God, they went after cat people. Good luck with that. Turn on the internet and see what cat people do when you go after them,” Walz said.

“It would be funny if it wasn’t so sad. They see the least fortunate among us as scapegoats and punch lines for them. Kamala Harris and Democrats see them as our neighbors. That is a big difference.”

Key progressive’s backing: Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal told CNN’s Manu Raju on Thursday that she supports Walz as Harris’ pick. The Washington lawmaker said Walz has strong union ties, is committed to the Biden-Harris agenda and would bring deep support in purple states in the Midwest.

CNN’s Morgan Rimmer contributed reporting to this post.

GOP Sen. Marco Rubio from Florida attacked Vice President Kamala Harris as a “real liberal” who has led on policies that “have destroyed the country,” while Democrats pushed back on GOP criticisms of Harris on the border.

“They rented Biden, they own her,” Rubio told CNN’s Manu Raju. “That’ll be the race. She was in the room when they made all these decisions that have destroyed the country.”

Vulnerable Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin said that former President Donald Trump is to blame for the continued crisis at the border, not Harris, noting that in the Senate, “we had a border measure that was very strong, endorsed by the Border Patrol, and Trump, Donald Trump tanked it.”

Democratic Campaign Committee Chair Suzan DelBene added that there has been a major uptick in enthusiasm — and donations — since Harris announced her candidacy. “We had our highest day of the cycle right after she announced she was running, and we’re continuing to see strong support in grassroots across the nation,” she said.

Rubio dismissed concerns about this new jolt of energy in the race, saying that “both sides are going to have enthusiasm.”

Vulnerable New York GOP Rep. Marc Molinaro compared the surge in enthusiasm Democrats are experiencing to what Republicans felt after the assassination attempt of Donald Trump.

“There’s going to be an energy bump, but I suspect as we push along, as we always do, Americans again remember that it’s too expensive to get too little in return, the southern border is surrendered, and we see our community and quality of life undermined, and Vice President Harris is responsible for that too,” he said.

Vice President Kamala Harris has strongly condemned pro-Hamas protesters who burned the American flag outside Union Station in Washington, DC, Wednesday.

“Yesterday, at Union Station in Washington, D.C. we saw despicable acts by unpatriotic protesters and dangerous hate-fueled rhetoric,” Harris wrote in a statement Thursday. “I condemn any individuals associating with the brutal terrorist organization Hamas, which has vowed to annihilate the State of Israel and kill Jews. Pro-Hamas graffiti and rhetoric is abhorrent and we must not tolerate it in our nation.”

Harris also condemned the “burning of the American flag,” calling the flag a “symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America.”

“I support the right to peacefully protest, but let’s be clear: Antisemitism, hate and violence of any kind have no place in our nation,” Harris wrote.

Conservative hardliners Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Anna Paulina Luna defended GOP Rep. Tim Burchett calling Vice President Kamala Harris a “DEI hire” earlier this week.

“Tim Burchett was just echoing what Joe Biden said,” Greene told CNN, pointing to a video where Biden touts the diversity in his administration.

In the video, Biden does not say that he chose Harris because of her race or her gender.

“I think that that’s just saying what the Democrat Party and Joe Biden had said himself. I don’t see how it’s wrong to repeat Democrats, their own words,” she added.

Pressed on the fact that Biden never said he hired Harris because she was a black woman, Greene doubled down.

“He picked her, therefore he hired her. So those, that’s what the Democrats did, the Democrat Party. They’re the party of making identity and race qualifications for hiring someone,” continued Greene. “I think it should be their character, what they’re capable of, their background, you know, their resume. This is the Democrat Party. The Democrat Party, those are their words, and that’s what Joe Biden chose.”

Luna argued that Burchett had not crossed a line. “I just, I think that there’s a double standard and I think that he uses words that the left likes to push. They want DEI, they want diversity, equity inclusion, and for argument’s sakes, Kamala Harris does fit the Diversity Equity and Inclusion term,” she said. “Yeah, it’s been taken out of context, I think because of who said it.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said that Vice President Kamala Harris is “a key player” in the Biden administration’s foreign policy decision-making processes.

Harris “has always been engaged and involved, is always prepared to for whatever discussion that we’re going to have,” said Austin at a news conference at the Pentagon.

Austin ran through a laundry list of the foreign policy challenges the Biden administration had faced that Harris had been involved in, such as, “the strikes that we’ve had to take, the deployments that we’ve done, (and) the decision to support Ukraine.”

Austin said his assessment of Harris is from “having sat in meetings with her for three-and-a-half years,” and “having observed … her provide input to some very complex decision-making processes.”

He added that Harris “absolutely loves troops.”

“She’s always been focused on the welfare of our troops and our families, and also veterans as well,” said Austin.

Vice President Kamala Harris slammed GOP policies concerning gun violence while addressing the American Federation of Teachers union in Houston.

“We want to ban assault weapons, and they want to ban books,” she said.

She told the teachers union that “extremist” Republicans have failed to pass gun safety laws to protect both students and teachers.

She continued addressing the teachers union:

“While you teach students about democracy and representative government, extremists attack the sacred freedom to vote. While you tried to create safe and welcoming places where our children can learn, extremists attack our freedom to live safe from gun violence. They have the nerve to tell teachers to strap on a gun in the classroom while they refuse to pass common-sense gun safety laws.”

“While you teach students about our nation’s past, these extremists attack the freedom to learn and acknowledge our nation’s true and full history — including book bans,” she added.

Addressing a teachers union in Houston on Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris told crowd members that: “In this moment we are in a fight for our most fundamental freedoms. And to this room of leaders, I say: bring it on.”

“Bring it on. Bring it on,” Harris continued.

In response, the crowd started chanting: “Bring it on! Bring it on! Bring it on!”

Once the chants stopped, Harris told the crowd:

“We believe in our country, we believe in its promise of freedom. And the American people believe in the promise of freedom. So we are in the fight,” she said.

Vice President Kamala Harris said President Joe Biden showed “once again what true leadership looks like” when he addressed the nation Wednesday night.

Harris made the comments speaking to a teachers union in Houston on Thursday, where she added that Biden’s policies focus on the future of the country.

“He thinks and talks about his work and our country, understanding what it means in terms of what we do now and how that will impact the future. He thinks about our history and the context of the importance of the work we do now,” Harris said.

Vice President Kamala Harris said that under her administration she will continue President Joe Biden’s legacy and not go back to failed economic policies of former President Donald Trump.

“You know America has tried these failed economic policies before, but we are not going back,” Harris said while speaking at the American Federation of Teachers convention in Houston, Texas on Thursday. “We will move forward.”

The Democratic National Committee filed a complaint with the Federal Elections Commission, claiming independent candidate Cornel West accepted illegal in-kind contributions from Republican-aligned firms to assist his ballot access efforts in Arizona and North Carolina.

The DNC announced it filed the complaint last week against West’s campaign and three outside groups suggesting that Republicans are illegally backing West’s ballot access operation in two key battleground states.

The complaint argues People Over Party and Blitz Canvassing, which have aided West’s campaign in North Carolina, and Wells Marketing, which has petitioned on behalf of West in Arizona, were not paid for their work in compliance with campaign finance laws.

“In these two battleground states, Cornel West’s campaign has received in-kind contributions well in excess of the limits from Republican leaning entities in violation of federal law,” the complaint reads. “It is indisputable that the West campaign has accepted the benefits of these services.”

The efforts by People Over Party and Blitz Canvassing in North Carolina were the subject of the North Carolina State Board of Election’s investigation into West’s ballot access petition earlier this month. The board subsequently blocked West from appearing on the state’s ballot after the board chair stated he has “no confidence” signatures collected by the Republican-aligned groups were “done legitimately.” West’s campaign is appealing the board’s decision in federal court.

CNN has reached out to West’s campaign for comment.

House Republicans passed a symbolic resolution attacking Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, over immigration. The vote was 220 to 196.

Six Democrats voted with Republicans in favor – Reps. Jared Golden of Maine, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington, Yadira Caraveo of Colorado, Don Davis of North Carolina, Henry Cuellar of Texas and Mary Peltola of Alaska.

The resolution “strongly condemns the Biden administration and its border czar, Kamala Harris’s, failure to secure the United States border,” according to the text.

The resolution itself is a messaging exercise and has no real penalties for Harris. The White House  has rejected GOP claims  dubbing Harris “border czar,” arguing that her focus was on the region and not on border security.

“The vice president was not a ‘border czar.’ They’re making that up because they have no affirmative agenda, vision or track record for the American people,” House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters earlier today.

This is the last vote in the House until September 9 as the chamber breaks for August recess.

Former President Barack Obama is expected to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris soon and his team has been in touch with the campaign, a source told CNN.

Obama and Harris have been in touch regularly, and he is serving as a sounding board for her, as he has been over the 20 years they’ve known each other, the source said.

Obama believed it was important for the Democratic Party to have a legitimate process where delegates select their new nominee, and he thinks Harris is off to an impressive start, this source said.

Former President Donald Trump made at least 10 false claims about Vice President Kamala Harris in his first campaign rally since she became the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. We’re still looking into some of his claims, but at least 10 were wrong.

Here’s just one of the false claims the former president made, for the full list read this story.

Harris and the retirement age

Discussing Social Security, Trump claimed of President Joe Biden and Harris: “They’re talking about, he was talking, she’s talking about – lifting the retirement age.”

Facts First : This claim is false about Harris. She has not spoken in favor of raising the age for receiving Social Security retirement benefits. (Biden did, as a US senator in the 2000s and prior, express support for or openness to raising the retirement age, but he has been a vocal opponent of the idea as president .)

Harris has supported increasing, not reducing, Social Security benefits. In 2019, about two years before she became vice president, she  co-sponsored  a bill from Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, called the Social Security Expansion Act, that would  boost Social Security benefits  by raising payroll taxes on high earners.

President Joe Biden is expected to be as forceful as he has ever been in urging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire agreement when the two leaders meet privately at the White House Thursday afternoon, sources tell CNN, as US officials believe that a deal may be on the cusp.

“We’re closer than we’ve ever been,” one senior administration official said. “It’s up to the Israelis to accept it.”

Biden’s in-person meeting with Netanyahu comes only days after the president’s stunning announcement dropping out of the 2024 race over the weekend, and a resolution to the Israel-Hamas war that began in October now looms large over Biden’s legacy as a one-term president. Progress in the negotiations for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war have come in fits and starts in recent months, and Biden and his senior national security officials have been closely involved in trying to land the deal.

Biden will also have a second separate setting Thursday afternoon where he could apply firm pressure on Netanyahu to finalize the ceasefire agreement – a joint meeting with the prime minister with the families of American hostages in Gaza.

Multiple sources stressed that no major announcement about an agreement is expected on Thursday – however, as CNN reported this week, US and Israeli officials have voiced increased optimism about the prospects of an agreement.

Speaking at her first public event since her husband dropped his bid for reelection, first lady Jill Biden told US Olympic athletes’ families in Paris, France, that President Joe Biden had led the country with “hope always in his heart.”

“It’s what I love about our country: That we are united, and together we can reach for every possibility. President Biden has led our country with that hope always in his heart,” the first lady said.

She paused as the crowd applauded. “Thank you,” she said, “I’ll take that home to him.”

“As he says, there is nothing America can’t do when we do it together,” she continued, “and we see that, especially now at the Olympics, in this moment. We are more than our cities or states or backgrounds, we are more than our jobs or our political parties. We are all first and foremost Team USA.”

President Joe Biden  saved his most powerful argument against  Donald Trump  for the moment he explained to the nation why he was no longer the person to make it.

In his  primetime Oval Office address on Wednesday, Biden ceded the political stage to Kamala Harris, ushering in an  unusual period heading into the election  where the vice president, not the president, will lead their party.

Apart from Biden’s  announcement on Sunday not to seek reelection, after days of Democratic Party turmoil, the speech was the most critical moment in his attempt to pass power to Harris. The new presumptive Democratic nominee must  now work quickly to carve her own political identity  and to make a case for her own presidency — a task in which she must create a vision, program and aura that is distinct from Biden’s and his political liabilities.

This reversal of power dynamics requires Biden to swallow his own aspirations, may at times compromise his dignity, and for Harris, at some point —  perhaps as soon as this week over Gaza  — to break from her boss for her own political good.

House Democrats Wednesday night praised President  Joe Biden  for his  speech explaining his decision to step aside  from the presidential race, putting an end to a bitter chapter of Democratic infighting over Biden’s future where many Democratic lawmakers publicly and privately pressured the president to not run for reelection.

Biden’s  disastrous debate performance  on June 27  sent the Democratic Party into a tailspin, where concerns about the president’s mental acuity and the negative impact that could have on down ballot races culminated in 36 House and Senate Democrats publicly calling on Biden to end his presidential campaign.

But in the wake of Biden’s heartfelt speech, the consensus among lawmakers was one of gratitude, ready to bury the hatchet.

Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan of Wisconsin, who had called for Biden to step aside, praised the speech, saying: “He did a great job of laying out why he did what he did.”

Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who at one point  told  Biden that polling showed that the president cannot defeat Donald Trump and that Biden could destroy Democrats’ chances of winning the House in November if he continues seeking a second term, called Biden’s address “great.”

“I thought it showed his greatness and his goodness,” the California Democrat said.

“He made me cry,” Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett, a staunch Biden supporter amid concerns about his electability, said.

“It was the president that I know and love… you could see what it’s like to have a real compassionate, well-intentioned, thoughtful president.”

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Former First Lady Melania Trump will release a new memoir, titled “Melania,” this fall, her office announced on Thursday, describing the book as “a powerful and inspiring story of a woman who has carved her own path, overcome adversity and defined personal excellence.”

Her first memoir will offer a rare glimpse into the famously private former first lady, who has maintained a low profile throughout her husband’s campaign, having attended just three public appearances since he launched his third presidential bid.

The book will include stories and family photos that have “never before shared with the public,” her office said. They did not include a release date, and it is unclear whether the book will be published before Election Day.

“Melania” will be released by Skyhorse Publishing, which has published a series of books by other supporters of former President Donald Trump, including former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Trump’s former attorney Alan Dershowitz. Last year, Skyhorse published “The Great Awakening” by conservative firebrand and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, which was written in part by Trump’s former strategist Steve Bannon.

Skyhorse has also published books by third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.

The book will be released in two editions — a “Collector’s Edition,” featuring “256 pages in full color throughout, with each copy signed by the author,” which will be sold for $150, and a “Memoir Edition,” which is 304 pages and will be sold for $40. Signed copies of the “Memoir Edition” will go for $75. Both editions are available for pre-order through  Melania Trump’s website.

The office of the former First Lady did not comment beyond the press release.

President Joe Biden said Thursday’s GDP report makes it clear “we now have the strongest economy in the world” and specifically name-dropped Vice President Kamala Harris.

“When I took office, we were in the midst of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression” Biden wrote in a statement released Thursday morning.

“Thanks to my and Vice President Harris’s economic agenda, our economy grew a robust 2.8% over the last quarter, based on strong American consumers and business investment. We’ve created nearly 16 million jobs, wages are up, and inflation is coming down. We’re rebuilding the Nation and bringing manufacturing back to America,” the statement continued.

He adds later in the statement: “The Vice President and I will keep fighting for America’s future—a future of promise and possibilities, of ordinary Americans doing extraordinary things.”

Biden typically touts economic numbers like the GDP, but his inclusion of Harris twice is notable. In his statement on the first-quarter GDP, he didn’t mention Harris once.

State of the economy: As CNN previously reported, economic growth in the first half of the year was solid, with the economy expanding a robust 2.8% annualized rate in the second quarter, according to fresh Commerce Department figures released Thursday, which are adjusted for inflation and seasonal swings.

Businesses are continuing to invest, and a key gauge of consumer demand has been robust this year. As the economy continued to expand from April through June, inflation resumed a downward trend, the latest GDP report showed, and seems to be on track to slowing further toward the Federal Reserve’s 2% target.

Former President Donald Trump claimed Vice President Kamala Harris is “a much worse candidate” than President Joe Biden.

“Should he stay? I guess that’s up to him, and it’s up to the people and I don’t think they should use the 25th Amendment,” Trump said on Fox & Friends. “You have not long to go, you know, we have four months now, and then he’s got another month and a half.”

“I think if he goes, she then takes over and she is worse than he is, I really believe. She is a San Francisco radical,” Trump said. “She is actually, I think a much worse, in a way, a much worse candidate.”

Trump claimed that the way in which Biden ended his 2024 bid “was a coup.”

“They didn’t want him running. He was way down in the polls, and they thought he was gonna lose. They went to him, and they said, ‘You can’t win the race,’ which I think is true. Unless I did something very foolish, which I wasn’t going to do,” Trump said.

Trump continued his barrage of attacks against his likely new opponent Harris, saying, “She’s bad news. She’s a radical left, not very smart person.”

Less than 24 hours after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress, former President Donald Trump said Israel has a public relations problem and needs to end the war with Hamas quickly.

“I want him to finish up and get it done quickly. You gotta get it done quickly, because they are getting decimated with this publicity. And you know, Israel is not very good at public relations,” Trump said on Fox and Friends.

Trump will meet with Netanyahu on Friday.

“Israel has to handle their public relations. Their public relations are not good,” the former president said. “They’ve got to get this done fast because the world, the world is not taking lightly to it. It’s really incredible.”

Trump reasserted his claim that the Hamas-led October 7 attacks wouldn’t have happened if he were president.

Asked if he would change US weapons policy to Israel, Trump said, “I would make sure that it gets over with fast. You have to end this fast. It can’t continue to go on like this. It’s too long. It’s too much.”

Trump said he suspected “bad news” with the hostages, many of whom he believes are dead.

“I think you’re going to find that one of the reasons that Hamas is not really negotiating very nicely, I think they are saying wow, they the hostages back and we have killed the hostages. I think a lot of the hostages are dead” Trump said.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said while she thinks the country is ready for an all-female ticket, she intends to serve out the rest of her term as governor instead of potentially becoming Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate.

Asked in an interview with theSkimm, taped on Wednesday, whether she thought the country was prepared to elect two women to serve in the White House, Whitmer answered, “I do, actually.”

“I just want to be clear — I’ve made a commitment to serve out my term here in Michigan, and I feel like it’s important. And I can be great help to Vice President Harris on the ground here in Michigan and that’s gonna be my focus,” said Whitmer, whose current term ends in 2027.

She went on to highlight the abundance of women in leadership in Michigan, which currently has a female governor, secretary of state and attorney general, along with several others.

Asked what Harris should be looking for in a running mate, Whitmer made clear, “Kamala Harris in and of herself has more experience than the whole GOP ticket put together.”

“(Donald Trump and JD Vance) only have six years of public service experience, and I often point out to people, you wouldn’t go into brain surgery and ask for the freshest neurosurgeon out of medical school. Experience is important,” she continued.

Whitmer said she’s “confident” Harris will choose someone she “trusts, that shares her values, that can step into the breach in the very unlikely event that they would ever need to, that they would be ready.”

Vice President Kamala Harris starts her day Thursday in Houston, where she will deliver the keynote speech at the American Federation of Teachers’ 88th national convention.

She will then head to Washington, DC, for a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at 4:30 p.m. ET.

Ahead of her meeting with Netanyahu, Harris strongly condemned pro-Hamas protesters who burned the American flag outside Union Station in Washington, DC, Wednesday.

“Yesterday, at Union Station in Washington, D.C. we saw despicable acts by unpatriotic protestors and dangerous hate-fueled rhetoric,” Harris wrote in a statement Thursday.

“I condemn any individuals associating with the brutal terrorist organization Hamas, which has vowed to annihilate the State of Israel and kill Jews. Pro-Hamas graffiti and rhetoric is abhorrent and we must not tolerate it in our nation.”

Harris also condemned the “burning of the American flag,” calling the flag a “symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America. It should never be desecrated in that way.”

“I support the right to peacefully protest, but let’s be clear: Antisemitism, hate and violence of any kind have no place in our nation,” Harris wrote.

Former President Donald Trump said Thursday that Secret Service shouldn’t have allowed him on stage at the Butler, Pennsylvania, rally where he was shot in an assassination attempt.

“The biggest mistake they made is allowing me to go,” Trump said on Fox News. “They shouldn’t have let me go on the stage.”

“Now, they just weren’t communicating properly with the local police. Different groups of people knew there was some nut job on the roof and he was up there,” Trump continued, mentioning the woman in the crowd who warned about the shooter and the  municipal officer  who came face-to-face with him.

Trump said that often the Secret Service has him wait 10 or 15 minutes before taking the stage at a rally due to lightning or thunder, and questioned why he was sent on stage this time.

While Trump praised the Secret Service agents who rushed on top of him after shots were fired, he said there was clearly a failure of communication between the Secret Service and the local police and that someone should have been on the roof where the shooter was.

“It’s just a terrible thing. It’s such a shame, and the Secret Service, they’re such great people,” Trump said. “It’s a blight on their reputation. There should have been somebody on the roof,” Trump said.

The likely  2024 presidential election campaign  between  Vice President Kamala Harris  and former  President Donald Trump  begins with no clear leader, according to a  new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.

Trump holds 49% support among registered voters nationwide to Harris’ 46%, a finding within the poll’s margin of sampling error. That’s a closer contest than earlier CNN polling this year had found on the matchup between Biden and Trump.

The survey finds voters widely supportive of both Biden’s decision to step aside and his choice to remain in office through the end of his term. Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters are broadly enthusiastic about Harris and willing to coalesce around her as the new presumptive nominee, even as they remain deeply divided on whether Biden’s Democratic successor should seek to continue his policies or chart a new course.

The poll, conducted online July 22 and 23, surveyed registered voters who had previously participated in CNN surveys  in April  or  June, both of which found Trump leading Biden by 6 points in a head-to-head matchup. Checking back in with the same people means that shifts in preferences are more likely to reflect real changes over time and not just statistical noise.

And the new poll finds some critical movement in these early days of a Harris-Trump race.

Harris hangs on to 95% of those who earlier said they supported Biden, while Trump retains the support of a slightly smaller 92% of his previous backers. Those who previously said they would support neither Biden nor Trump in a two-way matchup now split 30% for Harris and 27% for Trump, with the rest saying they’d vote for someone else or opt out of this year’s election.

Half of those who back Harris in the new poll (50%) say their vote is more in support of her than against Trump. That’s a dramatic shift compared with the Trump-focused dynamic of the Biden-Trump race. Among Biden’s supporters in CNN’s June poll, just 37% said their vote was mainly to express support for the president.

About three-quarters of Trump’s supporters (74%) say their vote is to express support for him rather than opposition to Harris. That’s an increase in affirmative support for him compared with the June CNN poll (66%), which came before an  assassination attempt on Trump’s life  and the  Republican National Convention  at which the former president formally accepted his party’s nomination.

The poll finds Trump’s favorability rating ticking up to 43%, higher than it’s been since 2020 in CNN polling.

Fox News has proposed a debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris on September 17.

The debate invitation from the right-wing cable network would take place in the swing state of Pennsylvania, with anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum serving as moderators, it said Wednesday.

In letters to the Trump and Harris campaigns, Fox News President Jay Wallace and Vice President of Politics Jessica Loker said it is “open to discussion on the exact date, format and location – with or without an audience.”

The network attached statistics and ratings which it said pointed to its “strength with key demographics such as independents in swing states.”

Trump and President Joe Biden’s campaign had previously agreed to two debates this year, one hosted by CNN in June and another to be hosted by ABC on September 10.

Trump has also expressed displeasure at ABC and has previously posted that he wants Fox News to host the debate instead of the Disney-owned network.

In a conference call with reporters on Tuesday, Trump said he “absolutely” wants to debate Harris, and “would be willing to do more than one debate, actually.”

“I haven’t agreed to anything. I agreed to a debate with Joe Biden,” Trump said. “But I want to debate her, and she’ll be no different, because they have the same policies. I think debating’s important for a presidential race, I really do, you sort of have an obligation to debate.”

Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday released her first video for her presidential campaign: “We choose freedom.”

The 75-second video begins with Harris asking: “In this election, we each face a question. What kind of country do we want to live in?” as scenes from her first campaign rally in Milwaukee play.

As the video transitions into clips of Donald Trump and JD Vance, she continues, “There are some people who think we should be a country of chaos, of fear, of hate.”

Harris makes clear the message of her campaign—choosing freedom—as she highlights many controversial issues including women’s reproductive rights and gun violence prevention, both of which she has led the charge for the White House.

“We choose freedom. The freedom not just to get by, but get ahead. The freedom to be safe from gun violence. The freedom to make decisions about your own body,” Harris said.

“We choose a future where no child lives in poverty, where we can all afford health care. Where no one is above the law. We believe in the promise of America and we’re ready to fight for it. Because when we fight, we win.”

The video features Beyoncé’s song “Freedom.” A source close to Harris  told CNN  that her team got approval from Beyoncé’s representatives to use the song throughout her presidential campaign.

Watch Kamala Harris’ first presidential campaign ad

President Joe Biden has framed his decision to step aside from the 2024 presidential race as a matter of saving democracy and passing “the torch to a new generation.”

Last night, in a poignant address to the nation that marked the beginning of the closing chapter of his presidency and half-century in public service, Biden said uniting the party required sacrificing personal ambition for what he sees as a greater good.

“I revere this office. But I love my country more,” he said.

“It’s been the honor of my life to serve as your president. But in defense of democracy, which is at stake – and is more important than any title. I draw strength and I find joy in working for the American people,” he said.

Biden is no longer a presumptive Democratic nominee trying to convince the nation that he has the stamina and faculties to take on  Trump  in an election in which he warned  nothing less than democracy itself is in the balance.

He’s now a lame duck, having  thrown his political weight  behind his vice president, Kamala Harris, after being convinced by fellow Democrats that he is politically incapable of seeking a second term.

In his speech, Biden worked to shape the first draft of his own legacy, heralding his first-term accomplishments while looking ahead to goals for his remaining months in power, including Supreme Court reform, ending the war in Gaza, upholding American alliances and working toward his cancer-ending moonshot.

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