memeorandum: After blasting Trump on violence, Biden now turns to schools (Bill Barrow/Associated Press)

9:55 AM ET, September 2, 2020

Top Items:

Joe Biden Leads Donald Trump in Latest Grinnell College National Poll — If the election were held today, the newest edition of the Grinnell College National Poll shows Joe Biden winning the popular vote in his quest to become to be the 46th President of the United States.

Discussion: Washington Times and Daily Kos

USA Today:

Exclusive: The conventions over, Joe Biden leads Donald Trump by a narrower 50%-43% in USA TODAY/Suffolk Poll — The political conventions over, Joe Biden now leads Donald Trump in the race for the White House by 50%-43%, the new USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll finds.

Discussion: New York Times, The Hill, Politico and Los Angeles Times

Chris Kahn / Reuters:

No bounce in support for Trump as Americans see pandemic, not crime, as top issue: Reuters/Ipsos poll — NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's attempt to make civil unrest a central theme of his re-election campaign has yet to boost his political standing, as most Americans …

Discussion: Breitbart and Politico

Politico:

POLITICO Playbook: Brace for impact — DRIVING THE DAY — GOOD MORNING, and happy Wednesday. We should all begin to focus our attention on the end of this month and the fiscal stimulus/government funding mess that awaits Washington — because it is massive, can easily go off the rails and is very far from being figured out.

Laura Barrón-López / Politico: Trump attacks take a toll on Black Lives Matter support

Bill Barrow / Associated Press:
After blasting Trump on violence, Biden now turns to schools

Discussion: Townhall, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, The Hill, Washington Times and Real Clear Politics

Jada Yuan / Washington Post:

Melania Trump used private email accounts while in the White House, says former colleague and friend — Melania Trump regularly used a private Trump Organization email account, an email from a MelaniaTrump.com domain, iMessage and the encrypted messaging app, Signal, while in the White House …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Political Wire, Associated Press, CNBC, The US Sun, The Guardian, Raw Story, The Hill and Axios

Ben Jordan / TMJ4:

Kenosha business owner declines President Trump photo-op, former owner replaces him — A Kenosha business owner is accusing President Donald Trump of using his destroyed store for political gain. — Tom Gram's century-old camera shop burned to the ground a week ago during the unrest in Uptown Kenosha.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, The Hill, The White House and Mediaite

ABC News:

DHS withheld July intelligence bulletin calling out Russian attack on Biden's mental health — The Trump campaign has repeatedly engaged in a similar line of attack. — In early July the Department of Homeland Security withheld publication of an intelligence bulletin warning law enforcement agencies …

Discussion: Good Morning America, Political Wire, The Hill, ABC7, Washington Post, Mediaite and Raw Story

Jamie Ross / The Daily Beast: DHS Blocked Intelligence Memo That Warned of Kremlin Plan to Attack Biden's Mental Health, Says Report

Pat Rynard / Iowa Starting Line:

Ernst Suggests Iowa Doctors Falsifying COVID Cases For Money — Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst seemed to embrace on Monday a thoroughly-discredited QAnon conspiracy theory about U.S. deaths from COVID-19 being a mere fraction of what has been reported. As the Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier wrote …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo and Political Wire

Katie Shepherd / Washington Post:

‘So skeptical’: Sen. Joni Ernst echoes conspiracy theory questioning coronavirus death count — When a man in the crowd of her Iowa campaign stop told Sen. Joni Ernst (R) on Monday that he believed the number of U.S. coronavirus deaths had been overcounted, Ernst replied that she too was “so skeptical.”

Discussion: Slate

Amie Rivers / Waterloo/Cedar Falls Courier:
Ernst, in rural Waterloo, says Senate race will be expensive, close

Discussion: The Hill, Raw Story and Talking Points Memo

Peter Canellos / Politico:

The Unlikely Kennedy Who Ended the Kennedy Dynasty — For most of the 60-year history of the Kennedy dynasty, it's been easier to imagine its last act as coming in a burst of triumph, a spasm of violence or a dream-shall-never-die promise of enduring hope. On Tuesday, however …

Ursula Perano / Axios:
Ed Markey defeats Joe Kennedy in Massachusetts Democratic Senate primary

Discussion: Politico, Washington Post, WBUR, Slate, Bangor Daily News, The Daily Caller, The Daily Beast, Mediaite, The Intercept, Raw Story, BuzzFeed News, ABC News and The Daily Free Press

Eleanor Watson / CBS News:
Ed Markey beats Joe Kennedy III in hotly contested Massachusetts Senate primary

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, The Boston Globe and Fox News

Alex Rogers / CNN:
Sen. Ed Markey defeats a Kennedy in Massachusetts

Discussion: New York Times, Politico, NPR and Daily Kos

Brooke Singman / Fox News:

Pelosi used shuttered San Francisco hair salon for blow-out, owner calls it ‘slap in the face’ — ‘We have been shut down for so long,’ owner says — EXCLUSIVE: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited a San Francisco hair salon on Monday afternoon for a wash and blow-out …

KTVU-TV:
Nancy Pelosi confirms she got hair done indoors in San Francisco

Discussion: Fox News, Louder With Crowder, The Daily Caller, Patterico's Pontifications, Breitbart, The Gateway Pundit, Instapundit and americandigest.org

Washington Post:

Tactics of fiery White House trade adviser draw new scrutiny as some of his pandemic moves unravel — Peter Navarro has faced an internal investigation into his treatment of colleagues, and now two of his coronavirus-related actions are under internal scrutiny.

Discussion: Just The News and Raw Story

Mike Allen / Axios:

Pence: “I don't recall being told to be on standby” during Trump's Walter Reed visit — Vice President Mike Pence said in an interview with Fox News on Tuesday that he does not “recall” being told to be on standby to assume the powers of the presidency if President Trump was put under anesthesia during …

Discussion: The Post Millennial, Washington Times, Politico, CNN, CANNONFIRE, Raw Story, The Hill, Talking Points Memo, Denver Post, POLITICUSUSA and Political Wire

Mark Leibovich / New York Times:
Trump Says Some Really Strange Things. Republicans Say No Comment, Again.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Politico, Raw Story, Mediaite, NBC New York and The Hill

HuffPost:

Trump Stopped Going to Dover AFB To Receive Bodies After Getting Berated On First Visit — Vice President Pence attended “dignified transfer” ceremonies for two years by himself after the father of a slain SEAL “rattled” Trump In February 2017. — WASHINGTON ― In the world …

Martin Pengelly / The Guardian:

Trump told Sarah Sanders to ‘take one for the team’ after Kim Jong-un wink — Donald Trump told Sarah Sanders she would have to “go to North Korea and take one for the team”, after Kim Jong-un winked at the then White House press secretary during a summit in Singapore in June 2018.

Discussion: Raw Story and Political Wire

Eric Levitz / New York Magazine:

Many GOP Voters Value America's Whiteness More Than Its Democracy — In Donald Trump's America, democracy dies in broad daylight. — Previous presidents have flouted the rule of law and sought to restrict access to the ballot, but none of Trump's modern predecessors have treated these endeavors like photo ops.

Discussion: Washington Post and PNAS

John Hinderaker / Power Line:
The Democrats Explain Their Voter Fraud Plans

Discussion: Vox, CNN, New York Times, No More Mister Nice Blog, Breitbart and Instapundit

Ezra Klein / Vox:

Can anything change Americans' minds about Donald Trump? — President Trump disembarks from Air Force One as lightning splits the sky at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on August 28. Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images — The eerie stability of Trump's approval rating, explained.

Julia Carrie Wong / The Guardian:

Russian agency created fake leftwing news outlet with fictional editors, Facebook says … The Russian agency that interfered in the 2016 US election created a fake leftwing news publication, staffed it with fake editors with AI-generated photos and hired real freelance reporters as part …

Discussion: Graphika, VICE, NBC News, About Facebook, Washington Post and courthousenews.com, more at Mediagazer »

Kate Sullivan / CNN:

'I support Joe Biden's pro-science agenda': 81 Nobel laureates endorse Biden for president — Washington (CNN)Eighty-one Nobel Prize winners endorsed Joe Biden for president in an open letter on Wednesday, citing the former vice president's “willingness to listen to experts” and his …

Discussion: Axios, The Hill and Mediaite

Washington Post:

Justice Department zeroing in on longtime GOP fundraiser Elliott Broidy — Federal prosecutors are preparing to charge longtime GOP fundraiser Elliott Broidy in connection with efforts to influence the U.S. government on behalf of foreign interests, according to people familiar with the matter …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Raw Story and Political Wire

Matt Viser / Washington Post:

Biden turns attention back to coronavirus and reopening of schools — Joe Biden on Wednesday will turn his focus to the struggles that students and parents are facing around the country with school districts unable to fully reopen amid the ongoing concerns about the coronavirus.

Discussion: Reuters, The Guardian and The Hill

Thomas Kaplan / New York Times:
Biden Plans a Speech Faulting Trump Over Reopening Schools

Discussion: Political Wire, Bloomberg, Popular Information, EA WorldView, Blue Virginia, The US Sun and Townhall

Lydia Saad / Gallup:

U.S. Perceptions of White-Black Relations Sink to New Low — WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans' already tepid review of relations between White and Black Americans has soured since 2018 and is now the most negative of any year in Gallup's trend since 2001. The majority of U.S. adults …

Discussion: Axios

Richard Winton / Los Angeles Times:

FBI investigates after alarmed pilot tells LAX tower: ‘We just passed a guy in a jet pack’ — The FBI has launched an investigation after an American Airlines pilot said he saw what appeared to be a man flying with a jet pack Sunday night near Los Angeles International Airport. — “Tower, American 1997.

Discussion: KTLA

ProPublica:

New Engineering Report Finds Privately Built Border Wall Will Fail — ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they're published. — This article is co-published with The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit …

David Folkenflik / NPR:

At Voice of America, Trump Appointee Sought Political Influence Over Coverage — Toggle more options — At the Voice of America, staffers say the Trump appointee leading their parent agency is threatening to wash away legal protections intended to insulate their news reports from political meddling.

Discussion: Washington Post, more at Mediagazer »

Alana Goodman / Washington Free Beacon:

Hunter Biden Holds Stake in Chinese Company Sanctioned for Human-Rights Abuses — Joe Biden has promised to go after companies with ties to China's repression — Hunter Biden holds a stake in a Chinese surveillance company that is under U.S. sanctions for human-rights violations …

Laurel Wamsley / NPR:

FEMA Says It Will Stop Paying For Cloth Face Masks For Schools — The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it is changing the policy on the personal protective equipment that it will pay for. Federal officials announced the changes during a call on Tuesday with state and tribal emergency managers …

Discussion: Axios, The Hill and Political Wire

Becket Adams / Washington Examiner:

Joy Reid flips an old attack on its head and compares Islamic extremists to Trump supporters — For a minute there, MSNBC's Joy Reid sounded a lot like the time-traveling hackers who uploaded anti-Muslim remarks to her now-defunct blog. — The cable news host and conspiracy theory enthusiast remarked …

Discussion: The Daily Beast, The Daily Caller and TheBlaze

Justice News:

Nine Boston Police Officers Arrested for Overtime Fraud Scheme — BOSTON - Nine current and former Boston Police Officers were arrested today and charged in connection with committing over $200,000 in overtime fraud at the Boston Police Department's evidence warehouse.

Tallahassee Democrat:

Gunfire in a Tallahassee parking lot leads to arrest of armed couple, complaints of racism — Charles McMillon Jr. was dropping off a U-Haul van with his young son and childhood friend Kendrick Clemons when out of nowhere bullets started flying. — They had just parked the van …

Discussion: Raw Story and New York Post

BuzzFeed News:

New FBI Documents Show What Witnesses In The Mueller Probe Told Federal Investigators About Trump And Russia — BuzzFeed News sued the government to get copies of the witness interview summaries that Robert Mueller kept from public view. Today, we are publishing the 10th installment of what the FBI interview summaries contain.

John Cassidy / New Yorker:

Donald Trump's Incitements to Violence Have Crossed an Alarming Threshold — In December, 2016, Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, two political scientists at Harvard, published an opinion piece in the Times that posed the question “Is Donald Trump a Threat to Democracy?”

Discussion: Snopes.com, USA Today, HuffPost and New Republic