HOW REALITY-TV FAME HANDED TRUMP A $427 MILLION LIFELINE  —  Tax records show that “The Apprentice” rescued Donald J. Trump, bringing him new sources of cash and a myth that would propel him to the White House.  —  From the back seat of a stretch limousine heading to meet the first contestants …

Trump Secretly Mocks His Christian Supporters  —  One day in 2015, Donald Trump beckoned Michael Cohen, his longtime confidant and personal attorney, into his office.  Trump was brandishing a printout of an article about an Atlanta-based megachurch pastor trying to raise $60 million from his flock to buy a private jet.

Electoral College Rating Changes: Ohio and Iowa Move to Toss Up  —  In mid-June, we moved both Iowa and Ohio from Likely Republican to Lean Republican.  At the time, we noted that while the polls were looking shaky for Pres. Trump, they were also catching him at what could be his lowest point of the cycle.

Schumer Refuses to Meet With Amy Coney Barrett, Calls Process ‘Illegitimate’  —  BARRETT, SPURNED  —  Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said he doesn't plan to meet with Amy Coney Barrett, Trump's Supreme Court nominee officially announced Saturday.

In Pennsylvania, advantage Biden with a big boost from women: POLL  —  The result includes a more than 2-1 Biden lead in the Philadelphia suburbs.  —  What to expect from the first presidential debate  —  “This Week” host George Stephanopoulos joins us to discuss President Trump's Supreme …

Trump, Biden first debate: Everything you need to know  —  President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden come face-to-face for their first debate on Tuesday night amid increasingly nasty attacks on each other.  —  Trump has called Biden a socialist puppet who wants to destroy the suburbs and “hurt God.”

Behind the White House Effort to Pressure the C.D.C. on School Openings  —  Documents and interviews show how senior officials sought to play down the risks of sending children back to the classroom, alarming public health experts.  —  WASHINGTON — Top White House officials pressured …

Trump — not Biden — is being underestimated going into the debate  —  In 2016, during one of her first prep sessions for the presidential debates with Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton listened to a litany of attacks from Philippe Reines, a longtime aide who was playing the role of Trump …

Grand Jury Deliberations in Breonna Taylor Case Will Be Released  —  The Kentucky attorney general's office said it would release the recordings of the deliberations after a grand juror complained about how they were publicly represented.  —  LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A juror in the Breonna Taylor case contends …

Ohio could be Biden's best shot at keeping Trump from contesting the 2020 election  —  Typically, presidential elections are fought and won in the so-called tipping-point states — places such as Wisconsin or Pennsylvania that statisticians  —  consider most likely to put one candidate …

Postal Service workers quietly resist DeJoy's changes with eye on election  —  Many USPS employees see recent cost-cutting changes that have slowed mail delivery as violating the spirit, if not the letter, of the law.  —  This summer, as controversial new procedures at the U.S. Postal Service snarled …

Brooklyn Voters Receive Absentee Ballot Envelopes With Wrong Voter Names And Addresses  —  The New York City Board of Elections has mailed out nearly half a million absentee ballots ahead of Election Day this November, as many New Yorkers are opting to vote by mail during the pandemic.

Immigrants Say They Were Pressured Into Unneeded Surgeries  —  Immigrants detained at an ICE-contracted center in Georgia said they had invasive gynecology procedures that they later learned might have been unnecessary.  —  Wendy Dowe was startled awake early one morning in January 2019 …

‘To Represent All Mississippians’: Hyde-Smith Ad Uses Russian, Canadian Footage  —  Canadian, Russian, South African and Ukrainian models appear in U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith's first 2020 campaign ad for her Mississippi campaigns—but no Mississippians.  Instead, the ad uses stock footage …

Meet a Secret Trump Voter  —  'Being a lesbian who's voting for Trump is like coming out of the closet again.'  —  Chris is a registered Democrat in her 50s who lives in Manhattan.  She's well-educated, well-traveled and well-informed.  She has voted for candidates of both parties …

Jill Biden Is the Candidate Now, and Everyone Knows It  —  Yesterday, Joe Biden once again called a “lid” before most people in the country clock in for work.  That's become a pattern over the last month, with him taking off nearly half the days that a candidate would normally be campaigning their tail off.

Barr's Justice Department serves up talking points for Trump  —  The prosecution of Michael Flynn.  A Senate investigation into the provenance of the Steele Dossier.  The nascent federal probe of discarded absentee ballots in Pennsylvania.  —  In recent days, the Justice Department …

‘Deeply unpatriotic’: Mary Trump slams the president for not paying taxes for years … WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump's niece, Mary Trump, say the topic of her uncle not paying income taxes for 10 of the last 15 years must be “hammered on” during the first general election debate Tuesday night.

‘He just lies’: Florida's senior voters suddenly are in play  —  TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida seniors, long an unflinching bloc of reliable GOP votes, are suddenly in play as President Donald Trump's handling of the coronavirus has his reelection campaign on the defensive.

Fox News Lobotomizes Its ‘Brain Room,’ Cuts Fact-Based Journalism  —  ‘NOT INTERESTED IN FACTS’ … Staffers said the recent layoffs gutting Fox News' fact-checking team were a victory for the network's right-wing opinion shows and further cemented its status as “state media.”

Media Gunning For Scott Atlas Because He Keeps Exposing Coronavirus Lies  —  ‘Everything he says is false,’ NBC News quoted CDC Director Robert Redfield as saying of Atlas.  That's just not true, top epidemiologists told The Federalist.  —  Centers for Disease Control Director …

The Weak Leading the Woke  —  What We Ask About When We Ask About Joe  —  How old is Joe Biden?  —  As this issue goes to press, 77.  America's median age is 38, which means that more than half the country is less than half Biden's age.  If inaugurated on January 20, 2021 …

TikTok rolls out in-app elections guide  —  TikTok said Tuesday that its debuting a new in-app elections guide to connect users with credible information about the elections from sources like the National Association of Secretaries of State, BallotReady, and SignVote.