STORYLINE

Rap superstar Kanye West has qualified to appear on Oklahoma’s presidential ballot, the first state where he met the requirements before the filing deadline.

But confusion remains over whether he's actually running.

A representative for West filed the necessary paperwork and paid the $35,000 filing on July 15th which was the deadline for a spot on the state's Nov. 3rd presidential ballot, said Oklahoma Board of Elections spokeswoman Misha Mohr. He was one of three independent presidential candidates to pay the filing fee prior to the deadline, she added. The others were concert pianist Jade Simmons and cryptocurrency entrepreneur Brock Pierce.

The filing came a day after New York Magazine's “Intelligencer” quoted West adviser Steve Kramer saying “he's out" and noting that the staff he had hired were disappointed.

However, TMZ reported that the West campaign had filed a “Statement of Organization” Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission, stating that a Kanye 2020 committee would serve as principal campaign committee for a West candidacy.

West has already missed the deadline to qualify for the ballot in several states, and it’s unclear if he is willing or able to collect enough signatures required to qualify in others.

West, who is married to reality television star Kim Kardashian West, initially announced his candidacy on July 4th. Days later, he told Forbes magazine that he, who once praised President Donald Trump and said the two share “dragon energy,” was “taking the red hat off” - a reference to Trump’s trademark red “Make America Great Again” cap.

West, who said that he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, told the magazine that he planned to model his White House on the fictional land in “Black Panther” if he won the presidency, adding “Let’s get back to Wakanda.”

***

Joe Biden named California Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate on August 11th, making history by selecting the first Black woman to compete on a major party’s presidential ticket and acknowledging the vital role Black voters will play in his bid to defeat President Donald Trump.

In choosing Harris, Biden is embracing a former rival from the Democratic primary who is familiar with the unique rigor of a national campaign. Harris, a 55-year-old first-term senator, is also one of the party’s most prominent figures and quickly became a top contender for the No. 2 spot after her own White House campaign ended.

Harris joins Biden in the 2020 race at a moment of unprecedented national crisis. The coronavirus pandemic has claimed the lives of more than 150,000 people in the U.S., far more than the toll experienced in other countries. Business closures and disruptions resulting from the pandemic have caused an economic collapse. Unrest, meanwhile, has emerged across the country as Americans protest racism and police brutality.

Trump’s uneven handling of the crises has given Biden an opening, and he enters the fall campaign in strong position against the president. In adding Harris to the ticket, he can point to her relatively centrist record on issues such as health care and her background in law enforcement in the nation’s largest state.

Harris’ record as California attorney general and district attorney in San Francisco was heavily scrutinized during the Democratic primary and turned off some liberals and younger Black voters who saw her as out of step on issues of systemic racism in the legal system and police brutality. She tried to strike a balance on these issues, declaring herself a “progressive prosecutor” who backs law enforcement reforms.

Biden, who spent eight years as President Barack Obama’s vice president, has spent months weighing who would fill that same role in his White House. He pledged in March to select a woman as his vice president, easing frustration among Democrats that the presidential race would center on two white men in their 70s.

Biden’s search was expansive, including Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a leading progressive, Florida Rep. Val Demings, whose impeachment prosecution of Trump won plaudits, California Rep. Karen Bass, who leads the Congressional Black Caucus, former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, whose passionate response to unrest in her city garnered national attention.

A woman has never served as president or vice president in the United States. Two women have been nominated as running mates on major party tickets: Democrat Geraldine Ferraro in 1984 and Republican Sarah Palin in 2008. Their party lost in the general election.

***

The Republican Party formally nominated President Donald Trump for a second term in the White House on August 24th, one of the first acts of a GOP convention that has been dramatically scaled down to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Trump has sought to minimize the toll of the pandemic, but its impact was evident as proceedings began in Charlotte. Instead of the thousands of people who were expected to converge on this city for a week-long extravaganza, just 336 delegates participated in a roll-call vote from a Charlotte Convention Center ballroom.

The GOP convention is a crucial moment for Trump, who is trailing in national and battleground state polls and under intense pressure to turn the race around. Just 23% think the country is heading in the right direction, while 75% think it's on the wrong path, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Many of the usual trappings of a convention were present on Monday, including signs designating each state and gift bags with Republican swag. But chairs on the ballroom floor were arranged with lots of space between them and convention organizers told participants to wear masks, though adherence to the rule was uneven.

***

Anti-Trump messages were projected on the Trump Hotel in Washington, DC as the Republican National Convention was underway on August 25th.

The messages included "Trump has no plan," "nothing will change because Trump won't change," and "it is what it is."

President Trump made that comment during a recent interview when asked about the number of people in the United States in the United States killed by the coronavirus.

***

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden said the country has not seen enough economic recovery since the coronavirus outbreak began months ago.

He blasted President Donald Trump for downplaying COVID-19, saying that it will continue to kill Americans and ravage the economy.

U.S. unemployment dropped sharply in August to a still-high 8.4% from 10.2%, with about half the 22 million jobs lost to the coronavirus outbreak recovered so far, the government said on September 4th in one of the last major economic reports before Election Day.

Employers added 1.4 million jobs last month, the Labor Department said, down from 1.7 million in July and the fewest since hiring resumed in May.

But the economy has recovered barely half the 22 million jobs that vanished when the pandemic paralyzed the nation in early spring.

Biden also accused of being out of touch with ordinary Americans, caring instead about his wealthy friends and donors.

"Families teeter on the brink of hunger and homelessness, and our president calls that success, what does that say about what he values?" Biden said Friday.

***

Try as he might to change the subject, US President Donald Trump can't escape the coronavirus.

In newly released interviews from journalist Bob Woodward's forthcoming book "Rage," Trump privately acknowledged the severity of the pandemic even as he played it down in public.

Excerpts of the book were published September 9th by The Washington Post and CNN, which also aired audio of some of the interviews.

Woodward, who is most famously known for helping break open the Watergate scandal during the Nixon administration, has chronicled the happening of most American presidents since then.

Two years ago Woodward released a different book, "Fear", that depicted a chaotic White House environment under the Trump administration.

After its release the president complained that he was not actively involved in the book and agreed to at least nine private interviews with Woodward which were used for his latest novel "Rage."

"This is a case where Trump himself wanted to shape the narrative, and while the book isn't out yet at least, the early headlines aren't very kind to him," said Jonathan Lemire, a White House reporter for the Associated Press.

Lemire added that other former presidents, like George W. Bush and Barak Obama, who agreed to have Woodward write a book about their administrations were also displeased with the final products.

"But this is different," Lemire said. "Trump himself is far more conscious or frankly, obsessed with the media coverage he receives than any of his predecessors. We see that every day on Twitter. He often delves into media critique."

In taped conversations released along with the excerpts, Trump insisted he didn't want to create "panic." But his comments also raised fresh questions about how he has managed the defining crisis of his presidency, one that has killed about 190,000 Americans so far, with no end in sight.

Trump's team would much rather center the November vote around the economy, cracking down on protests spawned by racial injustice, and the president's promise that he could appoint more conservative justices to the Supreme Court.

"They're comfortable fighting on anything else except for the pandemic because public opinion polls show the Americans don't think the president has done a very good job," Lemire said. "And by his comments, his own words, these are not anonymous sources. These are not administration officials on background. His own words caught on tape are again highlighting the pandemic, put it at the national... center of the national discourse, and raising all sorts of further concerns about how, frankly, he has handled the largest health crisis this nation has faced in a century."

After details of the book were released, Democrats have condemned Trump's actions of downplaying the coronavirus early on, with the Governor of Michigan Gretchen Whitmer calling the president "the biggest threat to the American people."

And now, Trump's own words are redirecting attention to his handling of the pandemic when he can least afford it - less than two months before Election Day.

"Because this... revelation is about COVID-19, it is possible this will be damaging to him. This will hurt his electoral challenge... chances. It certainly can't help," Lemire said. "But it remains to be seen whether or not this is a mortal blow to his reelection bid or whether we're simply talking about something else in 72 hours."

***

Joe Biden expressed his strongest support yet for Puerto Rican statehood on September 15th, though he says the decision must be made by residents of the island.

Biden said at a Hispanic Heritage Month kickoff event in Kissimmee, Florida, that he believes statehood “would be the most effective means of ensuring that residents of Puerto Rico are treated equally.”

But Biden emphasized that “the people of Puerto Rico must decide, and the United States federal government must respect and act on that.”

Biden had previously declined to take a position on the issue.

During the last referendum on statehood, an overwhelming majority of Puerto Ricans voted in favor of becoming a state.

Biden’s remarks came as part of a broader effort to appeal to Latinos in Florida and particularly Puerto Ricans, which make up one of the fastest-growing demographic groups in central Florida.

Democrats have expressed concerns that Biden may be slipping in the state, particularly with influential Latino voters.

***

With less than 50 days to go until the U.S. elections, President Donald Trump has been steadfast in dismissing concerns of foreign interference in the November ballot.

Trump insists that the expected huge number of postal ballots Americans will use are a much bigger concern, telling reporters September 16th that "much of the stuff coming out about foreign countries turned out to be untrue."

But testifying on Capitol Hill on September 17th, FBI Director Christopher Wray said that Russia has been "very active" in its efforts to influence US elections, with the primary goal being to "denigrate" Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Wray told lawmakers that Russia is primarily interfering through malign foreign influence in an effort to hurt Biden's campaign -- echoing the intelligence community's public assessment on Moscow's meddling efforts issued last month.

Wray's comments come as President Donald Trump and several other top administration officials have recently attempted to play up the theory that China is meddling to get Biden elected, while downplaying well-founded reports that Russia is trying to help Trump win again, like it did in 2016.

Intelligence officials have said they have uncovered evidence that Russia is currently interfering in the election to hurt Biden's campaign. Separately, some evidence has already emerged about Moscow's efforts, including Facebook's announcement earlier this month that a troll group that was part of Russia's attempt to interfere in the 2016 election is trying to target Americans again.

Independent Senator Angus King, a co-chair of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, a congressional Commission that studied cyber security, worries about the continued attempts by Russia to affect American presidential races.

"What bothers me is that I don't think they were doing it for fun (attack the 2016 race)," he said. "It worries me that they were practicing, that they were learning and that this election could be the test case."

While there is consensus on Russian attempts to attack the US elections, what is not clear is their end goal.

"We would put Russian intelligence and squarely at the top of the of the risk score here," Sandra Joyce, the Senior Vice President and Head of Global Intelligence for the private security fire FireEye. "There's really no end to what they are capable of doing if they decide to go ahead and do it. "

Graham Brookie, the Director and Managing Editor of the Digital Forensic Research Lab at the Atlantic Council says there is evidence Russians have continued to experiment in both the 2016 and 2018 elections.

The Senior Vice President and Director of Technology Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Jim Lewis, says it is clear that at least two state opponents have decided to disrupt the American election.

"The Chinese studied what the Russians did," Lewis told the Associated Press, but they don't agree with the Russians on what the best outcome in 2020 will be. "You've got two competing hostile powers, one of whom is quite good and one of whom is learning quickly. "

While the intelligence community has assessed that China and Iran prefer Trump to lose in November, officials have offered no indication, to date, that either country is acting on that preference in the same way as Russia, according to public statements issued by the intelligence community and sources familiar with the underlying evidence.

The same GRU military intelligence unit, known as Fancy Bear, that Microsoft identifies as being behind the current election-related activity also broke into voter registration databases in at least three states in 2016, though there is no evidence it tried to interfere with voting.

During the Cyberspace Solarium Commission investigation, King said he spoke to many local election officials. "In my view they are over confident," he said, adding "I'm worried there is still a vulnerability there."

FireEye's Joyce warns her company has found active measures "on the part of multiple nation states," to collect information about local election officials.

***

Cindy McCain, the widow of the late U.S. Senator and 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain, is endorsing Democrat Joe Biden for president in a rebuke of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump has had a fraught relationship with members of John McCain's family since he disparaged the Republican Arizona senator during his 2016 campaign.

Cindy McCain is citing the decades long friendship between her family and Biden's and their bond as the parents of children serving in the military.

Her backing could help Biden appeal to Republicans disaffected with Trump.

It also could give Biden a boost in Arizona, a crucial swing state that McCain represented in Congress for 35 years.

01:57:19

00:00:00

Rapper Kanye West files for Oklahoma presidential ballot

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New York, 13 December 2016

1. President-elect Donald Trump exiting elevator with rapper Kanye West,

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Washington, 11 October 2018

2. Kanye West and President Donald Trump at the White House

00:08:00

Biden selects Sen. Kamala Harris as running mate

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Iowa City, Iowa - 10 April 2019

3. Kamala Harris speaking to a crowd in Iowa City

Des Moines, Iowa - 3 July 2019

4. Kamala Harris talking to reporters at a July 4th picnic in Iowa

00:22:12

Trump accepts nomination at RNC convention

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Charlotte, North Carolina - 24 August 2020

5. Wide of introduction of President Trump UPSOUND:

"Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming the President of the United States, and our nominee, Donald J. Trump"

6. SOUNDBITE (English) Donald Trump, US President

"(Crowd: Four more years, four more years, four more years, etc!)

You want to really drive them crazy? You say 12 more years.

00:56:07

Anti-Trump messages projected on Trump hotel

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Washington, DC - 25 August 2020

7. Front of Trump Hotel, with messages projected on it reading "Trump has no plan," "Chaos," "Nothing will change because Trump won't change," and other anti-Trump messages

01:12:10

Biden: Trump virus response keeps hurting economy

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Wilmington, Delaware - 4 September 2020

8. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, (D) Presidential Nominee:

"I talk to a lot of real working people. Ask them, they feel like they're being left behind, ask them how they feel about the economy coming back. You'll find they don't feel it."

01:23:21

Woodward book spotlights Trump's response to virus

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ARCHIVE: Washington - 11 September 2018

9. Copies of the Bob Woodward book "Fear" on display inside a bookstore

ARCHIVE: Washington - 29 April 2017

10. Journalist Bob Woodward sits at the head table during the White House Correspondents' Dinner

01:31:19

Biden signals support for Puerto Rican statehood

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Kissimmee, Florida - 15 September 2020

11. SOUNDBITE: (English) Joe Biden, (D) Presidential Nominee:

" I happen to believe statehood would be the most effective means of ensuring that residents of Puerto Rico are treated equally, with equal representation at the federal level.

01:40:11

Trump undeterred by Russian threats to US election

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Raleigh, North Carolina - 3 September 2020

12. Various, mail-in ballots being prepared

POOL

Washington - 17 September 2020

13. SOUNDBITE (English) Christopher Wray, FBI Director:

"The intelligence community's consensus is that Russia continues to try to influence our elections."

01:52:22

Republican Sen. John McCain's widow endorses Biden

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ARCHIVE: Kyiv, Ukraine - 31 March 2019

14. Mid, Cindy McCain (dark winter jacket) speaking to a woman of the International Republican Institute, visiting a polling station in the Ukraine

STORYLINE:

Former US President Barack Obama endorsed Joe Biden on April 14th, giving the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee a boost from the party's biggest fundraiser and one of its most popular figures.

"This is a big deal for Biden because it helps him create some momentum, " says Julie Pace, Associated Press Washington Bureau Chief.

The endorsement marked Obama's return to presidential politics more than three years after leaving the White House.

He didn't mention his successor, President Donald Trump, by name and instead sought to bridge the ideological divide among Democrats.

"He's eager to get out there. He is eager to start drawing the contrast with Donald Trump, Pace said. "This is basically what he's been waiting for."

Biden now has the support of all of his former Democratic primary rivals except for Elizabeth Warren.

The Massachusetts senator is expected to formally endorse Biden soon, according to a person familiar with her plans who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss her thinking.

Two other prominent Democrats who have yet to publicly back Biden are former President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, the party's 2016 nominee.

Hillary Clinton has been in regular touch with Biden, including several times since Sanders dropped out of the race, according to an aide.

Obama avoided intervening in the Democratic primary, but followed the race closely from the sidelines and is eager to take a more active public role.

He's expected to headline fundraisers for Biden and public events in key swing states, if such gatherings can still be held given social distancing guidelines during the coronavirus pandemic.

After his endorsement was released, Obama sent a fundraising appeal to Biden supporters, asking for donations ranging from $5 to $100.

The endorsement will test whether Obama can transfer his personal popularity to Biden.

While the former president is seen favorably by a wide swath of Democratic voters, he was also a deeply polarizing figure during his two terms in office.

During his presidency, Democrats lost about 1,000 legislative seats around the country, starting with disastrous 2010 midterms that also cost the party control of the House and many statehouses.

***

ASIAN AMERICANS ACTORS ON CALLING COVID-19 'THE 'CHINESE VIRUS': MAKING THIS BLANKET STATEMENT IS BAD

President Trump has stopped calling COVID-19 the "Chinese Virus" but some believe the damage is already done.

"I felt like it was a very uneducated statement," said TV personality Jeannie Mai, who was born in the United States to a Vietnamese mother and a Chinese father. "I think you have to be very responsible when you choose terminology to give people an idea of what to picture, what to visualize."

"The Good Doctor" actor Will Yun Lee, who was born in the U.S. to Korean parents, said blaming a group of people is dangerous because it only encourages xenophobia and racism.

"Making this blanket statement is bad. People take it the way they're going to take it. And unfortunately a lot of people have taken it to associate it to anybody who looks like me or is Asian-American or whatever Asian ethnicity you are. It becomes like the word 'chink,' right? It's a very harsh word."

Trump isn't the only person who has referred to COVID-19 in this way.

Earlier in April, TV host Bill Maher defended the notion of calling coronavirus the "Chinese Virus" on his HBO show, "Real Time with Bill Maher," saying it's logical because that's where it originated.

"Tigertail" and "The Farewell" actor Tzi Ma, who was born in Hong Kong and moved to the U.S. as a child, responded to Maher's statement saying, "For the moment it could be funny. For the moment it could give you some gratification or satisfaction by saying it. However you have to remember that there are ramifications."

Nico Santos of the NBC comedy "Superstore" was born in the Philippines and moved to the U.S. as a teen. He said this blame mentality rears its head whenever there is fear a community.

"We saw the same sort of thing happen when when the AIDS crisis was happening. People directed that sort of like fear and hate towards the LGBTQ community. When 9/11 happened, there was a lot of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim sentiment. Even people who actually weren't Muslim or who weren't of Middle Eastern descent, who said, if you just look like you work, if you're basically you looked like you were brown or maybe came from that part of the world, you all of sudden, you know, bore the brunt of that of that hate."

***

The Justice Department on May 7th said it is dropping the criminal case against President Donald Trump's first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, abandoning a prosecution that became a rallying cry for Trump and his supporters in attacking the FBI's Russia investigation.

The move is a stunning reversal for one of the signature cases brought by special counsel Robert Mueller. It comes even though prosecutors for the last three years had maintained that Flynn had lied to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in a January 2017 interview. Flynn himself admitted as much, and became a key cooperator for Mueller as he investigated ties between Russia and the 2016 Trump campaign.

In court documents being filed May 7th, the Justice Department said it is dropping the case "after a considered review of all the facts and circumstances of this case, including newly discovered and disclosed information." The documents were obtained by The Associated Press.

The Justice Department said it had concluded that Flynn's interview by the FBI was "untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn" and that the interview on January 24, 2017 was "conducted without any legitimate investigative basis."

The U.S. attorney reviewing the Flynn case, Jeff Jensen, recommended the move to Attorney General William Barr last week and formalized the recommendation in a document this week.

The decision was quickly embraced by Trump, who has relentlessly tweeted about the case and last week pronounced Flynn "exonerated," and energized supporters who have taken up the retired Army lieutenant general as something of a cause celebre. But it may also add to Democratic concerns that Attorney General William Barr is excessively loyal to the president, and could be a distraction for a Justice Department that for months has sought to focus on crimes arising from the coronavirus.

The Justice Department's action comes amid an internal review into the handling of the case and an aggressive effort by Flynn's lawyers to challenge the basis for the prosecution. The lawyers cited newly disclosed FBI emails and notes last week to allege that Flynn was entrapped into lying when agents interviewed him at the White House days after Trump's inauguration.

***

Paul Manafort, Donald Trump's onetime presidential campaign chairman who was convicted as part of the special counsel's Russia investigation, has been released from federal prison to serve the rest of his sentence in home confinement due to concerns about the coronavirus.

Manafort, 71, was released May 13th from FCI Loretto, a low-security prison in Pennsylvania, according to his attorney Todd Blanche. Manafort had been serving more than seven years in prison following his conviction.

His lawyers had asked the Bureau of Prisons to release him to home confinement, arguing that he was at high risk for coronavirus because of his age and preexisting medical conditions.

Manafort was hospitalized in December after suffering from a heart-related condition, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press at the time. They were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Manafort was among the first people to be charged in special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation, which examined possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 election campaign.

He was prosecuted in two federal courts, convicted by a jury in federal court in Virginia in 2018 and later pleaded guilty in Washington.

He was sentenced last March and was immediately hit with state charges in New York that could put him outside the president's power to pardon. New York prosecutors have accused him of giving false information on a mortgage loan application.

***

US President Donald Trump's long-time personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen was released from federal prison on May 21st to serve the remainder of his sentence at home, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

Cohen had been serving a federal prison sentence at FCI Otisville in New York after pleading guilty to numerous charges, including campaign finance fraud and lying to Congress.

The person was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Cohen was released on furlough as part of an attempt to slow the spread of the coronavirus in federal prisons. Cohen, 53, began serving his sentence last May and originally was scheduled to be released from prison in November 2021.

Prison advocates and congressional leaders have been pressing the Justice Department for weeks to release at-risk inmates, arguing that the public health guidance to stay 6 feet (1.8 meters) away from other people is nearly impossible behind bars.

Attorney General William Barr ordered the Bureau of Prisons in March and April to increase the use of home confinement and expedite the release of eligible high-risk inmates, beginning at three prisons identified as coronavirus hot spots. Otisville is not one of those facilities.

The Bureau of Prisons placed Cohen on furlough as it continues to process a move to home confinement, another person familiar with the matter said.

The agency has the authority to release inmates on furlough for up to 30 days and has been doing so to make sure suitable inmates, who are expected to transition to home confinement, can be moved out of correctional facilities sooner, that person said.

***

Joe Biden blistered President Donald Trump on June 2nd for directing authorities to drive back peaceful protesters outside the White House "in order to stage a photo op."

The former vice president said the commander in chief was "more interested in power than in principle."

Biden was delivering a speech in Philadelphia, addressing the civil unrest across America in the wake of the death of George Floyd.

Biden is also working to elevate his voice in the national debate after more than two months of the campaign for the White House being frozen amid the outbreak of the coronarvius.

He's also looking to provide a stark contrast to Trump who has struck a forceful tone against protests.

***

It's official. After an almost year-long, often tumultuous battle, former Vice President Joe Biden has crossed the finish line, formally clinching the Democratic nomination.

The milestone sets him up for a bruising battle against President Donald Trump that will play out amid the backdrop of a pandemic, economic collapse and civil unrest, a daunting trifecta of challenges Biden hopes to use to his advantage.

"They're some of the sternest challenges our nation has ever faced," Biden said June 5th at an event in Delaware. "They need a president who cares about them, who cares about helping them heal now."

Biden became the presumptive nominee almost two months ago when his last opponent in the primary, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, dropped out of the race.

But he only pulled together the nearly 2-thousand delegates needed to seal the nomination after the latest round of contests this week.

The former vice president's path to the prize wasn't always so clear. While he consistently led the largest primary field in history in the national polls, his campaign looked to be in trouble after a string of losses in the early contests.

He rebounded with a resounding win in South Carolina. From there, he dominated Super Tuesday, launching what turned out to be an insurmountable comeback.

While Biden no longer has to battle Democratic rivals, he has a host of other issues to tackle, from winning over skeptics in his party's left wing to running a campaign essentially out of his Delaware home.

Though Biden has started to venture out more this week, the coronavirus pandemic has largely confined him to his Wilmington, Delaware, home for much of the past three months.

University of Virginia Center for Politics Director Larry Sabato says while that approach may irk his rival, Donald Trump, and challenge political norms, it could be just the right move during this unprecedented campaign year.

"The best strategy for Joe Biden may be a low-key strategy, which fits in pretty well. Do the events that you want to do, organize them from the basement and let Donald Trump deal with the problems. It's actually tougher this year to be the incumbent than it is to be the challenger," Sabato says.

"Most people know that Joe Biden was a two term vice president under Barack Obama and that he opposes, as Obama does, almost everything that Donald Trump has been doing or trying to do. That is enough of a contrast for most voters," Sabato adds.

With his place in the 2020 presidential race now set, all eyes are turning to what could be the most important decision of Biden's five-decade political career: choosing a running mate, something he says he hopes to do by August 1st.

***

The Trump administration is suing former national security adviser John Bolton to block the publication of a book that the White House says contains classified information.

The suit follows warnings from President Donald Trump that Bolton could face a "criminal problem" if he doesn't halt plans to publish the book.

The administration has also said the former adviser did not complete a pre-publication review to ensure that the manuscript did not contain classified material.

Bolton's attorney, Chuck Cooper, has said Bolton worked for months with classification specialists to avoid releasing classified material. He has accused the White House of using national security information as a pretext to censor Bolton.

He has accused the White House of using national security information as a pretext to censor Bolton.

Trump said June 16th Bolton could face a “criminal problem” if he doesn’t halt plans to publish the book.

He said Attorney General William Barr will decide if Bolton will be charged.

***

President Donald Trump “pleaded” with China’s Xi Jinping during a 2019 summit to help his reelection prospects, according to a scathing book by former adviser John Bolton that accuses the president of being driven by political calculations when making national security decisions.

The White House was working furiously to block release of the book, whose China revelations carry echoes of Trump’s efforts to solicit political help from Ukraine that led to his impeachment.

Bolton, Trump's national security adviser for a 17-month period, called Trump's attempt to shift the June 2019 conversation to the US election a stunning move, and wrote that it was among innumerable conversations that “formed a pattern of fundamentally unacceptable behavior that eroded the very legitimacy of the presidency”.

Deeply critical of the president and much of his senior team, Bolton wrote that because staff had served him so poorly, Trump “saw conspiracies behind rocks, and remained stunningly uninformed on how to run the White House, let alone the huge federal government.” He added that while he was at the White House, Trump typically had only two intelligence briefings a week “and in most of those, he spoke at greater length than the briefers, often on matters completely unrelated to the subjects at hand.”

The 577-page book paints an unvarnished portrait of Trump and his administration, lending the most vivid, first-person account yet of how Trump conducts himself in office. Several other former officials have written books, but they have been almost entirely flattering of the president. Other former officials have indicated they were saving their accounts of their time working for Trump until after he left office in order to speak more candidly. The Associated Press obtained a copy of Bolton's book in advance of its release next week.

As for the meeting with the Chinese president in Osaka, Japan, Bolton wrote that Trump told Xi that Democrats were hostile to China.

“He then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win,” Bolton said. “He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome.”

The book, titled “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” which is set to be released Tuesday by Simon & Schuster, has been the subject of a lengthy battle between Bolton and the White House.

Trump signed legislation June 17th that seeks to punish China for a crackdown on ethnic minorities, even as the Bolton book said the American leader expressed support for the brutal campaign in a private conversation with his Chinese counterpart.

The Uighur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020 passed with overwhelming support from Republicans and Democrats in Congress. Trump signed it with no ceremony, issuing a statement in which he said a sanctions provision intruded on executive authority and he would regard it as non-binding.

***

A top White House aide who handles President Donald Trump's trade policy toward China described John Bolton's controversial new book as "revenge porn," and said Bolton took no interest in China policy, despite his position as Trump's national security adviser.

"It's 'Big Lie' Bolton. It's 'Book Deal' Bolton." He's doing it for the money," said Peter Navarro, Trump's director of trade and manufacturing policy.

In his book, Bolton claims that President Donald Trump “pleaded” with China’s Xi Jinping during a 2019 summit to help his reelection prospects,

He also accuses the president of being driven by political calculations when making national security decisions.

The White House has been working furiously to block the book, asking a federal court for an emergency temporary restraining order June 17th against its release.

Navarro said Trump has used tariffs to stand up to China in retaliatation to such Chinese actions as intellectual property theft, militarizing the South China Sea and cracking down on Hong Kong.

"I think there's a consensus now in this government that China is the single greatest strategic and existential threat to this country."

"It's not Russia. It's certainly not Venezuela. It's not Iraq, Iran or Afghanistan issues," Navarro said. "It's China."

"He took no interest in that whatsoever," he said.

***

Supporters of President Donald Trump faced off with anti-racism protesters on June 20th in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where the President held a campaign rally.

Black Lives Matter activists flooded the city's downtown streets, and some got into arguments with Trump supporters who were shouting “all lives matter”.

Later in the evening, a group of armed men began following the protesters.

There were no reports of trouble.

02:29:18

00:00:00

Barak Obama gives Biden a boost with endorsement

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ARCHIVE - Washington - 23 March 2010

1. Biden introducing Obama at healthcare law signing

++CONTAINS AUDIO OF EXPLETIVE++ Biden heard saying to Obama: "This is a big f------ deal"

ARCHIVE: Washington - 7 January 2015

2. President Obama speaks in the Oval Office with Vice President Joe Biden

POOL

4:3 FROM SOURCE

ARCHIVE: Chicago - 4 November 2008

3. Various, then President-elect Obama on stage after victory speech with then-Vice President elect Joe Biden

00:13:03

Asian American actors on calling COVID-19 the 'Chinese Virus': 'Having this blanket statement is bad'

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Archive: Washington, DC, 18 March 2020

4. UPSOUND (English) Reporter question:

"Why do you keep calling it the Chinese virus? There are reports of dozens of incidents of bias against Chinese Americans in this country - why do you keep using this?"

5. SOUNDBITE (English) Donald Trump, U.S. President:

"Because it comes from China. It's not racist at all, no.

Los Angeles, 6 April 2020

6. SOUNDBITE (English) Jeannie Mai, TV Personality - on Trump calling COVID-19 the "Chinese virus":

"It was a very uneducated statement. I think you have to be responsible when you choose terminology to give people an idea of what to picture, what to visualize."

00:38:19

Justice Dept. drops Michael Flynn's criminal case

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Washington, DC - 18 December 2018

7. Michael Flynn leaves courthouse as competing demonstrators chant "lock him up" and "U.S.A."

00:45:16

Manafort released from prison due to virus concerns

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ARCHIVE: Washington, DC - 23 May 2017

8. Former campaign chairman for US President Donald Trump, Paul Manafort leaves courthouse

ARCHIVE: New York - June 27, 2019

9. Paul Manafort in handcuffs walks in hallway of a Manhattan courthouse escorted by court officers

00:54:18

Ex-Trump lawyer Cohen to be released from prison

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10. Various of Cohen testifying in Congress

01:05:10

Trump attorney Michael Cohen out of prison

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New York - 21 May 2020

11. Michael Cohen exits vehicle and walks into residence

01:11:19

Biden: Trump more set on 'power than principle'

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Philadelphia - 2 June 2020

12. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden (D) Presidential candidate::

"We can be forgiven for believing the president is more interested in power than in principle, or just in serving the passions of his base than the needs of the people in his care. For that's what the presidency is, the duty to care, to care for all of us, not just those who vote for us, but all of us."

01:37:22

Biden clinches Democratic presidential nomination

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Los Angeles, 3 March 2020

13. Joe Biden walks into rally after winning a number of Super Tuesday contests

Los Angeles, 3 March 2020

14. Biden on stage at California rally after winning a number of Super Tuesday contests

01:46:15

US Justice Dept. sues Bolton to block book release

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ARCHIVE: Washington, DC - 30 September 2019

15. Mid shot of John Bolton walking up to podium

ARCHIVE: Seoul, South Korea - 24 July 2019

16. John Bolton arriving to meet South Korean officials

POOL

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17. Mid shot of William Barr at Justice Department news conference

01:59:20

Bolton book: Trump asked China for reelection help

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Washington - 17 June 2020

18. Bolton's book, "The Room Where it Happened"

02:04:03

White House aide calls Bolton book 'revenge porn'

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Washington, DC - 18 June 2020

19. Peter Navarro walking to microphone

20. SOUNDBITE (English) Peter Navarro, Assistant to the President, Director of Trade and Manufacturing Policy :

"Look, I knew John Bolton pretty well after he got in here and my take on him. It's big lie Bolton. It's book deal Bolton. He's doing it for the money. That's pretty clear. And my view is it's the Washington swamp's equivalent of revenge porn.

02:19:23

Pro and anti-Trump protests near Tulsa rally

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Tulsa, Oklahoma - 20 June 2020

21. Trump supporters holding banners reading (English) ''Make America Great Again!''

22. Armed men following the protest

STORYLINE

John Lewis, a lion of the civil rights movement whose bloody beating by Alabama state troopers in 1965 helped galvanize opposition to racial segregation, and who went on to a long and celebrated career in Congress, died. He was 80.

Lewis’s announcement in late December 2019 that he had been diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer - “I have never faced a fight quite like the one I have now,” he said - inspired tributes from both sides of the aisle, and an unstated accord that the likely passing of this Atlanta Democrat would represent the end of an era.

Lewis was the youngest and last survivor of the Big Six civil rights activists, a group led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. that had the greatest impact on the movement. He was best known for leading some 600 protesters in the Bloody Sunday march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma.

At age 25 - walking at the head of the march with his hands tucked in the pockets of his tan overcoat - Lewis was knocked to the ground and beaten by police. His skull was fractured, and nationally televised images of the brutality forced the country’s attention on racial oppression in the South.

Within days, King led more marches in the state, and President Lyndon Johnson soon was pressing Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act. The bill became law later that year, removing barriers that had barred Blacks from voting.

Lewis joined King and four other civil rights leaders in organizing the 1963 March on Washington. He spoke to the vast crowd just before King delivered his epochal “I Have a Dream” speech.

A 23-year-old firebrand, Lewis toned down his intended remarks at the insistence of others, dropping a reference to a “scorched earth” march through the South and scaling back criticisms of President John Kennedy. It was a potent speech nonetheless, in which he vowed: “By the forces of our demands, our determination and our numbers, we shall splinter the segregated South into a thousand pieces and put them together in an image of God and democracy.”

It was almost immediately, and forever, overshadowed by the words of King, the man who had inspired him to activism.

Lewis was born on Feb. 21, 1940, outside the town of Troy, in Pike County, Alabama. He grew up on his family’s farm and attended segregated public schools.

As a boy, he wanted to be a minister, and practiced his oratory on the family chickens. Denied a library card because of the color of his skin, he became an avid reader, and could cite obscure historical dates and details even in his later years. He was a teenager when he first heard King preaching on the radio. They met when Lewis was seeking support to become the first Black student at Alabama’s segregated Troy State University.

He ultimately attended the American Baptist Theological Seminary and Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. He began organizing sit-in demonstrations at whites-only lunch counters and volunteering as a Freedom Rider, enduring beatings and arrests while traveling around the South to challenge segregation.

Lewis helped found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and was named its chairman in 1963, making him one of the Big Six at a tender age. The others, in addition to King, were Whitney Young of the National Urban League; A. Philip Randolph of the Negro American Labor Council; James L. Farmer Jr., of the Congress of Racial Equality; and Roy Wilkins of the NAACP. All six met at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York to plan and announce the March on Washington.

The huge demonstration galvanized the movement, but success didn’t come quickly. After extensive training in nonviolent protest, Lewis and the Rev. Hosea Williams led demonstrators on a planned march of more than 50 miles from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama’s capital, on March 7, 1965. A phalanx of police blocked their exit from the Selma bridge.

Authorities shoved, then swung their truncheons, fired tear gas and charged on horseback, sending many to the hospital and horrifying much of the nation. King returned with thousands, completing the march to Montgomery before the end of the month.

Lewis turned to politics in 1981, when he was elected to the Atlanta City Council.

He won his seat in Congress in 1986 and spent much of his career in the minority. After Democrats won control of the House in 2006, Lewis became his party’s senior deputy whip, a behind-the-scenes leadership post in which he helped keep the party unified.

In an early setback for Barack Obama’s 2008 Democratic primary campaign, Lewis endorsed Hillary Rodham Clinton for the nomination. Lewis switched when it became clear Obama had overwhelming Black support. Obama later honored Lewis with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and they marched hand in hand in Selma on the 50th anniversary of the Bloody Sunday attack.

Lewis also worked for 15 years to gain approval for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. Humble and unfailingly friendly, Lewis was revered on Capitol Hill -- but as one of the most liberal members of Congress, he often lost policy battles, from his effort to stop the Iraq War to his defense of young immigrants.

He met bipartisan success in Congress in 2006 when he led efforts to renew the Voting Rights Act, but the Supreme Court later invalidated much of the law, and it became once again what it was in his youth, a work in progress. Later, when the presidency of Donald Trump challenged his civil rights legacy, Lewis made no effort to hide his pain.

Lewis refused to attend Trump’s inauguration, saying he didn’t consider him a “legitimate president” because Russians had conspired to get him elected. When Trump later complained about immigrants from “s---hole countries,” Lewis declared, “I think he is a racist ... we have to try to stand up and speak up and not try to sweep it under the rug.”

Lewis said he’d been arrested 40 times in the 1960s, five more as a congressman. At 78, he told a rally he’d do it again to help reunite immigrant families separated by the Trump administration.

“There cannot be any peace in America until these young children are returned to their parents and set all of our people free,” Lewis said in June, recalling the “good trouble” he got into protesting segregation as a young man.

“If we fail to do it, history will not be kind to us,” he shouted. “I will go to the border. I’ll get arrested again. If necessary, I’m prepared to go to jail.”

In a speech the day of the House impeachment vote of Trump, Lewis explained the importance of that vote.

“When you see something that is not right, not just, not fair, you have a moral obligation to say something, to do something. Our children and their children will ask us ‘what did you do? what did you say?” While the vote would be hard for some, he said: “We have a mission and a mandate to be on the right side of history.”

Lewis’ wife of four decades, Lillian Miles, died in 2012. They had one son, John Miles Lewis.

***

On July 27th lawmakers paid tribute to the late Rep. John Lewis, a long-time Georgia lawmaker and icon of the civil rights movement.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others attended a private ceremony in the Rotunda before Lewis' body is moved to the steps on the Capitol's east side for a public viewing, an unusual sequence required because the COVID-19 pandemic has closed the Capitol to the public. Inside the Rotunda and outdoors, signs welcomed visitors with a reminder that masks would be required.

Some of the lawmakers in attendance at the private memorial wore face masks reading, "good trouble," a reference to a famous quote by the late Lewis. An audio recording of a speech by Lewis was also played during the ceremony that included him explaining the need for civil disobedience and "good trouble" to rectify social injustices.

***

President Donald Trump on August 14th paid a visit to his younger brother, Robert Trump, at the New York hospital where he has been hospitalized.

The president entered New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan wearing a face mask.

“I hope he’s okay,”Trump said shortly before arriving at the hospital. "He’s having a tough time.”

The hospital visit came ahead of Trump's scheduled weekend trip to his private golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.

The White House did not immediately release details about why Robert Trump, who is 72, had been hospitalized, but officials said that he was seriously ill.

Robert Trump, one of the president's four siblings, recently filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Trump family seeking to stop publication of a tell-all book by the president’s niece Mary titled “Too Much and Never Enough."

Robert Trump had previously worked for his older brother as a top executive at the Trump Organization.

Once a regular bold face name in Manhattan's social pages, he has kept a lower profile in recent years.

He married his longtime girlfriend, Ann Marie Pallan, in March, according to the New York Post. He divorced his first wife, Blaine Trump, more than a decade ago.

In a 2016 interview with the New York Post, he described himself as a big supporter of his brother's run for the White House.

“I support Donald one thousand percent,” Robert Trump said.

***

Former White House adviser Steve Bannon was arrested on August 20th on charges that he and three others ripped off donors to an online fundraising scheme “We Build The Wall.”

The charges were contained in an indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Bannon and three others “orchestrated a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of donors” in connection with an online crowdfunding campaign that raised more than $25 million to build a wall along the southern border of the United States.

A phone at the office of Bannon's lawyer went unanswered Thursday morning. A spokeswoman for Bannon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

***

US President Donald Trump’s former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, was pulled from a luxury yacht and arrested on August 20th on allegations that he and three associates ripped off donors trying to fund a southern border wall.

He's the latest in a long list of Trump allies to be charged with a crime.

The organizers of the “We Build The Wall” group portrayed themselves as eager to help the president build a “big beautiful” barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border, as he had promised during the 2016 campaign.

They raised more than $25 million from thousands of donors and pledged that 100% of the money would be used for the project.

But according to the criminal charges unsealed Thursday, much of the money never made it to the wall.

Instead, it was used to line the pockets of group members, including Bannon, who served in Trump's White House and worked for his campaign.

He allegedly took over $1 million, using some to secretly pay co-defendant Brian Kolfage, the founder of the project, and to cover hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal expenses.

Hours after his arrest, Bannon pleaded not guilty during an appearance in a Manhattan federal court.

He is the latest addition to a startlingly long list of Trump associates who have been prosecuted, including his former campaign chair, Paul Manafort, whom Bannon replaced, his longtime lawyer, Michael Cohen, and his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn.

Trump has also made clear that he is willing to use his near-limitless pardon power to help political allies escape legal jeopardy, most recently commuting the sentence of longtime political adviser Roger Stone.

Bannon was taken into custody around 7 a.m. by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service on a 150-foot (45-meter) luxury yacht called Lady May, which was off the coast of Connecticut, authorities said.

The boat is owned by exiled Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui and currently for sale for nearly $28 million. According to Marine Traffic, a commercial tracking service, the vessel's transponder signal went dark on June 17, shortly after it departed a port in Connecticut en route to Miami, potentially indicating its beacon was inoperable or had been turned off.

At his hearing later on August 20th, Bannon appeared with his hands cuffed in front of him and a white mask covering most of his face.

He rocked back and forth on a chair in a holding cell where he appeared via video with his lawyers on the telephone.

The magistrate judge approved Bannon’s release on $5 million bail, secured by $1.75 million in assets.

Neither Bannon, nor his spokesperson or attorney responded to requests for comment on August 20th.

After the arrest, Trump quickly distanced himself from Bannon and the project.

***

A bronze statue representing US First Lady Melania Trump was on September 15th unveiled in her native Slovenia to replace a wooden one that was set on fire in July.

The new sculpture is a replica of the original one that was commissioned by US artist Brad Downey and placed near Trump's home town of Sevnica, in central Slovenia.

The original statue - carved by local folk artist Ales Zupevc - was torched by unknown arsonists on July 4th 2020.

It was carved in a linden tree and pained in light blue to resemble Trump's outfit at her husband's swearing in ceremony.

The sculpture bares no obvious resemblance to the US first lady.

A group of locals gathered at the site watching as the new statue was unveiled.

Zupevc climbed the wooden stand, smiling as he stood by the life-size sculpture.

A plaque reads that it is "dedicated to the eternal memory of a monument to Melania which stood at this location."

Born Melanija Knavs in nearby Novo Mesto in 1970, the new U.S. first lady grew up in Sevnica while Slovenia was part of the Communist-ruled former Yugoslavia.

A country of some 2 million people, Slovenia is an Alpine nation, known as nature-loving and environment-friendly.

***

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a diminutive yet towering women’s rights champion who became the court’s second female justice, died on September 18th at her home in Washington. She was 87.

Ginsburg died of complications from metastatic pancreatic cancer, the court said.

Her death just over six weeks before Election Day is likely to set off a heated battle over whether President Donald Trump should nominate, and the Republican-led Senate should confirm, her replacement, or if the seat should remain vacant until the outcome of his race against Democrat Joe Biden is known.

Chief Justice John Roberts mourned Ginsburg’s passing. “Our Nation has lost a jurist of historic stature. We at the Supreme Court have lost a cherished colleague. Today we mourn, but with confidence that future generations will remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg as we knew her - a tireless and resolute champion of justice,” Roberts said in a statement.

Ginsburg announced in July that she was undergoing chemotherapy treatment for lesions on her liver, the latest of her several battles with cancer.

Ginsburg spent her final years on the bench as the unquestioned leader of the court’s liberal wing and became something of a rock star to her admirers. Young women especially seemed to embrace the court’s Jewish grandmother, affectionately calling her the Notorious RBG, for her defense of the rights of women and minorities, and the strength and resilience she displayed in the face of personal loss and health crises.

Those health issues included five bouts with cancer beginning in 1999, falls that resulted in broken ribs, insertion of a stent to clear a blocked artery and assorted other hospitalizations after she turned 75.

She resisted calls by liberals to retire during Barack Obama’s presidency at a time when Democrats held the Senate and a replacement with similar views could have been confirmed. Instead, Trump will almost certainly try to push Ginsburg’s successor through the Republican-controlled Senate - and move the conservative court even more to the right.

Ginsburg antagonized Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign in a series of media interviews, including calling him a faker. She soon apologized.

Her appointment by President Bill Clinton in 1993 was the first by a Democrat in 26 years. She initially found a comfortable ideological home somewhere left of center on a conservative court dominated by Republican appointees. Her liberal voice grew stronger the longer she served.

Ginsburg was a mother of two, an opera lover and an intellectual who watched arguments behind oversized glasses for many years, though she ditched them for more fashionable frames in her later years. At argument sessions in the ornate courtroom, she was known for digging deep into case records and for being a stickler for following the rules.

She argued six key cases before the court in the 1970s when she was an architect of the women’s rights movement. She won five.

“Ruth Bader Ginsburg does not need a seat on the Supreme Court to earn her place in the American history books,” Clinton said at the time of her appointment. “She has already done that.”

On the court, where she was known as a facile writer, her most significant majority opinions were the 1996 ruling that ordered the Virginia Military Institute to accept women or give up its state funding, and the 2015 decision that upheld independent commissions some states use to draw congressional districts.

Besides civil rights, Ginsburg took an interest in capital punishment, voting repeatedly to limit its use. During her tenure, the court declared it unconstitutional for states to execute the intellectually disabled and killers younger than 18.

In addition, she questioned the quality of lawyers for poor accused murderers. In the most divisive of cases, including the Bush v. Gore decision in 2000, she was often at odds with the court’s more conservative members - initially Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.

The division remained the same after John Roberts replaced Rehnquist as chief justice, Samuel Alito took O’Connor’s seat, and, under Trump, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh joined the court, in seats that had been held by Scalia and Kennedy, respectively.

Ginsburg would say later that the 5-4 decision that settled the 2000 presidential election for Republican George W. Bush was a “breathtaking episode” at the court.

She was perhaps personally closest on the court to Scalia, her ideological opposite. Ginsburg once explained that she took Scalia’s sometimes biting dissents as a challenge to be met. “How am I going to answer this in a way that’s a real putdown?” she said.

When Scalia died in 2016, also an election year, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to act on Obama's nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to fill the opening. The seat remained vacant until after Trump's surprising presidential victory. McConnell has said he would move to confirm a Trump nominee if there were a vacancy this year.

Reached by phone late Friday, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, declined to disclose any plans. He said a statement would be forthcoming.

Ginsburg authored powerful dissents of her own in cases involving abortion, voting rights and pay discrimination against women. She said some were aimed at swaying the opinions of her fellow judges while others were “an appeal to the intelligence of another day” in the hopes that they would provide guidance to future courts.

“Hope springs eternal,” she said in 2007, “and when I am writing a dissent, I’m always hoping for that fifth or sixth vote - even though I’m disappointed more often than not.”

She wrote memorably in 2013 that the court’s decision to cut out a key part of the federal law that had ensured the voting rights of Black people, Hispanics and other minorities was “like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”

Change on the court hit Ginsburg especially hard. She dissented forcefully from the court’s decision in 2007 to uphold a nationwide ban on an abortion procedure that opponents call partial-birth abortion. The court, with O’Connor still on it, had struck down a similar state ban seven years earlier. The “alarming” ruling, Ginsburg said, “cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to chip away at a right declared again and again by this court - and with increasing comprehension of its centrality to women’s lives.”

In 1999, Ginsburg had surgery for colon cancer and received radiation and chemotherapy. She had surgery again in 2009 after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and in December 2018 for cancerous growths on her left lung. Following the last surgery, she missed court sessions for the first time in more than 25 years on the bench.

Ginsburg also was treated with radiation for a tumor on her pancreas in August 2019. She maintained an active schedule even during the three weeks of radiation. When she revealed a recurrence of her cancer in July 2020, Ginsburg said she remained “fully able” to continue as a justice.

Joan Ruth Bader was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1933, the second daughter in a middle-class family. Her older sister, who gave her the lifelong nickname “Kiki,” died at age 6, so Ginsburg grew up in Brooklyn’s Flatbush section as an only child. Her dream, she has said, was to be an opera singer.

Ginsburg graduated at the top of her Columbia University law school class in 1959 but could not find a law firm willing to hire her. She had “three strikes against her” - for being Jewish, female and a mother, as she put it in 2007.

She had married her husband, Martin, in 1954, the year she graduated from Cornell University. She attended Harvard University’s law school but transferred to Columbia when her husband took a law job there. Martin Ginsburg went on to become a prominent tax attorney and law professor. Martin Ginsburg died in 2010. She is survived by two children, Jane and James, and several grandchildren.

Ginsburg once said that she had not entered the law as an equal-rights champion. “I thought I could do a lawyer’s job better than any other,” she wrote. “I have no talent in the arts, but I do write fairly well and analyze problems clearly.”

***

People are continuing to pay their respects outside the US Supreme Court as they reflect on the legacy of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and come to terms with the approaching power struggle to fill her vacant seat.

Scores of flowers, pictures, candles, and small American flags were left near the Washington DC courthouse, along with and handwritten condolence messages and quotes from Ginsburg, who died Friday of metastatic pancreatic cancer at age 87 after 27 years on the court.

Angel Smith, a furloughed worker, came up from Richmond, Virginia just to celebrate Ginsburg at the growing memorial.

She said it was disheartening to see some people already move on to discussing her passing as an opportunity to replace her.

"I just hope that the next person is somebody who could be on that same level as her," Smith said. "Her final wishes were appropriate, and I think they should be respected. And after I put down my flowers and my sign and my candle, I came off to the side and I said a prayer for this country. I asked that they honor her wishes and that they wait."

President Donald Trump metSeotember 21st with Judge Amy Coney Barrett at the White House as the conservative jurist emerged as a favorite to replace the Ginsburg on the Supreme Court, the start of a monumental Senate confirmation fight over objections from Democrats it’s too close to the November election.

Trump said he expects to announce his pick by week’s end, before the burial of Ginsburg, the court's liberal icon, at Arlington National Cemetery.

***

President Donald Trump's has said he would nominate a conservative woman to replace Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on September 18th at the age of 87.

Trump, who will announce his nominee on September 19th, says he's confident his choice will be confirmed, but some disagreement is forming on whether the pick should focus on cementing the conservative majority on the court, or assist in Trump's reelections efforts.

Mark Sherman, a Supreme Court Reporter for the Associated Press, said five women are rounding out Trump's Supreme Court pick shortlist: Amy Coney Barrett, Barbara Lagoa, Joan Larsen, Allison Rushing, and Kate Todd.

"They have in common that they're all well-regarded conservatives. Four of them are federal judges, and the fifth is a lawyer in the White House," Sherman said.

Barrett, 48, is widely considered to be the front-runner. She was previously considered as a finalist for Trump's second nomination to the high court, which eventually went to Justice Brett Kavanaugh. A devout Catholic mother of seven, she is a favorite of religious conservatives and considered a strong opponent of abortion.

"She has a long history in conservative circles. She was a clerk at one point to Justice Scalia when he was on the Supreme Court," Sherman said. "We do know from her record that she has raised questions about abortion rights and also suggested that there are many more abortion restrictions that she would find allowable under the law than, say, Justice Ginsburg did."

Lagoa, 52, is a Cuban American judge from Florida who was nominated by Trump to serve on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2019. Her name was on the White House's list of potential high court contenders released earlier this month.

Raised in the heavily Latino Miami suburb of Hialeah, Lagoa is the daughter of Cuban exiles who fled the communist regime of Fidel Castro. She speaks fluent Spanish and has a solidly conservative judicial record.

"Picking Lagoa could perhaps help him win more of the Cuban vote, which is an important constituent part of the Hispanic vote in Florida," Sherman said. "And if the vote in Florida is close... any little edge could be decisive."

Larsen, 51, was a little-known University of Michigan legal scholar until 2015, when then- Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, tapped her to fill a vacant seat on the Michigan Supreme Court.

After Trump won the presidency and the Michigan electoral college in 2016, he quickly sought to elevate Larsen to the federal bench, tapping her in May 2017 to fill a vacant seat on the Cincinnati-based 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Rushing, 38, was confirmed just 18 months ago to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond. If elevated to the Supreme Court, she would be the youngest justice confirmed since the early 1800s.

She is a native of Hendersonville, North Carolina. Her potential selection is being championed within the White House by chief of staff Mark Meadows, who also hails from the mountains of the Tarheel State.

Todd, 45, is the only lawyer on Trump's potential shortlist for the Supreme Court who has never served as a judge.

A deputy White House counsel, her close connection to the Trump administration could give an opening to Democrats to attack her independence and relative lack of experience. However, her lack of a judicial record also leaves little paper trail for opponents to sort through for material to attack.

"The president has said he will make a nomination public on September 19th," Sherman said. "And there is the at least the possibility that Republicans, with their majority in the Senate and no procedural hurdles, really could perhaps confirm a new justice before the election. Remains to be seen if they will, but that's certainly a possibility."

***

Democratic Presidential Nominee Joe Biden and his wife Dr. Jill Biden were in Washington on September 25th to pay their respects to the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

They were invited to attend the special ceremony at the Capitol to commemorate Ginsburg lying in state.

Biden said he met Ginsburg for the first time when he was chairman of the committee that oversaw her confirmation hearing.

Services were brief, with the rabbi’s reflections and prayer, before guests lined up to pass by the casket and pay their respects.

Members of the House and Senate who were not invited to the ceremony because of space limitations imposed by the coronavirus pandemic will be able to pay their respects before a motorcade carrying Ginsburg’s casket departs the Capitol in the early afternoon.

The honor of lying in state has been accorded fewer than three dozen times, mostly to presidents, vice presidents, and members of Congress.

Rep. John Lewis, the civil rights icon, was the most recent person to lie in state following his death in July. Henry Clay, the Kentucky lawmaker who served as Speaker of the House and also was a senator, was the first in 1852.

Rosa Parks - a private citizen, not a government official - is the only woman who has lain in honor, a separate commemoration, at the Capitol.

Ginsburg had lain in repose for two days at the Supreme Court, where thousands of people paid their respects outside, including President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump on September 24th. Spectators booed and chanted “vote him out” as the president, who wore a mask, stood silently near Ginsburg’s casket at the top of the court’s front steps.

Trump plans to announce his nomination September 19th of a woman to take Ginsburg’s place on the high court, where she served for 27 years and was the leader of the liberal justices.

Ginsburg, the second woman to serve on the Supreme Court, will be buried next week in Arlington National Cemetery beside her husband, Martin, who died in 2010.

02:03:17

00:00:00

John Lewis, lion of US civil rights , dies at 80

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Selma, Alabama - 7 March 2015

1. John Lewis and President Barack Obama walk across Edmund Pettus Bridge on 50th anniversary of march

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Rep. John Lewis, (D) Georgia:

"We were beaten, tear-gassed, some of us was left bloody right here on this bridge. "

00:13:15

Congressional leaders pay respects to Rep. Lewis

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Washington - 27 July 2020

3. Various of casket of late Rep. John Lewis being brought into US Capitol Rotunda

4. Lawmakers rise to give standing ovation in honor of Lewis after recording of his speech is played

00:25:15

Trump visits brother, Robert, at New York hospital

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

New York - 14 August 2020

5. U.S. President Donald Trump's motorcade arrives at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan

6. Wide exterior of hospital

00:37:11

Ex-WH adviser Steve Bannon arrested in fraud scam

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington DC - 16 January 2018

7. Steve Bannon arrives on Capitol Hill to testify

Rome - 26 March 2019

8. Close of Political Strategist Steve Bannon posing for photographers at Foreign Press Association in Rome

00:45:09

Bannon pleads not guilty in border wall scheme

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

New York - 20 August 2020

9. Steve Bannon, US President Donald Trump’s former chief strategist, leaves a Manhattan federal court and walks through media scrum to a waiting SUV which drives off

00:50:19

Melania Trump bronze statue unveiled in Slovenia

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sevnica - 15 September 2020

10. Local folk artist Ales Zupevc unveils bronze statue representing US First Lady Melania Trump UPSOUND Music

11. Close of statue

01:02:10

US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dies

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ASSOCIATED PRESS / POOL

POOL

ARCHIVE: Washington - 1 June 2017

12. Various views, U.S. Supreme Court photo opportunity, including Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

ASSOCIATED PRESS

ARCHIVE: Chicago - 9 September 2019

13. SOUNDBITE (English) Ruth Bader Ginsburg, US Supreme Court Justice:

"I don't know what it will take, but we really should get back to the way it was when people were examining the qualifications of someone to be a judge rather trying to guess how they would vote."

01:36:01

Memorial for Ginsburg outside US Supreme Court

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington, DC - 21 September 2020

14. Flowers and tributes outside US Supreme Court

15. Closeup of a picture of Ginsburg next to flowers

01:43:16

Trump's top contenders to take RBG's court seat

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 12 May 2020

16. Wide of United States Supreme Court building

17. Close-up engraving reads "Equal Justice Under Law"

01:51:17

Bidens pay their respects to Ginsburg

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POOL

Washington DC - 25 September 2020

18. Various of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's casket to lay in state

19. Presidential Nomine Joe Biden and his wife Dr. Jill Biden paying their respects