Morning Report — Harris, Trump spice broadsides with policy

View Online  MORNING REPORT Thursday, August 15  by Alexis Simendinger & Kristina Karisch Thursday, August 15  by Alexis Simendinger & Kristina Karisch © The Associated Press / Carlos Osorio | Supporters of Vice President Harris and running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) rallied in Michigan last week. Harris, Trump spice broadsides with policy Vice President Harris's campaign lost no time Wednesday telling supporters that the annual inflation rate slowed to 2.9 percent in July, the lowest it's been since 2021, citing new federal data.   "This is great news for the American people," the campaign wrote, "and quite the opposite of the economic crash that Donald Trump publicly cheered for."   Who should get the credit?  Thanks to Vice President Harris and President Biden's work, inflation has fallen to the lowest level in more than three years," the campaign message continued. Harris and Biden will appear together today in Maryland to repeat that message, arguing that she, the president and Democrats seeking election this year back policies that are lowering prices for middle-class Americans and for many small businesses.    Harris is expected to expand Friday on her broad economic vision, including opposition to "price gouging," during a campaign speech in Raleigh, N.C.   Trump, campaigning Wednesday in heavily Democratic Asheville, N.C., told his enthusiastic audience that his campaign team wanted him to talk about his ideas for the economy because voters say it's the most important issue they're facing. But the former president quickly shifted to personal critiques of Harris while voicing his regret that Biden was no longer the Democrats' nominee.   "Today we're going to talk about one subject and then we'll start going back to the other, because we sort of love that, don't we?" Trump said. "They say it's the most important subject. I'm not sure it is, but they say it is the most important."   Why Asheville? Theories: The campaign may have needed an indoor venue large enough for a secure rally, plus access to multiple media markets with reach into more conservative Western North Carolina.    Among economic ideas Trump presented:  Trade: He suggested import duties of up to 20 percent on the trillions of dollars of goods imported to the U.S. every year. Previously, Trump suggested tariffs of 10 percent on all U.S. trading partners (The Washington Post).   Health care: "I'm going to keep the Affordable Care Act. Unless we can do something much better, we'll keep it," he said. When Trump was in the Oval Office, Republicans voted repeatedly to repeal the law enacted in 2010, but the effort went nowhere. The law has been challenged in court more than 2,000 times and the Supreme Court has upheld it three times. Flashback to Trump's comment in November during the GOP primary when he said he was "seriously looking at alternatives."    Taxes: Trump repeated his call to eliminate the taxes that seniors pay on their Social Security benefits, an idea he endorsed on Truth Social on July 31. His advisers have not detailed a plan. Ending taxes on Social Security payments is estimated to cost more than $1.5 trillion, while speeding up the date by which the trust funds for the pension program and Medicare are exhausted.   The Wall Street Journal: Takeaways from Trump's economic speech.   Trump plans a press conference this afternoon in Bedminster, N.J., three days after he joined a two-hour conversation with Tesla founder Elon Musk on the social media platform X. He held a freewheeling press conference last week in Florida and phoned "Fox & Friends" to discuss headlines of the day.    Trump's response to Harris's enthusiastic crowds and her surge in recent polls is simple: more Trump.   The Harris campaign's rebuttal Wednesday relied on Trump's determination to stick with his familiar stump speech and combative style more than deep dives into 2025 policy and legislation. Voters, they believe, fill in the blanks.   "The evidence is clear," Harris's team wrote, linking specifics to recent news accounts. "Trump's economic agenda would be catastrophic. … Independent expert analysis found Trump's economic agenda will trigger a recession by mid-2025, cost over 3 million jobs, raise costs for families by $2,500 per year, increase the debt by $4 trillion, send inflation skyrocketing and hurt everyone but the richest Americans." 3 THINGS TO KNOW TODAY 🚨Continued turmoil over campus protests in reaction to the war in Gaza led to the Wednesday resignation of New York's Columbia University President Minouche Shafik, an economist, who is taking a job with the British government in London ahead of the new academic term. She is the third prominent university president, all female, to step down this year.   🌀Hurricane Ernesto is forecast this morning to become a large hurricane near Bermuda on Saturday after strengthening to a Category 1 storm Wednesday with winds up to 80 miles per hour as it pummeled Puerto Rico. Ernesto into the weekend will remain over the Atlantic Ocean away from the eastern seaboard and is expected to head toward eastern Canada by Monday. 🦠Mpox was declared a new global health emergency Wednesday. What is the virus? Where are outbreaks? What is the World Health Organization doing about it?    Leading the Day © The Associated Press / Matt Rourke | Former President Trump held a rally Wednesday in heavily Democratic Asheville, N.C. CAMPAIGN POLITICS The Hill's Jared Gans updates the current polling in seven swing states and explains why two things are true: Harris's survey numbers are rising and the presidential race remains highly competitive in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.   This morning, the first Emerson College Polling national survey following Biden's withdrawal from the contest found Harris leading Trump 50 percent to 46 percent. Five percent of likely voters are undecided. The survey's margin of error was plus or minus 3 percent.   The Cook Political Report and a new Quinnipiac University poll found Harris opening up a lead in Pennsylvania, the largest swing state, through which she and her running mate will barnstorm beginning Sunday ahead of the Democratic Party's nominating convention. Biden narrowly defeated Trump by 1.17 points in Pennsylvania in 2020.   2024 ROUNDUP Democratic running mate Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota faces new scrutiny over the 2020 Minneapolis riots and whether he was too slow to send in troops, The New York Times reports. VP debate negotiations: Walz Wednesday accepted CBS News's invitation for an Oct. 1 vice presidential debate in New York City. GOP running mate Sen. JD Vance of Ohio told Fox News, "We're going to talk to them and figure out when we can debate," adding that he wants to do more than one. "We want to look at the moderators, talk about the rules a little bit," he said. "I strongly suspect we're going to be there on October 1st, but we're not going to do one of these fake debates where they don't actually have an audience," Vance said, echoing Trump's preference for crowd reactions during live televised events.  Plenty of presidential candidates have toured must-win states via train and bus. Harris and Walz, who will each speak at the Chicago convention next week, plan to tour Pennsylvania by bus with their respective spouses beginning Sunday in Pittsburgh.  House Democrats are targeting Project 2025, the sweeping conservative platform intended to guide the next Republican president. Trump, recognizing that its details are targeted by opponents with zeal, publicly disavowed knowledge of its 900-plus pages. In opposition to Project 2025's ambition to take a broom to the federal workforce, the Partnership for Public Service unveiled a Vision for a Better Government Wednesday, a plan to improve how federal agencies hire, fire and promote federal employees. Trump dodged a reporter's question about his false allegation that images of Harris's rally crowds, seen in television footage and independent videos, were faked with AI. "Can't say," the former president replied Wednesday. Trump voted early Wednesday in the Florida primary. The state and federal primaries in the Sunshine State are scheduled Aug. 20. Early voting continues through Saturday. Musk is putting his money, time and reputation behind Trump in this year's election. How far is the billionaire owner of Tesla and SpaceX willing to go to help the former president in the political arena?  New York Judge Juan Merchan ruled for a third time against the Trump legal team's efforts to get him to step aside from the former president's hush money case, which resulted in Trump's conviction on 34 criminal counts.  In Texas, former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner won the Democratic nomination to replace the late Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D), making Turner her likely successor next year in the heavily Democratic district that she represented for nearly three decades. Where and When Morning Report's Kristina Karisch is off this week.    The House and Senate are out until after Labor Day.   The president will receive the President's Daily Brief at 10 a.m. Biden will speak at 1:30 p.m. at Maryland's Prince George's County Community College about the administration's progress in lowering prices for Americans. He will return to the White House.    The vice president will join Biden in Maryland this afternoon for consumer-focused campaign remarks. Zoom In © The Associated Press / Jeff Chiu | Google faces a lengthy court process to try to arrive at repair options after being found in violation of antitrust law with its monopoly in online search.  ADMINISTRATION Searching for solutions: The Justice Department and state attorneys general are considering a breakup of Google as a possible remedy among various scenarios that could address concerns about the tech behemoth's monopoly over online searches, Bloomberg News and The New York Times reported. Alphabet-owned Google was found last week to have violated antitrust law. Still in the early stages of deliberations for what is expected to be a lengthy process that likely will be appealed up through the courts, the government will confer with other companies and experts to discuss proposals to address Google's power. A court hearing is scheduled Sept. 6 to discuss next steps.   Space turf: A pair of U.S. Air Force bases would receive as cargo some pharmaceuticals manufactured in microgravity in space under pending House legislation. California-based Varda Space Industries is the first company to successfully carry out commercial space manufacturing and the only commercial space company to deliver such cargo to the U.S. Varda is at the forefront of a rapidly evolving and confusing governance dispute described by some as a "constitutional crisis," reports The Hill's Saul Elbein. Elsewhere © The Associated Press / AP photo | On Sunday, residents of an apartment building that was damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side eyed the destruction in Kursk, Russia. INTERNATIONAL Ukraine's gains: Ukraine's forces Wednesday advanced further into Russia's Kursk region as Kyiv said its gains would provide a strategic buffer zone to protect its border areas from Russian attacks, Reuters reported.    Kyiv's surge into Russian territory last week caught Moscow by surprise, reportedly embarrassing Russian President Vladimir Putin. "It's creating a real dilemma for Putin, and we've been in direct contact, constant contact, with the Ukrainians," Biden told reporters Tuesday. "That's all I'm going to say about it while it's active."   Russian forces that began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 had been grinding out steady gains all year. President Volodymyr Zelensky said he met top officials to discuss the humanitarian situation in an occupied area that Kyiv says exceeds 390 square miles.   Opinion America's plan in the Middle East is unraveling, by Dana Stroul, guest essayist, The New York Times. Five things to know about the U.S. v. Google, by Asheesh Agarwal, opinion contributor, The Hill. The Closer © The Associated Press / Chris O'Meara | NASA astronauts Suni Williams, left, and Butch Wilmore blasted off June 5 to the International Space Station for a planned eight days. They may not be able to get back to Earth until next year. Take Our Morning Report Quiz   And finally … It's Thursday, which means it's time for this week's Morning Report Quiz! Alert to this week's headlines, we're eager for some smart guesses about what went up and down in the news.   Be sure to email your responses to asimendinger@thehill.com and kkarisch@thehill.com — please add "Quiz" to your subject line. Winners who submit correct answers will enjoy some richly deserved newsletter fame on Friday.   To dramatically link the 2024 Summer Olympics to the 2028 games in Los Angeles, who fell from a great height Sunday in Paris? High jump gold medalist Hamish Kerr of New Zealand French President Emmanuel Macron Tom Cruise The Los Angeles paragliding team Blue Eagles   Investors and economic analysts pounced Wednesday on which economic indicator, which moderated enough in July to stoke optimism that the Federal Reserve will soon lower interest rates? (Clue alert: Answer is in this newsletter!) Rent inflation report Monthly jobs report International trade report Consumer price index   Voters gave Vice President Harris higher marks than former President Trump in ____, according to poll results published Wednesday by The Associated Press. Honesty Trust to handle the economy Trust to handle immigration Nicknaming prowess   Two astronauts who ventured to the International Space Station in June aboard Boeing's Starliner for what was to be eight days remain stuck there because of technical problems. When might they come down, according to NASA? Sept. 10 Dec. 25 Jan. 21 February. Maybe. It's unclear. 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