Coverage on this live blog has ended.
What's happening on the campaign trail today
- The phones of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, were targeted in a Chinese hacking campaign against U.S. telecommunication networks, two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News. People affiliated with the campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris were also targeted, another source said.
- Both Trump and Harris have made appearances in Texas today. Trump spoke this afternoon in Austin, and Harris held a campaign event in Houston. The Harris event featured an appearance by Beyoncé.
- Following Trump's remarks, he sat down for an interview on Joe Rogan's podcast. A campaign spokesperson said it lasted three hours. That led him to be about three hours late for a rally in Michigan, where he attacked Harris as "horrible."
- The presidential candidates' allies also participated in competing events in a different state. Former President Barack Obama and Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance both held events this evening in North Carolina.
Trump has made gains with Latino men — why they’re voting red and how Harris is addressing it
Chris Gonzalez, 33, just voted in his first presidential election. The Tucson, Arizona, resident cast his ballot for Trump.
“I just want the economy to be better,” Gonzalez, currently a salesperson for a roofing company, said. “I remember I was unemployed when he [Trump] was when he first got office, and I always had job offers. The price of consumables was cheaper. … And under this administration it’s like some months we barely get by.”
‘We must mobilize’: Harris rallies with Beyoncé and Willie Nelson in Texas
In a star-studded evening before an electrified crowd of tens of thousands of supporters, Harris tonight implored women and men to cast their ballots on Nov. 5 in defense of their freedoms and as a rejection to former President Donald Trump’s policies.
“Texas, what we’re experiencing here is a health care crisis, and Donald Trump is the architect of it,” Harris said.
Trump attacks Harris for 'partying' with Beyoncé, calls her 'horrible'
Trump continued attacking Harris, targeting her intelligence and referring to her as "horrible," "useless" and "a disgrace to your nation."
He frequently criticizes her in personal terms and tonight also slammed her for going "out partying" — a reference to her large rally in Texas tonight featuring Beyoncé — while "Israel is attacking." (Trump explained his own rally during the Israeli strike on Iran as not "partying" but "working to make America great again.")
Despite polling indicating that he and Harris are running neck and neck, Trump claimed that she was losing the election and asked the crowd how Harris could be “celebrating" with Beyoncé "when you’re down by like a lot." Multiple polls from October show Trump and Harris locked in a razor-tight race.
Even if Harris isn’t talking about gender, everyone else is
In just two weeks, Harris could make history as America’s first female president. You don’t hear her talk about it much.
“The experience that I am having is one in which it is clear that regardless of someone’s gender, [voters] want to know that their president has a plan to lower costs, that their president has a plan to secure America in the context of our position around the world,” the vice president told NBC News in an interview Tuesday.
But while Harris isn’t talking about it, everyone else is.
Trump files brief in government appeal of classified docs case
Trump's attorneys filed a brief today arguing the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith in the classified documents case in Florida was unconstitutional.
"There is not, and never has been, a basis for Jack Smith’s unlawful crusade against President Trump," his attorneys wrote in the filing.
Trump has also challenged the special counsel’s role in the D.C. election interference case, with his attorneys yesterday informing the judge in that case of their intent to challenge the constitutionality of Smith's appointment.
Crowd continues trickling out of Trump rally as he speaks
Trump made a comment during his speech about the Traverse City crowd being larger than he expected, urging journalists to show the size of the crowd.
However, a substantial number of his supporters had already left by the time he started speaking, about three hours after the event was supposed to start. And a steady stream of spectators continued leaving the chilly venue as Trump spoke.
"I figured when I got here there’d be like 20 people, and I was ready to do it — Look at this place. It goes back— they never show the crowds, you know? They never show it. You ever see Kamala’s crowd? They put like 10 people, they bus them in. They take a bus and they pay people. That’s true. They pay people. They don’t get people," Trump said without evidence.
Trump also paused his remarks for two apparent medical incidents in the crowd. During the second incident, he requested that his staff play "Ave Maria," a staple on his rally playlist.
Kari Lake launches new ads that underscore her alignment with Trump
Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake launched two new political advertisements today, one of which prominently features Trump.
Titled "Trump and Lake: Vote America First Twice," the new spot is featuring on broadcast and digital, according to the Lake campaign. It starts off with Trump bashing Lake's opponent.
"Ruben Gallego is horrible," says Trump in the ad, using soundbites taken from his rally in Glendale, Arizona, in August.
"If we win this state, we win the presidency, and we have to take Kari Lake with us," says Trump in the advertisement.
The spot is indicative of the Lake campaign's larger strategy of convincing Arizonans that her election to the Senate will help Trump further his agenda in the White House should they both win their contests.
While Lake has underperformed Trump in recent polls, she's touted her relationship with the former president since day one of her campaign. Lake launched her Senate bid at an event a year ago with Trump projected onto a large screen behind her — and he endorsed Lake from the start. Her campaign bus features a photo of Lake and Trump together arm-in-arm with the words "endorsed by President Trump" plastered in bold text.
Western Michigan voter asks both candidates to protect the rights of people with disabilities and Native Americans
Hannah DeMott, a Jenison, Michigan, resident, voted by mail for Harris but says neither she nor Trump is doing enough to protect the rights of people with disabilities or Indigenous communities.
“Seeing Donald Trump talking about certain communities, he has such a lack of awareness and understanding,” DeMott said.
In particular, she referenced a 2015 incident where Trump appeared to mock a reporter with a congential joint condition at a campaign event in South Carolina.
“That hits me straight into the heart because my twin is disabled and I am now continuing my career working with disabled individuals,” she said. “I don’t understand how someone could vote for a president that is so openly misleading and harmful.”
“There’s disabled folks that can’t vote and don’t have a voice,” DeMott continued. “I would love to see whatever candidate is elected to speak up more on disabled voices because as someone who has a voice, I’m going to use it for disabled voices.”
On Indigenous rights, she is particularly concerned about oil pipelines that she fears would risk “taking away food sovereignty and fresh water, and breaking treaties” with Native nations.
One such flashpoint has been Michigan’s controversial Line 5 pipeline. Sixty-three Tribal Nations in the Great Lakes region filed an amicus brief last year in support of Michigan Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel’s legal efforts to shut down the pipeline. They argued the tribes “have cultural, economic, or treaty-based interests in protecting the Straits of Mackinac from a catastrophic oil spill.”
“I’d be a bad friend or disrespecting something so sacred to someone I love dearly to not also fight for their rights,” DeMott said of Indigenous peoples.
Viral video of ripped-up Pennsylvania ballots is fake and Russian-made, intelligence agencies say
Russian actors “manufactured and amplified” a recent viral video that falsely showed a person tearing up ballots in Pennsylvania, the FBI and two other federal agencies said today.
The FBI and officials from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said the U.S. intelligence community made the assessment based on available information and past activities from other Russian influence actors, including videos and disinformation efforts.
“This Russian activity is part of Moscow’s broader effort to raise unfounded questions about the integrity of the US election and stoke divisions among Americans,” the agencies said in a statement. “In the lead up to election day and in the weeks and months after, the [intelligence community] expects Russia to create and release additional media content that seeks to undermine trust in the integrity of the election and divide Americans.”
Trump walks onstage about 3 hours late to the Undertaker's WWE theme song
Trump walked onstage to the song "Rest in Peace" by Jim Johnston, the wrestler the Undertaker's theme song in WWE. The dramatic instrumental song is different than his usual walk-on song, "God Bless the USA," by Lee Greenwood.
Trump stood onstage for several minutes as the Undertaker's theme played. Then, the Greenwood song came on and Trump listened to that as well before starting to speak.
Trump had been delayed in Texas and his speech began about three hours after it was set to start.