US election roundup: Obama's campaign trail debut, Biden's cash advantage & more

Former President Barack Obama is returning to Philadelphia on Wednesday for his first in-person 2020 campaign event for Joe Biden.

In 2016, the man known as one of the Democratic Party's strongest orators delivered Hillary Clinton's closing argument in the same place - at a rally for thousands the night before Election Day on Independence Mall.

Now, with the coronavirus pandemic upending campaigning, Obama will be speaking to a much smaller crowd at a drive-in rally, where supporters will listen to him over the radio inside their cars.

The format reflects the challenge Democrats face in boosting enthusiasm and getting out the vote in a year when they've eschewed big rallies in favor of small, socially distanced events, drawing a contrast with President Donald Trump and Republicans on the coronavirus.

President Donald Trump campaigned in the crucial battleground state of Pennsylvania on Tuesday, telling supporters he needed a second term in the White House to ensure a successful recovery from the novel coronavirus pandemic and its economic fallout.

At an airport rally in Erie in the northwest corner of the state, Trump said Pennsylvania could put him over the top in the Nov. 3 election and warned that Democratic rival Joe Biden would decimate the state's energy and manufacturing jobs.

"This is an election between the Trump super recovery, which is happening right now, and a Biden depression," Trump told cheering supporters, who as at most of his rallies were packed shoulder to shoulder, with many not wearing masks.

With more than $177 million in the bank, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden currently holds a massive cash advantage against US President Donald Trump, just 12 days ahead of the November 3 election, according to new filings with the Federal Election Commission.

The filings revealed on Tuesday that the President only had $63.1 million worth of cash in the bank as of this month, reports The Hill news website.

Until September, Biden's election campaign had raised a whopping $383 million worth of funds, while Trump managed $247.8 million. In August, the Biden campaign's fund-raising amount stood at $364.5 million, compared to the President's $210 million.

Trump on Tuesday abruptly ended an interview with a US-based news channel and said he is considering releasing a video of it ahead of the broadcast time for the "sake of accuracy in reporting".

The 'CBS News 60 minutes' interview with Lesley Stahl was scheduled to be broadcast on Sunday.

"I am pleased to inform you that, for the sake of accuracy in reporting, I am considering posting my interview with Lesley Stahl of 60 Minutes, PRIOR TO AIRTIME! This will be done so that everybody can get a glimpse of what a FAKE and BIASED interview is all about," Trump said in a series of tweets Tuesday afternoon.

If Joe Biden defeats Trump next month, he'll quickly face a new challenge: standing up a new administration to lead a divided nation through a series of historic crises.

After making Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic a centerpiece of his campaign, Biden will have to show that his team can better handle the public health calamity. He will also have to contend with what Democrats say is the damage the Trump administration has done to the bureaucratic machinery in Washington, as well as low morale throughout the civil service.

And he'll face pressure from liberals to deliver early wins with personnel and Cabinet picks to ensure their buy-in for his big policy fights to come.

With the election less than two weeks away, Biden and his aides are most focused on maintaining his advantage in polls against Trump.

If Donald Trump is forced from the White House in the November election, he won’t be the only loser.

Though many governments would likely celebrate the end of the most unconventional and at times chaotic US presidency of modern times, others will have reason to miss it. For the leaders of Turkey, North Korea and Israel, the ledger has been almost entirely positive. Trump’s ejection would confront them with immediate challenges.

The scorecard for countries like China is more nuanced. Even so, what the mostly authoritarian winners from Trump’s four years in office have in common is a fear his departure would spell the return of a more conventional US foreign policy.

Four years after Donald Trump's election reframed how many nations interacted with the United States, the way that the world's foremost superpower moves forward after its presidential election stands to impact many geopolitical pressure points — whether the victor turns out to be Trump or his Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden.

From Iran to Cuba, from China to Israel, American involvement and influence on the international stage has evolved sharply since Trump took office in 2017.

He swept away agreements with some nations, alienated long standing allies and pulled out of multilateral obligations that he said didn't serve the interests of the United States.

The political divide between Hindu supporters of US President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden is getting deeper with the presidential election less than two weeks away and the starting of early polls in some states.

In a sign of the growing political prominence of Hindus in America, the Trump and Biden campaigns are wooing this religious minority community like never before.

Hinduism is the fourth largest faith in the US, representing approximately one per cent of the US population in 2016.

Time was dwindling for thousands of North Carolina voters to fix absentee voting errors as elections officials hustled out an updated process for handling mail-in ballot problems two weeks before Election Day.

Court battles had halted processing of ballots mailed back with deficiencies from Oct. 4 until the state issued new guidance Monday.

State and federal judges temporarily froze key parts of the process amid lawsuits over what to do with ballots that lacked a witness signature and other information.