Impact2020: October 2, 2020

In today’s Impact2020 briefing, President Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis upend the election, Georgia and Ohio are starting to receive more attention from the campaigns, a Republican CEO is upset about his South Carolina factory appearing in a Trump ad.

On the Ground

Trump tested positive. What’s next?

President Donald Trump’s positive coronavirus test has injected a fresh sense of uncertainty over what the 2020 campaign will look like in the final month of the race.

Trump, who is experiencing “mild symptoms” and quarantining at the White House, was forced to cancel his trip to Sanford, Fla. today, McClatchy’s Alex Roarty and Michael Wilner report. It’s unclear when the president, who has been ramping up his travel schedule the last few weeks, will be able to return to the trail. The campaign announced Friday that all of Trump’s previously scheduled events were either going virtual or being postponed.

In an email today, Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien “advised staff who were exposed to anyone who tested positive for the coronavirus to self-quarantine immediately,” but said that their office would remain open, McClatchy’s Francesca Chambers reports.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden tested negative for COVID-19 today and planned to forge ahead with a campaign visit to Grand Rapids, Mich., this afternoon, David Catanese reports for McClatchy. Biden’s running mate, Kamala Harris, also tested negative for the coronavirus Friday and was still scheduled to appear in Las Vegas later today.

Credit: Joe Biden / Twitter

Trump’s diagnosis also threw the next presidential debate on Oct. 15 in Miami into question, the Miami Herald’s David Smiley and Douglas Hanks report. Johann Zietsman, the CEO of the Arsht Center, where the debate is set to take place, said he hadn’t heard from the debate commission since the news broke.

See more on the fallout from Trump’s positive coronavirus test in the Trail Mix section.

Expanding the map

While the coronavirus has shaken up the race (again), Catanese reports that the Trump and Biden campaigns are increasingly pouring cash into the GOP-leaning battleground states of Georgia and Ohio.

Catanese writes: “It’s the latest indication of Trump’s defensive posture, as the incumbent is forced to dedicate vast resources to terrain where he won comfortably in 2016.”

“Biden is on offense and forcing Trump to defend states that are critical to any of his pathways to 270,” said Meg Ansara, who served as Hillary Clinton’s battleground state director in 2016. “Any dollar to defend a core state means less resources to battle in top-tier battlegrounds like Florida, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.”

Trump and his GOP allies spent more than $11 million in Georgia during the month of September, according to a McClatchy analysis of data provided by Advertising Analytics. For the Trump campaign, they spent more in Georgia than Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire and Nevada during that time period.

The Trump campaign also reserved $9 million in ads in Ohio for October, an increase from the $1 million spent there in September. Catanese writes, it’s “acknowledgment that the state the president won by 8 points in 2016 is now in danger of slipping back into the Democratic column.”

A recent internal Democratic poll showed Biden with a lead of 5 points in Ohio, according to a source who has seen it, in line with a public poll by Fox News. Biden’s campaign has reserved $4 million in ads in Ohio between now and Election Day after spending less than $2 million in the state last month.

CEO wants company removed from Trump ad

A CEO whose company was briefly featured in a new Trump campaign TV ad is asking for the footage of its South Carolina plant to be removed immediately, Roarty reports for The State.

Arnold Kamler of Kent International, Inc., a bicycle manufacturing company, said he doesn’t want his business to be associated with an administration that pursued trade policies he says forced him to lay off employees.

“I would like them to remove it because it was completely unauthorized,” said Kamler. “We haven’t had any help from the administration at our factory in South Carolina.”

Footage of a woman assembling a bicycle at a manufacturing plant appears about 20 seconds into the Trump ad, which criticizes Biden on taxes before touting the president’s own economic record. Roarty reports: “Kamler was eventually able to confirm that the footage featured a manufacturing plant in Manning, S.C. … The video clip itself appears to be pulled from a 2017 CBS Evening News report about the facility.”

Kamler, a Republican, said he’s worked well with GOP officials in the past, but that in this election, he’s going to vote for Biden.

Tune In

Politico’s Tim Alberta joins McClatchy’s Kristin Roberts and Alex Roarty to break down the state of play in Michigan and other key battleground states across the Midwest on a brand new episode of the Beyond the Bubble podcast. Download on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts

Trail Mix

COVID fallout

• McClatchy’s Simone Jasper reports that Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel tested positive for COVID-19.

• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he’s moving “full steam ahead” with the Supreme Court confirmation of Judge Amy Coney Barrett despite Trump’s diagnosis, the Lexington Herald-Leader’s Daniel Desrochers reports.

• A North Carolina restaurant temporarily closed after Ivanka Trump’s recent visit, Joe Marusak writes for the Charlotte Observer.

• Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves was not wearing a mask when he was among the public officials who met Monday with Trump, the Biloxi Sun Herald’s Anita Lee reports.

Battleground state watch

• In Wisconsin, “Republican lawmakers rushed to the state Supreme Court on Friday to try to get a quick decision that would help reverse a federal ruling allowing more absentee ballots to be counted,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Patrick Marley reports.

• Voting rights advocates are suing Texas Gov. Greg Abbott over his order allowing counties to have no more than one drop-off location for absentee ballots, Emma Platoff reports for the Texas Tribune.

Battle for Congress

• GOP Sen. Thom Tillis and Democrat Cal Cunnigham repeatedly accused each other of being “rubber stamps” for their respective parties during the North Carolina Senate debate Thursday night, Brian Murphy reports for the Raleigh News & Observer.

• A candidate who is the Constitution Party nominee for Senate in South Carolina said he will vote for Republican Lindsey Graham, The State’s Joseph Bustos writes.

• Bustos also notes that Democrat Jaime Harrison is set to outspend Graham 7-1 on the South Carolina airwaves during the final month of the Senate race.

Debate fallout

• The office of Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only Black Republican serving in the Senate, says he “immediately” communicated his concerns to White House officials over Trump’s debate comment that a white supremacist group should “stand back” and “stand by,” Michael Wilner and Maayan Schecter report for The State.

Number of the Day

68%

A new poll from the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that while many Americans are at least somewhat concerned about foreign interference in the November election, it breaks largely along partisan lines. 68% of Biden supporters saying they are “extremely” or “very” concerned about foreign countries influencing how Americans perceive the candidates, compared to 30% of Trump supporters.

“Who gives a f*** about the Christmas stuff and decorations?”

CNN aired what it says is secretly recorded audio from 2018 of First Lady Melania Trump talking to former friend and adviser Stephanie Winston Wolkoff.

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This story was originally published October 2, 2020 at 1:36 PM.