| Good morning and welcome to On Politics, a daily political analysis of the 2020 elections based on reporting by New York Times journalists. |
Another Primary Day, and an unyielding virus. It’s Tuesday, and this is your tip sheet. |
- State and local officials — not to mention health experts — are expressing alarm at the coronavirus’s continued spread in the United States. New cases are surging in nearly two dozen states, and Oklahoma and Missouri on Sunday reported their largest single-day case increases yet.
- The United States accounts for one in every five new cases worldwide, despite making up only 4 percent of the world’s population. The virus is spreading more rapidly than ever before across the globe.
- Pushing back against a narrative embraced by President Trump, Dr. Michael Ryan, the executive director of the World Health Organization’s health emergencies program, said on Monday that increased testing was not driving the jump in cases. “We do not believe that this is a testing phenomenon,” he said. “Clearly, hospital admissions are also rising in a number of countries, deaths are also rising, and they are not due to increased testing, per se.”
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- As Florida surpassed 100,000 total cases over the weekend, its surgeon general released a new health advisory: “All individuals in Florida should wear face coverings in any setting where social distancing is not possible.”
- Trump on Monday suspended work visas through the end of the year, effectively preventing over half a million foreigners from coming to work in the United States, according to White House estimates. The move is intended to boost employment prospects for American workers amid the economic downturn caused by the pandemic.
- But business leaders have long lobbied against it — as they did in April, when Trump initially floated the idea of suspending visas. At that time, he bowed to pressure and suspended only the issuance of green cards for 60 days.
- With Monday’s order, Trump also extended the green-card prohibition through the end of the year. The order targets the H-1B visa program for high-skilled workers and visas for some students and seasonal employees; health care professionals, farm workers and some workers in other industries are exempt.
- Two Trump campaign staff members who attended the president’s rally in Tulsa, Okla., on Saturday tested positive for the coronavirus shortly afterward, the campaign announced on Monday. It’s not yet clear how many people those staff members interacted with at the event.
- Just days before the rally, six other members of Trump’s advance team tested positive for the virus, adding to concerns over the wisdom of holding the event.
- But Trump is still in a reopening frame of mind. Within hours of the announcement about the new infections, the White House began rolling back restrictions that have been in place at the complex since March.
- Fewer temperature checks will be administered to White House visitors, and many staff members who have been teleworking will be allowed to return to their offices. But people who come in close contact with Trump or Vice President Mike Pence will still receive temperature checks and coronavirus tests, and they will have to answer questions about their history of symptoms.
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- The Times reported last week that the Trump campaign was pushing to add a fourth presidential debate to the fall schedule and seeking to exert control over who will moderate the forums. But Team Biden is having none of it.
- In a letter to the Commission on Presidential Debates, Jen O’Malley Dillon, Joe Biden’s campaign manager, wrote, “Our position is straightforward and clear: Joe Biden will accept the commission’s debates, on the commission’s dates, under the commission’s established format and the commission’s independent choice of moderators.”
- Three presidential debates are typically held during the general election. But with Trump’s poll numbers slipping, his campaign is eager for a chance to reframe the discussion. Brad Parscale, Trump’s campaign manager, wrote in a statement: “We want fair debates. We want them sooner and we want a bigger schedule. We also don’t want them up against football games competing for viewers.”
- In other debate news, the University of Michigan plans to withdraw as the host of the second forum because of concerns about the coronavirus.
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 | | Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times |
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Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary, at a briefing on Monday, where she defended Trump’s use of a racist term to describe the coronavirus. |
What political ads tell us about today’s Democratic primary in Kentucky |
Several states are holding primary elections today, and perhaps no race is being watched more closely than the Democratic Senate primary in Kentucky. |
For much of the past year, it appeared the general election battle for the Senate seat was set, with Amy McGrath, a Democrat, expected to take on Mitch McConnell, the incumbent senator and Republican majority leader. They have long been trading television attack ads during the nightly news. |
But over the past few weeks, Charles Booker, a state representative who is competing against McGrath, has seen a boom in support for his progressive campaign, and it has been turning into real money. Now, both Booker and McGrath are inundating Kentucky airwaves in a final push before voting on Tuesday. |
McGrath, who has spent $3.1 million in the past week, began running a closing argument ad last Tuesday that features her answer to “Why I’m a Democrat.” She describes her lifelong desire to be a fighter pilot in the military, one that she realized only after elected Democrats passed new laws allowing women to join the ranks. Unlike a lot of her ads from this year, this one makes no mention of McConnell. |
For Booker, who has spent about $740,000 over the past week, his most frequently aired ad features a debate answer from McGrath, in which she says that she did not join one of the protests in the state against police brutality and systemic racism. The screen then cuts to Booker speaking at a protest through a bullhorn with his mask around his chin, “as your brother, as your cousin, as your neighbor, as your fellow good troublemaker.” |
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