Welcome to the online edition of From the Politics Desk, a nightly newsletter where the NBC News politics team brings you the latest reporting and analysis from the campaign, the White House and Congress.
In today’s edition, senior political reporter Jonathan Allen breaks down the pro bono proposals Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are touting as part of their campaign platforms, plus CNN’s explosive reporting on Mark Robinson shakes up the North Carolina gubernatorial race.
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President Trump’s tax repeal highlights a series of free initiatives that will define the 2024 election
Jonathan Allen
As president, Donald Trump slashed the lucrative tax deductions enjoyed by coastal donors and suburban battleground voters, and now he’s promising to give them back — if he ever gets back to the Oval Office.
Trump aides say he’s not buying hostages with ransoms or overturning the $10,000 annual limit on how much taxpayers can claim in federal deductions based on state and local taxes, known in Washington as the “SALT cap.” Campaign officials say Trump is responding to new economic realities and pursuing a “two-pronged” solution: first, promoting pro-growth policies and second, adopting tax positions that allow people to keep more of their money.
Caroline Bruckner, managing director of the Kogod Center for Tax Policy at American University, said what has changed more than the economy is Trump’s needs.
“Changing the state and local tax deduction limits was a simple ploy to target revenues flowing to Democratic states,” Bruckner said of the 2017 law that used the SALT cap to offset budgets for other tax cuts. “Now it appears that high-income taxpayers in battleground states have successfully sued Trump.”
The policy shift is one in a series of freebies that Trump and his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, are offering to voters in the final stretch before Election Day, working together to promise what amounts in many ways to a tax cut.
Both candidates have pledged to block a tip tax on service industry workers. Trump has said he would remove seniors from Social Security benefits. Harris has focused on Biden administration proposals such as expanding the child tax credit and providing subsidies to first-time homebuyers. She has also proposed a first-year tax credit of up to $50,000 for small business founders.
Some of the promises involve big spending, like President Trump’s announcement (details have yet to be released) that he will provide free in vitro fertilization treatments to people trying to conceive.
“It’s the season of free everything,” said former Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pennsylvania), a former leader of moderate Republicans in Congress.
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Mark Robinson vows to stay in North Carolina gubernatorial race after reports he made inflammatory comments on porn site
Adam Edelman and Alexandra Marquez
Mark Robinson, a Republican candidate for North Carolina governor, vowed Thursday to continue his campaign after reports that he posted dozens of lewd and inflammatory comments on a pornography message board more than a decade ago.
According to a CNN report, in posts to a pornography website called Nude Africa, Robinson called himself a “black Nazi,” supported the reinstatement of slavery, said he liked watching transgender porn, and related sexually explicit stories, including a memory of “peeping” on women in gym showers when he was 14. The posts were made under the username “minisoldr” between 2008 and 2012, before Robinson entered politics, having been elected lieutenant governor in 2020, according to the CNN report.
In a video posted to X ahead of the article’s publication, Robinson denied the report, calling it “tabloid trash.”
“Rest assured, what you will see in this article are not the words of Mark Robinson. You know my words, you know my character, and you know I have been completely transparent throughout this campaign and before,” he said in the video.
“We are in this race to stay and fight to win, and with your help, I’m sure we can win,” he added.
The report was the latest blow to Republicans in a key battleground state where Robinson, who is backed by Donald Trump, is struggling against Democratic candidate Josh Stein, and North Carolina has become increasingly important in the presidential race after Kamala Harris rose to the top of the Democratic field.
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Black voters in battleground states overwhelmingly support Harris – with big differences across age and gender
By Stephanie Perry and Curtis Bunn
Black voters in battleground states overwhelmingly say they will cast their ballots for Kamala Harris in November, but she will need to strike a chord with skeptical undecideds to come close to matching Joe Biden’s 2020 vote margin among Black voters.
Data from a new poll conducted by Howard University Poll of 963 black voters in seven key battleground states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — showed that 82% said they would vote for Harris, 12% said they would vote for Donald Trump, an additional 5% were undecided and 1% planned to choose another candidate.
Exit poll results from 2020 in the same battleground state showed that 89% of Black voters supported Biden, while 9% supported Trump.
While black voters in battleground states largely support Harris, there are some key differences among subsets of black voters.
While 89% of black voters over the age of 50 said they supported Harris, that number dropped to 75% among those under 50.
Among black men under 50, Harris holds a 50-point lead, but a 78-point lead among men over 50. Among younger women, Harris has a 65-point lead, but among older women, it’s 84-point lead.
Meanwhile, college-educated black voters in battleground states favor Harris over Trump by 73 points, while black voters without a college degree favor Harris over Trump by 68 points. The poll also found that younger and less educated voters were more likely to support Trump.
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π³οΈ GOTV: The NAACP told NBC News it plans to spend $20 million mobilizing black voters in 12 states this fall. Read more β
π Poll results: Mark Murray explains the results of national and battleground state polls released in the last 24 hours. Continue reading β
ποΈ Today’s top news
π€ BFFs: Henry J. Gomez and Alan Smith dig into Trump and J.D. Vance’s “bff-level” relationship. Read more β π½ Omaha! Sen. Lindsey Graham met with Nebraska Governor Jim Pilen and about two dozen Republican lawmakers on behalf of the Trump campaign as part of an effort to change how Nebraska allocates its electoral votes. Read more β π Still undecided: The pro-Palestinian Democratic Undecided Movement has made clear its opposition to Trump and other third-party candidates while not endorsing Harris. Read more β π» Impact of the hack: According to the FBI, Iranian hackers sent materials stolen from the Trump campaign to Biden campaign officials. Read more β βοΈ To Springfield: Trump said Wednesday he plans to visit Springfield, Ohio, in the “next two weeks.” Continue reading β π£οΈ A long history: Violent attacks on illegal immigration have been a consistent feature of President Trump’s presidential campaign since the day he announced his candidacy in 2016. Continue reading β
That’s all from the Politics Department. If you have any comments (what you liked, what you didn’t like, etc.), please email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com.
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