A little over 2 weeks – 12 trading days – until the US Election, and the Town Hall meetings co-hosted on the two main US national TV networks provided nothing really new with regards to policy or outlook. However, it did provide the opportunity to have both meetings running consecutively side-by-side. President Trump was in Miami, in the must-win state of Florida (29 Electoral College votes) with NBC, while former Vice President Biden was in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, another key swing state with 20 Electoral college votes available to the victor, with ABC.
President Trump said “I know nothing about QAnon”, that he WILL accept a peaceful transfer of power, ”Yes, I will. But I want it to be an honest election, and so does everybody else.” and commented on whether he took a coronavirus test on the day of his last debate with Mr Biden, saying: “Possibly I did, possibly I didn’t.”
Candidate Biden continued to avoid answering if he would move to increase the size of the supreme court (the third arm of US government) with judges if, as seems likely, the Senate confirm judge Amy Coney Barrett to the court before election day. “I have not been a fan of court packing. I’m not a fan.” He admitted that the 1994 crime bill, which he helped draft, which the Black Lives Matter Movement has claimed is one of the reasons for mass jailings of African Americans, was a “mistake” but continued to defend his record “It [the bill] had a lot of other things in it that turned out to be both bad and good.”
So attention is turned to a weekend of high intensity campaigning, the final two-week onslaught of media messages and no-holds-barred advertising. The pair are still expected to meet face to face for the final time before polling day on Thursday in Belmont University, Nashville, Tennessee (a strongly Republican state with 11 electoral college votes, almost guaranteed for the President).
The Pandemic, Economics, Foreign Policy, and even the environment are likely to be key topics in what is expected to be a much less raucous and chaotic affair than their first encounter. The most powerful job in the world is up for grabs, and it impacts us all, regardless of where we live.
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Stuart Cowell
Head Market Analyst
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