♪ if it's thursday, kamala harris is off the campaign trail after two members of her campaign team test positive for the virus. this as infections are rapidly rising around the country as we near yet another grim milestone. 8 million confirmed cases. and president trump is desperately trying to find or force some october surprise. biden maintains a double-digit lead in our brand-new nbc/"wall street journal" poll. welcome to thursday. it is "meet the press daly.

"i'm chuck todd. just 19 days to go. the breaking news right now is this. senator kamala harris has been sidelined from the campaign trail until at least sunday after two people involved in her campaign tested positive for covid. she has not, by the way. one of them was harris' communications director and the other was described as a nonstaff flight crew member. the campaign says neither of them has had recent contact with vice president biden. but the news raises obvious concerns as to whether we could see more cases inside the campaign, even though officials have touted the safety precautions and protocols in place to mitigate that risk. we'll have the latest from inside the campaign in a moment. these cases around biden/harris come as new infections are rising across the country. in some places quite rapidly filling hospitals to capacity and comes as the president's re-election campaign continues to struggle in the home stretch. he will soon be holding a rally in north carolina where recent polling has him trailing. and then look at this. in our brand-new nbc/"wall street journal" poll, biden and harris hold an astonishing

11-point lead over trump and pence. second poll in a row of a double-digit lead. biden's support is once again over 50%. third poll in a row where he's been over 50%. and it's that 50% threshold that's haunting the president. not just the ballot but a number of issues. more than 50% of voters have major concerns that he'll divide the nation. more than 50% disapprove of the job he's doing. even more disapprove of the handling of the virus. and just under 50% of voters say there's no chance they'd support the president. none. what's potentially more worrisome for the trump campaign is they trail so much despite there being so many voters who say they're better off now than they were four years ago. let me repeat. 50% of the country says they're better off than they were four years ago. the share of voters who say better off numbers outnumbers the share who say worse off by a 16-point marmg gin. that should be game, set and match for an incumbent

president. they are saying it's the country. by a 20-point margin, voters say the country is worse off than it was four years ago. folks are not voting their pocketbook. they're voting country first. joining me now is nbc's ali vitali, following the biden campaign in philadelphia. also with us democratic pollster and republican strategist matt gourman. we'll go through those numbers in a second. let me start with ali and the biden campaign and what we know about the virus and the protocols. what can you tell us about harris and what does this mean? is she just quarantining for five days? what's the plan here? >> well, they're specifically saying that she's not quarantining for five days. and the reason they say she doesn't have to quarantine is because they say she wasn't in close contact, according to cdc guidelines with these two individuals in the 48 hours

prior to their testing positive. there was so much heming and hawing about the supreme court nominating battle, pulling harris off the trail for a few days, but it turns out the last time she had contact with her communications director at least in these kinds of close quarters was last week, right before those hearings. so the fact she's likely been away from her campaign staff to do these hearings gave her more distance from these positive cases. and what they are saying instead is they are pulling her off the road as a precautionary measure but that she'll instead be campaigning virtually and still working during this period of time. i think it's also really important to note that both former vice president biden and senator harris are both tested regul regularly. from both of them we've seen two negative pcr tests since october 8th. that's the day when they say harris flew on a plane with these two individuals who have since tested positive. but they say she was wearing an n95 mask. they were social distancing while they were there. so again, they're just trying to show they have these precautions

in place and that also it's the thing that they hope ultimately protects their staff from spreading it and their principals from getting it. what this shows is, as much as the white house might try on the campaign trail to turn the messaging away from the pandemic, there are reminders of it at every turn. whether it's cases popping up in the white house or cases popping up now within the biden campaign. but the contrast between the way those two campaigns and the administration are dealing with it could not be more different. we saw that the only reason we started hearing about the outbreak in the white house was because news of hope hicks leaked before the white house confirmed it. trump's response to that wasn't any kind of precautionary pulling of travel. he went to bedminster. we're seeing the exact opposite from the biden campaign, precautionally pulling harris' travel and making sure they're doing contact tracing to make sure they know where this could spread at all. >> ali, i wanted to follow up with one more question there that was not covid related. and that is this gargantuan war

chest biden has. over $750 million raised in the last two months. are they going to spend all this money themselves, or are they going to start sharing some of this money? they can't -- i'll be honest. it's impossible to spend all the money they have by election day. are they going to be giving some of this money to other campaigns, other state party organizations to help other campaigns down the ballot? >> this is one of those moments where it's actually a tragedy of riches, it sounds like because other than really ramping up those campaign ads, which we know they were already doing, they are just swimming in cash right now in these last 19 days. you talk about the amount of cash they have on hand. they could spend $20 million a day between today and election day and that's money that they're just throwing on top of whatever else they've already been spending out there. biden's campaign manager did say today they're going to be helping with down ballot races while also staying on offense

themselves and the key for them is going to be the closing pitch but also making sure that voters are informed about where and how to vote. >> ali vitali with the biden campaign, thank you. let me go over to monica alba. monica, i want to start with this fundraising issue. i know the president the other day went out of his way to say we have plenty of money. i swear, which usually is code for, he's well aware that they don't have that much money. they've pulled down basically the only place they seem to be adding money in any state is the state of georgia. how are they trying to fill the gap here and try to close the funding gap? >> yeah, they are an absolutely cash-strapped campaign at this point. what ali raises there is the natural follow-up question, why hasn't the trump campaign touted any numbers or fundraising as it relates to september because they haven't yet. and the filing deadline, of course, is today. normally in the earlier months

of this campaign, you would see the trump re-elect effort boasting about massive hauls as it related to key moments such as the impeachment inquiry or other mueller related, notable moments. they said they raised a lot of money around the ruth bader ginsburg vacancy and around the first general election debate. they didn't release any figures, though. and that's so telling because it appears they have continually been outraised by the biden campaign and democrats in this final stretch of the election. so what are they trying to do? they are sending the president in an all-out campaign blitz to all of the key battleground states. some of which, like north carolina, where he won last time, he's trailing. so they believe the earned media that comes from a rally like this is more valuable in some cases than those other ads, adds you point out they've pulled down, but we'll be very curious what kind of fundraising numbers they put out for september, chuck. >> well, one thing people need

to know, monica, when a campaign doesn't have the money and knows they don't have the money, they say things like, we think these earned media event really are more impactful. if they really believe that, they wouldn't be raising money. monica alba, ali vitali. i want to break down the political situation and the polling situation, two strategists, two friendly people we like to banter with her. cornell belcher and matt gourman, republican strategist. and i want to bring back that 50% problem, gentlemen. matt, i'm going to make you have to answer this first. you have the president's basically -- this 50% issue where you have already 50% joe biden three polls in a row. major concerns trump will divide the country, another 53%. trump's job rating is above -- disapproval above 50%. the disapproval for the coronavirus above 50%. how -- these feel like hard numbers, matt. how do you turn this around in

19 days? >> that's a good question. and i think it goes to the point i've been saying for months now. you need to make this a choirks not a referendum. it seems to be a referendum on trump. he can't do anything because it's really his personality. and you look at a lot of those negatives. trump is near the top but a lot of it is based on his personality, not his policies. and you know, even the covid handling you can argue is really rooted in how his personality works. so if you combine the fact that 53% believe he's going to divide the country and to your point before where people believe they are better off, but the country is worse off, they view the country worse off in large part because of the division and the chaos. so those two stacks are not a good sign for -- >> it is not the economy, stupid. sorry, jim carville. >> no, it's not the economy, stupid, at all. it is a pandemic stupid.

it is racism and division, stupid. it is defining deviance down stupid. if it was about the economy, it would be one thing. you saw this in 2018. republicans did worse off where quite frankly the economy is doing best. if you look at the way the suburbs have turned against donald trump and republicans, it's real problematic. you have these women voters who are -- not necessarily voting their pocketbook but their values. and their emotions. and, look, when you get this sort of wrong track, wrong direction numbers in the country, it is always problematic for the incumbent. when you look at some of how these numbers are baked in. look, i worked for a guy in 2012 who i thought was pretty darn good. we didn't have double-digit leads in 2012 for one months, two months, three months, four

months. some of this is getting awfully baked in. when you look at the way that campaign is swimming in cash. i am envious of that, on that campaign, because it also pertains to how they can now start impacting down ballot, which i think is even more problematic for republicans. >> matt gorman, if i go to the control room, guys, i want graphic 10. this sthe comparison of the biden favorable and clinton favorable. this is what i think might be among the most important differences between 2020 and 2016. joe biden's net favorability rating in our poll is plus 1 in october of 2020. in october of 2016, even when we had hillary clinton ahead in the polls her net favorability was 10 points under water. as the president tries to re-create the 2016 campaign, this seems to me his biggest hurdle. joe biden is not hillary clinton. and that is something that he

can't change. >> no. that is absolutely true. it goes back to the point referendum versus choice. one of the most interesting poll numbers i see is people who dislike both candidates. trump won that by double digits in 2016. he's losing by double digits this time around. right? and if you noticed bien's messaging goes in large part to the point where people feel good about their own station in life but not good about the country as a whole. it's different than clinton. if you elect him, the country will dramatically change. it will be united. but you, as individual, probably won't dramatically change. to borrow that term, it's a return to normalcy. and that's very different from what he's used to -- trump is used to running against with hillary. >> matt, let me put it in these terms. if an incumbent senator or member of congress consistently polled in the high 30s or low

40s for three -- for basically all of the fall, would you believe they had a chance at re-election? >> no. not at all. i think moving my money to another state. it wouldn't even be a decision. absolutely not. and look, this race has been much more stable than a lot of people want to believe. much like the primary. we want to inject variables into it, but the guy -- biden has had an approval rating, or a lead, 69 points, for months now. >> so cornell, what are -- do you see a trouble spot in here? as if you are the lead numbers guy for biden, would you say, look, other than what i know they think it's closer and so certainly 2016 ptsd gets the left sort of keeps them in engaged. i don't think you have to worry about that. but concretely, what are some parts of the electorate you're nervous about for biden? >> i think you need to cobble

together, expand on that obama coalition. so, you know, looking at how you continue to expand the electorate. you remember, chuck, that on -- in 2008 going into election day, david plouffe said we're not going to be sitting around election night waiting for the returns of one state. that's be on the offense and expand the electorate and bring in more states and bring in more people. if you look at -- i still worry about young people. and i'm still worried about younger people of color, particularly younger african-american men. who we saw dramatic drop offs in 2016. i'm still worried about their enthusiasm. >> matt gorman, at this point in time in october of 1996, the last time anybody had any candidate had a lead like this it was bill clinton over bob dole. and it was early october. and haley barbour was chairman

of the rnc and the division was made. cut ties with dole. do what you can to save the senate and the house. we know financially donors have been quietly making that decision considering the senate leadership fund can't stop raising money. but can any campaigns pivot fast enough away from them to save themselves or not? >> i think in many respects that strategy may be a relic of the past. if you look, there's been a decline in the number of people who split their ticket among senate and presidency. look no further than 2016 when you had every state won by trump, republican senators also were victorious. you look at joe hack and kelly ayotte who distanced themselves from trump, lost narrowly and trump outran them a little bit. and he brought roy blunt over the finish line in missouri. i get the strategy. i'm just not sure it's effective anymore in this day and age. >> and what's fascinating to me is how many of these senate

republicans trail trump in the ballot. they are actually underperforming trump. oerg only, i think, susan collins of any of the competitive senate races polls ahead of trump these days. cornell belcher, matt gorman, thank you both. up ahead -- on the front lines of the new coronavirus surge in dozens of states. and nbc news is hosting a socially distanced town hall with president trump tonight moderated by savannah guthrie. you can watch it on all the nbc news platforms live tonight in miami. and the sunshine state, catch our new podcast florida, florida, florida. pretty proud of this one. our five-part series looks at the 2000 presidential recount. episode five went up today, folks. check it out. it's available right now in the chuck toddcast feed. download it now wherever you get your podcasts.

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since august, it's gotten bad. and it's getting much worse. >> people are dying every night. there's nothing we can do about it. >> n95 masks do not absorb tears when you are at a bedside removing somebody from a bipap, letting their family facetime them to say good-bye. >> it seems the folks here seem to have to see it to believe it. and the new yorkers when i was there they saw it and believed it. but here, people just haven't seen it so they just don't quite believe that it's a real threat. >> welcome back. those are health care workers dealing with an influx of patients as covid cases are on the rise in at least 37 states. 37 states. here's some more coronavirus facts you need to know at this hour. europe's second wave of the virus is getting worse. on wednesday, italy reported its hi highest deadly day.

emmanuel macron issued new tough measures for france including a curfew in paris and other parts of the country. back here in the united states, coronavirus concerns are growing in the college football world. the university of alabama's head coach nick saban and the athletic director have tested positive for coronavirus. this comes as the university of florida and louisiana state university postponed their game this saturday after at least 19 players on florida's team tested positive. and missouri and vanderbilt had to postpone their football game also because vanderbilt just couldn't field enough players due to covid. dr. anthony fauci is calling a herd immunity, quote, ridiculous in an interview today after two senior officials at the white house reportedly ad advocated it for the strategy earlier this week. the u.s. recorded the highest number of daily covid cases, nearly 60,000. our regional charts that show those numbers rising in every part of the country. used to be only a handful. midwest is being hit the hardest recording its second highest day of new cases ever.

and that was yesterday. wisconsin has one of the highest positivity rates in the country at more than 20% and yesterday recorded more than 1,000 hospitalizations for the first time since the pandemic began. big ten football is going to start next week, midwest folks? state officials opened a temporary facility for coronavirus patients to help ease the burden on overwhelmed hospitals. we'll speak to a doctor on the front lines in wisconsin in a moment. and north carolina and south carolina are reporting the most cases anywhere in the country. north dakota reported its highest number of cases since the pandemic began. there is still no mask mandate. bismarck is included in the high risk areas and the mayor joins me now. mayor, i appreciate you coming on. so, look, this is something i remember a few months ago, the governor, your governor breaking down in tears frustrated by how politicized mask wearing had

become. but let's start with the basics here. tell me what your situation is. what your hospital capacity is and where you think you need to go next. >> one of the things we've been working with is health care all along. for us in bismarck, this started in the end of february, early march. we kind of got the first wave of it in north dakota for some strange reason. it came here first. and we were probably about three weeks ahead of the rest of this state as we were following the numbers and starting to put plans in place to deal with the virus. where we're at on capacity right now is we're growing capacity. so our health care system, we got two major providers in the community that are providing hospital beds. and they are in the process of growing space. it's not so much about the beds or the icu beds. it's about pressure rooms and who is staffing those rooms. that's where we're running into an issue is hospital staffing. >> and how much of this, mr.

mayor, is also maybe folks from outside the area in more rural parts of the state where they feel like they have to come to bismarck for care? is that also adding to your burden? >> i wouldn't say it's a burden, but we are a regional health care provider in bismarck. fargo, on the other side of the state is the major regional health care provide or that side of the state, as well as grand forks up in the northeast corner and minot, due north of us. we're dab smack in the center of the state and as the state capital, that's one of our big industries. we really are a hub for health care. so we wind up having a lot of patients come to the bismarck area. >> do you have a sense, have your public health officials given you a sense of why you're seeing a spike now? i know there's been some speculation maybe this is still related to sturgis which, obviously, not in north dakota

and south dakota but is it that or is this just the -- it's getting cooler? >> yeah, a lot of it with our population is asymptomatic. people that don't know they're sick that are spreading it. so the segment of the population we're trying to drill down on are the 20-year-old to 30-year-olds. unfortunately one of the areas we're having a spike is with a segment of the community that is at risk and that's our long-term care facilities. a lot of those 20-year-old to 30-year-olds also work in long-term care facilities. we're trying to drill down and get a handle on the testing and the immediate testing so that we can start pulling off the layers of those that are at risk. >> have you thought about other curbs? where are you in bars and restaurants and are you -- what data trigger points do you have that would make you think, you

know, maybe we need to put in some new restrictions? >> one of the things we're really cognizant of because we were shut down economically and within the community early on with this as a lot of bars, restaurants, different businesses were across the state. so we have to keep in mind the economic ramifications of what we're trying to do. >> of course. >> the messaging for us is do the right thing. if you're going to be around people that you can't socially distance from, then mask up. if you can take extra precautions, do those. if you're going to see grandma and grandpa this weekend, make sure that you're protecting yourself to protect them. in north dakota, south dakota and the upper midwest, we're very mobile. >> right. >> so i'm a little reticent to try to enforce a mandate on a

local level. anything that would be significant in nature would have to come from a higher level from the state because it's nothing for somebody in north dakota or south dakota for matter matter or eastern montana to say let's go shopping this weekend and shop. that's what we do in the midwest. >> you'd be better off saying we need more testing and a mask mandate but then let businesses try to operate safely. >> i'm not for a mask mandate. i think we need to rely on people to do the right thing in the right situations. if you can socially distance, then -- the need for a mask. but it depends on the situation you're on. do you have at-risk categories so that you need to protect yourself further than someone asymptom atic if they contract cov covid. many need to contact their local health providers to find where they fall in the categories and

what the best protocols are to protect themselves. there's some personal responsibility that needs to take place as well. >> mayor of bismarck, north dakota, thanks for taking time with us. good luck with the expansion of your health care capacity. it's a tough time these days. so good luck. joining me now for a medical perspective, dr. paul casey, the medical director of the emergency department at a hospital in green bay, wisconsin. for a few weeks, the alarm has been sounding, particularly in northern wisconsin. i saw a couple of weeks ago where you guys had reached 94% capacity on hospital beds. where are you today, dr. casey? >> so it varies on a day-to-day basis. some days over 80%, some days 90%. we're seeing a steady increase in covid-19 admissions. >> what kind of -- do you feel

better prepared for this wave than the first wave? are you seeing -- do you have all the equipment you need? are we about -- do you feel like we'll be repeating some of the same mistakes? >> the big difference between this wave and the first wave is during the first wave we actually shut down normal operations, including surgeries that weren't emergency surgeries but necessary surgeries, for example, hip replacements. so during the first wave back in the spring we shut down all primary care clinics. we shut down all elective surgeries so we had huge capacity to care for patients. my hospital converted an entire 40-bed ward into a covid unit. and we prepared for the worst and hope for the best and fortunately, we were faced with the best situation. our maximum number of inpatients back in the spring was 20. and this second surge, what we're seeing is that we were -- we had a lot of patients who weren't able to receive their

usual care so we reopened normal operations in may to accommodate all those patients who needed routine health care, mammography, colonoscopy, hip surgery. we went back to full operations and that consumed all our staff. so about three weeks ago, the last part of september, we started to see this rise in the second surge to the point that now omuch to all of our normal patients which typically on a good day, without covid, we would be at 70% to 80% capacity in our hospital. so you throw on top of that a 30-plus covid patients which take up an entire ward. that place is -- places us in serious jeopardy. >> do you think you're going to have to -- are you at a point where you guys may have to postpone elective sur ivive sur? are you worried you'll have to go down that road again? >> unfortunately, that's what we're worried about. we don't want to go there because we don't want to disrupt routine health care.

we're very close to having to do that a second time. >> is there a -- is that prev t preventable? could you get a field hospital? would you like to see medical staff from other part -- what resources are you looking for to avoid that situation? >> so actually, you mentioned the field hospital. yesterday a field hospital opened in milwaukee. and it's specifically for covid patients. the problem for us in the northeast part of wisconsin is that field hospital is 120 miles away. so there are very strict criteria they have to accept patients. patients have to be ambulatory, do self-care. so we don't foresee that as offering a huge venue to offload our patient load here in northeast wisconsin. the thing we really need is for the -- to slow the spread of this virus. the daily case count is rising exponentially. that's what we need to stop. we have enough ppe. we have enough beds but we don't want to have to use those beds

only for covid patients. >> are you seeing any pattern with this spike? is it lack of mask wearing? is it a specific event? is there any -- do you have a sense of why this wave is coming? >> i do. i ask patients when i evaluate them for covid symptoms where they think they got the virus. and the striking trend we currently see is small family gatherings. yesterday i worked a 12-hour shift at a small critical access hospital 40 miles from green bay. i had -- i was donning ppe all day. i saw ten potential covid patients. four needed admission. one elderly gentleman, i said, where do you think you got this? he said my wife and i don't go anywhere. who visits you? he said, well, my grandchildren bring our groceries. so it was very clear that this virus is being transmitted by asymptomatic people,

particularly younger people, who visit elderly, vulnerable people and either small family gatherings or other small events, weddings, funerals, that type of thing. >> right. dr. paul casey, fighting the good fight up there in wisconsin, green bay, wisconsin. thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective and expertise. very helpful. thank you, sir. >> thank you for having me. up ahead -- the latest on the amy coney barrett supreme court confirmation process. plus, the trump campaign's repeated attempts to manufacture an october surprise. they repeatedly fall flat. more on that after this. hen thed got a chip. they drove to safelite for a same-day repair. and with their insurance, it was no cost to them. >> woman: really? >> tech: that's service you can trust. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ i'm looking for my client. i'm so sorry. accountant. [ sighs ] hey! hey man! you're here. you don't trust me here is vegas, do you?

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for those who were born to ride, there's progressive. welcome back. the first order of business for the senate judiciary committee this morning was confirming the date to vote on judge amy coney barrett's confirmation to the supreme court. they set the vote for a week from today. mitch mcconnell says he'll put judge barrett's nomination to the full senate the next day. judge barrett's confirmation hearing continued this morning but without the nominee herself. they are finishing up the second round of questioning last night. they moved on to panels of outside witnesses this morning. garrett haake has been covering the hearing all week for us at his perch above the hearing room. garrett, did anybody move the needle today that made you think that, well, boy, they -- maybe they scored this political point or that? we know there's nothing standing in the way of her confirmation. >> i don't think anything changed in terms of the

confirmation itself, but it was interesting before the witnesses came into the room, good old-fashioned debate between the senators. they spent about two hours going back and forth on just the fact that we're even dealing with this nomination so close to election day. and the comment that stuck with me that i think we are going to archive this tape for months and months from now should democrats take control back of the senate was sheldon whitehouse, democrat from rhode island saying there aren't going to be two sets of rules here. if the senate's new rule is we're going to do this because we can, that's going to be the same rule for democrats should democrats take control of the u.s. senate. it was just kind of laying a gauntlet down saying if this is the way we're going to operate, we're going to go through with this nomination, despite all the discussion over the last several months about it, just be prepared. i don't know exactly what that's going to mean in terms of how democrats will conduct themselves should they take control of the senate but in the event that happens, that's worth keeping an eye on. the other piece of news from

today is the idea that the majority leader wants to move even faster than we thought. get this nomination on the floor, get the process started on friday. not even waiting until the next week. that gives them a little bit more leeway should something else go wrong. some other kind of surprise between now and election day. >> garrett haake at the supreme court hearing all week. great work, by the way. >> thanks, chuck. >> thank you for that report. join us for "meet the press reports" tonight. we'll delve into the battle of who gets to sit on the supreme court. was it always as political? a trip down memory lane and how can we fix this? stream any time on peacock. coming up, the october surprises that have quickly fizzled out. you're clearly someone who takes care of yourself. so when it comes to screening for colon cancer, don't wait. because when caught early, it's more treatable. i'm cologuard. i'm noninvasive and detect altered dna in your stool to find 92% of colon cancers

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when was the last time your property tawhat?l went down? never. are you kidding me? for years, the residential burden has gone up. while the corporate burden has gone down. prop 15 reverses that. it closes corporate loopholes and invests in schools, small business, and firefighters. and when the big corporations pay more, your tax bill goes down. that's right. a savings of a hundred twenty-one dollars a year for the average home. give homeowners a break. vote yes on 15. welcome back. if the trump campaign was planning on an october surprise to save the election for him,

that plan is not working. consider these headlines over the past few days. the justice department had been investigating the origins of the russia investigation. attorney general bill barr is telling republicans that u.s. attorney john durham's report will not be released before the election. barr tasked another u.s. attorney to look into the obama administration's unmasking of unnamed individuals in intelligence reports. that investigation ended with no charges and no evidence of wrongdoing. and president trump himself is now trying to peddle some bizarre "new york post" report that ties joe biden to his son's business dealings with the ukrainian energy company. its report is based on an email found on a copy of a hard drive seized by the fbi. nbc news has not been able to verify a single fact or even see this email and the post says that rudy giuliani, trump's personal attorney, who has been hanging out with russian intelligence operatives, have provided the paper with the computer's contents. the story is so unfounded, social media companies including facebook and twitter limited access to it on their platforms. but for more on all of this and the psyche of donald trump,

i'm joined by michael cruz, senior staff writer for politico and longtime reporter on the trump and trump world beat. michael, it's so clear what the president is trying to do here. instead of roger stone and wikileaks, it's rudy giuliani and some computer guy in delaware. but this is sort of donald trump's m.o. he's always looking for a short cut or a scam or something, right? >> so here's the thing. for this to be an october surprise, for there to be an october surprise, not to be too logical here but we need to be surprised. and this stuff is no longer surprising to people who have been paying attention for the last five and a half years. i mean, think about what we've seen so far this month. we came into this month trying to assess the political implications of the death of a supreme court justice. we come into this month, the

president is diagnosed with the coronavirus. turns his convalescence and recovery into a reality tv show. did that surprise people? no. i think people have, in some sense, lost the capacity to be surprised. people are exhausted. people are tired. people have seen this show before. people are not surprised. and i don't think they will be surprised. it's my fear actually that the october surprise, should one happen, will be coronavirus related and a coronavirus related surprise is probably not going to be a help, politically speaking, for the president. >> uh-huh. so in other words, are we in the gary busey portion of donald trump's reality show? >> i think he's running out of road. we'll see what happens on election day or shortly thereafter, but the playbook for

donald trump, as you know, as we all know by now, has always been to stoke conflict and to stoke chaos. he has the ability to withstand chaos, to exploit that chaos more than other people have the wherewithal to keep up with it. that's always been his strategy. and we are just not in a moment as a country where that is what we're looking for. disruption, chaos, turning bull in china shop stuff in d.c. was a compelling message in 2016. it worked on people because it is what people wanted. and there aren't people -- at least not enough people at this point, polls suggest strongly, who want that kind of chaos, that kind of conflict. donald trump is a man of few moves. a smart trump source has been telling me for years he is the prince of chaos, the trump biographer has told me many times, this just no longer plays

as well now as it did four years ago. >> and let's think about these 19 days. a normal person in a situation, there's certainly a whole list of things he can do. but knowing donald trump and when he is in a corner, i mean, is he likely to just try the same things over and over again so this didn't work so he'll try another planted story or another, you know, russian -- use some other discredited russian propaganda. does he just keep going back to these same wells over the next couple of weeks? >> louder, weirder, wilder. i look even at the hat he was wearing last night and seeing him at rallies. his supporters wearing them, too. it is the same hat as 2016, only the letters are noticeably bigger. and i think that it's reflective of what we're seeing with his

campaign strategy heading down the home stretch here in 2020. >> hey, one other observation that tim alberta made about watching him on the trail. he's also different in how he messages. have you noticed that he doesn't actually talk about issues anymore. everything is grievance with him now. there is no more -- in 2016, you know, people may not have liked how he talked about issues, but he actually talked about trade, manufacturing a lot, immigration a lot. again, you may not have liked how he talked about it, but he actually was talking about issues. there's no issue talk anymore with him at these rallies. >> and the issues he was talking about at this stage in the 2016 campaign were compelling, on point, and he was delivering them with his, albeit crude, but still message discipline. to your point, at this stage, he is not talking about issues. there isn't even a message. it's just grievance, grievance, grievance.

and that works on the core supporters that he has. there's a significant base, but the question always has been, that base alone is not enough for him to win an election. he needs somebody else. and those groups that helped him win in groups that helped him win in 2016 beyond his base, polls jugt they are fleeing. >> michael cruise on the trump psyche beat. but i would not wish that on anyone. coming up, voting in a pandemic. where record numbers of early voters are turning out. ters aret ♪ [sfx: typing sound] ♪ [sfx: typing sound]

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joe biden was raised with middle class values. joe doesn't need to be the center of attention. or see himself on tv. he has always focused on getting the job done. joe led us out of the 2008 recession, and increased health coverage for millions. as president, joe will focus on getting us out of our crises. he'll listen to experts, work across the aisle. and put the american people first. ff pac is responsible for the content of this ad. a livcustomizeperesponsible iquickbooks for me.

okay, you're all set up. thanks! that was my business gi, this one's casual. get set up right with a live bookkeeper with intuit quickbooks. welcome back, early voting starting this georgia this week and people are showing up to the polls in record numbers and they're being very patient. nearly 130,000 georgians turned out to vote. something that georgia experienced in the presidential primary back in june. blaine alexander is back on the beat with us. she has been talking to these early voters, and it looks like there is a lot of determination for people standing in line so long for voting. >> absolutely, chuck. a lot of determination. whether or not there are lines or not they will not leave without casting tear ballot.

officials are making every effort to ensure that this election does not resemble what we saw back in june that was considered a debacle with people waiting in lines for hours. one of the things they have done is open sites like this. this is what they call a mega polling site. there are a number of them. this is the largest early voting facility. this is an nba arena. they have voting machines, on the floor, near the concession stands, 300 voting machines packing this location. they have been able to process people in and out in less than 20 minutes. that is certainly what they would like to see. let's talk about the lines that you mentioned. earlier this week that is what we saw especially on monday and tuesday. those were the first two days of early voting. two factors there.

you had so many people coming out on that first day, but the factor is that some of the technology to keep them in was not able to keep up the with the crowd. so we have seen the wait times significantly decreate. right now the longest waits are 90 minutes or so. and finally, chuck, officials here in georgia want people to vote early. here in fulton county, the most populous in the state, they're hoping that 80% of people cast their ballot before november 3rd. >> i think we will see how competitive it is blayne, we will be checking in quite a bit. we'll be back tomorrow if wrr "meet the press daily." katy turr will be back after

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good afternoon, it is 11:00 a.m. out west. 2:00 p.m. in the east. 217,000 americans are dead and 37 states are seeing increases cases of the coronavirus. with 19 days, now, 19 days until the election it is clear that the coronavirus is the driving fact factor, 17 million people have cast their ballots according to the both candidates are zeroing in on the voting blocks they nee need. donald trump is trying to connect with seniors. and the campaign and the candidate are not taking add kuwait precautions. in north carolina right now just