Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton will continue their last minute rush for votes on this Sunday, as Trump is again making claims of voter fraud before Tuesday's election, while Clinton last night enlisted the help of a famous pop star to get more people to the polls.
Here is where the race stands:
1. The clock is ticking down. After a four stop day that took him to Florida, North Carolina, Nevada and Colorado, Trump will try to out-do that on Sunday, with five campaign rallies, as he goes to Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Virginia. As for those five states, Trump is favored in Iowa, not many people give him a chance in Minnesota, he could be gaining in Michigan, Pennsylvania still seems an uphill fight, and Virginia is considered a long shot. But if Trump wins all five on Tuesday night, he will certainly be able to say with a big smile, "I told you so."
2. Clinton playing some defense. While Trump tries to expand his electoral map, Hillary Clinton is trying to shore up her support, especially in Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Not only has Clinton scheduled a late visit to Michigan, but President Obama is being brought in on Monday to try to sway some votes as well. Clinton will be in Pennsylvania, Ohio and New Hampshire on Sunday, while Mr. Obama goes to Florida to help her out. Clinton's latest star power helper was singer Katy Perry for a Saturday performance in Pennsylvania; Clinton will be with basketball star LeBron James on Sunday in Cleveland. We will find out on Tuesday night whether Clinton needed to play defense in the Midwest or not.
3. Trump claims voter fraud in Nevada. At a rally in Reno, Nevada on Saturday night, Donald Trump again repeated his claims of a "rigged" election, as he complained about people being allowed to vote into the night at the Cardenas precinct in the Las Vegas area. "It's being reported that certain key Democratic polling locations in Clark County were kept open for hours and hours beyond closing time, to bus and bring Democratic voters in," Trump said. "Folks it's a rigged system." But reports from Nevada don't line up with that - instead the people who were in line at poll closing time were allowed to vote. That's the rules for everyone, whether it is early voting or on Election Day.
4. What about the polls? The polls continue to show an edge for Hillary Clinton, albeit a smaller one than about two weeks ago. But are the polls right? I will remind everyone again that in 2012, the polling average was about 3 points in favor of Mitt Romney, even though many Republicans had been arguing at the time that the polls were skewed against the GOP. Then in 2014, the polls were too favorable to the Democrats. This time - who knows? And that has everyone struggling right now to figure out exactly where this race is going.
5. More flak for the news media. I have talked about this for a number of months, how the abuse being heaped on the press at Trump rallies will hopefully not boil over before Election Day. After Trump was rushed off stage in Reno on Saturday night, a television cameraman tried to go down in the crowd to take pictures of what was going on. As you can see in this video, he gets pushed around by the crowd - one man even tries to tear the camera off his shoulder. Lots of people told me the cameraman deserved it, that he was the aggressor, as my Facebook and Twitter feeds overflowed with hatred for the press, and me. It is truly unfortunate that we have reached this point.
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