WASHINGTON (AP) — Roundup of the 2016 presidential race (all times EDT:
Ryan slams Clinton campaign’s emails about Catholics
Updated 6:01 p.m.: House Speaker Paul Ryan is joining the Trump campaign in criticizing Hillary Clinton aides for comments about Catholics.
In a statement Wednesday, Ryan said the April 2011 email exchange between current Clinton Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri and John Halpin, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, showed a disdain for the Catholic faith that was “staggering.”
Halpin wrote that “the most powerful elements of the conservative movement are all Catholic” and described their positions as “an amazing bastardization of the faith.”
Ryan earlier this week said he wouldn’t campaign for Trump although he still supports the GOP presidential nominee. He says the email reflected the Clinton campaign’s “hostile attitude toward people of faith in general.”
Palmieri told reporters traveling with Clinton on Wednesday that she doesn’t recognize the hacked email, although she wouldn’t say explicitly whether she believes it had been forged.
Clinton says Trump supporters having a bad couple weeks
Updated 4:33 p.m.: Hillary Clinton is showing a little sympathy for Donald Trump supporters who keep disrupting her event.
As security escorted one man out of a rally in Pueblo, Colorado, Wednesday, Clinton said: “You have to feel a little sorry for them, they’ve had a really bad couple of weeks.”
Multiple Clinton events have been interrupted this week by hecklers, including some targeting her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Clinton said Trump is running a “scorched earth strategy” shows how desperate his campaign is. He says all Trump has left is “pure negativity, pessimism.”
Trump insists Clinton ‘has to go to jail’
Updated 4:18 p.m.: Donald Trump is ramping up his calls for an investigation into Hillary Clinton and insisting that she “has to go to jail.”
Trump has in recent weeks dramatically escalated his rhetoric into the FBI investigation into Clinton over the use of her private email server. The FBI director criticized Clinton but did not recommend criminal charges.
Last summer when Republicans chanted “Lock her up!” at his rallies, Trump would respond: “Let’s just win in November.”
But that changed Sunday when Trump said to Clinton across the debate stage that she’d be ‘in jail’ if he’s ever president. On Wednesday he amped it up further by suggesting Clinton “has to go to jail.”
House Republican’s ad promises to stand up to Clinton
Updated 3:52 p.m.: The House Republican campaign organization is airing an ad for a House candidate that is premised on the party’s presidential nominee losing to Democrat Hillary Clinton.
The spot says that House Republican candidate Claudia Tenney will “stand up to Hillary Clinton.” The Republican presidential nominee is Donald Trump, whose campaign is staggering after the revelation of a recording in which he brags about groping women. House Speaker Paul Ryan on Monday told Republicans that he would no longer campaign for Trump, a move that suggests he fears Trump is headed for defeat and will drag down Republican House candidates.
The National Republican Congressional Committee is following that strategy with the 30-second TV ad for Tenney.
Tenney is running against Democrat Kim Myers and independent Martin Babinec in a tight race for the central New York seat held by retiring GOP Rep. Richard Hanna.
Obama encourages Florida voters to register
Updated 3:12 p.m.: President Barack Obama says Florida voters have “no excuse” for failing to register to vote after a federal judge extended the deadline by six days, to next Tuesday.
Obama told Miami radio station WHQT on Wednesday that the stakes on Nov. 8 are “just too high” to “sit this one out.”
He says Florida can determine the election outcome.
Obama also urged Ohio voters to take advantage of the opportunity they have to cast ballots before Nov. 8. Early voting in Ohio opened Tuesday.
The president joked during an interview with Cleveland radio station WZAK that the city is like Chicago in that it can start snowing anytime.
He says Ohio’s weather is still nice, so people shouldn’t wait any longer to vote.
Trump warns Islamic State will take over U.S.
Updated 2:45 p.m.: Donald Trump is claiming without evidence that the Islamic State group will “take over this country” if Hillary Clinton is elected president.
Trump asserted that Islamic State fighters are “hoping and praying” that his Democratic nominee wins the White House.
He then warned that the terror group, which he said controls a portion of the Middle East, would then “take over this country, they’ll take over this part of the world.”
Trump made the incendiary claim at a rally Wednesday in Ocala, Florida. Both Trump and Clinton have claimed that IS uses the other’s rhetoric as a recruiting tool.
‘Here’s your tobacco, here’s your shotgun, you’re in charge’
Updated 2:30 p.m.: Bill Clinton is taking a shot at Donald Trump’s slogan.
The former president spoke at a college in Indianola, Iowa, Wednesday on behalf of wife Hillary Clinton. He noted that that he was a “white Southerner,” and said that his memory is that the phrase “Make America Great Again” means: “Here’s your tobacco, here’s your shotgun, you’re in charge.”
Clinton avoided mentioning Trump as he addressed students and supporters at Simpson College. He stressed Hillary Clinton’s qualifications and asked voters to stay away from the “venom” of the race.
He concluded with advice he said he borrowed from a friend: “If you don’t want somebody to drive a truck off the cliff, don’t give them the keys.”
Four Republicans reverse Trump unendorsement
Updated 2:05 p.m.: At least four Republican lawmakers who just days ago said that Trump should step aside as their party’s presidential nominee now say they’ll support him after all.
Three of the four are running for reelection: Sen. John Thune of South Dakota and Reps. Scott Garrett of New Jersey and Bradley Byrne of Alabama. The fourth, Sen. Deb Fischer Nebraska, isn’t on the ballot until 2018.
They were among the lawmakers who had said Trump should withdraw because of his inflammatory comments about women. They’ve been taking heat from party loyalists.
Clinton campaign considers 3 red states in play
Updated 1:50 p.m.: Hillary Clinton’s campaign is keeping an eye on a trio of traditionally Republican states that could be up for grabs in November: Arizona, Georgia and Utah.
Clinton communications director Jennifer Palmieri says running mate Tim Kaine will soon be doing interviews in Utah and Arizona. While neither Clinton nor Kaine has plans to travel to those states, Palmieri said the campaign is looking “to see if that makes sense.”
Democrats have been particularly intrigued by polling suggesting a close race in Utah, one of the most conservative states in the country. Several political leaders there have pulled their endorsements from Trump in recent days.
Trump criticizes Clinton email investigation
Updated 1:25 p.m.: Donald Trump is suggesting Washington politicians in both parties collude to keep themselves out of legal trouble.
Trump at a rally Wednesday in battleground Florida criticized the Department of Justice’s refusal to recommend charges against Hillary Clinton for blending personal and official business on a homebrew email server. He’s suggesting that both Democrats and Republicans in Congress went along with it.
“Did they make a deal where everybody protects each other in Washington?” Trump asked the crowd in Ocala.
The Republican nominee went on to call the probe “one of the great miscarriages of justice” in United States history.
Trump, increasingly isolated after the revelation of a vulgar 2005 video, has been lashing out at both parties in recent days, targeting both Clinton and House Speaker Paul Ryan, who said he would no longer campaign for the Republican presidential nominee.
Pence encourages Christians to vote
Updated 12:40 p.m.: Mike Pence is telling Christians this election is no time to “sit on the sidelines.”
Donald Trump’s running mate addressed students at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, as Trump took an aggressive turn against Republican leaders who have abandoned him because of his inflammatory comments about women.
Pence tells students at the evangelical college that personal “shortcomings are no excuse for inaction” and they should vote for Trump.
He says people of faith cannot choose to stand “idly by in this great national debate.”
Bush administration officials oppose Trump
Updated Noon:
Thirteen transportation, energy and environmental officials from George W. Bush’s administration have signed a statement opposing the election of Donald Trump. They say he doesn’t stand for the Republican Party’s principles.
They say they are all Republicans who have never before publicly opposed a GOP presidential nominee. A former transportation secretary, Mary Peters, and former Environmental Protection Agency administrator, Christine Todd Whitman, are among them.
The statement says that while Trump has expressed support for greatly increased infrastructure spending, he hasn’t been clear where he intends to find the money for it. Further, the statement says his support for greater spending isn’t sufficient to overcome concerns about “his capacity to govern fairly and effectively.”
Fifty former Republican national security officials signed a similar statement in August.
Federal judge extends voter registration in Florida
Updated 11:30 a.m.: A federal judge has extended voter registration until Oct. 18 in the battleground state of Florida, due to the disruption and damage from Hurricane Matthew.
U.S. District Judge Mark Walker’s decision extends the deadline six more days. He’d already extended the Oct. 11 deadline one day, after the Florida Democratic Party filed a lawsuit on the weekend following the hurricane’s brush with Florida’s east coast.
Democrats had asked Republican Gov. Rick Scott to extend the deadline, but Scott turned down the request and said people have had enough time to register.
Sen. Deb Fischer reverses unendorsement of Trump
Updated 10:30 a.m.: Donald Trump has one defector from the Senate back in the fold.
Republican Sen. Deb Fischer of Nebraska called just days ago for Trump to step aside because of his remarks about imposing himself on women. The conservative Republican loyalist called Trump’s comments “disgusting and totally unacceptable” and said Trump should let running mate Mike Pence serve as the party’s nominee in the election.
Now she’s reversed herself. Fischer told Nebraska radio station KLIN that it’s “not a tough choice” to keep supporting Trump. She spoke Tuesday.
Fischer’s Nebraska colleague, Sen. Ben Sasse, has attracted plenty of criticism from Republicans in the state for his long-held opposition to Trump.
Clinton to challenge Republicans to drop Trump support
Updated 9:30 a.m.: Hillary Clinton will challenge Republicans over their support for Donald Trump during campaign events in Colorado and Nevada.
Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta says Republicans have to answer whether they are with Trump or against him, particularly as he runs what Podesta called a “race into the sewer.”
He says even those who have revoked their support for Trump following revelation of his predatory comments about women have “propped him up for a very long time.”
Podesta says Trump’s strategy appears to be trying to “disgust” voters so they don’t show up to vote.
Clinton is holding rallies Wednesday in Pueblo, Colorado, and Las Vegas.
Trump’s campaign manager hedges on special prosecutor
Updated 7:30 a.m.: Donald Trump’s campaign manager says it’s not certain he’ll follow through on his vow to appoint a special prosecutor to go after Hillary Clinton if he becomes president.
Kellyanne Conway says, “We’ll have to see, if he’s elected president, if that makes any sense.”
On ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Conway was asked Wednesday about Trump’s repeated suggestions that he’d use the power of the presidency to put Clinton behind bars for alleged misdeeds. She said, “It wouldn’t be up to him whether or not she goes to jail. That would have to be fully adjudicated through the regular channels like it would be for anyone else.”
Conway says Trump is channeling the frustrations of many people who think Clinton plays by a different set of rules.
As for Republican leaders who’ve abandoned or wavered on Trump, Conway says his campaign wants the support of anyone who will endorse Trump.
Trump vows to win election ‘his way’
Updated 7 a.m.: Here comes Donald Trump, unfiltered. Again.
The Republican presidential candidate is vowing to win the election his own way, as party leaders step back from him.
He declared on Fox News on Tuesday night that he’s “just tired of non-support” from Republican leaders and he “wouldn’t want to be in a foxhole with a lot of these people.”
With his campaign floundering, Trump is reverting to the combative, divisive strategy that propelled him to victory in the GOP primary. That means attacking critics — including fellow Republicans. Those close to Trump suggest it’s “open season” on every detractor, regardless of party.
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