Morning Report — Harris, Trump spice broadsides with policy

Vice President Harris’s campaign lost no time Wednesday telling supporters that the annual inflation rate slowed to 2.9 percent in July, the lowest it’s been since 2021, citing new federal data.

“This is great news for the American people,” the campaign wrote, “and quite the opposite of the economic crash that Donald Trump publicly cheered for.”

Who should get the credit? 

“Thanks to Vice President Harris and President Biden’s work, inflation has fallen to the lowest level in more than three years,” the campaign message continued.

Harris and Biden will appear together today in Maryland to repeat that message, arguing that she, the president and Democrats seeking election this year back policies that are lowering prices for middle-class Americans and for many small businesses. 

Harris is expected to expand Friday on her broad economic vision, including opposition to “price gouging,” during a campaign speech in Raleigh, N.C.

Trump, campaigning Wednesday in heavily Democratic Asheville, N.C., told his enthusiastic audience that his campaign team wanted him to talk about his ideas for the economy because voters say it’s the most important issue they’re facing. But the former president quickly shifted to personal critiques of Harris while voicing his regret that Biden was no longer the Democrats’ nominee.

“Today we’re going to talk about one subject and then we’ll start going back to the other, because we sort of love that, don’t we?” Trump said. “They say it’s the most important subject. I’m not sure it is, but they say it is the most important.”

Why Asheville? Theories: The campaign may have needed an indoor venue large enough for a secure rally, plus access to multiple media markets with reach into more conservative Western North Carolina. 

Among economic ideas Trump presented: 

Trade: He suggested import duties of up to 20 percent on the trillions of dollars of goods imported to the U.S. every year. Previously, Trump suggested tariffs of 10 percent on all U.S. trading partners (The Washington Post).

Health care: “I’m going to keep the Affordable Care Act. Unless we can do something much better, we’ll keep it,” he said. When Trump was in the Oval Office, Republicans voted repeatedly to repeal the law enacted in 2010, but the effort went nowhere. The law has been challenged in court more than 2,000 times and the Supreme Court has upheld it three times. Flashback to Trump’s comment in November during the GOP primary when he said he was “seriously looking at alternatives.” 

Taxes: Trump repeated his call to eliminate the taxes that seniors pay on their Social Security benefits, an idea he endorsed on Truth Social on July 31. His advisers have not detailed a plan. Ending taxes on Social Security payments is estimated to cost more than $1.5 trillion, while speeding up the date by which the trust funds for the pension program and Medicare are exhausted.

The Wall Street Journal: Takeaways from Trump’s economic speech.

Trump plans a press conference this afternoon in Bedminster, N.J., three days after he joined a two-hour conversation with Tesla founder Elon Musk on the social media platform X. He held a freewheeling press conference last week in Florida and phoned “Fox & Friends” to discuss headlines of the day. 

Trump’s response to Harris’s enthusiastic crowds and her surge in recent polls is simple: more Trump.

The Harris campaign’s rebuttal Wednesday relied on Trump’s determination to stick with his familiar stump speech and combative style more than deep dives into 2025 policy and legislation. Voters, they believe, fill in the blanks.

“The evidence is clear,” Harris’s team wrote, linking specifics to recent news accounts. “Trump’s economic agenda would be catastrophic. … Independent expert analysis found Trump’s economic agenda will trigger a recession by mid-2025, cost over 3 million jobs, raise costs for families by $2,500 per year, increase the debt by $4 trillion, send inflation skyrocketing and hurt everyone but the richest Americans.”

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LEADING THE DAY

CAMPAIGN POLITICS

The Hill’s Jared Gans updates the current polling in seven swing states and explains why two things are true: Harris’s survey numbers are rising and the presidential race remains highly competitive in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

This morning, the first Emerson College Polling national survey following Biden’s withdrawal from the contest found Harris leading Trump 50 percent to 46 percent. Five percent of likely voters are undecided. The survey’s margin of error was plus or minus 3 percent.

The Cook Political Report and a new Quinnipiac University poll found Harris opening up a lead in Pennsylvania, the largest swing state, through which she and her running mate will barnstorm beginning Sunday ahead of the Democratic Party’s nominating convention. Biden narrowly defeated Trump by 1.17 points in Pennsylvania in 2020.

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ZOOM IN

ADMINISTRATION

Searching for solutions: The Justice Department and state attorneys general are considering a breakup of Google as a possible remedy among various scenarios that could address concerns about the tech behemoth’s monopoly over online searches, Bloomberg News and The New York Times reported. Alphabet-owned Google was found last week to have violated antitrust law. Still in the early stages of deliberations for what is expected to be a lengthy process that likely will be appealed up through the courts, the government will confer with other companies and experts to discuss proposals to address Google’s power. A court hearing is scheduled Sept. 6 to discuss next steps.

Space turf: A pair of U.S. Air Force bases would receive as cargo some pharmaceuticals manufactured in microgravity in space under pending House legislation. California-based Varda Space Industries is the first company to successfully carry out commercial space manufacturing and the only commercial space company to deliver such cargo to the U.S. Varda is at the forefront of a rapidly evolving and confusing governance dispute described by some as a “constitutional crisis,” reports The Hill’s Saul Elbein.

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ELSEWHERE

INTERNATIONAL

Ukraine’s gains: Ukraine’s forces Wednesday advanced further into Russia’s Kursk region as Kyiv said its gains would provide a strategic buffer zone to protect its border areas from Russian attacks, Reuters reported. 

Kyiv’s surge into Russian territory last week caught Moscow by surprise, reportedly embarrassing Russian President Vladimir Putin. “It’s creating a real dilemma for Putin, and we’ve been in direct contact, constant contact, with the Ukrainians,” Biden told reporters Tuesday. “That’s all I’m going to say about it while it’s active.”

Russian forces that began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 had been grinding out steady gains all year. President Volodymyr Zelensky said he met top officials to discuss the humanitarian situation in an occupied area that Kyiv says exceeds 390 square miles.

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THE CLOSER

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