Axios AM: Mike's Top 10 — State-by-state map: GOP's youth crisis — Asteroid grab — White-collar crackdown

1 big thing: GOP's massive youth crisis | Thursday, October 22, 2020

View in browser   Presented By Facebook   Axios AM By Mike Allen ·Oct 22, 2020 🎤 Happy Debate Day! Today's Smart Brevity™ count: 1,169 words ... 4½ minutes. 💻 I hope you'll join me tomorrow at 3:30 p.m. ET for an Axios virtual event with former national security adviser H.R. McMaster, Voto Latino CEO and president María Teresa Kumar and Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.). Register here.  🇺🇸 🇮🇱 Situational awareness: A joint U.S.-Israeli delegation traveled secretly to Sudan yesterday for talks on a possible normalization announcement between the countries that could be released in the next few days, Axios contributor Barak Ravid scoops.     1 big thing: GOP's massive youth crisis Data: SurveyMonkey. Chart: Danielle Alberti/Axios There are only five states where under-35 voters embrace President Trump over Joe Biden — Arkansas, Idaho, South Dakota, West Virginia and Wyoming — Margaret Talev writes from new 50-state SurveyMonkey-Tableau data for Axios. Why it matters: These scattered red spots aren't swing states, vividly illustrating Trump's peril if young people were to actually turn out this year. Trump's path to re-election depends heavily on younger adults staying home. The data is a warning for the Republican Party in nearly every state as it looks beyond November. Among 640,328 likely voters surveyed nationally in multiple waves from June through this week, younger voters strongly supported Biden over Trump in most states — including Texas (59%-40%), Georgia (60%-39%) and even deep-red South Carolina (56%-43%). The bottom line: SurveyMonkey chief research officer Jon Cohen told Axios that because younger voters are less reliable to turn out, "there is the conditional 'if they vote.'" Share these maps.     2. Our weekly map: The pandemic is getting worse again Data: The COVID Tracking Project, state health departments. (*Due to a database error, Missouri had a 3-day gap in reporting from Oct. 11-13.) Map: Andrew Witherspoon/Axios Every available piece of data proves it: The pandemic is getting worse again, all across America, Axios' Sam Baker and Andrew Witherspoon report. Hospitalizations are up: There are about 39,000 people in U.S. hospitals today for COVID-19, the most since early August. Another key metric — the percentage of all tests that come back positive — is also on the rise. The positivity rate grew to about 5.3% over the past week. A rising positivity rate means we're not simply catching more cases. It means there are more cases out there to catch. One piece of good news: The death rate from the virus is the one thing that isn't going up. Patients who are in the hospital for coronavirus — those with the most severe infections — have about a 7.6% chance of dying, according to new research. That's a significant improvement from the early days of the pandemic. But a 7.6% chance of death is still higher than other infections, including the flu. Share this story.     3. U.S.: Iran, Russia caught meddling U.S. officials say emails purporting to be from the far-right group Proud Boys were actually from Iran. Via MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show"   At a surprise 7:30 p.m. briefing, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said Iran and Russia have obtained voter registration information that can be used to undermine confidence in the U.S. election system, Axios' Jacob Knutson writes. Ratcliffe said Iran sent threatening emails to Democratic voters this week. Voters in Florida and Alaska received threatening emails claiming to be from the far-right Proud Boys. FBI Director Chris Wray, who followed Ratcliffe at the briefing, said: "You should be confident that your vote counts. Early, unverified claims to the contrary should be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism." Go deeper: Read Wray's statement. ... Watch the video.     A message from Facebook We support updated internet regulations     At Facebook, we continue to take steps to improve our platforms such as tripling our safety and security teams, building privacy tools, and more. Updated internet regulations will set standards for addressing today's toughest challenges. Read why we support updated internet regulations.     4. Pic du jour: Asteroid grab Photo: NASA via AP NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft briefly touched the surface of an asteroid Tuesday in a bid to collect a sample from the space rock that will one day return to Earth, Axios Space author Miriam Kramer writes. Why it matters: Scientists are hoping to study a sample from the asteroid, named Bennu, to piece together more about the solar system's evolution. It was the first asteroid-sampling effort by the U.S.     5. White-collar crime crackdown Illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios   America has waited a decade for an aggressive government crackdown on white-collar crime. Now, just before the election, and in the middle of a bull market, it has arrived, Axios' Felix Salmon writes. Why it matters: When times are good, investors become more trusting and more greedy. That makes them more likely to put their money into fraudulent or criminal enterprises. When markets surge, investors lower their guard. So after a decade-long bull market, there is no shortage of those frauds to prosecute. Just this week, we've seen headlines about multi-billion dollar fines for Goldman Sachs and Purdue Pharma; the unveiling of a major antitrust case against Google; venture capitalist Elliott Broidy pleading guilty to accepting millions of fraudulently-obtained dollars; an allegation that software magnate Bob Brockman criminally evaded taxes on some $2 billion of income; and an admission of tax fraud by Robert Smith, the founder and CEO of Vista Equity Partners. Share this story.     6. Obama unloads: "This is not a reality show. This is reality" Photo: Alex Edelman/AFP via Getty Images With horns honking approval, President Obama made his first trail appearance for Joe Biden, speaking passionately — and with a dash of humor — for just over half an hour at a drive-in rally in Philadelphia: [H]e's got a secret Chinese bank account. How is that possible? How is that possible? A secret Chinese bank account! Listen, can you imagine if I had had a secret Chinese bank account when I was running for re-election. You think Fox News mighta been a little concerned about that? They would've called me "Beijing Barry." ... And with Joe and Kamala at the helm, you're not gonna have to think about the crazy things they said every day. ... You're not going to have to argue about them every day. It just won't be so exhausting. You might be able to have a Thanksgiving dinner without having an argument. ... We wouldn't tolerate it in our own family, except for maybe crazy uncle somewhere ... And why are folks making excuses for that? "Oh, well, that's just him." ... No! There are consequences to these actions. They embolden other people to be cruel and divisive and racist. Read the transcript.     7. Tales from the trail: Plexiglass shields are back Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images At tonight's debate in Nashville (9 p.m. ET), President Trump and Joe Biden will be separated by plexiglass shields, like the candidates were for the V.P. debate. 🥊 Sen. Mitt Romney told CNN's Manu Raju: "I did not vote for President Trump," but didn't elaborate. 😷 Chris Christie writes in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, "I Should Have Worn a Mask ... It's not a partisan or cultural symbol, not a sign of weakness or virtue": Wear it or you may regret it — as I did. 🗞️ How it's playing ... The New York Times     8. Curtains for Quibi Quibi's "Turnstyle" technology. Photo: Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images   Quibi, the video subscription streaming service, announced it's shutting down, Axios' Sara Fischer reports. Why it matters: The six-month-old app had struggled to hit its subscriber growth targets amid the pandemic. The company raised a whopping $1.75 billion from Hollywood behemoths like Walt Disney, NBCUniversal and AT&T's WarnerMedia. The company never confirmed paid subscriber numbers, but founder Jeffrey Katzenberg (an investor in Axios) told the N.Y. Times in May that he had 3.5 million downloads. Read an open letter from Katzenberg and CEO Meg Whitman.     9. Graphic du jour: Manufacturing "tea kettle" Data: FRED; Chart: Axios Visuals 💰 Sign up for Dion Rabouin's daily Axios Markets.     10. First look: Top artists' "I voted" Courtesy New York Magazine New York Magazine, in conjunction with the nonpartisan group I am a voter, enlisted 48 artists from diverse backgrounds and artistic influences to design stickers for a series of four covers for its Oct. 26 issue. Each magazine has a peelable sticker sheet inside, the magazine told me. Get the magazine. Courtesy TIME For the first time, the TIME logo on the magazine's cover has been replaced with another word: VOTE. Molly Ball writes: "This is the biggest difference from 2016: though all the data seem to point to a Trump loss, the pundits who were so certain four years ago now have a haunted air. To count Trump out is to tempt fate."     A message from Facebook We support updated internet regulations     We support new regulations that hold companies, including Facebook, accountable on issues including: Combating foreign election interference. Protecting people's privacy. Enabling safe and easy data transfer between platforms. Read why we support updated internet regulations.   📱 Thanks for starting your day with us. Invite your friends to sign up for Axios AM/PM.   Axios thanks our partners for supporting our newsletters. Sponsorship has no influence on editorial content. Axios, 3100 Clarendon B‌lvd, Suite 1300, Arlington VA 22201   You received this email because you signed up for newsletters from Axios. Change your preferences or unsubscribe here.   Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up now to get Axios in your inbox. And make sure you subscribe to Mike's afternoon wrap up, Axios PM.   Follow Axios on social media: