Donald Trump Used Legally Dubious Method to Avoid Paying Taxes - New York Times

As that empire floundered in the early 1990s, Mr. Trump pressured his financial backers to forgive hundreds of millions of dollars in debt he could not repay. While the cancellation of so much debt gave new life to Mr. Trump's casinos, it created a potentially crippling problem with the Internal Revenue Service. In the eyes of the I.R.S., a dollar of canceled debt is the same as a dollar of taxable income. This meant Mr. Trump faced the painful prospect of having to report the hundreds of millions of dollars of canceled debt as if it were hundreds of millions of dollars of taxable income.

But Mr. Trump's audacious tax-avoidance maneuver gave him a way to simply avoid reporting any of that canceled debt to the I.R.S. "He's getting something for absolutely nothing," John L. Buckley, who served as the chief of staff for Congress's Joint Committee on Taxation in 1993 and 1994, said in an interview.

The new documents, which include correspondence from Mr. Trump's tax lawyers and bond offering disclosure statements, might also help explain how Mr. Trump reported a staggering loss of $916 million in his 1995 tax returns^[1], portions of which were first published by The Times last month.

Photo

A line from one of Mr. Trump's 1995 tax returns^[2] obtained by The New York Times.

United States tax laws allowed Mr. Trump to use that $916 million loss to cancel out an equivalent amount of taxable income. But tax experts have been debating how Mr. Trump could have legally declared a deduction of that magnitude at all. Among other things, they have noted that Mr. Trump's huge casino losses should have been offset by the hundreds of millions of dollars in taxable income he surely must have reported to the I.R.S. in the form of canceled casino debt.

By avoiding reporting his canceled casino debt in the first place, however, Mr. Trump's $916 million deduction would not have been reduced by hundreds of millions of dollars. He could have preserved the deduction and used it instead to avoid paying income taxes he might otherwise have owed on books, TV shows or branding deals. Under the rules in effect in 1995, the $916 million loss could have been used to wipe out more than $50 million a year in taxable income for 18 years.

Mr. Trump declined to comment for this article.

"Your email suggests either a fundamental misunderstanding or an intentional misreading of the law," Hope Hicks, Mr. Trump's spokeswoman, said in a statement. "Your thesis is a criticism, not just of Mr. Trump, but of all taxpayers who take the time and spend the money to try to comply with the dizzyingly complex and ambiguous tax laws without paying more tax than they owe. Mr. Trump does not think that taxpayers should file returns that resolve all doubt in favor of the I.R.S. And any tax experts that you have consulted are engaged in pure speculation. There is no news here."

Mr. Trump financed his three Atlantic City gambling resorts with $1.3 billion in debt, most of it in the form of high interest junk bonds. By late 1990, after months of escalating operating losses, New Jersey casino regulators were warning that "a complete financial collapse of the Trump Organization was not out of the question." By 1992, all three casinos had filed for bankruptcy, and bondholders were ultimately forced to forgive hundreds of millions of dollars in debt to salvage at least part of their investment.

Photo

The Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City in June. The casino closed in October after years of losing money. Credit Mark Makela for The New York Times

The story of how Mr. Trump sidestepped a potentially ruinous tax bill from that forgiven debt emerged from documents recently discovered by The Times during a search of the casino bankruptcy filings. The documents offer only a partial description of events, and none of Mr. Trump's tax lawyers agreed to be interviewed for this article.

At the time, Mr. Trump would have been hard-pressed to pay tens of millions of dollars in taxes. According to assessments of his financial stability by New Jersey casino regulators, there were times in the early 1990s when Mr. Trump had no more than a few million dollars in his various bank accounts. He was so strapped for cash that his creditors were apoplectic when they learned that Mr. Trump had bought Marla Maples an engagement ring estimated to be worth $250,000.

It is unclear who first glimpsed a way for Mr. Trump to dodge a huge tax bill. But the basic maneuver he used was essentially a new twist on a contentious strategy corporations had been using for years to avoid taxes created by canceled debt.

The strategy, known among tax practitioners as a "stock-for-debt swap," relies on mathematical sleight of hand. Say a company can repay only $60 million of a $100 million bank loan. If the bank forgives the remaining $40 million, the company faces a large tax bill because it will have to report that canceled $40 million debt as taxable income.

Clever tax lawyers found a way around this inconvenience. The company would simply swap stock for the $40 m illion in debt it could not repay. This way, it would look as if the entire $100 million loan had been repaid, and presto: There would be no tax bill due for $40 million in canceled debt.

Best of all, it did not matter if the actual market value of the stock was considerably less than the $40 million in canceled debt. (Stock in an effectively insolvent company could easily be next to worthless.) Even in the opaque, rarefied world of gaming impenetrable tax regulations, this particular maneuver was about as close as a company could get to waving a magic wand and making taxes disappear.

Alarmed by the obvious potential for abuse, Congress and the I.R.S. made repeated efforts during the 1980s to curb this brand of tax wizardry before banning its use by corporations altogether in 1993. But while policy makers were busy trying to stop corporations from using this particular ploy, the endlessly creative club of elite tax advisers was inventing a new way to circumvent the ban, this time through the use of partnerships.

This was the twist that was especially beneficial to Mr. Trump. Wealthy families like the Trumps often own real estate and other assets through partnerships rather than corporations. Mr. Trump, for example, owned all three of his Atlantic City casinos through partnerships, an arrangement that allowed casino profits to flow directly to his personal tax returns when times were good.

But what if times were bad? What if Mr. Trump's casino partnerships could not repay hundreds of millions of dollars they owed to bondholders? And what if the bondholders were persuaded to forgive this debt? Wouldn't that force the partnerships — i.e., Mr. Trump — to report hundreds of millions of dollars of taxable income in the form of canceled debt?

Enter the tax advisers with their audacious plan: Why not eliminate all that taxable income from canceled debt by swapping "partnership equity" for debt in exactly the same way corporations had been swapping company stock for debt?

True enough, the I.R.S. and Congress had clearly signaled their disapproval of the basic concept. Fred T. Goldberg , who was the I.R.S. commissioner under George Bush, recalled in an interview that the I.R.S. frowned on partnership equity-for-debt swaps for the same reason it objected to corporate stock-for-debt swaps. "The fiction is that the partnership interest has the same value as the debt," he said. Lee A. Sheppard, a contributing editor to Tax Notes, wrote in 1991 that trying to find a legal justification for this tactic was akin to proving "the existence of the Loch Ness monster."

On the campaign trail, Mr. Trump boasts of his mastery of tax loopholes and claims no other candidate for the White House has ever known more about the tax code. This background, he argues with evident disgust, gives him special insight into the way wealthy elites buy off politicians and hire high-priced lawyers and accountants to rig the tax system — just as, he claims, they rig elections.

That insight was on display in 1991 and 1992 when he was laying the groundwork to make a multimillion-dollar tax bill disappear.

Before proceeding with his plan, Mr. Trump did what most prudent taxpayers do: He sought a formal tax opinion letter. Such letters, typically written by highly paid lawyers w ho spend entire careers mastering the roughly 10,000 pages of ever-changing statutes that make up the United States tax code, can provide important protection to taxpayers. As long as a tax adviser blesses a particular tax strategy in a formal opinion letter, the taxpayer most likely will not face penalties even if the I.R.S. ultimately rules the strategy was improper.

The language used in tax opinion letters has a specialized meaning understood by all tax professionals. So, for example, when a tax lawyer writes that a shelter is "more likely than not" going to be approved by the I.R.S., this means there is at least a 51 percent chance the shelter will withstand scrutiny. (This is known as an "M.L.T.N." letter in the vernacular of tax lawyers.) A "should" letter means there is about a 75 percent chance the I.R.S. will not object. The gold standard, a "will" letter, mean s the I.R.S. is all but certain to bless the tax avoidance strategy.

But the opinion letters Mr. Trump received from his tax lawyers at Willkie Farr & Gallagher were far from the gold standard. The letters bluntly warned that there was no statute, regulation or judicial opinion that explicitly permitted Mr. Trump's tax gambit. "Due to the lack of definitive judicial or administrative authority," his lawyers wrote, "substantial uncertainties exist with respect to many of the tax consequences of the plan."

Document

Donald Trump's Lawyers' Warnings on Tax Maneuver

Mr. Trump's own lawyers at Willkie Farr & Gallagher cautioned him about using a a tax avoidance maneuver in the 1990s.

^[3]

One letter, 25 pages long, analyzed seven distinct components of Mr. Trump's proposed tax maneuver. It found only "substantial authority" for six of the components. In the stilted language of tax opinion letters, the phrase "substantial authority" is a red flag that the lawyers believe the I.R.S. can be expected to rule against the taxpayer roughly two-thirds of the time. In other words, Mr. Trump's tax lawyers were telling him there were at least six different reasons the I.R.S. would probably cry foul if he were audited. In anticipation of that possibility, the lawyers even laid out a fallback plan that would have allowed Mr. Trump to spread the pain of a large tax hit over many years if the I.R.S. ultimately balked.

It is unclear whether the I.R.S. ever challenged Mr. Trump' s use of this specific tax maneuver. According to a financial disclosure statement prepared by Mr. Trump's accountants, he was under audit by the tax authorities as of 1993, only a year after he avoided reporting hundreds of millions of dollars in taxable income because of this legally suspect tactic. But the results of that audit are unknown, and the agency declined to comment on Monday.

Regardless of whether the I.R.S. objected, Mr. Trump's tax avoidance in this case violated a central principle of American tax law, said Mr. Buckley, the former chief of staff for Congress's Joint Committee on Taxation, who later served as chief tax counsel for Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee.

"He deducted somebody else's losses," Mr. Buckley said. By that, Mr. Buckley meant that only the bondholders who forgave Mr. Trump's unpaid casino debts should have been allowed to use those losses to offset future income and reduce their taxes. That Mr. Trump used the same losses to reduce his taxes ultimately increases the tax burden on everyone else, Mr. Buckley explained. "He is double dipping big time."

In any event, Mr. Trump can no longer benefit from the same maneuver. Just as Congress acted in 1993 to ban stock-for-debt swaps by corporations, it acted in 2004 to ban equity-for-debt swaps by partnerships.

Among the members of Congress who voted to finally close the loophole: Senator Hillary Clinton of New York.

Continue reading the main story^[4]

References

1. ^{^} 1995 tax returns (www.nytimes.com)
2. ^{^} 1995 tax returns (www.nytimes.com)
3. ^{^} Document Donald Trump's Lawyers' Warnings on Tax Maneuver Mr. Trump's own lawyers at Willkie Farr & Gal lagher cautioned him about using a a tax avoidance maneuver in the 1990s. (www.nytimes.com)
4. ^{^} Continue reading the main story (www.nytimes.com)

In final sprint, Trump targets Democratic states while Clinton tries to gin up enthusiasm among minorities - Washington Post

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is redirecting his attention to traditionally Democratic states in the final days of the 2016 campaign in an urgent attempt to expand what for weeks has been an increasingly narrow path to victory.

Following FBI Director James B. Comey's surprise announcement Friday that the agency would once again examine emails related to Hillary Clinton's time as secretary of state, Trump and his advisers see a fresh opportunity to make gains in states that most public polls have shown as out of reach. They spent the weekend deliberating ways to seize on what they see as a dramatic turn in the campaign's closing chapter and scramble the political map following a rough stretch beset by controversy.

Trump held rallies Sunday in Colorado and New Mexico, and he was scheduled to make two stops Monday in Michigan — and visit Wisconsin the day after that.

Clinton, meanwhile, is focused on shoring up turnout and enthusias m, particularly among minority voters, in such critical battlegrounds as North Carolina, Florida and Ohio. Early voting data from Ohio contains ominous signs of a lack of enthusiasm for Clinton, notably in places such as Cleveland's Cuyahoga County, where high black turnout propelled President Obama to victory in 2008 and 2012.

As a result, Clinton's campaign has launched an intensive effort to send her most popular surrogates, including the president, first lady Michelle Obama and rapper Jay Z, across the country.

Latest results from the Post-ABC presidential tracking poll

Clinton's operation has also come out forcefully against what aides described as Comey's "unprecedented" decision to release a "vague" and "misleading" letter. One senior aide said the campaign does not believe Comey's actions have measurably changed the state of the race.

[FBI obtains search warrant to search newly discovered emails potentially relevant to Clinton investigation^[1]]

Trump's sudden blue-state push faces steep challenges both organizationally and demographically. In several of the states in question, millions of early votes have already been cast, and polling indicates that the planned shift faces hurdles.

Nationally, the contest is tightening in tracking surveys to within the margin of error, bu t Trump remains behind by mid-to-high single digits — much as Mitt Romney was four years ago — in the states he is hoping to turn into unusual final-week fronts.

According to the latest Washington Post-ABC poll, a majority of all likely voters is unmoved by Comey's decision, which has spurred a fierce backlash from Clinton backers.

[Post-ABC poll finds tight presidential race, with mixed reaction to FBI's review of Clinton's emails^[2]]

Trump campaign chief exec utive Stephen K. Bannon has settled on three states in particular — Michigan, Wisconsin and New Mexico — where the candidate and campaign will devote more time and money, said four people familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal campaign talks. All three states were won by Obama in 2008 and 2012.

Choose your own electoral adventure: Map out the ways Clinton or Trump could win

Bannon believes that if GOP voters rapidly "come home" nationally in light of recent events, that turnout plus late-breaking support among independents and blue-collar workers could bring new states into play beyond Pennsylvania, Nevada and Colorado — Democratic strongholds where Trump has been campaigning for months and remains behind, the people said.

Democrats and many Republicans remain skeptical that Trump can reach 270 electoral v otes with this 11th-hour ploy or any other. But Trump strategists argued Sunday that the race's fast-changing dynamics and unpredictability give them an opening despite polling and fundamentals leaning in Clinton's favor.

These advisers privately described Trump's path to the White House not as a direct shot but as a series of razor-thin upsets in several much-discussed battlegrounds, as well as unexpected bank shots in blue states. All of it would depend on better-than-expected Republican support nationally, they said.

"States that haven't usually been open to Republican nominees are going to see Mr. Trump and his supporters again and again," David Bossie, Trump's deputy campaign manager, said in an interview. "We see this like 1980 and 1984, when union leadership was against Ronald Reagan but many union members went for him. That's what we think can happen in the Upper Midwest and in states like New Mexico — blue-collar voters goi ng for Donald Trump."

Bossie said Clinton should expect a "full-frontal assault" before Election Day. "We're on the offensive everywhere."

Bossie said that Comey's letter to congressional leaders about renewing the Clinton probe was not the impetus for the expansion. He said Trump's trips to Michigan, Wisconsin and New Mexico, as well as Maine, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania, were planned before the FBI director made his announcement and were based on confidence in Trump's appeal to non-Republican voters.

For Clinton, her campaign's concentration has been on stoking its support in places where Democrats are assured about their campaign infrastructure but concerned that some Democratic voters, particularly minorities, may choose to stay home.

As Trump makes moves into Michigan and Wisconsin, the Clinton campaign and its allies are dubious about whether the Trump campaign will actually be able to move numbers there or ramp up their organization. But they are trying to energize voters in cities, including Detroit and Milwaukee, where her success could depend on a robust urban turnout should Trump attract unexpected working-class support.

The Clinton campaign also recently began spending money on television in Wisconsin for the first time this year, casting the ad buy as a way of bolstering support in a state with a hard-fought Senate race.

Michigan, which Democrats have carried in presidential races since 1992, is a clear test of the strength of Democrats' blue wall. Much of Obama's margin came from exceptional turnout in Detroit's Wayne County; he won it by 382,032 votes, on the strength of black and Muslim turnout that Democrats acknowledge this year is not yet at its Obama-era pace.

Clinton supporters learned nervousness in Michigan in this year's Democratic primary, when public polls failed to catch a surge by Sen. Ber nie Sanders (I-Vt.). Some white pockets of the Detroit area that went to sleep on the Michigan-born Romney are visibly more active for Trump.

On Sunday at a rally in Taylor, a Detroit suburb, Clinton's running mate, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, suggested that the bombshell nature of Comey's letter would end up helping Democratic turnout.

"It's kind of revved up some enthusiasm, a little bit of righteous anger," Kaine said.

Clinton is also still attempting to expand her own map, making a serious play to flip Arizona, a state the campaign believes she can win.

One Democratic strategist outside of the campaign said that private polling data had begun to show a closer race before Comey's letter, due largely to Republican voters drifting back into Trump's fold.

With early voting already underway in most of the contested battlegrounds, Clinton has dispatched an army of surrogates to get out the vo te, including celebrity artists Jay Z, Jennifer Lopez and Katy Perry. On Tuesday, the president will rally in Columbus, Ohio, and on Wednesday he will appear in Raleigh, N.C. Stops in Jacksonville, a city where African Americans make up 30 percent of the population, and South Florida, are planned, as are more events headlined by Michelle Obama.

In Nevada, Florida and Colorado — states Obama won — early and absentee turnout has been strong overall and is so far on track to match or exceed 2012 levels, according to available data.

But in Iowa and Ohio, turnout levels have been low. Take Cuyahoga County in Ohio, a Democratic stronghold, where in-person and absentee voting is down by more than 50 percent, compared with a similar period in 2012. That is in part because of the state's cutback in early voting days, but it does not bode well for Democrats' efforts to capitalize on their historic strength with the early vote.

Disproportionately high blac k turnout in Cuyahoga and Franklin counties were important factors in helping Obama eke out a two-point win in that state over Mitt Romney in 2012, said Cornell Belcher, one of Obama's pollsters in 2008 and 2012.

"You don't see the sort of energy there this time around as you saw before," Belcher said. "If on Election Day our electorate is 74 percent white, Hillary Clinton is probably not going to be president."

In North Carolina, another battle­ground that Trump almost certainly must win to take the White House, Democratic turnout has fallen compared with 2012 in early voting — although Democrats continue to maintain a significant lead over Republicans. Black turnout has also come up short.

Clinton senior adviser Joel Benenson struck an optimistic note over the weekend, noting that black turnout in early voting on Saturday in pivotal counties in both Ohio and North Carolina exceeded 2012 levels, which he cast as a micr ocosm of enthusiasm and engagement among that group.

"For voters of color, this is the first time in their life that they're hearing from a presidential candidate the kind of racially divisive rhetoric they've heard from Donald Trump in this campaign," Benenson said. "That is going to be on the minds of every voter on Election Day."

Democrats also say they expect a high number of crossover voters because of Trump's struggles with more centrist Republican voters and how Clinton is overperforming Obama with college-educated white voters. That could mean that while Republican ballots are coming in at a respectable clip, Trump may not be able to rely on all of those voters.

In coming days, Trump allies will attempt to counter the Clinton campaign's barrage of surrogates with Trump family members and high-profile supporters, including former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who will appear this week in historically Democratic enclaves and suburban swing districts. The campaign announced Sunday that Trump's wife, Melania, will speak Thursday in the moderate suburbs of Philadelphia.

Most Democrats are buoyed if somewhat skittish about the polls. In the Post-ABC poll, 6 in 10 voters say the Comey news will make no difference in their vote, while just over 3 in 10 say it makes them less likely to support her. Two percent say they are more likely to back her as a result.

In the three new states that Trump is targeting, he is trailing. In Michigan, he is behind by an average of eight percentage points, a margin nearly identical to Obama's nine-point margin there in 2012. He is behind by an average of six points in Wisconsin, also similar to Obama's margin in 2012. New Mexico's polling average shows Trump behind by 10 percentage points, although there have been few regular state-level surveys, and Trump's advisers said their internal polls show a closer ra ce. In Pennsylvania, Clinton leads by an average of six points in recent polls.

Trump bragged about his new strength in recent polls Sunday morning, despite repeatedly claiming that polls were "rigged" against him on the campaign trail. The celebrity businessman also claimed, without evidence, that "Twitter, Google and Facebook are burying the FBI criminal investigation of Clinton."

"We are now leading in many polls, and many of these were taken before the criminal investigation announcement on Friday — great in states!" Trump tweeted Sunday.

Clinton urged churchgoers in Florida on Sunday not to be "distracted by all the noise in the political environment."

During her remarks to about 300 people at the New Mount Olive Baptist Church in Fort Lauderdale, one of several planned stops for the day in the Miami area, Clinton made no mention of the renewed FBI scrutiny related to the private email server she used as sec retary of state. But she stressed the value of perseverance when confronting obstacles in life.

"Everyone — everyone — is knocked down in life," Clinton told the predominantly black congregation. "And as my mother showed me and taught me, what matters is whether you get back up. And those of us who are people of faith know that getting back up is what we are called to do."

Comey reignited a political firestorm over the emails when he alerted select members of Congress on Friday that FBI officials had detected a batch of emails pertinent to the case during an "unrelated" investigation. Persons close to the situation have told The Post that the emails were found on a computer belonging to former congressman Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who is under investigation for allegedly exchanging lewd messages with a 15-year-old girl. Weiner is the estranged husband of top Clinton adviser Huma Abedin.

Scott Clement and Jose A. DelReal in Washington, John Wagner in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Sean Sullivan in Las Vegas, David Weigel in Detroit and Vanessa Williams in Greensboro, N.C., contributed to this report.

References

1. ^{^} FBI obtains search warrant to search newly discovered emails potentially relevant to Clinton investigation (www.washingtonpost.com)
2. ^{^} Post-ABC poll finds tight presidential race, with mixed reaction to FBI's review of Clinton's emails (www.washingtonpost.com)

Clinton campaign accuses FBI director of 'double standard' in email probe - Washington Post

CINCINNATI, Ohio — Top aides for Hillary Clinton on Monday accused FBI Director James Comey of a "double standard" in his handling of the investigation into Clinton's use of a private email server as secretary of state.

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook called on Comey to explain why he rushed to disclose new information about the status of the investigation into Clinton, while reportedly ^[1]opposing, on the grounds that it would be too close to the election, a public statement by the FBI that the Russian government was seeking the influence the presidential race.

"It i s impossible to view this as anything less than a blatant double standard," Mook said.

Democrats are reeling from the news late last week that — a little more than a week before the election -- Comey is revisiting his probe into the potential mishandling of classified material.

Aiming to quickly redirect the focus of the presidential race, the Clinton campaign seized on news reports that Comey had rejected efforts within the FBI to identify Russia as the source of hacking incidents this year, which primarily effected Democratic organizations, including Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.

Clinton's press secretary, Brian Fallon, said that Comey "set a standard for narrating a play-by-play for matters involving Hilary Clinton," but has not set the same standard for inquiries into Russian hacking and potential ties to Republican nominee Donald Trump's campaign.

"Director Comey owes the public an explanation for this inconsistency,� � Fallon said.

[Justice Department says it is moving quickly in the renewed investigation into Clinton email server^[2]]

Meanwhile, in Warren, Mich., Trump hammered on the issue of Clinton's emails during an afternoon rally that started more than two hours late in the Detroit suburb.

He said that he expects the FBI to find some of the 33,000 emails that have yet to be uncovered among the 650,000 emails that are repo rtedly on the laptop at the center of the latest controversy. He repeated his claim that Clinton's use of a private email server "the biggest scandal since Watergate," and told Clinton to stop blaming the scandal on others.

""Hillary Clinton wants to blame everyone else for her mounting legal troubles," Trump said. "But she has brought this situation onto herself. She's got nobody to blame but herself."

While campaigning in Ohio earlier in the day, Clinton moved to turn the conversation to national security and Trump's fitness for office.

Latest results from the Post-ABC presidential tracking poll

The Democratic presidential nominee addressed the email issue at the start of a speech at Kent State University.

"I'm sure a lot of you may be asking what this new email story is about, and why in the world the FBI would decide to jump into an election with no evidence of wrongdoing," less than two weeks before Election Day, Clinton said. "That's a good question."

"I understand. And as I've said, I'm not making any excuses" for setting up her private email system as she did, Clinton said. "I've said it was a mistake, and I regret it."

[FBI Director James Comey's Republican critics are growing by the hour^[3]]

On Monday afternoon, the Justice Department responded^[4] to growing calls from a bipartisan group of lawmakers in Congress for additional information about the renewed inquiry. In a letter to lawmakers, the Justice Department said it was moving "as expeditiously as possible" to investigate the new emails, but it did not provide any additional information.

Clinton's campaign pushed back hard all weekend against Comey's decision. Clinton denies that her email put the country at risk, and her campaign says she testified truthfully.

Othe r Democrats also demanded swift answers about what Comey is looking for and why he chose to renew the inquiry less than two weeks before Election Day. Democratic senators asked for answers by the end of the day Monday.

At her rally in Ohio, Clinton predicted that the new inquiry will reach the same conclusion as Comey did at the end of the FBI investigation in July, when he announced that despite what he called sloppiness, there was no evidence of criminal conduct.

"There is no case," Clinton said, adding that she thinks most Americans have long since decided how they feel about the email issue. "Now, what people are focused on is choosing the next president and commander in chief of the United States of America."

[Is America addicted to this election?^[5]]

Campaigning earlier Monday in Grand Rapids, Mich., Trump said that Comey had "brought back his reputation" with his notice to Congress on Friday that he would look at new information in the case.

"It took a lot of guts" for Comey to change course three months after ending the probe into whether classified information was compromised, Trump said. "I really disagreed with him" over that earlier decision. "I was not his fan. But what he did brought back his reputation."

During her lengthy speech at Kent State, Clinton returned to an argument that has been among her most potent: that Trump's "very thin skin" and brash, ill-informed commentary on world affai rs disqualifies him as commander in chief.

"I'm running against a man who says he doesn't understand why we can't use nuclear weapons. He wants more countries to have nuclear weapons." Clinton said. "And if you're telling yourself he's going to surround himself with smart people to stop these crazy ideas, remember this: He was asked who he consults on foreign policy. Donald Trump said he doesn't need to consult because, and I quote, 'I have a very good brain.'"

Turning to Trump's relationship with Vladi­mir Putin, Clinton said the Russian president is playing Trump for a patsy.

"He knows he can use flattery to get into Donald's head, to make Donald the Kremlin's puppet," she said of Putin, "and it seems to be working. Donald has signaled to Putin that he will let Russia do whatever it wants."

[Clinton loses popularity edge in tight race with Trump, new Post-ABC Tracking Poll finds^[6]]

She also ran through a series of Trump remarks about the NATO alliance, U.S. nuclear umbrella in Asia and other topics that she said show him to be ignorant or reckless.

"This is one of those make-or-break moments for our nation," she said.

Aside from changing the subject from the emails, Clinton's efforts in Ohio are part of a strategy to create several paths to an electoral college victory — the simplest of which would be to win Florida. Clinton spent the weekend campaigning in the Sunshine State^[7], where some polls show Trump leading.

But the campaign has encountered significant obstacles over the weekend after Comey reignited a political firestorm when he said FBI officials had detected a batch of emails pertinent to the earlier case during an "unrelated" investigation.

People close to the situation have told The Washington Post that the emails were found on a computer belonging to disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner, who is under investigation for allegedly exchanging lewd messages with a 15-year-old girl. Weiner is the estranged husband of Clinton campaign vice chairman Huma Abedin.

Abedin, who is very often th e aide closest to Clinton's side on trips, has been absent from the campaign plane since the Comey news broke.

[Donald Trump is refusing to pay his campaign pollster three-quarters of a million dollars^[8]]

In Michigan when Trump first brought up Clinton's emails, the crowd began to loudly chant: "Lock her up! Lock her up!" In the audience was a woman dressed up in an orange prison jumpsuit labeled "Clinton."

As his audience laughed, Trump crowed, "Thank you, Huma," mispronouncing Abedin's firs t name as "OO-ma." "Thank you, Huma! And thank you, Anthony Weiner."

Clinton opened the last full week of campaigning Monday with a television advertisement revisiting the famous 1964 "Daisy" ad about the looming danger of nuclear weapons. The new ad^[9] features the same woman who, as a small girl, plucked petals from a flower in the original ad for President Lyndon Johnson's campaign, which was aimed at Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater.

Clinton's goal at rallies Monday near Cleveland and in Cincinnati is to keep up enthusiasm among Democrats and encourage more early vot ing this week. Former president Bill Clinton campaigned for his wife in Cleveland over the weekend, and President Obama is due in Columbus on Tuesday.

Trump leads Clinton in Ohio by 1.3 percentage points in the RealClearPolitics average of recent polls. That is within the margin of error, meaning the race is effectively tied.

On Sunday night, the FBI obtained a warrant to review the emails^[10], which one official said include a significant number of messages as sociated with Clinton and Abedin. In his letter to Congress, Comey said that whether the emails provide any new information to the Clinton investigation had yet to be determined, but Democrats worry that the news could sway the election.

Johnson reported from Grand Rapids, Mich. Anne Gearan contributed from Washington.

References

1. ^{^} www.cnbc.com (www.cnbc.com)
2. ^{^} Justice Department says it is moving quickly in the renewed investigation into Clinton email server (www.washingtonpost.com)
3. ^{^} FBI Director James Comey's Republican critics are growing by the hour (www.washingtonpost.com)
4. ^{^} www.washingtonpost.com (www.washingtonpost.com)
5. ^{^} Is America addicted to this election? (www.washingtonpost.com)
6. ^{^} Clinton loses popularity edge in tight race with Trump, new Post-ABC Tracking Poll finds (www.washingtonpost.com)
7. ^{^} www.washingtonpost.com (www.washingtonpost.com)
8. ^{^} Donald Trump is refusing to pay his campaign pollster t hree-quarters of a million dollars (www.washingtonpost.com)
9. ^{^} new ad (www.washingtonpost.com)
10. ^{^} www.washingtonpost.com (www.washingtonpost.com)

America Is Already in the Midst of a Voter Suppression Crisis - Slate Magazine

100-year-old Grace Bell Hardison had her registration challenged in North Carolina.

Screenshot via WNCT

Voter suppression doesn't only happen on Election Day. America is already in the midst of a voter suppression crisis. Voters attempting to cast an early ballot are being thwarted and lied to by Republican officials—a problem that will likely escalate into chaos on election day. This crisis is not unexpected; indeed, it's been carefully planned by Republican politicians since the turn of this century^[1]. In recent months, federal courts have attempted to restore voting rights in states where Republicans restricted or revoked them. But early voting has already proved that these efforts cannot turn around years of careful strategizing and disenfranchise ment. The only remaining question is how many qualified voters will have their ballots refused or nullified under illegal Republican regulations.

Mark Joseph Stern is a writer for Slate. He covers the law and LGBTQ issues.

In North Carolina, Grace Bell Hardison, a 100-year-old black woman, felt the sting of voter suppression^[2]. Hardison's voter registration was challenged in a scheme designed to disenfranchise Democrats in Beaufort County. The county was once required to submit all voting changes to the federal government due to its history of discrimination against minority voting, but the Supreme Court revoked this requirement^[3] in 2013. Since then, four individuals, led by Republican Shane Hubers^[4], have attempted to purge 139 voters (most of them black Democrats) from the rolls in Beaufort County by challenging their registration. Voters whose registration is challenged are informed via mail and must appear at a county board of elections or return a notarized form. Otherwise their voting rights are nullified.

Following media attention to her plight, Hardison successfully restored her voting rights. Other North Carolinians were not so lucky. Any registered voter in the state can challenge^[5] another voter's registration; in Moore County, the single person who challenged nearly 400 registered voters just happened to be the  secretary of the county Republican Party. Nearly all of them were purged from the voter rolls. Other counties are engaging in the same chicanery; in Cumberland County alone, officials have purged 3,500 people^[6] from the voter rolls. They will face no resistance from a legislature and governor who, in the words of^[7] the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4^th Circuit, recently passed voting restrictions that "target African Americans with almost surgical precision." The 4^th Circuit blocked many of the worst restrictions from taking effect this election season—but Republican-controlled county election boards have quietly continued to implement^[8] them by limiting the number of polling places and slashing early voting.

In Wisconsin, Zack Moore, a 34-year-old black man, faced voter suppression head on^[9]. (The linked piece, like the above piece about Grace Bell Hardison, is by Ari Berman of the Nation, who's been doing remarkable work reporting on voter suppression.) As required under Wisconsin's stringent new voter ID law^[10], Moore went to the Division of Motor Vehicles to obtain a photo ID to vote, presenting a photo ID from his previous state of residency, a Social Security card, and a pay stub addressed to his home in Wisconsin. It wasn't enough: The DMV demanded his birth certificate. When he told them it was lost, DMV officials told him to drive to Illinois and obtain a new one. As an alternative, Moore entered the ID Petition Process—which would not provide him an ID before Election Day. Eventually, a federal judge had to intervene^[11] to ensure that Moore could acquire the necessary ID. At least 2,200 other Wisconsinites^[12] are still waiting on the IDPP to provide them an ID. Countless other Wisconsin voters have already been denied^[13] the requisite ID because they lack a birth certificate.

In Texas, Molly E. Neck saw voter suppression in action^[14]. When Neck went to vote in San Antonio, she saw a sign declaring that all voters must present a valid ID before casting a ballot. That was simply false: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5^th Circuit struck down that requirement^[15] in August, allowing voters with no ID to sign an affidavit attesting to their identity instead. Texas officials have already been caught^[16] violating this ruling by misleading voters about ID requirements in official voting materials, leading a judge to place the state under court supervision. But individual counties continue to falsely inform voters that an ID is necessary to vote. A federal judge ordered Neck's county^[17] to c omply with the order and remove the false signs. But there are 254 counties in Texas. Judges and voting rights advocates will not win this game of whack-a-mole; it is inevitable that some voters will continue to be lied to by election officials.

In Indiana, police raided a black voter registration drive^[18] on the flimsiest of pretexts^[19] and indefinitely halted its operations, blocking as many as 45,000 votes^[20]. In Georgia, Republican officials refused to process^[21] as many as 100,000 voter registration applications and moved a predominantly black county's polling precinct from a gym to a sheriff's office. In Ohio, a federal judge blocked the state's efforts^[22] to purge 2 million people^[23] from the rolls—but officials are now refusing to reinstate^[24] many of the purged voters.

Of course, it's not just states and counties unlawfully planning to disenfranchise voters. Political operatives and Donald Trump are currently colluding^[25] to intimidate minority voters; the Trump campaign has explicitly boasted^[26] of its "major voter suppression" efforts to drive minorities away from the polls. Trump has urged his supporters^[27] to become "election observers" at minority-heavy polling places, and they've taken the hint: In Ohio, one man explained^[28] his plans to engage in "racial profiling" and stop "people who can't speak American" from casting a ballot.

Democrats have filed a lawsuit^[29] to stop this illegal voter intimidation. But even should the lawsuit succeed, why would we expect anyone to obey the ruling? Republican officials have already proved that officials can violate clear court orders with near-total impunity. They can ignore rulings they dislike and suppress minority votes with ease. They can mislead voters, purge them from the rolls, nullify their ballots, and deprive them of IDs. That is a crisis and an outrage. It is also the simple reality of the 2016 election.

References

1. ^{^} the turn of this century (www.slate.com)
2. ^{^} felt the sting of voter suppression (www.thenation.com)
3. ^{^} revoked this requirement (www.oyez.org)
4. ^{^} led by Republican Shane Hubers (www.thewashingtondailynews.com)
5. ^{^} can challenge (www.thewashingtondailynews.com)
6. ^{^} purged 3,500 people (www.usnews.com)
7. ^{^} in the words of (www.slate.com)
8. ^{^} quietly continued to implement (www.nytimes.com)
9. ^{^} faced voter suppression head on (www.thenation.com)
10. ^{^} stringent new voter ID law (www.brennancenter.org)
11. ^{^} had to intervene (twitter.com)
12. ^{^} At least 2,200 other Wisconsinites (journaltimes.com)
13. ^{^} denied (www.slate.com)
14. ^{^} saw voter suppression in action (www.nytimes.com)
15. ^{^} struck down that requirement (www.slate.com)
16. ^{^} have already been caught (www.slate.com)
17. ^{^} ordered Neck's county (www.texastribune.org)
18. ^{^} raided a black voter registration drive (www.huffingtonpost.com)
19. ^{^} the flimsiest of pretexts (theintercept.com)
20. ^{^} as many as 45,000 votes (www.washingtonpost.com)
21. ^{^} refused to process (www.washingtonpost.com)
22. ^{^} blocked the state's efforts (www.dispatch.com)
23. ^{^} purge 2 million people (www.thenation.com)
24. ^{^} refusing to reinstate (thinkprogress.org)
25. ^{^} currently colluding (online.wsj.com)
26. ^{^} explicitly boasted (thinkprogress.org)
27. ^{^} urged his supporters (www.slate.com)
28. ^{^} one man explained (www.bostonglobe.com)
29. ^{^} filed a lawsuit (online.wsj.com)

Jennifer Lopez Flashes Her Bare Butt During Hillary Clinton Concert With Ex Marc Anthony - Hollywood Life

Spirit Airlines flight evacuated, delayed by possible threat - KMOV.com

• Planes, hangars damaged by fire at Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight^[1]

  Planes, hangars damaged by fire at Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight^[2]

  Updated: Monday, October 31 2016 8:56 AM EDT2016-10-31 12:56:59 GMT

  Firefighters spent three hours working to control a fire at the Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight.

  More >^[3]

  Firefighters spent three hours working to control a fire at the Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight.

  More >^[4]

• Spirit Airlines flight evacuated, delayed by possible threat^[5]

  Spirit Airlines flight evacuated, delayed by possible threat^[6]

  Posted: Monday, October 31 2016 6:26 AM EDT2016-10-31 10:26 :05 GMT

  Updated: Monday, October 31 2016 8:34 AM EDT2016-10-31 12:34:35 GMT

  A Spirit Airlines flight was evacuated Sunday night in Fort Lauderdale, FL, after a possible bomb threat. 

  More >^[7]

  A Spirit Airlines flight was evacuated Sunday night in Fort Lauderdale, FL, after a possible bomb threat. 

  More >^[8]

• Mechanical issue diverts American Airlines flight to Denver^[9]

  Mechanical issue diverts American Airlines flight to Denver^[10]

  More than 100 people on an American Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Toronto are safe after the plane was diverted to Denver International Airport on Sunday.More >^[11]
  More than 100 people on an American Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Toronto are safe after the plane was diverted to Denver International Airport on Sunday.More >^[12]

• Pieces flew thousands of feet from Chicago plane on fire^[13]

  Pieces flew thousands of feet from Chicago plane on fire^[14]

  A federal investigator says engine pieces from the Amer ican Airlines plane that caught fire at Chicago's O'Hare airport have been found thousands of feet away.More >^[15]
  Engine pieces from an American Airlines plane that caught fire Friday on a runway at Chicago's O'Hare airport were found thousands of feet away, a federal investigator said.More >^[16]

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References

1. ^{^} Planes, hangars damaged by fire at Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight (www.kmov.com)
2. ^{^} Planes, hangars damaged by fire at Spirit of St. Louis Airport overnight (www.kmov.com)
3. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
4. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
5. ^{^} Spirit Airlines flight evacuated, delayed by possible threat (www.kmov.com)
6. ^{^} Spirit Airlines flight evacuated, delayed by possible threat (www.kmov.com)
7. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
8. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
9. ^{^} Mechanical issue diverts American Airlines fli ght to Denver (www.kmov.com)
10. ^{^} Mechanical issue diverts American Airlines flight to Denver (www.kmov.com)
11. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
12. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
13. ^{^} Pieces flew thousands of feet from Chicago plane on fire (www.kmov.com)
14. ^{^} Pieces flew thousands of feet from Chicago plane on fire (www.kmov.com)
15. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
16. ^{^} More > (www.kmov.com)
17. ^{^} Continue reading >> (www.kmov.com)
18. ^{^} "+i+" (www.kmov.com)
19. ^{^} "+i+" (www.kmov.com)