Clinton raps Trump on accepting outcome of election
WASHINGTON — The Latest on the U.S. presidential race (all times EDT):
3:15 p.m.
Hillary Clinton is assailing Donald Trump for refusing to say he'll respect the outcome of the presidential election.
The Democratic nominee says in Florida that she has "serious doubts" about whether Trump understands the meaning of the president's oath of office to "preserve, protect and defend the constitution."
Clinton said Tuesday at a Coconut Creek rally that Trump is "attacking everything that has set our country apart for 240 years." She pointed to his refusal at the final debate to commit to conceding the race if he loses.
She joked that Trump would have called George Washington "a loser" for not wanting to be king.
During the rally, the crowd broke into a spontaneous singing of "Happy Birthday" ahead of Clinton's 69th birthday on Wednesday.
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3 p.m.
President Barack Obama is wrapping up a three-day swing through Nevada and California. He's campaigning and raising money for Democratic candidates in the Nov. 8 election.
The president is participating in a fundraiser benefiting the organization that coordinates efforts to elect Democrats to the Senate. Tickets for the event were $33,400. It's taking place Tuesday at the home of television writer, director and producer Ryan Murphy.
Obama has participated in 12 fundraisers for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee this election cycle and Vice President Joe Biden has participated in 15.
Democrats need to pick up four seats to take the Senate majority if Hillary Clinton wins and five If Republican Donald Trump wins.
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2:10 p.m.
A hacked email shows Hillary Clinton's aides lamenting last year that she was not more forthcoming about her use of a private email server.
The March 2015 exchange between Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and political operative Neera Tanden was among more than 1,300 stolen emails released Tuesday by the WikiLeaks organization.
The day after The New York Times first reported that the former secretary of state had used a private email address, Podesta wrote that Clinton lawyer David Kendall and chief-of-staff Cheryl Mills had not been forthcoming on the facts.
Tanden described the problem as "a Cheryl special" and said Clinton's team was crazy not to have gone public about the issue months earlier. She then suggested the answer was that "They wanted to get away with it."
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2:05 p.m.
Hillary Clinton's campaign says the election is a choice between improving President Barack Obama's health care law or kicking 20 million people off insurance.
Clinton campaign communications director Jen Palmieri said Tuesday that Clinton has a plan to make health insurance more affordable. But, she said: "What we shouldn't do is what Donald Trump would do, which is throw away the gains we have made."
The campaign's statement comes after the federal government announced that premiums for some health plans will increase by an average of 25 percent.
Speaking earlier in Florida, Trump said that Obama's legislation is "just blowing up."
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1:55 p.m.
Donald Trump is praising veterans of the failed CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs operation which tried to topple Cuba's Fidel Castro.
The Republican presidential nominee visited the Bay of Pigs Museum in Miami on Tuesday. He received an endorsement from the Veterans Association for the Bay of Pigs.
Trump said he was "in a room full of heroes." He said the veterans were "fighting for values that unite us all" during the 1961 invasion.
He sharply criticized President Barack Obama's move to restore some diplomatic ties with Cuba, though he has yet to spell out his own plan for relations with the island nation.
Trump's appearance at the museum was his second event Tuesday aimed at rallying Cuban-American voters in the key battleground of Florida. They have traditionally leaned Republican.
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1:45 p.m.
A celebrity strike force is fanning out for Hillary Clinton. And it's not just megastars helping on the campaign trail.
The stars stumping for Clinton include Jay Z and Jennifer Lopez. But Sean Astin, of "The Goonies" and Busy Philipps, of "Freaks and Geeks" are also getting people to the polls.
Phillips recently campaigned in Iowa. She said she came out because she is a "concerned citizen."
The campaign deploys prominent supporters as stand-ins for the candidate. They're known as surrogates. They work with celebrities who want to get involved to figure out how best to use them — considering their fan base as well as how much time they have to offer.
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12:50 p.m.
The Justice Department and FBI say they will have officials ready on Election Day to respond to potential crimes.
Justice Department officials will be monitoring conduct at certain polling places, and lawyers will be available to handle complaints regarding voter intimidation, discrimination and fraud such as vote-buying.
The FBI will also have a command center to monitor potential security threats related to the election. U.S. intelligence officials have warned of Russian efforts to use hacking to interfere with the election process.
The Justice Department has already warned that it will have fewer observers at the polls than in 2012 because of a Supreme Court opinion that gutted a key provision of the Voting Rights Act.
The exact number of observers will not be revealed until closer to Election Day.
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11:50 a.m.
Donald Trump is slamming President Barack Obama's decision to re-open relations with Cuba, saying "it's always a bad deal with Obama."
Trump did not offer specific criticisms during a Tuesday meeting with Cuban supporters at his golf course just outside Miami.
He listened and nodded along as a pair of women recounted the injustices they suffered at the hands of Cuba's government
Trump reversed his own position on Cuba during a September visit to Miami, which has a sizable Cuban-American population.
He had previously supported the decision to reopen diplomatic relations with the island nation. But he now believes the United States "needs to strike a better deal" and has vowed to scrap Obama's efforts.
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11:05 a.m.
Hillary Clinton's big donors aren't letting up on the gas even as some recent polls show her pulling away from her Republican opponent, Donald Trump.
Priorities USA, the main pro-Clinton super political action committee, says it raised $18 million in the first few weeks of October. That's about $1 million a day.
In all, Priorities has raised about $175 million to help Clinton. During the run-up to President Barack Obama's re-election, Priorities collected about $75 million.
Super PACs can raise and spend money to promote a candidate, but can't coordinate with the candidate's campaign.
All super PACs and the candidates' own campaigns are due to file finance reports with the Federal Election Commission by midnight Thursday. Those are the last reports before Election Day, Nov. 8.
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11 a.m.
Hillary Clinton's big donors aren't letting up on the gas even as some recent polls show her pulling away from her Republican opponent, Donald Trump.
Priorities USA, the main pro-Clinton super political action committee, says it raised $18 million in the first few weeks of October. That's about $1 million a day.
In all, Priorities has raised about $175 million to help Clinton. During the run-up to President Barack Obama's reelection, Priorities collected about $75 million.
Super PACs can raise and spend money to promote a candidate, but can't coordinate with the candidate's campaign.
All super PACs and the candidates' own campaigns are due to file finance reports with the Federal Election Commission by midnight Thursday. That will be the last time before Election Day that the public gets a look at who is funding the race.
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10:45 a.m.
Donald Trump is saying the high cost of Obamacare is hurting employees at one of his golf clubs. But the club manager later clarified that most workers won't be affected.
Trump appeared Tuesday with employees at the Trump National Doral club outside Miami to tout his ability to create jobs.
The Republican nominee seized on news that average premiums under the Affordable Care Act will jump by 25 percent in popular plans before taxpayer subsidies kick in.
Trump said "all of my employees are having tremendous problem with Obamacare." That implied he was not providing his employees health insurance.
The club's general manager, David Feder, later said that "more than 95 percent" of the club's employees are on company-provided insurance, with the only exceptions being some part-time and seasonal workers.
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10:10 a.m.
Donald Trump is appearing with the employees at one of his Florida golf courses - and they are offering testimonials to the boss.
Several dozen employees at Trump National Doral just outside Miami stood with the Republican nominee as he boasted about the golf course and said that 80 percent of his workers were of Hispanic origin.
Insisting it wasn't rehearsed, Trump invited employees to the microphone to offer their support.
One put on a "Make America Great Again" cap. Another said he supported Trump, though his family did not. And a bartender said she "loved" working for Trump.
Trump has frequently mixed his campaign and business interests as he touts his ability to create jobs. On Wednesday, he will attend the official opening of his new hotel in Washington.
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8:40 a.m.
About 1.6 million Floridians have already voted in this year's crucial election.
New numbers released Tuesday by the state Division of Elections show nearly 300,000 voters went to early voting sites Monday, the first day it was offered in 50 counties. Another 1.3 million voters have mailed in ballots.
Florida is a battleground state and the start of early voting has prompted Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton to sweep through the state.
Trump is holding rallies Tuesday in Sanford and Tallahassee, while Clinton will hold a rally in Coconut Creek.
So far Republicans have a slight edge in early voting. Numbers show more than 665,000 Republicans have cast ballots compared to more than 658,000 Democrats. Nearly 251,000 voters with no party affiliation have voted.
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6:00 a.m.
Jay Z will hold a concert for Hillary Clinton in Cleveland just days before Election Day.
The Democratic presidential candidate's campaign says the hip-hop artist will perform on Nov. 4. He'll also be joined onstage by special guests.
Jay Z campaigned for President Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012.
Jennifer Lopez, Jon Bon Jovi and Katy Perry are also among the stars staging shows for Clinton in the next two weeks.
Lopez will appear in Miami on Saturday to encourage Florida voters to back Clinton. Bon Jovi will headline concerts in Pittsburgh on Thursday and in Tampa, Florida, on Nov. 5. And Perry will perform in Philadelphia on Nov. 5.
3:40 a.m.
Even as his path to the presidency narrows, a defiant Donald Trump is insisting he is "winning" and urging his supporters to defy what he is calling an establishment conspiracy to deny the White House to his populist movement.
Trump, in the middle of a three-day swing through battleground Florida as thousands began voting there in person, hammered the "disgusting" media on Monday for its "phony polls" that he claimed were the latest signs of a "rigged election."
"The media isn't just against me. They're against all of you," Trump told cheering supporters in St. Augustine. "They're against what we represent."
"I believe we're actually winning," he said.
But even as Trump publicly displayed his trademark bravado, his team conceded publicly as well as privately that he was trailing — and that crucial Pennsylvania may be slipping away to Democrat Hillary Clinton. That would leave him only a razor-thin pathway to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House on Nov. 8.