The battleground now coming into focus, the battlegrounds we should say. Kamala harris and Donald Trump will hone in on about half a dozen states for the next 53 days that could make or break their campaigns. In all likelihood thats the case. Good morning on a friday. Dana has the day off. Martha maccallum, my Colleague And Friend has had one doozy of a week. Martha quite a week for everybody. Great to be with you. Im Martha Maccallum and this is americas newsroom. Were gearing up for an actionpacked day. No stopping between now and november 5th. Former President Trump kicks things off doing a News Conference in california. That should be interesting. That will happen at noon eastern. You will want to tune in for that. Reminder, we havent had one of these at all from Vice President harris, 54 days, 0 Press Conferences from the v. P. Bill do you think she rides out the string . We dont know. Trump heads to nevada for a rally in vegas. The Vice President will return to pennsylvania. P. A. Is one of six states in the Tossup Category according to the Power Rankings. Right now its still anybodys game, martha. Martha Byron Donalds is on deck but first lets go to Bryan Llenas from pennsylvania today. Hi, brian. Vice president Kamala Harris has spent more time in pennsylvania than any other battleground this campaign. It is a mustwin. Yesterday in North Carolina while campaigning there, she made clear that having another president ial debate, she thinks, will help her chances in the commonwealth which polls show is a neckandneck tied race. President trump says he doesnt need another debate. He won anyway. I believe we owe it to the voters to have another debate. Weve done two debates. Because they were successful there will be no third debate. It is too late, anyway. The voting has already begun. In their first Post Debate Campaign stops, harris and her running mate Tim Walz mocked former President Trumps debate performance. Do you remember . He has Quote Concepts of a plan. Concepts of a plan. Which means no actual plan. Tell me you have this on your Bingo Card and theyre eating cats. Theyre eating cats. Meanwhile former President Trump while campaigning in tucson, Arizona Yesterday announced a new policy, No Tips on overtime. This is on top of trumps plans to not tax tips and to eliminate taxes on social security. The Harris Campaign says trump is, quote, desperate and scrambling. The latest polls show the economy is by far the Number One issue in pennsylvania and voters trust trump more than harris to handle the economy 50 to 42. Up eight points. The latest congressional republican Committee Report shows Consumer Prices on goods and services are up 19 in pennsylvania under the bidenharris administration. This means pennsylvania is spending 984 a month on food, energy, housing and transportation. Harris, guys, is stopping in johnstown which is in Cambria County before making her way to wilkes bury, pennsylvania. Both counties won handedly by trump in 2020. The Harris Campaign thinks showing up there will make all the difference. Martha Bryan Llenas in p. A. Well all spend a lot of time there in the next few months. North carolina. [cheers and applause] you are going to make all the difference in the outcome of this race. We are the underdog. And so we have Hard Work ahead of us. But we like Hard Work. You have to get people to vote. Because we want to get a landslide that is too big to rig. If we have the big votes they Cant Rig it. Well take back our country. Bill kind of feels like weve reached that moment. Listen to the sound bites there. Trump in arizona and Kamala Harris in North Carolina. Really is the Swing State Battleground showdown. Come to the board. If you were with us yesterday the Power Rankings came out. Everything you see in yellow here is a tossup. Yesterday we made the move down here in the southeast to put georgia and North Carolina into that Tossup Category. Well see right now how that goes. Trump held North Carolina in 2020. Biden flipped georgia in 2020. So it is critical state there. Let me advance this one time and show you why that matters here. Put this in red a little bit so you see better here. Pennsylvania, all right . Think about pennsylvania and its 19 electoral votes. It is highly unlikely very difficult, i should say, for a democrat to win the White House and lose the 19 electoral votes in pennsylvania. Thats the reason why, as brian was just reporting, Kamala Harris is there. Two other things stick out on the map. 16 here, 16 there, georgia and North Carolina. You win them both, 32 electoral votes. When you add this stuff up you see how critical these Battleground Areas are in the overall campaign. This right here, a lot of information on the board. These are the battlegrounds in won and lost together. Back in 2016, you note here arizona, georgia, michigan, this is nebraska two, okay, one electoral vote in the area of omaha why its on the board. North carolina and nevada, pennsylvania, wisconsin. Look what happened between 2016 and then 2020. Biden flipped most of them with the exception of North Carolina, okay . Want to make a note of this. Next hour well tell you why. Both campaigns that were run in the Tar Heel State in 2020 did what they needed to do. Trump held onto it. Bidens team did well. Well explain that. Trumps team did well especially in the rural sections of that state. Byron donalds join our conversation now, the republican from florida. Good morning to you. I dont know how you see it. Chime in on that or the fact no second debate. But 54 days without a press conference. Can she run out the string and not have one . And will voters accept that . Unfortunately i believe that she can but i dont think voters will accept it. Look, in that debate the other night Kamala Harris kind of proved she is good at getting under your skin but she didnt say anything. No substance. She dodged the Number One question on the minds of the american people. Are you better off today than you were four years ago . And she dodged it. The reason why is because the american people are not better off. This is why there have been no Press Conferences. This is why she only sat down with Dana Bash and they left about 30 minutes of the apparent interview on the Cutting Room Floor to only show us what she said. Its not a campaign of substance, it is a campaign of im trying to make things better but she is in charge. If she wanted to make things better, what has she been doing . Where has she been . She couldnt convince Joe Biden . I anticipate theyll try to run out the rest of this campaign without a press conference. If she has to talk substance, if she has to talk policy, if she has to talk about her terrible economic plan she put out, it wont help the lives of the american people. Martha the question for me is what is the Trump Campaign Strategy post this debate . Is it wise to not do another debate . Weve seen in prior elections that, you know, one side or the other times doesnt do great in a Debate And Life goes on. Then there is another debate and sometimes they win that one. How does President Trump get his message out to these 11 to 15 of undecided voters, especially in the Battleground States . Well look, i think the President And Jd vance have been getting that message out over the past 30 days. They do a lot of interviews. You guys know this. They dwarf the Media Apparatus communicating in all ways, shapes and forms to the american people. Donald trump and Jd Vance are doing podcast interviews. Something weve never seen in a president ial campaign before to get to the voters. They are crisscrossing the entire landscape. I think the one thing that we have to understand in 2024 is a lot of Media Isnt consumed by just talking directly to the press. It is also consumed in social media. A habit of most americans now is wake up, look at your phone, scroll through for 10 to 15 minutes to start your day. Them getting their message out is happening. The fact that the Harris Campaign refuses to talk to the american voter is one of the reasons why the polls, i believe, are going to continue to dana oh, darn. Bill the trouble is not in your set. I know that from growing up. Thats unfortunate. Our apologies to Byron Donalds hoping to answer that question and get to other topics, too. Dana we had other things we want to talk to him about. Bill you had the Aclu Application five years ago that Kamala Harris and team filled out. Part went to full decriminallyization with appropriate treatment for people arrested for drugs. The drugs span the entire list. The media has been very uncurious about that questionnaire. We dont know whether or not it will come up again or if she will explain it. Dana thats the problem. In the venues she is in, she is not pressed on any of these things. Thats kind of what i was getting at with Byron Donalds. What is the venue to have the pressing of these questions . Are you better off than you were four years ago . Do we have him back. Hi, good to have you back. He is joining us once again. Bill what do you think about some of these extreme positions that are on camera from five years ago, none of this came up with other night. Will the media get curious or not . The Media Wont get curious. They are in the pocket of Kamala Harris. Lets be perfectly honest and why it is incumbent on President Trump and Jd Vance to continue to press. I am looking forward to the Vice President ial debate between Jd Vance and Tim Walz on october 1st. Interesting how that one will turn out. Kamala Harriss Strategy is clear. She will run and hide from the american people. She is going to hide from the press. She will not allow herself to be cornered. Thats very damning. If thats how she will run as president , what would she do as president . She would hide from the american people no matter the crises. She would run and hide and send out staffers to talk on her behalf. Thats not leadership. The last thing i will say, her Campaign And Debate strategy trying to needle everybody, that might be cool on Tiktok And X. Thats not going to work with vladimir putin. It wont work with xi. They will laugh at her. We need real leadership in this country. I hope she opens herself to the press but i dont believe it is going to happen. Bill thank you for being here. Well talk again very soon. You made up for the screwup. Martha thank you very much. Authorities linking tren de aragua to more crimes across this country. The Wall Street Journal with a headline, this is a story you must read if you want to understand the threat that is posed by this group. It is titled a venezuelan gang expanding its deadly reach into the united states. They report tren de aragua involvement is suspected in 100 u. S. Cases that are currently under investigation bringing its violent brand of Robbery And DrugTrafficking North including wisconsin. Where a suspected Gang Member was arrested just last week. The person never should have entered the country to begin with. Its part of the Bidenharris Policy to allow no criminal Gang Members to the united states and here in and brutalized a Mother And Daughter for four days. Martha they have extreme and brutal tactics like what weve seen from the cartels. Texas is also now seeing a spike in Gang Activity and Brook Taylor joins us now from dallas. Hi, brooke. Good morning. Dallas police here confirmed to me they are investigating several crimes having to do with the tren de aragua gang. Sources tell me as you just mentioned this is a dangerous gang to pay attention to. It is not just an issue, though, in this city. Im told texas officials throughout the state are paying all attention to this gang. The governor here in texas, greg abbott, is expected to talk about tren de aragua next week. I want to bring you to a Story Over in el paso. Downtown a hotel called the Gateway Hotel was ordered to be shut down temporarily because of all the crime and Gang Activity. Disturbing Security Footage captured the chaos inside. A man with a gun, another Man Swinging a hatchet. Authorities say there are wild parties, drugs and in the pictures you can see young children even nearby. Records show police have been called to the hotel nearly 700 times. Look at this. These are all the complaints. Everything from drugs, sex, burglaries, fights. The County Attorney trying to close the hotel down for good. According to their Petition Officers say the criminal Activity Spike since tren de aragua Gang Members moved into their hotel. One man who lives there described it as worse than anyone could imagine. Yes, it is, yeah. Its even worse. I dont want to get into the details, the gory details. There is blood on some of the walls. Multiple incidents with gunfire inside the building and very unfortunate. We spoke to former u. S. Marshal in el paso, Deputy Chief who says officials that are down playing the Gangs Presence are in denial and theyre just concerned about their citys image. They are extremely violent. Extremely violent, extremely dangerous and causing all kinds of problems here in the united states and they are involved in drug trafficking, sex trafficking, human trafficking, robbery, murder, you name it. Border patrol confirmed they arrested three people at that hotel who are from venezuela and Immigration Judge previously told them that they had to be removed. Obviously they didnt listen so they were taken into custody. The next step is bringing them to the processing center, martha. Martha thank you very much. Brooke. A story well hear a lot more about im afraid. Thank you, brooke. Prices are very high for us. We have not here raised our prices in three years on almost ally thames. Were trying to maintain the prices and have consumer confidence. The point now my husband says this cant continue. Things are just way too high. Bill everybody is talking about. Harris trying to sell voters on her economic agenda. What is it . Americans are feeling frustrated over the pain in their pocketbook. Well get to that coming up. Martha the quarterback for the Miami Dolphins has a history of concussions. You see the coach walk out and there is the hit. Last night from the game he was pulled. Well talk about what happened there. The Backup Quarterback the thompson. But without investment, those breakthroughs are often paused.