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Election 2020 updates: Trump ends long day rushing through final rally

Trump and Biden both campaigned in three Midwestern states Friday.

ByLibby Cathey and Meredith Deliso
Last Updated: November 1, 2020, 11:41 AM EST

With four days until Election Day, and President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden racing toward Nov. 3, more than 82 million Americans have already cast their ballots -- an early voting record.

Friday brings both Trump and Biden to Minnesota and Wisconsin, revealing how crucial the states are to both campaigns, with the contest overshadowed by coronavirus cases rising there and in nearly every battleground state.

The president's aggressive, defensive strategy -- visiting states he won in 2016 including a first stop in Michigan this afternoon -- comes as polls show him trailing nationally and in swing states key to his reelection hopes. Vice President Mike Pence returns to Arizona for a pair of rallies in Flagstaff and Tucson.

Biden will see his busiest travel day to date of the general election. With a stop in Iowa, too, it's the first time the former vice president has made plans to campaign in three states in one day for the 2020 cycle. Running mate California Sen. Kamala Harris is in Texas as Democrats play offense and sense an opportunity to snatch the GOP-stronghold for the first time in more than four decades.

Top headlines:

Here is how the day is developing. All times Eastern.
Oct 30, 2020, 9:32 AM EDT

Biden to 'barnstorm' Pennsylvania in final days

Biden’s campaign has announced that he will be spending at least part of the last 72 hours in the 2020 race in the Pennsylvania -- an indication of just how important Democrats believe the Keystone State will be in determining a winner. 

On Sunday, Biden will travel to Philadelphia to “discuss bringing Americans together to address the crises facing the country and win the battle for the soul of the nation.”

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden arrives for a drive-in campaign rally at the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa, Fla., Oct. 29, 2020.
Drew Angerer/Getty Images

On Monday, Biden and former second lady Jill Biden, along with Sen. Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff plan to "barnstorm" the state, spreading out across all the four corners.

Biden’s speech on Sunday offers a bit of a full circle moment for for the former vice president, who held his "campaign launch rally" in Philadelphia on May 18, 2019, and laid out his campaign vision for unifying the country in the remarks just under a month after launching his third run for president.

Pennsylvania is by far the state Biden has visited the most in the 2020 general election and one that holds a particular importance to him.

"I'm going to win Pennsylvania. It's a matter of a great deal to me, personally as well as politically," Biden told reporters Monday.

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden attends a Drive-In rally at Dallas High School, in Dallas, Pennsylvania, Oct. 24, 2020.
Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images

Trump will take to Pennsylvania Saturday for three rallies, and he’s still planning to barnstorm nearly a dozen events in the final 48 hours across states he carried in 2016.

FiveThirtyEight currently places Pennsylvania as the likeliest "tipping-point state" in its forecast or the state that could determine the winner of the Electoral College.

-ABC News' Molly Nagle

Oct 30, 2020, 9:40 AM EDT

Early vote explosion shows system working, with stress tests ahead

It's happening the way it's supposed to happen. Voters are voting -- smashing records, adjusting behaviors and recalibrating expectations -- in ways that show the nation is many things, but definitely not apathetic.

It's also happening in ways that will stress the systems built to account for it all. More early votes, oddly, will mean reporting out results will take longer in several critical states -- to say nothing of the continuing challenges of participating in and administering an election in the midst of a pandemic.

Voters wait in line to enter a polling place and cast their ballots on the first day of the state's in-person early voting for the general elections in Durham, North Carolina, Oct. 15, 2020.
Jonathan Drake/Reuters

Amid a flurry of COVID-era campaigning in battleground states, this week brought new high-water marks that suggest turnout records will fall this year.

Nearly as many Texans have voted as in all of 2016, with Georgia, North Carolina, Florida and Arizona are among the states already three-quarters of the way there, according to the United States Elections Project at the University of Florida.

But this week also brought continued uncertainties about the process of voting. The Supreme Court now has nine justices again, and voters in states, including Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota and North Carolina have a right to be confused about what the law is when it comes to how to vote -- and even what those laws might be on Election Day and beyond.

Layered on top of all of that are the efforts by President Trump to sow doubts about the integrity of the election.

President Donald Trump gestures to supporters after a campaign rally at Phoenix Goodyear Airport, Oct. 28, 2020, in Goodyear, Ariz.
Evan Vucci/AP

From the local level on up, election officials say they're confident that there will be an accurate -- and, hopefully, promptly tallied -- vote count. But the surge of voting, while good for democracy, figures to make everything more difficult during this most difficult of times for the country.

-ABC News’ Political Director Rick Klein

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