Election 2020 updates: Biden outlines plan for tackling COVID-19
"We're not learning to live with it, we're learning to die with it," he says.
With 11 days to go until Election Day and President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden racing toward Nov. 3, voters have turned out in record numbers to cast their ballots early.
More than 50 million Americans have already voted in the 2020 election, reflecting an extraordinary level of participation and interest despite unprecedented barriers brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.
The candidates faced off in the final presidential debate of the 2020 election cycle from Belmont University in Nashville Thursday evening -- their last chance to pitch themselves to tens of millions of voters in primetime before Nov. 3.
In the final weeks of campaigning, the president has remained on defense as polls show him trailing nationally and in several battleground states key to his reelection hopes. He has two rallies in Florida today.
Biden, maintaining a lead in national polls -- his largest of the election, according to FiveThirtyEight's average -- stayed off the trail ahead of the debate, a pattern for the former vice president. On Friday, he's scheduled to deliver remarks in Wilmington, Delaware, on COVID-19 and the economy.
Polls indicate a huge pre-Election-Day edge for Biden and a sizable Trump advantage among those who plan to vote on Nov. 3. Trump has sowed doubt in the mail-in ballot process -- and imminent election results -- for months.
All 50 states plus Washington, D.C., have some form of early voting underway. Check out FiveThirtyEight’s guide to voting during the COVID-19 pandemic here.
Latest headlines:
- Trump rallies at The Villages in Florida amid slipping support among seniors
- Harris appeals to HBCU grads, Black men at back-to-back events in Atlanta
- Biden slams Trump's handling of COVID-19, outlines his own plan
- Trump takes swipe at Biden in announcing peace deal, predicts a 'great red wave'
- Early voting by the numbers
Pence votes in-person in Indiana
Vice President Mike Pence and second lady Karen Pence cast their ballots in-person this morning back home in Indiana.
They were originally scheduled to early vote the week of the vice-presidential debate but that was rescheduled to today.
Afterward, they both gave a thumbs up to the cameras.
When a local reporter asked Pence if there was anything he’d like to say, he answered: "Great honor. And great to be back home again. Thank you."
Pence has campaign stops today in Ohio and Pennsylvania. He holds two rallies in Florida on Saturday.
-ABC News' Justin Gomez
Trump takes swipe at Biden in announcing peace deal, predicts a 'great red wave'
While announcing a peace deal this afternoon between Israel and Sudan -- the third Arab country to move toward normalizing relations with the Jewish state in an election-season push by the Trump administration -- the president took a swipe at his political rival in the historic joint phone call from the Oval Office.
"Do you think Sleepy Joe could have made this deal, Bibi?" Trump asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over a speakerphone, referring to Biden.
"Well, Mr. President," Netanyahu replied, starting slowly, "one thing I can tell you is we appreciate the help for peace from anyone in America, and we appreciate what you've done enormously."
Trump took questions from reporters following the call, and in speaking to the massive amount of early voting across the country, he predicted a “great red wave” is imminent -- "like you've never seen before."
But polls show Trump trailing Biden nationwide, and some Republicans in tight races have sought to distance themselves from the president in the homestretch to Election Day.
When asked about his debate performance last night compared to his first debate, Trump said while he thinks his approach to the second debate was “obviously a more popular way of doing it,” the first debate was more effective.
“I think the other is more effective in terms of business and life,” Trump said. “The first one. I thought I did great. There are certain groups of very aggressive people that loved the first debate. But I think this was better. This was obviously a more popular way of doing it."
-ABC News' Elizabeth Thomas