OFF TO THE RACES: 61% concerned about Trump’s experience
One of the top headlines from our NBC/WSJ poll out yesterday: 61% Percent Concerned about Trump's Experience
There's also this: Forty percent of Democrats say that the long primary has helped the Democratic Party, compared to 22 percent who say the opposite.
And this: The president has hit his highest approval rating since his second inauguration in 2013.
First Read's sibling publication The Lid writes about just how much both sides will be going to the polls in November to vote *against* someone, not *for* someone.
And the Wall Street Journal writes on why Clinton is still favored despite the tightening race.
Our new NBC News|SurveyMonkey poll also looks at just how unpopular Clinton and Trump really are.
CLINTON: Clinton ally Terry McAuliffe is under investigation by the FBI over whether he accepted illegal campaign contributions, NBC News confirms.
NBC's Monica Alba writes that Clinton won't debate Sanders in California.
The Washington Post: "An army of Hillary Clinton’s surrogates in battleground states will blast Donald Trump on Tuesday over his past statements about the housing market and his business record, according to a campaign aide. The coordinated push is the first of their efforts to frame the likely Republican nominee in the minds of swing voters even while Clinton continues to contest the Democratic primary against Bernie Sanders. About a dozen surrogates and local elected officials in Ohio, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Florida, New Hampshire, Iowa, Colorado, Nevada and elsewhere will host calls, events and release statements focused on Trump’s response to the housing crisis that precipitated the economic recession."
And here's the Clinton campaign's video out this morning on the topic.
Ken Starr seems to regret a lot of the "unpleasantness" of how Bill Clinton's legacy is viewed through the lens of scandal, the New York Times writes.
SANDERS: From the Washington Post: "Sen. Bernie Sanders was given unprecedented say over the Democratic Party platform Monday in a move party leaders hope will soothe a bitter split with backers of the longshot challenger to Hillary Clinton — and Sanders immediately used his new power to name a well-known advocate for Palestinian rights to help draft Democratic policy."
He told NBC's Kristen Welker that he was taken out of context in an AP article that quoted him saying the Democratic National Convention would be "messy." He told NBC: "If you use the word 'messy,' it means that people will be engaged in vigorous debate. We don't have that often in the United States. But I think that's what the convention is about. I happen to believe that we should have a national healthcare system offering health care to all people. Secretary Clinton disagrees. I hope there will be a vigorous debate. That's what I mean by 'messy.' I hope people have debate over the important issues facing this country."
TRUMP: The Washington Post: "Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is reviving some of the ugliest political chapters of the 1990s with escalating personal attacks on Bill Clinton’s character, part of a concerted effort to smother Hillary Clinton’s campaign message with the weight of decades of controversy. Trump’s latest shot came Monday when he released an incendiary Instagram video that includes the voices of two women who accused the former president of sexual assault, underscoring the presumptive Republican nominee’s willingness to go far beyond political norms in his critique of his likely Democratic rival." MORE: “In one recent interview, Trump said another topic of potential concern is the suicide of former White House aide Vincent Foster, which remains the focus of intense and far-fetched conspiracy theories on the Internet. “It’s the one thing with her, whether it’s Whitewater or whether it’s Vince or whether it’s Benghazi. It’s always a mess with Hillary,” Trump said in the interview.”
Lobbying for a VP gig? Newt Gingrich sounded a lot like Trump when he told the Wall Street Journal of Mitt Romney "I don’t know what happened to Mitt, but it is weird; it is bizarre...Having a guy like that go berserk in public makes you wonder what his problems are."
The New York Times looks at how Trump has turned the traditions of the news conference on their head.
Trump isn't really building a national campaign, but the RNC is, writes the Washington Examiner.
From POLITICO: "Several members of the GOP establishment and its consultant and donor class who led the fight against Trump are now working directly on his behalf, motivated by a desire to win, the prevention of further splintering within their own ranks or the jingle-jangle of their next lucrative contract — and, in some cases, all of the above."
He's hitting back at media reports questioning how much he contributed to veterans groups earlier this year.