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Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Ahead of the first presidential debate of the 2024 cycle, new national polls from The New York Times, Quinnipiac University, and Marquette Law School found Donald Trump with modest leads over President Joe Biden in hypothetical general election match-ups.
* On a related note, while a Washington Post report found the former Republican president ahead in most of the nation’s battleground states, a Marquette Law School poll in Wisconsin found the Democratic incumbent with a small lead among likely voters.
* Ahead of tonight’s debate, the Biden campaign released a new ad reminding voters about Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The Democratic operation this week also began airing a commercial focused on the economy and Trump’s support for tax breaks for the wealthy.
* Speaking of ads, NBC News reports that a progressive organization called United for Democracy will run ads on CNN and MSNBC during tonight’s debate criticizing the Supreme Court and blaming Trump and his appointees for its rulings.
* In related news, the Trump campaign is launching a new ad of its own during tonight’s debate, going after the vice president. “Vote Joe Biden today, get Kamala Harris tomorrow,” a narrator tells viewers in the spot.
* South Carolina held primary runoff elections this week, and among those defeated were three Republican women who fought against an abortion ban in the state legislature.
* The Wisconsin Elections Commission is scheduled to meet today to vote on whether to order a recall election targeting Assembly Speaker Robin Vos. As the Associated Press reported, Trump supporters claim to have submitted enough valid petition signatures to force a recall race targeting Wisconsin’s top elected Republican official. (Vos became a Team Trump target after the Assembly speaker failed to overturn the former president’s defeat in Wisconsin in 2020.)