Huge statue of a naked Donald Trump appears in Philly; Tim Walz campaigns in Bucks and Montco; Larry Krasner’s suit against Elon Musk is on hold

CASTLE SHANNON, Pa. — At a campaign stop in Allegheny County, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D., Pa.) on Thursday defended his record on trade, pointing to times he’s opposed deals backed by Democratic administrations and supported aspects of former President Donald Trump’s protectionist agenda, such as the 2018 U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

“Part of that record is also fighting to stop trade deals that I thought were bad for the country,” Casey told reporters at a get-out-the-vote event in Castle Shannon. “Whether that's agreeing with a Republican president or a Democratic president, I don't really care. It's what we got to do. I’ve got to do what's best for Pennsylvania.”

The agreement revised the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, which has been criticized for accelerating the loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs. Casey noted that he criticized NAFTA as state auditor general in the 1990s and opposed former President Barack Obama’s unsuccessful effort to form a Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, with Pacific Rim nations. The USMCA, he said, should be a “model” for future agreements.

Former first lady Michelle Obama is slated to stump for Vice President Kamala Harris this weekend in Montgomery County

Obama will take part in what Harris' campaign is describing as a "special event" in Norristown on Saturday between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m., according to an event listing for the stop. An exact location for the visit was not immediately available.

Harris' campaign announced earlier this week that Obama would take part in a Pennsylvania-based event on behalf of the Harris-Walz campaign.

Elon Musk's pro-Trump America PAC has mailed out 187,000 checks so far to individuals who signed the PAC's petition and are expected to disburse all payments by Nov. 30, according to an email from America PAC obtained by The Inquirer.

By signing the petition — one of Musk's many efforts to help deliver Pennsylvania for former President Donald Trump in November — individuals pledge their support for the First and Second Amendments and could then provide the contacts that allow them to be targeted by Musk’s PAC to vote for Trump.

In return, signers receive various cash prizes, including $47 payments for referring a registered voter. Pennsylvania registered voters are eligible for a "special offer" where they can receive $100 just for signing the petition and then accrue an additional $100 for referring another signer.

A 40-foot naked statue of former president Donald Trump hanging by a crane popped up on Kensington Avenue Thursday afternoon to the curiosity, disgust, and delight of passersby.

The statue looks like one that went up in Madison, Wis., which was part of a "Crooked and Obscene Tour," The Capital Times reported. In the past month, the statue has made appearances in Las Vegas, Detroit and Phoenix.

According to the Detroit Free Press, the statue is made of foam and rebar and weighs about 6,000 pounds.

State and federal Republicans asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Thursday to stay a lower court order that has once again thrown the status of undated mail ballots in Pennsylvania into doubt.

In a decision Wednesday, the state Commonwealth Court ruled that such ballots — those in which the voter failed to write the date or wrote the incorrect date — should still be counted, as those dates serve no meaningful purpose and election administrators don’t use them to determine whether a ballot was submitted on time.

The decision followed a similar ruling from that court this summer, which was later overturned by the Supreme Court on procedural grounds.

MURRYSVILLE, Pa. — McLovin was in the house Thursday as U.S. Sen. John Fetterman hit the campaign trail for Bob Casey, his fellow Pennsylvania Democratic senator.

Fetterman, who is not up for reelection this year, showed up to a canvass launch with a Halloween costume inspired by the character from the 2007 comedy Superbad that was aimed at landing a dig at Casey’s opponent, Republican Dave McCormick, who has faced questions about his ties to Pennsylvania because he lived in Connecticut for years before launching his political career around 2022.

Fetterman wore a sandwich board-style print-out of McLovin’s Hawaiian fake ID, but with the picture and details changed to McCormick’s and “Pennsylvania” scribbled across the top.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz visited the Bharatiya Temple in Montgomery County to celebrate Diwali, the Festival of Lights.

Walz arrived Thursday to an excited crowd of temple-goers. He was introduced by Montgomery County Commissioner Neil Makhija, who is also the chair of the Board of Elections in the county. Makhija is the first Asian American county commissioner in Pennsylvania.

The governor lit a diya before receiving a blessing and delivering brief remarks. He wished attendees a happy and peaceful Diwali and told them to save some energy to celebrate Wednesday morning. He said that in both Pennsylvania and Minnesota, “the Indian and South Asian community is so much a fabric of our state and who we are in all aspects of civic, political, educational, the arts … entrepreneurship and business.”

Investigations into potential fraud in voter registration applications in three Pennsylvania counties have become fodder for online misinformation, including from Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

Authorities in Lancaster, Monroe and York counties have released limited details, and local prosecutors are looking into whether any crimes might have occurred.

Lancaster County District Attorney Heather Adams, an elected Republican, said election workers raised concerns about two sets of voter registration applications because of what she described as numerous similarities. They’re examining a total of about 2,500 forms.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz spoke at a rally Thursday at the Boilermakers Local 13 in Levittown in Bucks County for a campaign rally for Vice President Kamala Harris.

Before the governor arrived, supporters of former President Donald Trump held signs on the road nearby, encouraging drivers passing by to honk in support of Trump. One supporter walked along the road sticking numerous Trump lawn signs into the ground.

A handful of Harris supporters who were previously in front of the union building moved to also stand on the side of the road to encourage support from drivers passing by.

Dave McCormick is a major supporter of school choice, and in the final days of his campaign for U.S. Senate, the Republican candidate reiterated his enthusiasm during an Olde Richmond roundtable with charter and religious school advocates from across the region.

McCormick was joined by Sen. Tim Scott (R., S.C.) during the 40 minute event at the Liguori Academy, where he extolled his view that public schools were failing the state's youth — and that charters offered a solution.

"It's not anti-teacher to say that our public schools are failing us," McCormick told attendees after reminding them he was raised by two public school teachers.

Bucks County voters still seeking to apply for and cast mail ballots in person can do so until Friday, after a judge extended state deadlines following a suit from Donald Trump’s campaign.

Voters can request their ballot at the county’s Board of Elections office in Doylestown (55 E. Court St.) any time between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Thursday or Friday. Satellite offices will be open throughout the county from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Anyone in line by those cut-off times will still be allowed to cast their vote, under the terms of a clarified order issued Thursday by Common Pleas Court Judge Jeffrey G. Trauger.

U.S. Rep. Madeleine Dean (D., Pa.) called former President Donald Trump and the Supreme Court “criminal” for overturning Roe v. Wade.

She said she doesn’t know how the country has gone back to “those dark days” where abortion isn’t a right.

Dean encouraged the Bucks voters to vote against U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, a Republican whom Democrats have gone after over his votes against abortion rights bills and for not speaking out against Trump. Fitzpatrick has avoided questions from the press about his views on Trump since his first term in 2017.

Supporters filled the Boilermakers Local 13 in Levittown awaiting a visit from Gov. Tim Walz for a campaign rally for Vice President Kamala Harris.

Supporters of former President Donald Trump are also in attendance, holding signs on the road nearby, encouraging drivers passing by to honk in support of Trump. One supporter walked along the road sticking numerous Trump lawn signs into the ground.

A handful of Harris supporters who were previously in front of the union building moved to also stand on the side of the road to encourage support from passersby.

Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner’s suit against Elon Musk and his political action committee has been placed on hold, while the tech billionaire attempts to move the case to federal court.

Though the parties were scheduled to appear Thursday for a Common Pleas Court hearing before Judge Angelo Foglietta, Musk did not show.

“He is a very busy man who can’t just materialize on 12-hours notice,” his attorney, Matt Haverstick, said during the brief proceeding, in which Foglietta said he now must wait to see whether federal courts would take the case.

Pennsylvania’s top auditor is investigating the state’s automatic voter registration system, coming as some GOP lawmakers in Harrisburg baselessly suggest that the “motor voter” program allows non-U.S. citizens to participate in elections.

Noncitizens who are in the country legally are eligible to get their driver’s license in Pennsylvania; officials with both the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and the Department of State say there is no evidence that they are abusing the nonpartisan motor voter program.

The program has aided voter registration at driver’s license centers across the state since the mid-2000s and was streamlined by Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration last year via executive order.

BLAKESLEE, Pa. — The woman with pink-tinged hair and the guy with an orange beanie came tentatively to their door. They are quiet Harris voters in these mountain roads of Pennsylvania, and Michele Van Allen and Ramona McNees have come from New Jersey to find them.

Of course, being from Jersey, and still slightly pumped up from morning pickleball, Van Allen is not at all quiet. She coaxes the pair outside with her high-energy pitch — is she canvassing or ranting about a car that cut her off on the Turnpike, same basic energy — and they all bond over her enthusiasm.

In an area a neighbor referred to as “Trump Alley,” this young couple was impressed, and happy, to find friendly people from New Jersey at their woodsy doorstep.

Lawyers representing Elon Musk have asked that the lawsuit filed by Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner be moved to federal court — leaving the direction and timeline of the suit unclear.

Late Wednesday, Musk’s attorneys filed documents asking that the case be heard in federal court, just as the two sides were set to appear before a Philadelphia judge Thursday morning to hear arguments in the case.

Dustin Slaughter, a spokesperson for Krasner, said a hearing on the matter will still take place at 10 a.m. What will be addressed is unclear.

As Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump turn their attention to the Southwest, vice presidential candidateTim Walz will keep the campaign’s focus on Pennsylvania

Walz is expected to visit Erie and Bucks County Thursday. He is slated to appear in Bucks County at about 11 a.m., followed by a stop in Erie at 4:45 p.m. Additional timing and location information was not immediately available.

Bucks County, the only purple suburb of Philadelphia, could swing the race for Harris – or for former President Donald Trump. Both campaigns are well aware.

The legal bout between Philadelphia’s district attorney and the world’s richest man will head to a city courtroom Thursday morning.

With a hugely consequential presidential election just days away — and Pennsylvania at the center of the contest — a city judge is expected to hear legal arguments in a lawsuit filed by Philadelphia’s top prosecutor, Larry Krasner, who has accused Elon Musk of running an illegal lottery with his $1 million daily giveaway to voters in battleground states.

The proceedings are scheduled to start inside a City Hall courtroom around 10 a.m.

Vice President Kamala Harris will hold a rally in front of the iconic Philadelphia Museum of Art on Monday, the eve of the presidential election, according to a source familiar with the planning.

The Harris-Walz campaign declined to respond to questions about timing or who else might attend.

It’s fitting that an election so laser-focused on Pennsylvania will conclude in Philadelphia. Harris and former President Donald Trump are in a dead heat for the state’s crucial 19 electoral votes.

Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court injected new uncertainty into the long-running debate over undated mail ballots Wednesday with a ruling that prompted predictions of chaos from some of the court’s judges and left the fate of thousands of ballots once again in question a week before Election Day.

In a 3-2 decision, the court’s judges ruled that failure to count mail ballots that are missing dates or have the wrong date on their outer envelope risks violating the rights of the voters who submitted them.

On its face, the decision applied only to roughly six dozen ballots cast in a special election in Philadelphia last month. But the court’s reasoning — that excluding them from official tallies amounted to a violation of rights guaranteed under the state constitution — left elections officials uncertain of the decision’s implications for Tuesday’s vote.

The 2024 presidential election is just around the corner, and The Inquirer’s voters guide is bringing you key information about your ballot in Pennsylvania.

General elections — this year’s held on Nov. 5 — determine which candidates will be elected for their respective offices. The major party candidates on the ballot are typically chosen through the primary elections held in the spring. Voters can pick any candidate in the general election, regardless of their political party. This guide provides key points for all federal and statewide races as well as state legislative races in Philadelphia and its four collar counties.

The ballot will be crowded this year. Pennsylvanians will vote for U.S. president; their representatives in the U.S. Senate and House; representatives in the Pennsylvania General Assembly, including members of the state House and state Senate; as well as auditor general, attorney general, and treasurer.