Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org. I'm Ian Masters,

and today we'll examine a number of stories and issues in the news. We'll begin with the October surprise as a self-inflicted wound rather than a dirty trick to get

elected in the form of how Trump's closing argument at his Madison Square Garden rally

appears to have backfired while Kamala Harris's closing argument on the ellipse last night was

flawless.

Joining us is Justin Higgins, who has worked as a lobbyist for a Fortune 400 agribusiness,

as an emigration policy advisor to a Tea Party, now House Freedom Caucus member of Congress, and worked on the 2016 campaign at the RNC, all before becoming a Democrat and an appointed official for the Democratic governor of Puerto Rico.

He now hosts the Politics Plus Media 101 podcast.

Then we'll investigate the collusion between Trump and Putin and Musk and Putin and speak with Sidney Blumenville,

the former assistant and senior advisor to President Bill Clinton and his senior advisor to

Hillary Clinton.

He has been a national staff reporter for the Washington Post, Washington editor and

staff writer for the New Yorker, and his books include the bestsellers, the Clinton

Wars, the rise of the counterestablishment, and his books include the bestsellers, The Clinton Wars,

the Rise of the Counterestablishment, and the Permanent Campaign. His latest book is All

the Powers on Earth, The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln, 1856 to 1860, and we'll discuss

his latest article at The Guardian. We are witnessing the making of a fascist president in real

time.

Then finally we will look into the Supreme Court's latest partisan ruling to uphold Virginia's purge of its voter roles looking for largely non-existent non-citizen voters and speak with

Richard Brifaux, a professor of legislation at Columbia Law School where he previously served as vice dean at three different times during his career.

His research interests include campaign finance reform, government ethics, gerrymandering, election administration, and fair elections.

He's also a leading thinker on the new preemption, a critique of states that are increasingly

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