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For President Trump, the only thing that really matters is the size of his crowds. For Joseph R. Biden Jr., the road to the White House is full of honking cars.

Mr. Trump is defined by his obsession with the size of his rallies, an almost inevitable bookend to his boastful exaggerations about the number of people who attended his inauguration four years ago. For the president, campaigning is a show, and its success is defined by the ratings that come with it: the crowds.

Mr. Biden’s socially distanced rallies, which draw hundreds, not thousands, of people in their vehicles, are the physical manifestation of his willingness to sacrifice numbers for safety.

WASHINGTON — A group of Stanford University economists who created a statistical model estimate that there have been at least 30,000 coronavirus infections and 700 deaths as a result of 18 campaign rallies President Trump held from June to September.

The numbers

are not based on individual cases traced directly to particular campaign events.

the Stanford researchers, led by Professor B. Douglas Bernheim, the chairman of the university’s economics department, conducted a regression analysis. They compared the 18 counties where Mr. Trump held rallies with as many as 200 counties with similar demographics and similar trajectories of confirmed Covid-19 cases before the rally date.

The events took place from June 20 to Sept. 12; only the first two — in Tulsa, Okla., and Phoenix — were held indoors. The president has held about three dozen additional rallies since the study ended in September.

“The motivation for this paper,” he said, “is that there is a debate that is raging about the trade-off between the economic consequences of restrictions and the health consequences of transmission, and as an economist, I take that debate to be both important and appropriate.”

Even as polls tighten in battlegrounds across the country, Trump is still entering the last days of a caustic campaign with only a narrow path to victory -- albeit one he and his campaign remain convinced will manifest and one he is prepared to trumpet on election night even before all the votes are counted.

In a breakneck sprint, with 17 rallies scheduled for the campaign's final four days, Trump is allowing himself little time to contemplate what he might do if he loses. Given how vague his stated goals for a second term have been, even the consequences of winning seem far from mind.

Trump these days is focused almost exclusively on the immediate task at hand: avoiding the shameful fate of becoming a one-term president by throwing himself headlong into his final campaign.

But for the absence of a sea of “Keep America Great Again” hats and Rolling Stones soundtrack, Donald Trump’s coronavirus press briefings at the White House are, critics say, increasingly resembling his 2020 re-election campaign rallies.Some critics have even called for TV networks to drop live coverage of the daily sessions because, by carrying the president’s words unfiltered, they are actively misleading their audiences and could harm public health.

Broadcasters were widely criticized for giving Trump’s speeches and rallies wall-to-wall coverage during the 2016 presidential election, granting him free exposure worth billions of dollars in advertising. Although campaign rallies have been suspended because of the virus, there are concerns that history is repeating itself, giving Trump an advantage over his likely opponent, Joe Biden. On Sunday and Monday, the briefings shifted to late afternoon, giving Trump access to peak viewing hours.McCurry, now a professor at Wesley Theological Seminary, said he “tends to agree” with the view that networks should not carry the entire briefings live.“Putting it on because it’s better than whatever else is available to daytime TV is not a good reason. It shouldn’t be a platform for the president to just give out his own message. It’s not reality television,” he said.

Perhaps sensing political opportunity, Trump moved swiftly to regain the limelight and become master of ceremonies. At times, he has reassured viewers with an uncharacteristically solemn tone. But at others, he has reverted to his buccaneering style, over-promising vaccines or therapies – forcing experts to contradict him – or throwing a tantrum at a reporter who challenged him.

As the national early vote climbs past a staggering 93 million and challenges to the electoral process intensify across states, President Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr. are barreling into Pennsylvania and turning it into the top battleground in Tuesday’s election

Both campaigns see Pennsylvania as increasingly crucial to victory: Mr. Trump now appears more competitive here than in Michigan and Wisconsin, two other key northern states he hopes to win, and Mr. Biden’s clearest electoral path to the White House runs through the state.

Pennsylvania has more Electoral College votes, 20, than any other traditional battleground except Florida,

"Holding a half-million-person rally in the midst of a pandemic is emblematic of a nation as a whole that maybe isn’t taking [the novel coronavirus] as seriously as we should.”

It’s not just that Sturgis went on after the pandemic sidelined most everything else. It also drew people from across the country, all of them converging on one region, packing the small city’s Main Street and the bars and restaurants along it.

And in contrast with participants in the Black Lives Matter protests this summer, many Sturgis attendees spent time clustered indoors at bars, restaurants and tattoo parlors, where experts say the virus is most likely to spread, especially among those without masks.

Daily Covid-19 cases in the US reached a record high on Thursday, with experts warning that death rates could triple by mid-January

In total, there have been more than 8,947,980 cases and at least 228,677 deaths in the US -- 971 of them on Thursday, JHU data shows.

Thursday's average marks an 82.68% increase in new cases over the last month, Johns Hopkins says. This week alone, the nation added a record-setting 536,131 cases. Total coronavirus cases could top 9 million Friday.

Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, said in an interview published on Monday that she attended the Jan. 6, 2021, rally at the Ellipse in Washington.

Ms. Thomas did not answer detailed questions from The Times about its findings. Her comments to The Free Beacon were her first about her participation in the rally. She said she had attended the rally in the morning but left before President Donald J. Trump addressed the crowd.

“I was disappointed and frustrated that there was violence that happened following a peaceful gathering of Trump supporters on the Ellipse on Jan. 6,” she said. “There are important and legitimate substantive questions about achieving goals like electoral integrity, racial equality, and political accountability that a democratic system like ours needs to be able to discuss and debate rationally in the political square. I fear we are losing that ability.”

BERLIN — Leaders of Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) tried to rally support among party members for a blueprint outlining the terms of another coalition with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives. Following a week of talks, Merkel’s Christian Democrats and their Bavarian sister party agreed with the SPD Friday on a 28-page position paper, laying out their policy priorities for the coming years. The parties will proceed to formal coalition talks if an SPD conference next weekend backs the move.

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However, many SPD officials remain skeptical of a renewed alliance with the conservatives, including Kevin Kühnert, head of the SPD’s youth wing, known as the Jusos.

The most effective tactics for white nationalists are to associate American history with themselves and to suggest that the collective efforts to turn away from our white supremacist past are the same as abandoning American culture.

It’s a message that erases people of color and their essential role in American life, but one that also appeals to large numbers of white people who would agree with the statement, “I’m not racist, but I don’t want American history dishonored, and this statue of Robert E. Lee shouldn’t be removed.”

On Tuesday afternoon the president defended the actions of those at the rally, stating, “You also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.” His words marked possibly the most important moment in the history of the modern white nationalist movement. These statements described the marchers as they see themselves — nobly driven by a good cause, even if they are plagued by a few bad apples

Law enforcement officers used pepper spray on Saturday to break up a march to a polling place in Graham, North Carolina, a decision that has drawn criticism from the state's governor and civil rights groups.

aw enforcement pepper sprayed the ground to disperse the crowd in at least two instances -- first, after marchers did not move out of the road following a moment of silence, and again after an officer was "assaulted" and the event deemed "unsafe and unlawful."

the event's organizers and other attendees have said they did nothing to warrant the response,

Law enforcement authorities are increasingly worried, not just about what they have already seen, but also about what has been threatened, especially online.

Vehicles with Trump flags halted traffic on Sunday on the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey and jammed the Mario M. Cuomo Bridge between Tarrytown and Nyack, N.Y. Another pro-Trump convoy in Virginia ended in a tense shouting match with protesters as it approached a statue of Robert E. Lee in Richmond.

In Graham, N.C., a get-out-the vote rally on Saturday ended with police using pepper spray on some participants, including young children, and making numerous arrests. Organizers of the rally called it flagrant voter suppression.

Washington (CNN)Trying to win the critical swing state of Michigan, President Donald Trump is closing his campaign with a series of false claims about the state's famed auto industry.

Trump was dishonest about the industry again on Sunday -- both on Twitter and at a campaign rally in Macomb County. Let's go through his claims one by one.

The number of auto parts manufacturing jobs was essentially flat under Trump until the pandemic. There were 131,500 such jobs in Michigan as of February 2020, up just 100 jobs from February 2017. The September 2020 figure was 118,400 auto parts manufacturing jobs in Michigan, a decline of 13,000 from February 2017.

Following signals from President Donald J. Trump — who had tweeted “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” after an earlier show of force in Lansing — Michigan’s Republican Party last year welcomed the support of newly emboldened paramilitary groups and other vigilantes. Prominent party members formed bonds with militias or gave tacit approval to armed activists using intimidation in a series of rallies and confrontations around the state. That intrusion into the Statehouse now looks like a portent of the assault halfway across the country months later at the United States Capitol.

“We knew there would be violence,” said Representative Elissa Slotkin, a Michigan Democrat, about the Jan. 6 assault. Endorsing tactics like militiamen with assault rifles frightening state lawmakers “normalizes violence,” she told journalists last week, “and Michigan, unfortunately, has seen quite a bit of that.”

The chief organizer of that protest, Meshawn Maddock, on Saturday was elected co-chair of the state Republican Party — one of four die-hard Trump loyalists who won top posts.

virtually every speaker at Trump’s marathon rally. One after another, they looked at a seething, conspiracy-addled crowd and indulged, fed, and stoked every element of their furious worldview. I didn’t see a single true leader on Trump’s stage, not even Trump himself. I saw a collection of followers, each vying for the affection of the real power in Waco, the coddled populist mob.

To understand the social and political dynamic on the modern right, you have to understand how millions of Americans became inoculated against the truth

every time Trump faced pushback, he and his allies called critics “elitist” or “fake news” or “weak” or “cowards.” It was much easier to say the Trump skeptics had “Trump derangement syndrome,” or were “just establishment stooges,” than to engage with substantive critique

"xenophobia, racism, and extremism have no place in this country."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Jochaim Gauck were among political and religious leaders who attended

Germany has become more diverse through immigration - religiously, culturally and mentally,

Sen. Bernie Sanders said Monday that his campaign is consulting with local public health officials before his rallies as he chases the Democratic presidential nomination amid mounting concern over the spread of the novel coronavirus."I think every American has got to think about it. And we, before we do rallies, consult with local public health officials to make sure that it's OK. So we've never done a rally without the approval of local public health officials," Sanders told CNN's Chris Cuomo on "Cuomo Prime Time."

The virus has infected more than 108,000 people around the world and killed more than 3,800, according to CNN's tally. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said it is likely that widespread transmission of the virus will occur in the United States, where there were 717 confirmed cases as of Monday night.

"We're the only country -- major country -- not to guarantee health care to all. Think about somebody watching this program right now who may be feverish, who may be having a cough, who may be saying 'God, do I have the coronavirus? But I can't afford to go to a doctor. I can't afford the couple hundred bucks it may cost me.' Think about a worker who's making $13, $15 an hour who doesn't have any paid medical leave who has to go to work together because if he or she doesn't go to work they don't have the income to take care of their family," he said.

'He's under attack': pro-Trump rallies battle chill and opposing protesters

The anti-Trump group began chanting “T, R, U, M, P, are you fucking kidding me”, before moving on to “How much are they paying you?” – a reference to frequent claims by conservatives that liberal activists are being paid to protest.

In something of a blow for the expression of support, the pro-Trump rally was hampered by a dwindling turnout and a counter-protest.

How a Black Lives Matter activist took the stage and got Trump supporters to listen at last weekend’s DC rally

Surrounded by a few hundred President Trump supporters at the Mother of All Rallies event, Newsome, the president of Black Lives Matter of Greater New York, had arrived with about half dozen of his fellow activists to make their voices heard and prepared to spend the night engaging in tense exchanges with people who he knew would not be receptive to his message.

For a brief interlude, Newsome was able to take the stage and speak to the Trump supporters and at least some in the crowd actually listened.